Benko Kotruljic or Benedikt Kotruljevic

Benko Kotruljic or Benedikt Kotruljevic

Benko Kotruljic or Benedikt Kotruljevic

The first known manual about book-keeping was Della mercatura e del mercante perfetto, (On merchantry and the perfect merchant) written in 1458 by Benko Kotruljic or Benedikt Kotruljevic (Benedictus de Cotrullis, born in Dubrovnik, 1416-1469). It is also the oldest known manuscript on double-entry. As such it precedes Luca Pacioli’s description of double-entry for no less than 36 years, so that Kotruljic’s priority is indisputable.


Kotruljic’s famous 1464 manuscript on book-keeping,
was printed in 1573 in Venice; editor and publisher was
another oustanding Croatian scholar – Franjo Petris

The French translation of Kotruljic’s book appeared under the title “Parfait négociant” in Lyon in 1613.

In the book he states the following: “I declare that a merchant must not only be a good writer,accountant and book-keeper, but he also has to be a man of letters and rhetorician.”

His another important manuscript is Benedictus de Cotrullis: “De Navigatione”, 1464, written also in Italian. It is the first known manual on navigation in the history of Europe. Note that it appeared almost 30 years before the discovery of America. The book has been frequently copied throughout Mediteranean.


Benedictus de Cotrullis: De Navigatione, 1464;
photo from Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library

The original manuscript is kept at the University of Yale (in the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, MS 557), and has 132 pp. See

  • Darko Novakovic (discoverer of the book): Novopronadeni rukopis Benedikta Kotruljevica De navigatione, in Dubrovcanin Benedikt Kotruljevic : hrvatski i svjetski ekonomist XV. stoljeca. – Zagreb, Hrvatska akademija znanosti i umjetnosti : Hrvatski racunovoda, 1996. – ISBN 953-96998-0-0. – pp. 19-32.
  • Benedikt Kotruljevic: De navigatione / O plovidbi, Zagreb 2005., ISBN 953-6310-37-6 (parallel Italian-Croatian edition)
  • Dubrovcanin Benedikt Kotruljevic, Hrvatski i svjetski ekonomist XV. stoljeca, HAZU, Zagreb 1996. (radovi s konferencije)
  • Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Yale University (write in MS 557 and search; 20 pages of the book can be seen)
  • Benedetto Cotrugli: De Navigatione, online book

In this book Kotruljevic mentions places like Bocari (Bakar), Braca (Brac), Dalmatia, Fiume (Rijeka), Illirico (Croatia), Mare Adriatico, and many other, throughout Europe, Africa and Asia. In Chapter XXXXVIII (i.e. Ch XLVIII) he also mentions that in Popovo near Dubrovnik [25 km NW of Dubrovnik, near the village of Ravno] there is a huge cave [Vjetrenica] with miraculous wind: at the entrance the air is colder in the summer than in Italy in the winter.

On the islet of Kosljun near largest Croatian island of Krk there is a beautiful Franciscan monastery, which had one of the oldest “banks” in Europe. It was operational from the 17th to 19th century, providing loans for the poor at low interest rates, to protect them from exploiters. See “What’s on Kvarner,” p. 81, available at Appleby.

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