Details

Subjects:

Medici, Alamanno de'.
Medici, House of.
Accounting -- Italy -- 16th century.
Ambassadors -- Italy -- Florence -- 16th century.
Ambassadors.
Accounting.
Italy -- Florence.
Italy.

Form/Genre:

Codices.
Accounts.
Credit records.
Ledgers (account books)
Manuscripts, Italian.
Manuscripts, Renaissance.

Language:

Italian.

Biography/History:

Florentine statesman and ambassador in Milan for the Medici family. Appears to have fathered many illegitimate children with different women. Involved in the textile business with the Medici family, in particular with Bivigliano d'Alamanno de' Medici and Marcellino de' Medici.

Summary:

Notebook of accounts of Tommaso Ridolfi for the years 1522-1549, at least partially written by Tommaso Ridolfi and in the first person. Includes debts, credits and other transactions related to the textile business; in certain cases, various members of the Medici family acted as counterparts. Transactions related to household management are not uncommon, such as the purchase of food and furniture; the payment of wages of employees (such as the nanny and the farmer); and the purchase of clothes and shoes for Tommaso Ridolfi and his sister. The notebook also contains copies, transcribed and signed by Tommaso Ridolfi, of the receipts of tax payments (for a tax referred to in the manuscript as gabella) made by small towns that were under Florentine jurisdiction.

Notes:

Ms. codex.
Title supplied by cataloger.
Foliation: Paper, 95; 1-41, [42-95]; contemporary foliation in ink, modern foliation in pencil, upper right recto (f. 42-64, 73-88 and 93-95 are blank).
Script: Written in a cursive script, by multiple hands, including that of Tommaso Ridolfi.
Watermark: Similar to Briquet, Ancre 444 (Florence, 1529), but with a larger crown and a thicker ring.
Binding: Contemporary vellum, no. 129 on spine; the heading Giornale, no. 190 and letter A with decorative penwork on upper cover; lower cover wraps around upper cover with leather ties. Decorative leatherwork on spine.
Origin: Written in Italy between 1522 (f.1v) and 1549 (f.40v).
Forms part of: Gondi-Medici Business Records.

Penn Provenance:

Sold by Bernard M. Rosenthal, 1961.

Cited in:

Described in Zacour, Norman P. and Hirsch, Rudolf. Catalogue of Manuscripts in the Libraries of the University of Pennsylvania to 1800 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1965), p. 212 (Ms. Lea 342).

Cited as:

UPenn Ms. Codex 1422

OCLC:

310746540