What Mercantiquo is

Mercantiquo is a digital marketplace for old or rare books. Owners can insert their book data in Mercantiquo for free, after registration. Mercantiquo handles customers' personal data in observance of Italian privacy law 675/96 regarding the sending of promotional material. This data may be given to third parties engaged in marketing work with Mercantiquo. On request and at any time, customers may change their data, cancel it or forbid its use for marketing purposes.

Internet user can enter Mercantiquo files, but only customers can access book details and make transactions. To become a Mercantiquo customer, just register.

Mercantiquo reserves the right to eliminate from its files any books not strictly old or rare, with prior notice to the customer via e-mail.

To withdraw from Mercantiquo, just send an e-mail to our staff requesting it.

Bibliographic Research

The customer's rare book data, appraisal included, is not subject to checks by Mercantiquo. To request this service, you can refer to Bibliographic Research, on which Mercantiquo exclusively depends to certify the books in its archives.

Each certified work carries a mark visible to all users. When a request from one customer can be filled by the offer from another Mercantiquo will provide each one with the other's personal data so they can contact one another directly. In no other case will Mercantiquo cede this data to third parties.

How to enter book data

First and last names. Sometimes, as in "Agostinus of Ippona" or "Erasmus" (but not Dante, whose last name is definitely "Alighieri"), some doubt may arise about first and last names. In these cases simply type the name in the "Last name" field. When the last name is preceded by a title, such as "Abbot Bougard" or "Baron von Pufendorf: write the surname first, so the entry will be "Bougard Abbot" or "Pufendorf von Baron".

Full title. The concept of "title" was born in the XVI century. By "full title" we mean the title, subtitle and everything carried on the title page except the date and place of printing and the printer's name.

Page numbering. Page numbering. Please enter the number of pages in your book in Roman or Arabian numerals (e.g. XVIII is in Roman numerals and should be given as such).

Binding. State of the binding. Describing the binding is of help in appraising your book. Wrappers mean paper bindings.

Illustrations and engravings.. These are very important because they increase the value of your book. The first printed texts were enriched with woodcuts, then with graphics on metal in the XVI century (etchings, engravings etc.) which continued until the XVIII century. These were followed in the XIX century by lithographs (engravings on stone) and color lithographs, down to the invention of industrial engravings such as photogravure. Describe your work as best you can, stating if it is illustrated, if it has few or many plates, if these are in black and white or in color, if they are engraved or printed, if there is a printer's mark on the title page, if there is a frontispiece or portrait of the author, if it has geographical or topographical maps, etc.

Merits and defects. This refers to the book's state of conservation, that is, to everything that can increase or decrease its value. Use the multiple-choice menu to describe all the characteristics of your book.

Bibliography. If you know bibliography entries of your book please insert data in this field.

PDF, print-friendly file format. In Mercantiquo, book-file details may be viewed as web pages and PDF files (Portable Document Format). If you can't see the document when you click and you are asked to save it on disk, answer yes. As soon as you have finished downloading, download and install the latest version of Acrobat Reader, the free program that lets you read files in PDF.