"The story of the largest currency union in world history and its creation at the hands of the Holy Roman Empire. Providing a historical perspective on multilateralism, the book makes early monetary policies widely accessible and draws a vivid picture of economic and political life in a country...

The Big Problem of Small Change offers the first credible and analytically sound explanation of how a problem that dogged monetary authorities for hundreds of years was finally solved. Two leading economists, Thomas Sargent and François Velde, examine the evolution of Western European economies...