A History of Business in Medieval Europe, 1200-1550 -

Edwin S. Hunt, James M. Murray

Cambridge University Press

2008

277 páginas

9h 14m

ISBN-13: 9780521499231

A History of Business in Medieval Europe, 1200-1550, demolishes the widely held view that the phrase "medieval business" is an oxymoron. The authors review the entire range of business in medieval wetern Europe, probing its Roman and Christian heriage to discover the economic and political forces that shaped the organization of agriculture, manufacturing, construction, minig, transportation, and marketing. Then they deal with the responses of businessmen to the devastating plagues, famines, and warfare that beset Europe in the late Middle Ages. The remarkable sucess in coping with this hostile new environment was "a harvest of adversity" that prepared the way for the economic expansion of the sixteenth century.
Two main themes run through the book. First, the force and direction of business development in this period stemmed primarily from the demands of the elite. Second, the lasting legacy of medieval businessmen was less their skillful adaptations of imported inventions than their brilliant innovations in business organization.