The slave-trading accounts of Manoel Batista Peres, 1613–1619: Double-entry bookkeeping in cloth money. (August 2013)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Newson, Linda A
• Is Part Of: Accounting history. Volume 18:Number 3(2013)
• Page Start: 343
• Page End: 365
• Publication Date: 2013-08
• Subjects: Cloth money -- double-entry bookkeeping -- Portuguese slave trade -- private accounting -- seventeenth century -- unit of account -- Upper Guinea; Accounting -- History -- Periodicals; 657.0905
• DOI: 10.1177/1032373213485933
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1032-3732

Abstract

This study examines the accounts of the Portuguese New Christian trader, Manoel Batista Peres. These private accounts, found in the Archivo General de la Nación in Lima, Peru, were associated with the trading of slaves on the Upper Guinea Coast in the early seventeenth century. The accounts take the double-entry format but, in the absence of a metallic currency, were kept in cloth money. Combining evidence from the accounts themselves, with the context in which Peres conducted his business, the study explores the reasons why he kept his accounts in this format. It shows how this system of accounting could be adapted to a non-monetised economy and contributes to the debate over the relationship between double-entry bookkeeping and the rise of capitalism.