PACIOLI, Luca (Frater Lucas de Burgo Sancti Sepulchri; c.1445–1517). Summa de arithmetica, geometria, proportioni et proportionalita (Summary of arithmetic, geometry, proportions and proportionality). Venice: Paganinus de Paganinis, 10–20 November 1494.

This rare fragment comprises 19 double-sided leaves (i.e. 38 pages) and includes the entire celebrated section on double-entry bookkeeping (Tractatus XI: “Particularis de computis et scripturis”). Additionally, there is the title page, dedication, several summaries, and the table of contents. A lovely handwritten introduction by Siegfreid Gundelfinger explains the circumstances of his finding the loose pages and binding them into this booklet in 1929.

Publisher:
Venice: Paganinus de Paganinis, 1494.

Features:
First edition, first printing.
Super-chancery folio (11.8 x 8.5 inches).
19 leaves (38 pages), including the entirety of Tractatus XI, “Particularis de computis et scripturis.”
Pages: title page, preface, summario, ff. 5, ff. 197, and Tractatus XI, ff. 198–210.
Includes the well-known woodcut of Pacioli as well as decorative initials and diagrams.
The binding is made of vellum or vellum paper and titled in ink.
Provenance: Siegfried Gundelfinger (1878–1954, Bavarian accountant who emigrated to Mill Valley, California).

Father of Accounting:
Franciscan friar, magician, and mathematician, Fra Luca Pacioli is often called “The Father of Accounting” as his Summa contains, among comprehensive mathematical knowledge of the time, the first published rules of double-entry bookkeeping. Tractatus XI defines accounting practices that still form the basis of the field, such as the use of ledgers to account for assets, liabilities, capital, income, and expenses.

Leonardo da Vinci was fascinated by the Summa’s explanation of the mathematics of perspective. Not long after the book’s publication, Pacioli taught, collaborated with, and lived with Leonardo in Milan, Italy.

In 2019, the complete Summa sold for $1.2 million. If you’d like to own one of the most sought-after and important pieces of accounting history without spending $1.2 million for the whole Summa, consider this lovely Tractatus XI priced at less than 2% of that figure.

View the listing here.