This is a straight-forward, readable account, written with the minimum of jargon, of the central importance of money in the ordinary business of the life of different peoples throughout the ages from ancient times to the present day. Includes the Barings crisis and the report by the Bank of England on Barings Bank; up-to date information on the state of Japanese banking and the changes in the financial scene in the US. It also touches on the US housing market and the problem of negative equity. The paradox of why more coins than ever before are required in an increasingly cashless society is clearly explained, as is the role of the Euro coin as the lowest common denominator in Europe s controversial single currency system.
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...many fascinating historical perspectives are contained in this highly readable history of money --The Financial Times
. . . a masterful examination . . . It s a helter-skelter ride through history, swooping and touching on civilization and how they did business, funded their treasuries and paid their servants including armies . . . --World Money Laundering Report
This work of monumental proportions is both well conceived and executed . . . Davies writes with a sparkling wit, and his prose is elegant and flowing. This book is a total success. Both undergraduate and graduate students can learn much from this excellent work, which will be useful to economists, political scientists, and even anthropologists --Choice
. . . a masterful examination . . . It s a helter-skelter ride through history, swooping and touching on civilization and how they did business, funded their treasuries and paid their servants including armies . . . --World Money Laundering Report
This work of monumental proportions is both well conceived and executed . . . Davies writes with a sparkling wit, and his prose is elegant and flowing. This book is a total success. Both undergraduate and graduate students can learn much from this excellent work, which will be useful to economists, political scientists, and even anthropologists --Choice
From the Author
History of money from the dawn of civilization onwards
Because of the difficulties of conducting experiments in the ordinary business of economic life, at the centre of which is money, it is most fortunate that history generously provides us with a proxy laboratory, a guidebook of more or less relevant alternatives. Around the next corner there may be lying in wait apparently quite novel monetary problems which in all probability bear a basic similarity to those that have already been tackled with varying degrees of success or failure in other times and places. Economists, and especially monetarists, tend to overestimate the purely economic, narrow and technical functions of money and have placed insufficient emphasis on its wider social, institutional and psychological aspects. There are therefore many advantages which can only be obtained by tracing monetary and financial history with a broad brush over the whole period of its long and convoluted development, where primitive and modern moneys have overlapped for centuries and where the logical and chronological progressions have rarely followed strictly parallel paths. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Because of the difficulties of conducting experiments in the ordinary business of economic life, at the centre of which is money, it is most fortunate that history generously provides us with a proxy laboratory, a guidebook of more or less relevant alternatives. Around the next corner there may be lying in wait apparently quite novel monetary problems which in all probability bear a basic similarity to those that have already been tackled with varying degrees of success or failure in other times and places. Economists, and especially monetarists, tend to overestimate the purely economic, narrow and technical functions of money and have placed insufficient emphasis on its wider social, institutional and psychological aspects. There are therefore many advantages which can only be obtained by tracing monetary and financial history with a broad brush over the whole period of its long and convoluted development, where primitive and modern moneys have overlapped for centuries and where the logical and chronological progressions have rarely followed strictly parallel paths. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
By TimC
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
An amazing, no holds barred, and eye-opening - but perhaps rather academic - account of the rise to all pervasive dominance of money & banking, from it's emergence in the bronze age to what we have today. I recommend it to everyone seriously interested in discovering what, why, when & how it all happened. It also contains amusing little snippets of information that allow one to forget the seriousness of the subject.
My only criticism - but then I'm not an academic, economist or bank director - is the author's assumption that the reader will understand all the academic, economic & banking jargon that is necessary to discuss & understand the subject. Without a good dictionary, the average reader - if he's got a normal university degree and a good dose of bulldog spirit - will not find this an easy read... but that is generally true of every book covering so specialised a subject. So, "emptor caveat"! Not withstanding this criticism, I'm so glad I bought this book even though I was obliged to put it down from time to time to rest my over-stretched but admittedly aging brain.
My only criticism - but then I'm not an academic, economist or bank director - is the author's assumption that the reader will understand all the academic, economic & banking jargon that is necessary to discuss & understand the subject. Without a good dictionary, the average reader - if he's got a normal university degree and a good dose of bulldog spirit - will not find this an easy read... but that is generally true of every book covering so specialised a subject. So, "emptor caveat"! Not withstanding this criticism, I'm so glad I bought this book even though I was obliged to put it down from time to time to rest my over-stretched but admittedly aging brain.
10 of 13 people found the following review helpful
By demola
Format:Paperback
Glyn Davies presents a superbly fascinating account of money from the earliest times to 2002 and of its various forms from whales' teeth to the euro. I always thought money was well ... notes and greenbacks but it turns out that metallic money (silver and gold) were once all that was regarded as real money. I stopped several times to, perhaps creatively, think how money would have developed in a particular society and how it evolved in use from religious offerings to war payments to trade. How did different societies create and exploit money? In fact the book is very educational as it covers so much of the history of economics and not surprisingly the history of banking. I have a much more intuitive feel for where money came from, how it developed, how it is valued and devalued up to current mania for inflation targeting. This I fear will nourish and enrich my future readings of research papers on economic and monetary policy and of diverse central bank reports. Thank you Glyn.
Be warned, this is a long read. But mightily rewarding.
Be warned, this is a long read. But mightily rewarding.
10 of 17 people found the following review helpful
By Henry Minas
Format:Paperback
I really didn't like this book. It is huge but in a sense it is poor because it does not have a synthetic view of things. It is a long text which kills the reader by drowning him in the details.
As to the content: the views are VERY conventional. It is very academic with little insight into reality.
Sorry, for me it was impossible to read.
As to the content: the views are VERY conventional. It is very academic with little insight into reality.
Sorry, for me it was impossible to read.
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