The following interview is a historically-informed reconstruction. While Giacomo Dandolo is not a documented individual, his profession, decisions, and dilemmas are drawn from archival records of Venetian grain factors during the 1345-1347 famine crisis and the subsequent arrival of plague. The conversation imagines what such a merchant might have said, had we been able to ask him. Consider it less a séance than a very well-researched guess.
We meet in Giacomo's warehouse office near the Rialto, autumn 1347. Through the window, I can see the Grand Canal, unusually quiet. Three ships that should be unloading grain sit idle at their moorings. Giacomo, 47, has the weathered face of someone who's spent decades negotiating with ship captains and city officials. His ledgers are immaculate. His hands won't stop moving.
The city is calling you "il Prudente." The Prudent One. How does that sit with you right now?
Giacomo: laughs, but there's no humor in it
Like a stone in my stomach.
They gave me that name two years ago, during the famine. I was the one who said we needed to look east, to the Black Sea, when the harvests failed across Italy. "Prudent Giacomo," they said, "always thinking three moves ahead."
Now? Now half the city is dying, and those same ships I chartered are blamed for bringing whatever this is. This pestilence.
So yes. Prudent. He gestures at the ledgers spread across his desk. I have the records here. Every contract, every ship, every bushel of grain. I can show you exactly how prudent I was.
Walk me back to 1345. What were you seeing?
Giacomo: Prices. That's what I see first, always. Prices tell you what's coming before the news does.
Spring of 1345, wheat prices in Apulia jumped forty percent. Then Sicily, same thing. Sardinia. By summer, it was clear this wasn't a local shortage. Something was wrong with the weather. Too cold, too wet, crops rotting in the fields across southern Europe. Our usual suppliers had nothing to sell, or they were hoarding it.1
The city's grain reserves were adequate. But not for a multi-year crisis. And I could see it was going to be multi-year. The Doge's office started making inquiries. Quiet at first. "Giacomo, what are our options? Where else can we source grain?"
And you said the Black Sea.
Giacomo: The Genoese were already trading there. They had posts in Caffa, in the Crimea. We had some presence, but not like them. The Mongols of the Golden Horde controlled the region, and they had grain. Lots of it.
The question was logistics. Could we organize it fast enough? Could we pay for it?
He pulls out a contract, yellowed parchment covered in dense script.
This is from August 1346. A forced loan. The city "requested" that wealthy families contribute to a grain fund. Twenty thousand ducats, to be repaid with interest from future grain sales. We needed ships, we needed agents in Caffa, we needed warehouses. The whole supply chain had to be built essentially from scratch.1
How did you calculate the risk?
Giacomo: He looks up sharply.
What risk?
I mean, yes, there were pirates. There was the possibility the Mongols would change their minds about selling to us. There was weather. Ships go down. But those are normal trading risks. You price them in. You know your margins.
The risk I saw was: What happens if we don't do this? If we let Venice starve?
I'd watched the famine spread. By late 1346, people in Tuscany were eating grass, bark. There were reports of... he stops himself.
The city would have torn itself apart. So you tell me. Was that a risk worth taking?
I'm asking you.
Giacomo: long pause
Then yes. It was worth it. At the time, it was worth it.
"At the time"?
Giacomo: He stands, walks to the window. Watches the idle ships.
The plague came from the east. On ships. Ships that carried grain from the Black Sea.
The Genoese ships that arrived first, in October, their crews were dying. Some kind of fever, swellings in the neck and groin. We'd never seen anything like it. By the time we understood what was happening, it was everywhere. The rats from the ships, they...
He trails off. Turns back.
People say the disease came from the Mongols. Some say they were dying of it in Caffa, that they even catapulted diseased corpses over the city walls during a siege. I don't know if that's true. What I know is: we needed grain, we went where grain was, and death came with it.1
Did anyone argue against the Black Sea trade?
Giacomo: sits back down, returns to his ledgers
Not really. A few merchants said it was too expensive, that we should wait and see if the next harvest improved. But that's just merchant talk. Everyone hedging their bets.
The city officials were desperate. The Doge himself was involved in the negotiations.
He laughs, but it's bitter.
You know what's funny? The Genoese and Pisans were doing the exact same thing. We were all scrambling for the same grain sources. There was even talk of cooperation, of joint convoys. Venice and Genoa, cooperating. That's how serious it was.
What did importing grain at that scale actually involve?
Giacomo: Complicated.
First, you need agents in Caffa who can negotiate with the Mongol officials. They controlled the grain stores. You're paying in silver, mostly, though sometimes in goods they want. Venetian glass, certain textiles, weapons if you can get away with it.
Then you need ships. Big ones. Grain is heavy and you want to minimize the number of trips. Forty, fifty tons per ship. You need captains willing to make the run. Three weeks if the weather's good, longer if it's not. And you're sailing late in the season, after September, which is risky.1
Once the grain arrives, the city has regulations about distribution. Prices are controlled. You can't just sell to the highest bidder. There are official grain measures, inspectors, storage requirements. It's all very organized. The city takes this seriously. They've been managing grain imports since the 1250s, after earlier famines.1
So you were operating within an established system.
Giacomo: Yes and no.
The system existed, but not at this scale. Not with this urgency. We were improvising constantly. How much grain do you need to feed a city of 100,000 people? For how long? What if the next harvest fails too? What if the Mongols stop selling?
He touches the ledgers again, fingers tracing the columns of numbers.
Every decision felt like guessing. I have numbers here, calculations, but half of it was just instinct. Prayer.
Looking at your ledgers now, knowing what happened, what do you see?
Giacomo: very quiet
I see a city that didn't starve in 1346 and 1347. The grain arrived. We distributed it. People ate. That part worked.
I also see the moment we traded one kind of death for another.
Starvation is slow. You can see it coming, you can calculate it. This pestilence? It's fast. It doesn't care if you're rich or poor, if you planned ahead or didn't.
Do you think you made the right decision?
Giacomo: looks up sharply
Which decision? To import grain? To save the city from famine?
Yes. Absolutely. Without question.
But if you're asking whether I'd do it again, knowing what I know now...
He stops. Starts again.
The thing is, we still don't know how the disease spreads. Some say it's bad air from the swamps. Some say it's God's punishment. Some say it's the rats, or the fleas on the rats. If I'd known, if we'd known, would we have refused the grain? Let Venice starve to avoid the plague?
He shakes his head.
I don't know. That's the honest answer. And anyone who tells you they know what they'd do in an impossible situation is lying or stupid.
What would you tell someone facing a similar choice now?
Giacomo: laughs darkly
Now I'd tell them to be very careful about what they consider "prudent."
I thought I was being prudent. I thought I was solving a clear problem: no grain equals starvation equals death. So get grain. Simple.
But there's no simple in a crisis. Every solution creates new problems. The grain saved us from famine and brought the plague. I have to live with that.
He gestures at the quiet canal outside.
The ships are still there. We still need grain. The plague hasn't solved the harvest failures. So what do we do? Stop trading? Let the city starve after all? Or keep going, knowing we might be bringing more death with every cargo?
And what are you doing?
Giacomo: He picks up his pen. Pulls a fresh contract toward him.
I'm still signing contracts. Still chartering ships. Still bringing in grain. The city needs to eat. That calculation hasn't changed.
He dips the pen in ink, hesitates.
But I check the manifests differently now. I ask more questions about where the ships have been, what ports they've touched. I watch the crews when they dock.
He starts to write, then stops.
It probably doesn't matter. But I do it anyway. Because what else is there?