The Memoir of Marco Parenti: A Life in Medici Florence [Hardcover]

Mark Phillips (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1987

Originally published by Princeton University Press, The Memoir of Marco Parenti is now available only in this edition.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

A Renaissance perspective on what it is to be human.

(Renaissance Quarterly )

Phillips has enriched our understanding of Renaissance Florence by extensively presenting contemporary evidence from the diaries, letters, and memoir.

(The Sunday Times )

Marco Parenti was a moderately prosperous silk merchant in fifteenth-century Florence, decently educated, a responsible citizen, an amateur historian and a man with a leaning toward the natural science. Mark Phillips is a scrupulous twentieth-century scholar with a particular interest in why and how other men wrote history. The encounter between the two has resulted in an outstanding book. Parenti is marvelously vivid and endearing, in his study, in his warehouse, in his city, in a society where a man did not 'separate the prosperity of his soul from the health of his body or the wealth of his possessions.

(Penelope Fitzgerald, in The New York Times Book Review ) --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

About the Author

Mark Phillips is a professor in the Department of History at Carleton University.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 308 pages
• Publisher: Princeton Univ Pr (December 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0691055025
• ISBN-13: 978-0691055022
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 5.7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,718,758 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent memoir and background info., July 5, 2007

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Cas (the Idaho mountains) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Memoir of Marco Parenti: A Life in Medici Florence (Paperback)

This doesn't actually have the actual ricordi of Marco Parenti, the son-in-law of Alessandra Strozzi and a diplomat and merchant of Renaissance Florence, which would have been great, but it IS an excellent resource for learning about how one part of Florentine society worked. There are chapters here about his early life, education, and what Florentine politics were like at the middle of the 15th century. Along the way we learn about the Strozzi, the Medici, and a host of other families. We also learn what exile was like, and how letter-writing worked in a world without a post office (also some fun stuff about ciphers). While I definitely wish it included a straight translation of Parenti's personal logbook, this is a tremendous resource. Don't miss it if you're studying the Medicean period at all.