Portal:Biography/Selected article/May 25

Giovanni Villani (c. 1276 or 1280–1348) was an Italian banker, official, diplomat, and chronicler from Florence who wrote the Nuova Cronica (New Chronicles) on the history of Florence. He was a leading statesman of Florence but later gained an unsavory reputation and served time in prison due to the bankruptcy of a trading and banking company he worked for. His interest and elaboration in economic details, statistical information, and political and psychological insight signifies him as a more modern late medieval chronicler of Europe. His Cronica is viewed as the first introduction of statistics as a positive element in history. However, historian Kenneth R. Bartlett notes that "his reliance on such elements as Divine Providence links Villani closely with the medieval vernacular chronicle tradition," that is to say, not linked closely with his Renaissance-era successors. In recurring themes made implicit through significant events described in his Cronica, Villani also emphasized three assumptions about sin and morality that guided historical events, these being that excess brings disaster, forces of right and wrong are at constant struggle, and that events are directly related to the will of God.

Villani was inspired to write his Cronica after attending the jubilee celebration in Rome in 1300 and noting the venerable history of that city. He outlined the events in his Cronica year for year, following a strictly linear narrative format. He provided intricate details on many important historical events, such as construction projects, floods, fires, famines, and plagues of the city of Florence and the wider region of Tuscany.

While continuing work on the Cronica and detailing the enormous loss of life during the Black Death in 1348, Villani died of the very same illness. His work on the Cronica was continued by his brother and nephew. Villani's work has received both praise and criticism from modern historians. The criticism is mostly aimed at his emphasis of the supernatural in guiding events, his organizational style, as well as his glorification of the papacy and Florence. (Read more...)