Gasparo Scaruffi

Born in Reggio Emilia in 1519, Gasparo Scaruffi was an Italian merchant, banker, and early economic writer. He is best remembered for L’Alitinonfo, a work often described as one of the first systematic Italian texts on monetary questions, written at a time when trade was expanding and coinage systems were often confusing and unstable.

Scaruffi argued for clearer and more dependable monetary standards, and he became especially known for proposing a kind of universal currency that could support fairer exchange across different regions. That idea, ambitious for the 1500s, is part of why later readers have seen him as a remarkably forward-looking voice in the history of economic thought.

He died in Reggio Emilia in 1584. Although not as widely known today as some later economists, his writing still stands out for treating money not just as a tool of commerce, but as something tied to order, trust, and justice in society.