does anybody knows what was the name of the currency used in Italy at 1500?

Question

I am looking what was the currency italians used at the renaissance

Answer 1

The Italian florin was struck from 1252 to 1523 with no significant change in its design or metal content standard. The "fiorino d'oro" of the Republic of Florence was the first European gold coin struck in sufficient quantities to play a significant commercial role since the seventh century. As many Florentine banks were international supercompanies with branches across Europe, the florin quickly became the dominant trade coin of Western Europe for large scale transactions, replacing silver bars in multiples of the mark (a weight unit equal to eight troy ounces or two thirds of a troy pound).

In the fourteenth century, a hundred and fifty European states and local coin issuing authorities made their own copies of the florin. The most important of these was the Hungarian forint because the Kingdom of Hungary (more precisely the mountains of Slovakia and Transylvania) was the only major source of gold mined in Europe (until the western hemisphere began to contribute to the supply in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, most of the gold used in Europe came from Africa).

The design of the original Florentine florins was the distinctive fleur de lis badge of the city on one side and on the other a standing facing figure of St. John the Baptist wearing a very itchy looking hair shirt. On other countries' florins, first the inscriptions were changed (from "Florentia" around the fleur, and the name of the saint on the other), then local heraldic devices were substituted for the fleur de lis, many resembling the Virgin Mary.

Usually later, other figures were substituted for St. John. On the Hungarian forints, St. John was re-labelled St. Ladislaus, an early Christian King and patron saint of Hungary, and a battle ax substituted for the original's sceptre. Gradually the image became more regal looking. The weight of the original fiorino d'oro of Florence was chosen to equal the value of one lira (i.e. a nominal pound of 240 inflated denari) in the local money of account in 1252. However, the gold content of the florin did not change while the money of account continued to inflate; by 1500, a florin was worth seven Florentine lire. The values of other countries' money continually varied against each other, reinforcing the florin's utility as a common measure of value for foreign exchange transactions. By the end of the fourteenth century, a local variant of the florin, minted by several German states under a monetary convention at a lower weight and alloy standard, became the "Rheingulden" widely used throughout Germany. In the fifteenth century, the Rheingulden was adopted by the Holy Roman Empire as the "Reichsgulden".

Answer 2

Italy was a collection of city states, not a united country back then.

In the thirteenth century, Europe in general was experiencing an economic boom. The trade routes of the Italian states linked with those of established Mediterranean ports and eventually the Hanseatic League of the Baltic and northern regions of Europe to create a network economy in Europe for the first time since the third century. The city-states of Italy expanded greatly during this period and grew in power to become de facto fully independent of the Holy Roman Empire. During this period, the modern commercial infrastructure developed, with joint stock companies, an international banking system, a systematized foreign exchange market, insurance, and government debt. [2] Florence became the centre of this financial industry and the gold florin became the main currency of international trade.
This produced a new mercantile governing class, who won their positions through financial skill, adapting to their purposes the feudal aristocratic model that had dominated Europe in the Middle Ages. A feature of the High Middle Ages in Northern Italy was the rise of the urban communes that had shaken off control by bishops and local counts. In much of the region the landed nobility was consistently poorer than the urban patriarchs in the High Medieval money economy, whose inflationary rise left land-holding aristocrats impoverished. The increase in trade during the early Renaissance enhanced these characteristics. The decline of feudalism and the rise of cities influenced each other; for example, the demand for luxury goods led to an increase in trade, which led to greater numbers of tradesmen becoming wealthy, who, in turn, demanded more luxury goods. This change also gave the merchants almost complete control of the governments of the Italian city-states, again enhancing trade. One of the most important effects of this political control was security. Those that grew extremely wealthy in a feudal state ran constant risk of running afoul of the monarchy and having their lands confiscated, as famously occurred to Jacques Coeur in France. The northern states also kept many medieval laws that severely hampered commerce, such as those against usury, and prohibitions on trading with non-Christians. In the city-states of Italy, these laws were repealed or rewritten.[3]

Answer 3

Florins

Answer 4

itilia

Answer 5

ducats