Antonio di Simone, supplier of playing cards for silk dealers
composed by Lothar Teikemeier, last updated 11.12.2012

3.3 Antonio di Simone

Antonio di Simone is usually indicated as "fa i naibi", but among cards supplied by him we seldom find more than a dozen packs; usually he brings to the store a couple of packs, or a little more. On the other hand, his prices are remarkably higher than those of the other makers. We find surprising little variations around a unit price of 9s. In the course of time, this will be nearer to the common price of trionfi, than of naibi.
I suppose that the biggest difference with other products mainly (if not only) consisted in a more accurate decoration. These packs are seldom mentioned as fini, and never as gilded, but some justification should have existed for a price that was about the double than that of packs produced by Antonio di Dino, and five times the usual price for those of Niccolò di Calvello. Probably the indication of mezzani that we find in some cases should be extended to all these packs, because of the constant price; the same for doppi, whereas the fact that we find sometimes these packs mentioned as charte instead of naibi does not appear as a significant difference (still due to the same prices).

2.1 From book 12791 – Entrata e Uscita A

This book(7) seems to be the first of a series of three similar books, but actually is of a different kind. Its contents are actually various: initially we have about thirty leaves of receipts, then four leaves beginning with number 25 with entries of the same kind as the following books, then many further pages of expenses for production, and similar matters. In other words, this whole book is interesting for us just due to its leaves 25 to 29, and it is from there that I have deduced the following table.

The corresponding dates are earlier than the limits indicated for the book and also earlier than most of the other records that I could study up to now - even the suppliers are not the same as we find later on. Luigi rivenditore certainly was not a cardmaker, but just a small retailer. Grosso[?] is thus the only maker recorded here; we have not yet encountered him elsewhere, and even his name, or nickname, is uncertain. Uno fanciullo, a boy, as a supplier of goods, is a rather frequent occurrence; unfortunately for us, any such indication does not help to trace the makers of the products.
The last entry corresponds to a purchase of four packs of naibi from Simone di Ser Antonio Fazi; his profession is not indicated, but we can assume him to be a cardmaker. It is unavoidable for us to connect him with Antonio di Simone, maybe his son, whom we find later on as a maker of expensive cards. Important is that we find here his family name too, and it has been possible to find him in Catasto 1427, the known series of books with much information on Florentine families.(8) I could read there that he was 33 and lived together with his wife, 25, and a third person; I was certain to find his child Antonio di Simone recorded together with his parents - unfortunately for us (and maybe for him) the third person of the family was instead by then... his mother-in-law.