Banco di San Giorgio
The Banco di San Giorgio ( Bank of St. George ) or Casa delle Compere e dei Banchi di San Giorgio ( House of the Purchases of St. George ) was a financial institution of the Maritime Republic of Genoa . The bank was founded in 1407 and is one of the oldest in Europe and the whole world. The seat of the institute was the Palazzo San Giorgio of the same name in Genoa. This was built in the 13th century on the orders of the politician and admiral Guglielmo Boccanegra , the uncle of the first Doge of Genoa Simone Boccanegra .
organization
A few prominent families from the city of Genoa were essentially involved in the founding and management of the bank, among them the House of Grimaldi .
The bank was run by four consuls who decided on both finances and investments. However, since relations between the oligarchs of the city-republic and the family clans running the bank were very close, it is difficult to determine where the power of the bank ended and that of the republic began. This is also reflected in the fact that the bank took on political tasks at times.
Operation area
Quite a number of the Genoese colonies were at least temporarily run directly or indirectly by the Banco di San Giorgio . In 1453, the Republic of Genoa officially handed over control of Corsica , the entire Crimean area with the Caffa trading center and other smaller properties to the bank . In the following decades, however, they partially demanded them back.
In the 15th and 16th centuries, the bank lent large sums of money to numerous European rulers and gained extensive influence. The Catholic Kings Isabella and Ferdinand as well as Christopher Columbus had an account with her. The German Emperor Charles V was deeply indebted to the Banco di San Giorgio for most of his reign , and Niccolò Machiavelli claimed that the power of the bank made Genoa a more memorable republic than it was Venice.
In the 17th century, the bank invested heavily in the maritime trade of the increasingly developed oceans and competed at times with the Dutch East India Company and the British East India Company .
In 1805 it was finally closed by Napoléon Bonaparte after his successful Italian campaign.
In 1987, a new bank was founded in Genoa under the name Banco di San Giorgio , which, however, has probably only adopted the traditional name without having anything to do with the original institute.
literature
- Franklin A. Gevurtz: The Historical and Political Origins of the Corporate Board of Directors. In: Hofstra Law Review. Vol. 33, No. 1, 2004, pp. 89–173, doi : 10.2139 / ssrn.546296 , digitized version (PDF; 477 kB) .
- Thomas Allison Kirk: Genoa and the Sea. Policy and Power in an Early Modern Maritime Republic, 1559–1684 (= Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science. 123, 3), Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore MD et al. 2005, ISBN 0-8018-8083-1 .
- Emily Sohmer Tai: Restitution and the Definition of a Pirate: The Case of Sologrus de Nigro. In: Mediterranean Historical Review . Vol. 19, No. 2, 2004, pp. 34-70, doi : 10.1080 / 0951896052000336436 .
Web links
- Archive of the Bank San Giorgio (Italian)
- Overview of the preserved documents of the Banco di San Giorgio in the Genoa State Archives