Ferdinando II de' Medici

What people wore

Famine-Era Food Restrictions and Rationing

During periods of famine, authorities prohibited the baking of luxury bread and sweets to control food costs. The poorest citizens relied on state-subsidized shops that sold bread made from a mix of inferior cereals and pulses.

At the table

Rural diet of beans and chestnuts

During times of severe famine, country dwellers survived by consuming minimal food, such as beans and chestnuts, as cities prioritized their own limited grain supplies over feeding the rural population.

News and letters

Postal Networks and Improved Delivery Times

By the seventeenth century, a public postal network of regular couriers allowed ordinary people to send mail, whereas previously they relied on miscellaneous travelers. Letters that once took two weeks to arrive could then be delivered in five days.

Getting around

Travel and Communication in the Duchy

In the early 17th century, the Via Emilia was a vital, though sometimes poorly maintained, route for transit between Piacenza, Parma, and Bologna, featuring regular services by couriers and messengers who operated on fixed schedules. Travel on this route was managed via post stations where riders could change horses to maintain efficient communication networks.

What it cost

Soaring wheat prices in Parma

The controlled price of wheat in Parma's public market rose sharply from 117 soldi in 1588 to a peak of 402 soldi in 1592 during a major subsistence crisis.

Daily life

Cooking with a swivel arm and alcoves

In the rural Apennines, families cooked using a swivel arm called a cadnil to hold pots over an open fire, often inside a large wooden hood. Wealthier families built alcoves into the wall beside the hearth where they could rest in the warmth.

Work

Paying rent with capons

Rural tenants often paid their rent in the form of a pair of capons, which were required to be delivered within a week of Saint Martin's Day on November 11.