Section 04 of 05

Papers

Trade left more paper than stone. Prato’s walled-up archive, the ledger that has to balance and the bill of exchange are the instruments the rest of the register depends on.

3 entries

• 11The Datini archiveFrancesco di Marco Datini of Prato left roughly 150,000 letters and 500 ledgers, walled up in his house and rediscovered — the most complete surviving picture of how a medieval merchant actually worked.
• 12Double entryBookkeeping that balances is an instrument of trust, and it spread from Italian practice into everything.
• 13The bill of exchangeMoving money without moving coin, which is what made long-distance trade survivable.

Every entry in this section is also in the register, ordered by number.