"This exciting new volume examines the development of market performance from Antiquity until the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. Efficient market structures are agreed by most economists to serve as evidence of economic prosperity, and to be prerequisites for further economic growth....

A major feat of research and synthesis, this book presents the first comprehensive history of the Dutch economy in the nineteenth century--an important but poorly understood piece of European economic history. Based on a detailed reconstruction of extensive economic data, the authors account for...

'The Long Road to the Industrial Revolution' offers a new explanation of the origins of the industrial revolution in Western Europe by placing development in Europe within a global perspective. It focuses on its specific institutional and demographic development since the late Middle Ages, and...