Grain merchants and famines in late Renaissance: Giovanni Maria Mersi, Tommaso Barana and the provisioning of Padua and Vicenza (1572-1616)

The chapter will focus on the grain trade and victualling systems in the early modern period through the careers of two merchants who played a leading role in supplying the cities of late 16th-century Veneto. Giovanni Maria Mersi from Padua was involved in the supply of several cities at the same time, Vicenza as well as Padua, and, as farmer involved in town’s duties, such as in meat, salt and others, he had big interests in other sectors of the food trades. Simone Barana, who cooperated with Mersi to solve the supply problems of the Vicenza countryside, left us a probate with a list of his stocks that is particularly useful for understanding the work of a grain merchant in early modern times. To put the case of these two merchants in context, the victualling policies and the regulation on grain trade in the Venetian Mainland will be taken in account with the aim of showing how a complex set of rules was subject to selective application and the frequent activation of the victualling s...