the german catastrophe

 

Better educated [e.g. 11 national daily newspapers], the highest intermarriage rate between Jews and non-Jews, and yet a quick collective coma.

history isn't cyclical

"Most history is made by young people."
- Niall Ferguson

gilded capitalism

"Financial history is the essential backstory of all history."

- Historian and Harvard Business School Professor Niall Ferguson [born 1964]

Image of the Shad.

essex mercenary

Sir John Hawkwood [1320-1394] "the acute" was available to the highest bidder including the Pope.

Image explanation here.

only worth what others will exchange for it

To ancient Incas gold was the sweat of the sun and silver the tears of the moon whose value was aesthetic. Labour was the Inca unit of value.

An earlier reference here.

Ascent of Money

An earlier reference on this blog to Niall Ferguson's Ascent of Money here.

Planet Finance

Professor Niall Ferguson [born 1964] examines the global financial crisis in Vanity Fair here.

the greatest error of modern history?

Prince Archduke Francis Ferdinand [1863-1914], heir to the Austro-Hungarian Empire, was assassinated in Sarajevo. The Archduke had been on a visit to Bosnia. The assassin was a Serbian nationalist whose co-conspirators were in Belgrade. The Serbians wanted to detach Bosnia from the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

A look back at a review of Niall Ferguson's [born 1964] World War I book The Pity of War where he argues that Britain's intervention in 1914 was "nothing less than the greatest error of modern history," because Germany in fact did not pose an essential threat to British interests.