Social Fabric of Fifteenth-Century Florence

<p>The<i> Arte dei rigattieri</i> (merchants of second-hand goods in Florence) has never been ​​the subject of a systematic study even in scholarship devoted to the history of trades. Underpinned by a large collection of archival material this book analyzes the social life and economic activity of <i>rigattieri</i> in fifteenth-century Florence. It offers invaluable information on issues such as the relationship between socio-political affiliations and economic interest as well as the structures of consumption and the spending power of different social groups. Furthermore through the lens of the <i>Arte dei Rigattieri</i> this work examines the connection between the development of the political bureaucracy the establishment of Medicean power and contemporaneous processes of identity construction and social mobility.</p>