[ITALY]. [VENICE] - [SYRIA]. DAMAS]. Letter-missive... - Lot 24 - Ader

[ITALY]. [VENICE] - [SYRIA]. DAMAS]. Letter-missive from Pietro Alban (Venetian merchant?) sent to Damascus (Damascho) to Iohanni Andrea di Bartolomeo di Saladio. In Venetian ("in zergo"), on paperItaly , Venice [signed "Piero Alban in Vinegia"], dated August 11, 1494Dimensions : 205 x 205 mm . This is an example of the letter-messages sent by Venetian merchants exchanging with their colleagues in Syria, Libya and Lebanon. They have been studied in particular by Donatella Nebbiai, "Les rapports entre Venise et le Liban: une collection de lettres commerciales inédites du XVe siècle" in: Le livre et le Liban jusqu'à 1900, ed. Camille Aboussouan, Paris, 1982, pp.98-107. See also Ugo Tucci, Lettres d'un marchand vénitien Andrea Berengo (1553-1556), Paris, 1957 [minutes of letters sent from Aleppo between 1555 and 1556 kept in Venice, Archivio di Stato, liasse12 bis (Miscellanea Gregolin)]. These letters are written in "zergo", the language of the merchants of Venice: "He writes, in short, as he, the merchant, speaks to other merchants: and his language is the one spoken in the shops and alleys of Venice, on the Rialto bridge, the one understood in all the Mediterranean countries at the time, wherever business is conducted" (Tucci, 1957). The letters are an important testimony to the commercial network that linked the Middle East and Venice in the sixteenth century, with a powerful Serenissima trying to maintain its control over trade flows in the Mediterranean despite the new rival power of Portugal.