Details

Subjects:

Medici, House of -- Archives.
Medici, House of.
Accounting -- Italy -- 16th century.
Accounting.
Italy.

Form/Genre:

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

Language:

Italian.

Summary:

Ledger of accounts of an unidentified member of the Medici family for the years 1537-1538. Often includes the nature of a given credit or debt and its amount, as well as listing the names of the individuals or institutions that hold the debt or credit, the most important being Giuliano and Tommaso Crai; Jacopo and Filippo Guadagni; Batista di Francesco Mocci; Francesco Sani; Benedetto di Polito; Jacopo Poppi; Raffaello di Miniato; Giuliano di Piero Capponi; the Spedale di Santa Maria degli Innocenti (p.19); the Capitolo delle monache delle convertite (p. 20), a nunnery for young women, often prostitutes, who converted to Catholicism; the Spedale di Santa Maria Novella (p.17), a Florentine church which also offered pilgrims and those in need medical help; and the Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore (p.22). Transactions are sometimes related to payments for produce, rent or customs fees, as well as small debts and credits with workers (including a jeweler, a carpenter, a road worker, a dyer, and various builders).

Notes:

Ms. codex.
Title supplied by cataloger.
Pagination: Paper, 96; versos numbered 1-89, [90-96], contemporary pagination in ink, modern pagination in pencil, upper left verso; rectos numbered [i], i-lxxxviiii, [xc-xcv], upper right recto (leaves after p.89 are blank but ruled). Each opening has a matched arabic numeral on the left and a roman numeral on the right.
Layout: Written in 2 columns with vertical bounding lines in lead; the large column on the left with the debtor or creditor and a brief description of the credit or debt, and the smaller one on the right with the amount of the credit or debt. Usually credits are listed on the left page and debts on the right page of an opening, with the same individuals appearing as debtors or creditors on facing pages.
Script: Written in a cursive script, perhaps by multiple hands.
Watermark: Similar to Briquet, Ancre 492 (Lucca, 1522).
Binding: Modern cloth.
Origin: Written in Florence between 1537 (f. 1v) and 1538 (f. 16r).
Forms part of: Gondi-Medici Business Records.

Penn Provenance:

Sold by Bernard M. Rosenthal, 1963.

Cited in:

Described in Zacour, Norman P. and Hirsch, Rudolf. Catalogue of Manuscripts in the Libraries of the University of Pennsylvania to 1800: Supplement A (3), Library Chronicle 36 (1970), no. 2, p. 97 (Ms. Lea 487).

Cited as:

UPenn Ms. Codex 1497

OCLC:

319875066