Money and banking in medieval and Renaissance Venice
ISBN: 9780801831577
Platform/Publisher: ACLS / Johns Hopkins University Press
Digital rights: Users: Unlimited; Printing: Ten pages at a time; Download: Ten pages at a time
Subjects: European: General & Multiperiod;

Originally published in 1985. Frederic C. Lane and Reinhold C. Mueller, in the first volume of Money and Banking in Medieval and Renaissance Venice , discuss Venice's economic achievement in terms of the complex system the city's inhabitants developed to manage moneys of account and coins. Money merchants of Venice developed a system whereby a premium attached to moneys of account acted as a stabilizing force and allowed merchants to engage in long-term trade. This system, according to the authors, helped establish Venice as a dominant city-state in international trade and exchange. This book outlines the development and success of this system through 1508. At the time it was first published, this book made a significant contribution to the history of money and economics by underscoring the large role that Venice played in the economic history of the West and the ascendance of capitalism as a structuring force of society.


Frederic C. Lane was a professor of history at Johns Hopkins University. He specialized in the medieval history of Venice. Reinhold C. Mueller is a professor of history at Università Ca' Foscari Venezia in Venice, Italy.

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