Finanzmarktintegration im Spätmittelalter: Hanseraum, Heiliges Römisches Reich und Königreich Polen, ca. 1300-1550

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Oliver Volckart
• Subject Area: Economic and Social History
• Term: from 2007 to 2011
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 42431300

• Final Report Year: 2011

Final Report Abstract

Our research project cast light on dynamics of financial integration in Central Europe during the late middle ages. In line with recent revisions of the view that the late middle ages were a period of economic depression, we found robust evidence of increased financial integration at the time. We traced these developments to a number of factors. In particular we focused on how monetary policies and unions, the advent of printing and the revival of the Holy Roman Empire contributed to falls in transaction costs over the short- and the long-run. Such findings emphasise how the late medieval economy was shaped by the agency of its participants. Still, transaction costs played a comparatively large role in financial markets, and important questions remain on the extent to which our findings can be generalised to the real economy.

Publications

• (2009). Regeln, Willkür und der gute Ruf: Geldpolitik und Finanzmarkteffizienz in Deutschland, 14. bis 16. Jahrhundert. Jahrbuch für Wirtschaftsgeschichte 2, 101-129
  Volckart, O.
  
• (2011). Money, States and Empire: Financial Integration and Institutional Change in Central Europe, 1400-1520. Journal of Economic History 71, 762-791
  Chilosi, D. and Volckart, O.
  
• (2011). The Knowledge Economy of the Renaissance: The Advent of Printing and Financial Integration in Central Europe. Czech Historical Review 109, 262-282
  Chilosi, D. and Volckart, O.
  
• (2011). The Utility of a Common Coinage: Currency Unions and the Integration of Money Markets in Late Medieval Central Europe. Explorations in Economic History 48, 53-65
  Boerner, L. and Volckart, O.