Il ritrovamento del più antico mastro mercantile siciliano (XV secolo): il Quaterno del "mercerio" Battista da Bologna

Abstract

The paper presents the recent discovery of the most ancient ledger ever known of a Sicilian 'for profit' business. Our presentation of main contents of the book is read as part of a greater research, either for the ledger itself, in order to write a comprehensive essay in next future on it, and for Sicilian administrative and accounting resources of Ancien Regime, in order to collect and digitalize them for actual and perspective investigations. Here we try a link between contents of the 15th century ledger and the borader political, social and cultural context where the merchant lived and operated. The paper, also, tries to give an overview about methods and accounting languages used, as well as first outlines on History of Accounting for the period and the country selected for study.