The Ascent of Money
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| Author | Niall Ferguson |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Subject | history of money, credit, banking |
| Genre | economic history |
| Publisher | The Penguin Press HC |
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Publication date
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13 November 2008 |
| Pages | 432 |
| ISBN | |
| OCLC | 191929255 |
| 332.09 22 | |
| LC Class | HG171 .F47 2008 |
The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World is Harvard professor Niall Ferguson's tenth book, published in 2008, and an adapted television documentary for Channel 4 (UK) and PBS (US), which in 2009 won an International Emmy Award. It examines the long history of money, credit, and banking.
The book deals with the rise of money as a trade form, and tracks its progression, development, and effects on society into the 21st Century.
The book was adapted into a six-part television documentary with the new full title Ascent of Money: Boom and Bust for Channel 4 in the United Kingdom. It also aired on TVB Pearl in Hong Kong and ABC1 in Australia. In the United States, an edited two-hour version was aired in January 2009 by PBS.
A newer, reorganized four-hour version with the original full title The Ascent of Money: The Financial History of the World was aired in July 2009 by PBS. Both versions can still be viewed online at the link below.
From Shylock's pound of flesh to the loan sharks of Glasgow, from the "promises to pay" on Babylonian clay tablets to the Medici banking system. Professor Ferguson explains the origins of credit and debt and why credit networks are indispensable to any civilization.
How did finance become the realm of the masters of the universe? Through the rise of the bond market in Renaissance Italy. With the advent of bonds, war finance was transformed and spread to north-west Europe and across the Atlantic. It was the bond market that made the Rothschilds the richest and most powerful family of the 19th century.
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