On 13 March 2013 Ugo Tucci, professor emeritus of Economic History at the University Ca' Foscari, Venice, (professore emerito di Storia Economica dell'Università Ca' Foscari di Venezia) died in his home in Perugia. Ugo Tucci was born on 4 June 1917 in Spoleto and, after receiving his BA in Law at the University of Rome, became an administrator of the State Archives. A person of high cultural stature who infused in his colleagues a sense of respect, confidence and security, which was reciprocated, he supervised the construction of the State Archives of Trieste as director in the 1960s and 1970s. Tucci founded the State Archives of Gorizia and assumed the role of Superintendent of Archives for the region of Friuli Venezia Giulia. Along with his archival activity he carried out research in Venetian economic history. A stay at the Centre de Recherches Historiques (E.P.H.E.) in Paris, the Mecca of European historians during the post-war years, proved very important for Tucci's intellectual development. It enabled him to forge lasting ties with Lucien Febvre and above all Fernand Braudel, as well as with Ruggiero Romano and Alberto Tenenti, who were to become his fraternal friends.
At the end of the 1950s Romano, Tenenti and Tucci worked together in the Venetian archives. This was an extraordinary period characterized by a profound renewal of international historiography, of which Venice was one of the epicentres. An expert in Venetian documentation and an attentive reader of international historical literature, Tucci produced a large number of essays and monographs dealing with the economic history – but not only economic – of both Venice and medieval and early modern Italy. Among his broad interests, he focused on monetary, maritime and commercial themes, but he did not disdain forays into other economic and social aspects of Venetian life. He contributed to the Enciclopedia Einaudi and the Storia d'Italia and co-edited, along with Ruggiero Romano, the volume Economia naturale, economia monetaria (Annali, 6, of the Storia d'Italia). He contributed to both the Storia della Cultura Veneta and the Storia di Venezia published by the Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana, for which he co-edited, along with Alberto Tenenti, the volumes Il Mare (1991) and Il Rinascimento (1996). Tucci's other works included: Lettres d'un marchand vénitien: Andrea Berengo 1553–1556 (Paris, 1957); a collection of his essays Mercanti, navi, monete nel Cinquecento veneziano (Bologna, 1981); Il libro dell'Arte di Mercatura di Benedetto Cotrugli (Venice, 1990); Un mercante veneziano del Seicento: Simon Giogalli (Venice, 2008). Essays devoted particularly to maritime history are: I servizi marittimi per il pellegrinaggio in Terra Santa nel Medioevo; La spedizione marittima della quarta crociata; Navi e navigazione all'epoca delle crociate; Itinerari marittimi nel tardo Medioevo; L'impresa marittima, uomini e mezzi; L'orientamento in mare, carte e portolani nel Medioevo; L'alimentazione a bordo delle navi veneziane; La navigazione veneziana nel Duecento e nel primo Trecento e la sua evoluzione tecnica; Problemi di metrologia navale: la botte veneziana; La trasmissione del mestiere del marinaio a Venezia nel Medioevo.
Some years ago Tucci was asked to collect many of his articles scattered in journals, miscellanies and convention proceedings; he, however, refused outright: stating that it was unnecessary to dust off works that were out of date. This episode reflected Ugo Tucci's character, strong but also modest and generous. He was a member of the Comité International pour la Métrologie Historique and of the International Commission for Maritime History, president of the commission for the publication of financial documents of the Venetian Republic, vice-president of the Directive Committee of the Storia di Venezia, member of the Istituto Veneto per Scienze, Lettere ed Arti and honorary member of the International Institute of Economic History Francesco Datini. Upon retirement from Ca' Foscari, where he taught from 1971 to 1992, Tucci returned to his native Umbria, a region not touched by the salt sea; during Tucci's last years of life his membership of the Society for Nautical Research and its journal, The Mariner's Mirror, represented an important window with a vista on the sea, a copy of the February 2013 issue was placed on the bier of his coffin.
The passing of Ugo Tucci marks the end of an extraordinary phase, not only in Venetian studies but also in economic and social historiography influenced by the prestigious French school of Fernand Braudel. He was the last of the greats.
He is survived by his wife, Hannelore Zug Tucci. On 24 April 2013, his ashes were scattered 700 metres off the Venetian coast.