ABSTRACT: This paper present an overview of the earliest known instructional manual on double entry bookkeeping, Marino de Raphaeli’s La Riegola de Libro [The Rules of Bookkeeping] and of what it tells us of the needs of mercantile bookkeeping in the second half of the 15th century. It remained undetected for over 500 years bound together with the earliest known copy of Benedetto Cotruglli’s Libro de Larte dela Mercatura [The Book of the Art of Trade] which, itself, contains the earliest known written description of double entry bookkeeping. That these two books were bound together in one volume suggests that they were used by a merchant, both for his education and to guide him in his business.
KEYWORDS: Marino de Raphaeli’s, manuscript book, double entry bookkeeping.
