Context
Medieval Italy in Dati's Time
The merchants of Italy in those centuries found themselves in a fast-growing economy, one that required an influx of skilled accountants, notaries, secretaries, and other public officials. These positions required skills that church schools simply could not teach. It was at this point that Italian education began to diverge. Many historians have studied this particular area such as Katherine L. Jansen and Robert Lopez. In their books Medieval Italy: Texts in Translation and The Commercial Revolution of the Middle Ages, 950–1350 they describe the scenario in which this corresponding educational revolution took place. These two authors cite the Black Death of 1348 as a key component to European society's growth, with Jansen claiming that the plague "wrought changes to the European economy comparable to those brought about by the Industrial Revolution in the nineteenth century" (Jansen, p.77) These changes in population had a drastic effect on the economical and agricultural models of the time, which consequently gave to a rising demand in educated and skilled workers.
Florence During Dati
Florence prospered in part, much like many cities in north-central Europe, because of its localized center of production. This not only reduced the shipping expense of refined products from independent craftsmen but also the cost of export. Having taken control of Pisa in 1406, Florence had navigable access through the Arno River to their ports. Merchants also frequented the ports of Genoa and Venice. An urban center of production also allowed merchants closer supervision of textile manufacturing, which produced finer, better-tailored products than rural competitors still relying on the putting-out system. It is of note that this proximity corresponded with an increase in workplace abuse by employers or supervisors.
The Impact of Humanism on La Sfera
Goro Dati lived in a period defined by the philosophy known as humanism, which also alludes to the extent of his education. One facet of humanism was development of the individual, generally through scientific, philosophical, religious, or artistic pursuits. Supported by the Roman papacy in Dati's time, the humanist school of thought was overwhelmingly popular in late medieval Italy, particularly in Florence. Such works as Historiarum Florentini Populi Libri XII by Matteo Palmieri encouraged individual human betterment through artistry, wealth, public engagement, and stressed the importance of education. Education, so claimed, grants an understanding of the wider world, and thus the autonomy to move through it. Dati, a man of stature, possessed both the resources and motivation to pursue the mathematical and cosmological concepts in La Sfera. Raymond Clemens notes that though "Dati was ... [not] a typical hymanist[,] ... he was a member of a group of humanist merchants who viewed the humanities ... [in part] as a means for expressing the virtues of civic humanism that combined the study of letters with service to the state." The very act of writing La Sfera as an "in part ... textbook of world geography directed at children of the Florentine merchant class" was, therefore, an expression of Dati's devotion to his home city's republic, which is clear from his various appointments to high office, including as "one of the Five Defenders of the County and District ... [a job in which he recounts to have done] a great deal to improve the lot of the unfortunate peasants." Goro Dati’s La Sfera summarizes the scholarship of a humanist merchant.
This page incorporates the work of New College of Florida students Joseph Collins, Philip Zhou, and Benjamin Hughes.
