Beschreibung:

ACCOUNT BOOK OF FRANCESCO DI GIULIANO DE' MEDICI, in Italian, MANUSCRIPT ON PAPER Florence 1470-1525 212 x140mm. 196 leaves with an additional leaf (once added to f.43 with sealing wax) and an inserted paper strip (between f.126 and f.127) with entries written in brown to black ink in a variety of cursive business hands on ff.1-84 and ff.136-151, the remainder blank, continuous foliation 1-196, loose in original wallet-style limp-vellum wrapper, with two external brown leather bands attached with vellum strips, remains of ties, upper cover with title in gothic capitals (?[DEB]ITORI CREDITORI RICORDI) along the top, the number 30 and an informally written title Fr[a]n[ces]co di Giul[ia]no di Giovencho di Medici l'anno 1470 below, on the spine one later paper label with Libro Maestro di Francesco di Giuliano 1470 above another with the number 25, all written in brown ink (slightly stained). Modern tan morocco box. Francesco di Giuliano (1446-1528) was a grandson of Giovenco de' Medici, confidential adviser to Cosimo de' Medici and forebear of the Marchesi Medici di Castellina. He was active in the family firm of wool merchants, representing their interests in Pera (Constantinople) in 1471, and taking over management from his father in 1495. In 1919 a number of account books from this branch of the Medici family were sold in these rooms; most were bought by Gordon Selfridge and presented to Harvard University, where they are Mss 520-521, 523-527 and 529-533 of the Medici-Tornaquinci archives of the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration. The present volume was not included in the sale but presumably came from the same source: for the Harvard manuscripts see H.R.B. Richards, Florentine Merchants in the Age of the Medici (Cambridge, Mass., 1934) and R. de Roover The Rise and Decline of the Medici Bank (Cambridge, Mass. 1963). This libro mastro , a ledger, is principally concerned with the transactions undertaken by the firm of Francesco di Giuliano de' Medici. The earlier sections, ff.1-84 and ff.136-148, cover the period from 1470-1478 and record deals involving jewels, gold and silver articles as well as lending money at various rates; these were all part of Francesco's operation of a banco a minuto . He was connected with two banks of this type in the 1470s and 1480s. Their main business appeared to be the sale of jewellery on credit, with repayments by instalment, and loans secured against jewellery. They also engaged in money-changing and trading in bullion. From 148v the entries appear to record the outstanding debts, or the names of debtors and debts redeemed between 1511 and 1525. Unlike the earlier entries these are not always struck through to indicate transfer to the main account book. The entries on ff.150v and 151 are more personal and two of them appear to be autograph entries of 1525 - they open Io francesco - and relay Francesco's wishes. The hand is irregular and uncertain, no doubt because at the time he wrote it Francesco was 79 years of age.