The Rise of Merchant Empires

'It provides an excellent starting point for those who seek to understand the economic relationship between Europe and the rest of the world and adds considerably to our understanding of long-distance trade in the early modern period.' Teaching History

• Acknowledgements; Introduction James D. Tracy; 1. Structural changes in European long-distance trade, and particularly in the re-export trade from south to north, 1350–1750 Herman van der Wee; 2. The growth and composition of trade in the Iberian empires, 1450–1740 Carla Rahn Phillips; 3. The growth and composition of the long-distance trade of England and the Dutch republic before 1750 Niels Ateensgaard; 4. France, the Antilles, and Europe in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: renewals of trade Paul Butel; 5. Productivity, profitability and costs of private and corporate Dutch shipping in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries Jaap R. Bruijn; 6. The Dutch and English East India Companies compared: evidence from the stock and foreign exchange markets Larry Neal; 7. World bullion flows, 1450–1800 Ward Barrett; 8. Merchant communities (1350–1750) Frederic Mauro; 9. Economic aspects of the eighteenth century Atlantic slave trade Herbert S. Klein; 10. Marginalisation, stagnation, and growth: the trans-Saharan caravan trade in the era of European expansion, 1500–1800 Ralph A. Austen; 11. The 'decline' of the central Asian caravan trade Morris Rossabi; 12. Merchant communities in pre-colonial India Irfan Habib; 13. Merchants without empire: the Hokkien sojourning communities Wang Gungwu.