Essai de l'histoire du commerce de Venise

by Roma

Paris: Pierre Gilles Le Mercier and A. Morin, 1729

xxiv, 200, [4] p. | a^8 b^4 A-Q^8/4 R^6 | 166 x 95 mm

First and only edition of this history of Venetian trade through 1290, which Barbier attributes to one "Roma”—and which appears to be the first printed survey of Venetian trade altogether. Barbier records the anonymous author’s connections in Parisian law and finance, but we know little else of him, except that he perhaps took his text from a larger three-volume manuscript on the history of business in Italy. ¶  As the history of trade goes, few European cities will be as synonymous with the subject as Venice. The Middle Ages saw it become one of the continent’s most important ports, the vital crossroads of trade between East and West. The author divides his history into three parts: the years 421-697, which he calls the age of the Tribuns; 697-1173, the age of elected doges; and 1173-1290, the age of sovereign doges. He covers the early development of the Rialto, Venice’s strategic location as a boon for international trade, competition in fabric production (silk especially)—these and many other issues that historians continue to cite in discussions of early Venetian trade.  ¶ We fully expected to identify earlier histories of trade in Venice, a task we summarily failed at. The author himself complains of “the silence that historians of Venice have kept on this subject” (xiij). True enough, of the earlier commercio titles in both Cicogna and Soranzo’s continuation, none could be construed as a comprehensive historical survey of Venetian trade, nor have our subject searches in WorldCat turned up anything earlier. Given Venice’s tremendously influential role in the history of business, the gap this work fills should be an important one.  ¶ Hardly a common book, and this may be the only copy recorded at auction; it matches the binding description of a copy offered in 2013.

PROVENANCE: Bookplate removed from the front paste-down and a few efforts at obliterating small marks from the endleaves.

CONDITION: Contemporary leather, spine and board edges tooled in gold; marbled edges and endpapers. ¶ First and last few leaves a little dusty. Leather a bit discolored in spots; front paste-down skinned from removal of bookplate. A nice, solid copy in a contemporary binding.

REFERENCES: Emmanuele Antonio Cicogna, Saggio di bibliografia veneziana (1847), v. 1, p. 211, #1461; Ant.-Alex. Barbier, Dictionnaire des ouvrages anonymes, v. 2, col. 209; Kress Library of Business and Economics, suppl., p. 196 ¶ Paola Lanaro, “Introduction,” At the Centre of the World: Trade and Manufacturing in Venice and the Venetian Mainland, 1400-1800 (Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2006), p. 34 (“The Venetian Republic is still considered to be one of the first European states to accept the drastic change in mentality and in capitalistic practice brought about by the great maritime commerce between the Levant and the East, above all in terms of international commerce in transit”); Edwin S. Hunt and James M. Murray, A History of Business in Medieval Europe, 1200-1550 (Cambridge Univ, 2005), p. 60 (“it was the international merchants who spearheaded the development of the techniques that transformed medieval commerce…The earliest techniques appeared in Genoa and Venice during or even before the twelfth century”), 90 (“One of the special characteristics of Venice, and a source of its lasting power, was its role as entrepôt and staple”)

Item #518