Accounting and the Diffusion of Sacred Values in the Diocese of Ferrara (1431–1457)

Informed by the work of Laughlin and Booth, the chapter analyzes the role of accounting and accountability practices within the 15th-century Roman Catholic Church. Secular accounting and accountability practices were not regarded as necessarily antithetical to religious values, as would be expected by Laughlin and Booth. Instead, they were seen to assume a role which was complementary to the Church’s religious mission. Indeed, they were essential to its sacred mission during a period in which the Pope sought to arrest the moral decay of the clergy and reinstate the Church’s authority.