Violence is often viewed as an intrinsic feature of illicit markets, driven by competition, disputes, and predation. We argue that the connection between violence and markets is not exclusive to illicit markets and that in the absence of strong institutions these factors exist ubiquitously....

Hospitals were among the wealthiest organizations in medieval cities. Their directors managed portfolios consisting of real estate and financial instruments; as a result, they also handled large quantities of money. It has been suggested that they used these to provide a variety of financial...

This special issue focuses on the financial behaviour of different participants in European medieval and early modern financial markets. It extends our knowledge of the financial strategies employed by households, merchants, charities, city governments and corporations by asking what investment...

Not all major Italian cities of the late Middle Ages could rely on an established and organised system of public debt like Florence, Venice, Genoa, and others. The study of one such city, Bologna, reveals that whenever the city found itself in serious financial straits, outside of ad hoc...

This paper provides an overview of the various financial resources that existed in medieval Tirol to meet financial needs, using notary registers and court records from the 14 th century as sources. These provide ample evidence of an active capital and land market in rural areas, which offered...

The share of female inventors remains significantly lower than that of men in both developed and developing countries. This paper studies gender bias in patenting activity, using a unique dataset that matches Italian administrative employer-employee records both to patent data from the European...

Urban areas confront a chronic shortage of housing, especially in the low-rent segment. This precarious situation is further exacerbated by major challenges, like the destruction of housing by wars and natural catastrophes, rapid increase of demand, or pandemics cutting incomes. In response, the...

In this study we evaluate the role that Mediterranean Medieval trade with Africa and the Middle-East still plays today in Italian politics by shaping the attitudes towards migrants of individuals that live close to Medieval ports. Trade connections between Medieval ports and Muslim Africa and...

Urban areas confront a chronic shortage of housing, especially in the low-rent segment. This precarious situation is further exacerbated by major challenges, like the destruction of housing by wars and natural catastrophes, rapid increase of demand, or pandemics cutting incomes. In response, the...

This book presents a synthesis and analysis of the possessions of non-elite rural households in medieval England. Drawing on the results of the Leverhulme Trust funded project 'Living Standards and Material Culture in English Rural Households, 1300-1600', it represents the first national-scale...

Economic downturns can create conditions for conflict that may occur along religious or ethnic lines. In this paper, we provide arguably the first empirical evidence of this phenomenon in medieval India. Using centuries of geo-referenced data we document a positive relationship between weather...

This chapter surveys the writings of medieval Jewish rabbis on usury during 1050-1565. These writings belonged to three literary genres: legal, ethical/pietistic, and Biblical commentary. After surveying the moralistic condemnations of usury by medieval rabbis, I illustrate three theoretical...

Guinnane and Hoffman (subsequently GH) comment on two of our papers: Voigtländer and Voth: “Persecution Perpetuated” (2012, subsequently PP) and Satyanath, Voigtländer and Voth: Bowling for Fascism (2017, subsequently BF). They allege that our econometric results are fragile and depend on...

Earlier research on poverty failed to provide us with consistent measures of its prevalence across space and time. This is due to the limitations of the available sources and to the difficulty of applying to them the poverty definitions of modern social science. This article discusses different...

The establishment of Christianity in the late- and post-Roman world caused an economic as well as a religious revolution, but, while a great deal of attention has been paid to the religious developments of the period, the impact of the establishment of the Church on the economy has attracted...

The persistence literature in economics and related disciplines connects recent outcomes to events long ago. This influential literature marks a promising development but has drawn criticism. We discuss two prominent examples that ground the rise of the Nazi Party in distant historical roots....

Earlier research on poverty failed to provide us with consistent measures of its prevalence across space and time. This is due to the limitations of the available sources and to the difficulty of applying to them the poverty definitions of modern social science. This article discusses different...

The standard political economy narrative of representative assemblies in Western Europe is one of political bargaining and credible commitments. Monarchs sought to bargain with the leading men of the realms, exchanging their commitments on various policies for revenues and other resources. This...

Guinnane and Hoffman (subsequently GH) comment on two of our papers: Voigtländer and Voth: "Persecution Perpetuated" (2012, subsequently PP) and Satyanath, Voigtländer and Voth: Bowling for Fascism (2017, subsequently BF). They allege that our econometric results are fragile and depend on...

The persistence literature in economics and related disciplines connects recent outcomes to events long ago. This influential literature marks a promising development but has drawn criticism. We discuss two prominent examples that ground the rise of the Nazi Party in distant historical roots....

This volume presents a new history of Orsanmichele, covering the centuries before the Renaissance. It explores the Florentine grain market, the piazza of Orsanmichele and its loggias, and Orsanmichele s important confraternity and Madonnas during the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries.

"This book synthesizes a research on the so-called "Tang-Song social transformation" and "society of moneyed elite" in ancient China to examine the social changes that took place in the Tang and Song dynasties. The ancient Chinese "society of moneyed elite" theory provides a conceptual frame of...