«Merge Record #»«Title» - Susanne Schulz-Falster

trading cities are listed, including in addition to the major Italian cities, London,
Amsterdam, Hamburg, Paris or Vienna. They were normally issued on fixed days,
apparently varying from city to city.
The scene printed at the head of each exchange rate current varies depending on the city
and the year, the three 1750 Florence issues all show the same view of the city silhouette
behind a female figure in the foreground. The Genoa lists have a particularly charming
set of scenes at the head, inclduing the Borsa on the Piazza Banchi, the cathedral of San
Lorenzeo, views of the harbour and the city. As a collection they give a fascinating visual
impression of this most prominent of trading cities.
'Business thrives on the most recent news. The merchants of the sixteenth, seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries, no less than those of today, required the 'freshest advice' in
order to conduct their affairs profitably. The success of their ventures depended on
reliable information sent from afar. Mercantile communications form some of the earliest
written records of our civilization and merchants continue to be interested in organizing
and perfecting rapid dependable systems of communicating' (p. 21).
Issues included: FLORENCE (19 October 1771) 15 January 1752, 22 January 1752, 8
July 1752; MILAN: 4 August 1758, 18 August 1757; 6 May 1758; 4 July 1758; 13
September 1757; TURIN: 14 March 1767; 7 March 1767; GENOA: 21 May 1774; 24
October 1750; 25 April 1750; 4 July 1750; 20 November 1735?; 21 October 1731?; 10
October 1750; 30 July 1730?.
None of these issues seem to be recorded in the census provided by McCusker & Gravesteijn, who do not
record any issues at all for the cities of Milan and Turin; for details see McCusker & Gravesteijn, The
Beginnings of Commercial and Financial Journalism, NEHA Series III, Amsterdam, 1991, pp. 189-200;
213-222.
Severe Criticism of Beccaria: the Italian Rousseau
30.
FACCHINEI, Ferdinando.Note ed Osservazioni sul Libro intitolato dei Delitti e delle
Pene. [n.p.], [Venice, Zatta] 1765. $4800
Small 4to, pp. 191, [1] errata; contemporary floral boards; a very wide-margined copy (190 x
135mm).
First edition, very rare, of the first reaction to Beccaria's path-breaking work on legal
reform the 'Dei Delitti e delle Pene'. The cleric Ferdinando Facchinei immediately
identified the revolutionary implications of Beccaria's argument, and denounced him as
an 'Italian Rousseau', a dangerous subverter of the throne and the Church. 'Almost all
that our author puts forward rests only on two false and absurd principles - that all men
are born free and are naturally equal, and that laws are no more, nor should be, than the
voluntary pacts between such men. In this attack on Beccaria, Facchinei also coined the
term 'socialista' and 'socialismo' to describe this subversion of traditional society.
(Carpanetto & Ricuperati, p. 264).
Facchinei's reactionary critique was reprinted in later editions of Beccaria.
Manuppella 315 (mistakenly stating that the book was published without the year on the title); Melzi II,
239; L'Illuminismo Italiano alla Fondazione Feltrinelli, 205; very uncommon, OCLC records copies at