Tito Antoni
PROFESSOR OF ACCOUNTING HISTORY UNIVERSITY OF PlSA

THE PISAN DOCUMENT OF PHILADELPHIA (La Carta Pisana di Filadelfia)*

Until recently the oldest known specimen of account was con-sidered to be one from the year 1211, contained on the fragments of two parchment sheets that were originally part of a book belonging to Florentine bankers operating in Bologna.1 This early Floren-tine document contains a series of accounting items relating to loans of money at interest. The items appeared without separation between them or the use of columns for stating the values. As an important early document written in vernacular Italian, this account was published in 1887 in the Historical Journal of Italian Literature by Pietro Santini.2 Subsequently it was researched by Fabio Besta, who in his treatise, Accountancy (La Ragioneria),3 emphaisized its value with respect to accounting. The fact that no similar document was found over many years supported the opinion that it was the oldest example of European bookkeeping.

We are now able to back date the origin of bookkeeping by almost a century through the fortunate discovery of a specimen drawn up at the end of the 11th century or in the first decade of the 12th century by a Pisan shipbuilder to record expenditures incurred in the building or repairing of a galley. This account is the so-called Pisan document of Philadelphia (La Carta Pisana di Filadelfia) preserved in the Free Library of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was published in the journal, Studi di Filologia Italiana in 1973 by its discoverer, Ignazio Baldelli, professor of history of grammar and Italian language at the University of Rome.

This fragmentary acount was discovered serving as a lining for the back cover of a manuscript, the “Liber Sententiarum.” It is catalogued as item no. 136 in the donation made by the John F. Lewis family to the Free Library of Philadelphia where it is kept in the rare book department. Lewis had acquired the manuscript in 1915 from a dealer in antiques, Arno W. Voinich, in London but
*A paper delivered at the Second World Congress of Accounting Historians.

Rare Book Department, The Free Library of Philadelphia nothing further is known about previous transfers of ownership. The, manuscript was very probably lost during the inauspicious period of Florentine domination over Pisa in the 15th century.

The parchment containing the account was added to the manuscript after having been trimmed top and bottom in a direction oblique to the writing. As a result some of the initial lines and the final section were lost. There also had been an attempt made to scrape the writing off the parchment in order to re-use it, but fortunately this attempt was halted at line 16. In all, 188 words of the original document remain. They are written in vulgar western Tuscan with a precise Caroline minuscule. The development of some of the letters is characteristic of the first decades of the 12th century and closely resembles Pisan documents drawn up between the end of the 11th and the beginning of the 12th century. The exceptionally precise dating of this text is based upon paleographic findings. The period in which our unknown shipbuilder drew up his document is a few years after the first Crusade (1095-1099) and almost contemporaneous with the Pisan conquest of the Balearic Islands (1114-1115). It precedes by some 80 years the publication of “Liber Abaci” of Leonardo Fibonacci (1202) which marked the beginning of the use of Indo-Arabic numerals in the western world.

In the document expenditures are expressed in Roman numerals to indicate lire, soldi and deniers. The currency in use as the means of payment was the coined denier, but it is not certain whether it was from the ancient Pisa or the Lucca mint. From a sales contract (cartula venditionis) dated February 2nd, 1137, it is possible to ascertain that the new Pisan money (denariorum nove Pisane monete) in place of Luccan money (denariorum Lucensis) was in use as a means of payment at that time.

Expenditures on the parchment relate to shipbuilding costs but it is unclear whether they refer to the building of a completely new galley or to extensive repairs to one or more vessels. There is a payment of 1 lira and 9 deniers for matieria or madiere, the wood for the frame floor (which is the central part under the ribs of the hull that is attached to the keel) but no mention is made of expenditures for any of the other essential parts of a vessel, keel, fut-tock, bulwarks, beams, etc., unless these expenditures are included in the expenditures for wood planks. However, expenditures for non-structural parts of the ship are itemized: rudder (L.6.12), rigging (1.8), sails, and there are four successive payments of L. 5 to the ispornaio, the person who builds or repairs the ram or the cutwater. This suggests a repairing and outfitting operation of one or more galleys for military purposes. The galley of the time was a type of rowing vessel equipped with a sail and was used both as a means of commercial transport and as an instrument of piracy and warfare.

In Pisa the investment of capital in shipbuilding and ship-out fitting must have been considerable since the naval units destined for the conquest of the Balearic Islands, according to available sources, numbered 300 and those involved in the enterprise of 1087 at Almedia, Tunisia, numbered 1,000.5 In the early years of the 12th century a galley would cost about 45 lire, according to calculations based upon some documents of the Pisan Commune concerning the construction of two ships and four galleys. The sum of all legible outlays in the fragmentary account is 14 lire, 389 soldi and 400 deniers, which corresponds to 35 lire, 2 soldi and 4 deniers.6 This approaches the cost of building a galley at the time. One must keep in mind, however, that several payments were lost through the clipping and scraping of the parchment.

Various favorable factors such as the availability of labor and capital, the geographic location and the development of venture organizational structures contributed to the growth of shipbuilding activity at Pisa. An essential element of this development was the merchant shipbuilder who undertook the construction of galleys on a subcontract basis using a series of work orders passed on to specialized artisans for their execution. This nature of the ship-building activity at Pisa is readily deduced from the Pisan document of Philadelphia.

THE “CARTA PISANA” OF PHILADELPHIA (1120-1130)

[/]n nomine domini amen. a restaiolo.lis.vi.al marmuto.sol. . . . [t]imone.sol.xxv.in remora.col filio Orselli.sol.xxx.alo ispornaiosol.
xxxx.in sorti [d]r. iiii. in sorti, dr. iii. con ciatura. dr. i. in canapi. ii. dr. xvii. in si no pita. dr. i.
serratura di timo-[n]e.sol.iiii.e dr.vii.al restaiolo.sol.xx.in timeone.lis.v. lo ispornaio.sol.
xx.a Gherardo Ciguli taule.sol.xl.a lo ispornaio.sol.xx.ad Amico.
sol.xx.iscaricatura.dr.xii.intro guardatura [e] discaricatura.dr.xvii.a Bonacio.sol.xx.serratura di matieia dr.
xxviiii. a Ramondino. filio Orsi [s]ol.xv e dr.vii.di subielli.in corbella.dr.ii.intra marcho e sorti e
serra dr.xv. serratura di cora-

Antoni: The Pisan Document of Philadelphia 21
[l]e.dr,i.in legname da colonne.dr.xiii.ad Amico.sol.xxv.in coppi.dr.
ii.adesatura di serra dr.iii.ad Amico.solv.nelo lecio.sol.x.taliatura
dolatura e audcitura.dr.xxi.inn aguti dr. iii.Anrigo fece dare also
restaiolo.sol.xx.intra Oghicione e Pisanello.lisi.iii.inn amschere [d]r.xx.serra f ura di timone. a Pilot to. dr.xxxiiii.in vino dr .iiii.pison e di
boteghe.dr.xxxxi. [i]n sorti.dr.v.inn aguti ispannali.dr.xii.in vino.dr.v.aductura di
remora.dr.iiii.a maestro [d]i mannaia.dr.vi.a. Gualandello.dr.vi.a. Oghicione.solxx.a Pilotto.
sol.iii.e dr.v.serra-[t]ura e dela pianeta.dr.xviiii.dispennatura di timone.dr.iiii.in pece.
sol.xxvii. [e] dr.alo ispornaio.sol.xx.a Guala[ndello dr.] viii.disscaricatura di
quadrati
… invino.dr.v.in trivelle.dr. ….a Martino testore.dr.v. … xxx.a palomari.serratura di matieia.dr. … in sorti.dr.iiii. … dr.vii.in pali.dr.vi. … dr.xii.in pechi.dr.xii.
aductura di remora.dr.vii.a manoalo.dr.vi.
sol.v.salvamento di taule.
THE “CARTA PISANA” OF PHILADELPHIA (1120-1130) (English Translation)
In the name of God, amen. To the rope-maker lis.6, to the sail-maker
sol . …
[For] rudder sol.25, for oars with the son of Orselli sol.30, to the ram-restorer sol.40, for masting-wood dr.4, for masting-wood dr.3, for caulking dr.1, for 2 ropes dr.17, for sino-
pite dr.1, for sawing the rudder sol.4 and dr.7, to the rope-maker sol.20, for the rudder lis.5, to the ram-restorer
sol.20, to Gherardo Ciguli for boards sol.40, to the ram restorer sol. 20, to Amico sol. 20, for unloading dr.12, for
guardianship and unloading dr. 17, to Bonacio sol.20 , for sawing the floor timber dr. 29, to Ramoidino
son of Orsi sol. 15 and dr. 7 for pivots, for baskets dr. 2, for hammers and masting-wood and saw dr. 15,
for sawing the core dr. 1, for lumber to make columns dr. 13, to Amico sol. 25, for jars dr. 2,
for the saw shaft dr. 3,

22 The Accounting Historians Journal, Spring, 1977
to Amico sol. 5, for the oak sol. 5, for cutting, planing and parching dr. 21, for nails dr. 3,
Anrigo gave ta the rope-maker sol. 20, to Oghicione and Pisanello lis.3, for food dr. 20,
for sawing the rudder to Pilotto dr. 34, for wind dr. 4, rent of the shop dr. 41,
for masting-wood dr. 5, for long nails dr. 12, for wine dr. 5, for finishing the oars sol. 4, to the master carpenter dr. 6,
to Gualandello dr. 6, to Oghicione sol. 20, to Pilotto sol. 3 and dr. 5, for sawing and planing dr. 19,
for pruning the rudder dr. 4, for pitch sol. 27 and dr. 5,
to the ram-restorer sol. 20, to Gualandello dr. 8, for unloading the rigging
for wine dr.5, for augers dr to Martino, weaver, dr.5
30 to divers, for sawing the floor timber dr. .., for masting-
wood dr. 4
dr.7, for poles dr.6, dr.12, for tar dr.12
for finishing the oars dr.7, to the hodman
dr.6
sol.5, for preserving the boards.

It is to be noted that in this naval account we find the oldest ex-ample of management from which guidelines were taken to be used by all entrepreneurs in the following centuries. The manufacture of products from wool, iron bar or leather was accomplished through the synthesis of a series of commissions passed for execution to external concerns. The merchant-entrepreneur initiated and controlled the various phases of the work by a series of work orders without participating directly in the productive process. Our shipbuilder, as inferred from the account, maintained the economic direction of all phases of the galley’s construction, supplied the raw materials to the artisans, paid them for their work and rented the shipyard facilities for the assembly of the vessels. Thus the Pisan document disclosed the use of a practical shipyard technology in an age when seafaring and merchant activities were changing many aspects of our western civilization. It is significant that the amount is recorded in vulgar Pisan and that the terminology used relates to the sea.

Conclusions

The Pisan account of Philadelphia shows that even as early as the 11th century there existed a need to record business transactions. From this early account it is possible to infer certain guidelines which were used to manage shipbuilding activities. A somewhat systematic bookkeeping method was used in making the entries in this account but it was a primitive arrangement in which the transactions were recorded sequentially in paragraph form without the use of columns for the statement of values.

It seems clear that the rule of accounting which appeared about a few decades later in the “liber abaci” of Leonardo of Pisa was unknown to this shipbuilder. This rule required the bookkeeper “. . . to write down in a lined column the amount of every expense by placing the lire under the lire— and to total it with care.”7 At that time the lack of Indo-Arabic enumeration was compensated by the use of an abacus board.

Although we are now able to refer to the Pisan document of Philadelphia as the oldest known account, we must not assume that even in earlier times similar accounts were not used. In fact, it is not possible that so many entrepreneurs — using different kinds of organizational units for capital accumulation in diversified fields such as real estate, industry, banking and trading of manufactured goods—could have managed without the account , that most necessary instrument of accounting. It is to be hoped that new discoveries in museums, archives, or libraries elsewhere, like that of La Carta Pisan di Filadelfia, will bring to light other and earlier examples of accounting and expand our knowledge of the methods in use.

FOOTNOTES

1Biblioteca Mediceo.
2Santini, pp. 392-395.
3Besta, pp. 312-313, 422-423.
4Archivio Di Stato Di Pisa.
5Loi, editor.
6Conversion is based upon 12 deniers = 1 soldo; 20 soldi = 1 lira.
7Fibonacci, XI. 21.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Archivio Di Stato Di Pisa, Diplomatico S.Paolo All’ Orto, No. 61.
Besta, F., La Ragioneria, Vol. 11, Milano, 1932.
Biblioteca Mediceo-Laorenziana Di Firenze, Codice Laurenziano Aedil 67.

24 The Accounting Historians Journal, Spring, 1977
Fibonacci, Leonardo, Liber Abaci, ms. Magliabechiano, XL.21 in Biblioteca Nationale
di Firenze. Loi, P., Editor, Carmen in victoria pisanorum genuensium Et aliorum italiensium de
Timino Sarraceorum Rege, Pisa, 1968. Santini, P., Frammenti di un libro di banchieri fiorentini Scritto in volgare nel 1211,
in Giornale Storico della Letteratura Italiana”, Vo. X, 1887.