The connection between war and cash payments (gold/silver) has long been a staple of military history: a largely self-contained field that has stood apart from monetary history. The present essay examines the use of alternate currencies to compensate soldiers for war in trecento Italy during the era of costly mercenaries (“the age of the companies of adventures”) and the so-called bullion crisis. The paper investigates the recourse to in kind payments (horses, grain, utensils, ceremonial armor, cloth, land) and to bills of exchange, letters of payment and paper instruments. The use of paper is noteworthy, counterintuitive and the worthy of further research that includes consideration of the use of notarial documents, apodisse and bollette, in payments to soldiers. The broad aim of the paper is to bring together more closely study of the economy of war with monetary history and economic history more generally.
Vanderbilt University, United States - ORCID: 0009-0002-1847-8806
Chapter Title
Alternate currencies, bills of exchange and warfare in Trecento Italy
Authors
William Caferro
Language
English
DOI
10.36253/979-12-215-0347-0.23
Peer Reviewed
Publication Year
2024
Copyright Information
© 2024 Author(s)
Content License
Metadata License
Book Title
Mezzi di scambio non monetari. Merci e servizi come monete alternative nelle economie dei secoli XIII-XVIII / Alternative currencies. Commodities and services as exchange currencies in the monetarized economies of the 13th to 18th centuries
Editors
Angela Orlandi
Peer Reviewed
Number of Pages
592
Publication Year
2024
Copyright Information
© 2024 Author(s)
Content License
Metadata License
Publisher Name
Firenze University Press
DOI
10.36253/979-12-215-0347-0
ISBN Print
979-12-215-0346-3
eISBN (pdf)
979-12-215-0347-0
eISBN (xml)
979-12-215-0348-7
Series Title
Datini Studies in Economic History
Series ISSN
2975-1241
Series E-ISSN
2975-1195