Giovanni Villani was an Italian banker, official, diplomat and chronicler from Florence who wrote the Nuova Cronica on the history of Florence. He was a leading statesman of Florence but later gained an unsavoury reputation and served time in prison as a result of the bankruptcy of a trading and banking company he worked for. His interest in and elaboration of economic details, statistical information, and political and psychological insight mark him as a more modern chronicler of late medieval Europe. His Cronica is viewed as the first introduction of statistics as a positive element in history.
However, historian Kenneth R. Bartlett notes that, in contrast to his Renaissance-era successors, "his reliance on such elements as divine providence links Villani closely with the medieval vernacular chronicle tradition." In recurring themes made implicit through significant events described in his Cronica, Villani also emphasized three assumptions about the relationship of sin and morality to historical events, these being that excess brings disaster, that forces of right and wrong are in constant struggle, and that events are directly influenced by the will of God.
Statue of Giovanni Villani by Gaetano Trentanove in the Loggia del Mercato Nuovo in Florence
A painting by Giotto di Bondone in the Basilica of Santa Croce, Florence, within the chapel owned by the Peruzzi bankers; Giotto's artworks were praised by Villani.
Villani was the superintendent of the construction of Andrea Pisano's bronze doors for the Florence Baptistry.
Coat of arms for the Arte di Calimala, the guild to which Giovanni Villani belonged
The Nuova Cronica or New Chronicles is a 14th-century history of Florence created in a year-by-year linear format and written by the Italian banker and official Giovanni Villani. The idea came to him in the year 1300, after attending Rome's first Jubilee. Villani realized that Rome's many historical achievements were well-known and desired to lay out a history of the origins of his own city of Florence. In his Cronica, Villani described in detail the many building projects of the city, statistical information on population, ordinances, commerce and trade, education, and religious facilities. He also described several disasters such as famines, floods, fires, and the pandemic of the Black Death in 1348, which would take his own life. Villani's work on the Nuova Cronica was continued by his brother Matteo and his nephew Filippo after his death. It has been described as the first introduction of statistics as a positive element in history.
The crowning of Manfred of Sicily in a manuscript of the Cronica; by the 16th century, there were multiple versions of the Cronica in printed form as well as in illuminated manuscript form.
Statue of Giovanni Villani in the Loggia del Mercato Nuovo in Florence
Florence Cathedral
Palazzo Vecchio