Terre e contadini della Badia fiorentina a metà del Quattrocento

The essay reconstructs the relations between Florence's most important urban monastery and its peasants in the central decades of the 15th century. The research is based on the perusal of fiscal, administrative and accounting sources: in particular, real estate inventories and double-entry ledgers kept by the Florentine monastery's accountants. From these apparently arid sources emerge unsuspected pictures of peasant life, as well as relations between monks and land workers determined as much by economic logic as by ethical and religious aspects.