Research Catalog

The merchant of Prato's wife : Margherita Datini and her world, 1360-1423

Title: The merchant of Prato's wife : Margherita Datini and her world, 1360-1423 / Ann Crabb.
Author: Crabb, Ann, 1940-
Publication: Ann Arbor [Michigan] : The University of Michigan Press, [2015]

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Status	Format	Access	Call Number	Item Location
Request for On-site Use Request Scan Available - Can be used on site. Please visit New York Public Library - Schwarzman Building to submit a request in person.	Text	Use in library	JFE 15-1988	Schwarzman Building - Main Reading Room 315

Details

Description

275 pages; 24 cm

Summary

"Although the fourteenth-century Italian merchant Francesco Datini has received attention from business historians, there has previously been no full study of his wife, Margherita Datini. Drawing on a sizable trove of Margherita's correspondence held in the Archivio di Stato di Prato, including hundreds of letters she exchanged with Francesco, Ann Crabb investigates the social and economic importance of women's roles as wives and mothers, early modern European views on honor, and the practice of letter writing in Margherita's world. Margherita's often colorful comments demonstrate her attitudes toward her rather unhappy marriage and her inability to have children, along with other aspects of her life. Her letters reveal the pride she felt in carrying out her many responsibilities as a wife and, later, a widow: in scribal letter writing, in business, in household management, and in farming. Crabb emphasizes that the role of a wife was a recognized social position, beyond her individual relations with her husband, and provided opportunities beyond what restrictive laws or restrictive views of female honor would suggest. Further, Crabb considers Margherita's successful efforts, on her own initiative and in her late thirties, to learn to read and write at a literate level. This book will be of interest to both scholars and general readers of women's history. In addition, historians of early modern Italy and, more generally, of early modern Europe will find this book valuable"--

Subjects

Genre/Form

Biography.
History.
Records and correspondence.

Bibliography (note)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Call Number

JFE 15-1988

ISBN

9780472119493
0472119494
9780472120734 (canceled/invalid)

LCCN

2014032713

OCLC

900242803

Author

Crabb, Ann, 1940- author.

Title

The merchant of Prato's wife : Margherita Datini and her world, 1360-1423 / Ann Crabb.

Publisher

Ann Arbor [Michigan] : The University of Michigan Press, [2015]

Type of Content

text

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Chronological Term

To 1500

Research Call Number

JFE 15-1988

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