Book Cover
Book
Author Ferguson, Niall.

Title The ascent of money : a financial history of the world / by Niall Ferguson
Published London : Allen Lane, 2008

Copies

Location Call no. Vol. Availability
 MELB  330.9 Fer/Aom  AVAILABLE
 WATERFT BUSINESS  330.9 Fer/Aom  AVAILABLE
Description 441 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, facsimiles ; 24 cm
regular print
Contents Dreams of avarice -- Of human bondage -- Blowing bubbles -- The return of risk -- Safe as houses -- From empire to Chimerica -- The descent of money
Summary Niall Ferguson follows the money to tell the human story behind the evolution of finance, from its origins in ancient Mesopotamia to the latest upheavals. To Christians, love of it is the root of all evil. To generals, it's the sinews of war. To revolutionaries, it's the chains of labor. But historian Ferguson shows that finance is in fact the foundation of human progress. What's more, he reveals financial history as the essential backstory behind all history. Through Ferguson's expert lens, for example, the civilization of the Renaissance looks very different: a boom in the market for art and architecture made possible when Italian bankers adopted Arabic mathematics. The rise of the Dutch republic is reinterpreted as the triumph of the world's first modern bond market over insolvent Habsburg absolutism. Yet the central lesson of financial history is that, sooner or later, every bubble bursts.--From publisher description
Analysis Money
Finance
Financial crises
History
International comparisons
Overseas item
Notes TV tie-in
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Subject Finance, Public.
Money -- Political aspects.
History, Modern.
Economics -- History.
International finance -- History.
Finance -- History.
Money -- History.
Economic history.
Genre/Form History.
Author Ferguson, Niall.
ISBN 9781846141065 hardback
1846141060 hardback
9781846141928 paperback