Research Catalog

Title

Merchant writers : Florentine memoirs from the Middle Ages and Renaissance / Vittore Branca ; translated by Murtha Baca ; with a biographical essay by Cesare De Michelis.

Publication

• Toronto ; Buffalo ; London : University of Toronto Press, [2015]
• ©2015

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Additional Authors

• Baca, Murtha
• Branca, Vittore

Description

x, 407 pages; 24 cm

Summary

"The birthplace of Boccaccio, Machiavelli, and the powerful Medici family, Florence was also the first great banking and commercial centre of continental Europe. The city's middle-class merchants, though lacking the literary virtuosity of its most famous sons, were no less prolific as writers of account books, memoirs, and diaries. Written by ordinary men, these first-hand accounts of commercial life recorded the everyday realities of their businesses, families, and personal lives alongside the high drama of shipwrecks, plagues, and political conspiracies. Published in Italian in 1986, Vittore Branca's collection of these accounts established the importance of the genre to the study of Italian society and culture. This new English translation of Merchant Writers includes all the texts from the original Italian edition in their entirety. Moreover, it offers a gripping personal introduction to the mercantile world of medieval and Renaissance Florence."--

Series Statement

Lorenzo Da Ponte Italian library

Uniform Title

• Mercanti scrittori. English.
• Lorenzo da Ponte Italian library.

Subjects

• Merchants
• Commerce
• Commerce > Medieval
• Florence (Italy) > Biography
• Manners and customs
• 500-1500
• Merchants > Italy > Florence > Biography
• Florence (Italy) > Social life and customs
• Italy > Florence
• Commerce > History > Medieval, 500-1500
• History
• Florence (Italy) > Commerce > History
• Biography

Genre/Form

• Biography.
• History.

Note

• Translation of: Mercanti scrittori.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and index.

Contents

Book of good practices / Paolo Da Certaldo -- Memoirs / Giovanni di Paolo Morelli -- Memoirs / Bonaccorso Pitti -- Mirror of humanity / Domenico Lenzi the Grain Merchant -- Memoirs / Donato Velluti -- Secret book / Goro Dati -- Last will and testament / Francesco Datini -- Book of family affairs / Lapo Di Giovanni Niccolo De' Sirigatti -- Memoirs / Bernardo Machiavelli -- Appendix: A portrait of Vittore Branca / Cesare De Michelis.

Call Number

JFE 16-9132

ISBN

• 9781442637146 (bound)
• 1442637145 (bound)

LCCN

2015509114

OCLC

907173896

Title

Merchant writers : Florentine memoirs from the Middle Ages and Renaissance / Vittore Branca ; translated by Murtha Baca ; with a biographical essay by Cesare De Michelis.

Publisher

Toronto ; Buffalo ; London : University of Toronto Press, [2015]

Copyright Date

©2015

Type of Content

text

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Series

Lorenzo Da Ponte Italian library

Lorenzo da Ponte Italian library.

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Chronological Term

500-1500

Added Author

Baca, Murtha, translator.

Branca, Vittore, editor.

Research Call Number

JFE 16-9132