his article presents the successful model of Genoese finance in the early modern period, particularly its primary role in the Spanish silver market in the 16th and 17th centuries. Thanks to a series of unpublished sources held at the State Archives of Bologna and a valuable contemporary manuscript preserved at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries. The main centres for the collection and distribution of Iberian bullion have been identified and analysed, highlighting the principal practices and customs employed in these commercial and financial hubs of the Mediterranean area. The Genoese bankers’ professional skill is compared with the mercantile techniques of their main competitors: their Florentine counterparts. In particular, documents preserved in several private Genoese archives once again highlight the need to revisit the business papers of financial operators of the time to shed further light on the complex mechanisms of redistribution of Spanish silver, which has too often been mistakenly identified as the leading cause of the “price revolution”, but above all, of the crisis and decline of the 17th century.
"Estas son las cuentas y lo demás son cuentos". Il mercato dell'argento spagnolo nel XVII secolo.
Claudio Marsilio
2026-01-01
Abstract
his article presents the successful model of Genoese finance in the early modern period, particularly its primary role in the Spanish silver market in the 16th and 17th centuries. Thanks to a series of unpublished sources held at the State Archives of Bologna and a valuable contemporary manuscript preserved at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries. The main centres for the collection and distribution of Iberian bullion have been identified and analysed, highlighting the principal practices and customs employed in these commercial and financial hubs of the Mediterranean area. The Genoese bankers’ professional skill is compared with the mercantile techniques of their main competitors: their Florentine counterparts. In particular, documents preserved in several private Genoese archives once again highlight the need to revisit the business papers of financial operators of the time to shed further light on the complex mechanisms of redistribution of Spanish silver, which has too often been mistakenly identified as the leading cause of the “price revolution”, but above all, of the crisis and decline of the 17th century.
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