After World War II, a major discontinuity occurred in the study of price history. With the spread of historical relativism, the ideal of objectivity faded in many disciplines. At the same time, an epistemic revolution spread rapidly through the discipline of economics. In 1947, economist Tjalling Koopmans published a pivotal essay, which strenuously attacked the compilation of price records for their own sake. Koopmans argued that empirical observation of any phenomenon is “impossible” without “theoretical preconceptions” and that measurement without theory is useless because “conclusions relevant to the guidance of economic policies cannot be drawn.” (Tjalling C. Koopmans, “Measurement without Theory,” Review of Economics and Statistics 29 [1947] 161–72). Koopman’s argument was mistaken in its epistemology and fallacious in its logic (see appendix O above), but it captured perfectly a new academic attitude in economics and the social sciences. This new orthodoxy was widely accepted in America especially. It caused a radical change in the work that economists actually did.
In the United States, large open-ended projects of empirical description on price history came to an end. Prices continued to be studied, but in a very different way, mainly as part of the process of “testing” specific theories. Open descriptive inquiries on price movements were banished to the periphery of economic research in the United States (see appendix O).
In Europe, the trend was different. Projects of empirical description in price history became more important after 1945, not less so. This was so in Britain, where Sir Henry Phelps-Brown and Sheila Hopkins made a seminal contribution by carefully constructing long series of English wages and “consumable” prices, which put the entire problem in a new perspective by bringing home the experience of ordinary people. It is striking to observe that the Phelps-Brown-Hopkins indices are now very heavily used by American economists who insist on the uselessness of “measurement without theory.”
Price history also had a central place in the work of the French Annales school, which devoted much attention to the subject. The major conceptual apparatus of the Annales school, and in particular its concepts of “longue duree”, “conjuncture,” and “structure,” was drawn from the history of prices. The epistemology of the Annalists centered on the study of problems and “problematiques,” not on the theories and “theory-testing” of American economics and social science. A problematique was not merely the problem itself but also an apparatus of methods for its study and a critique of previous attempts at its solution. Each of these epistemic approaches had strengths and weaknesses. Both made major contributions to knowledge.
The profound differences between American and European scholarship in this generation have been discussed by John Day, an American trained in the methods of the Annales school. In his “autohistoire,” Day observes that where American economic historians are trained to begin with a theory, Annalists are taught to start with a problem. “Ce marriage de convenance,” he writes, “entre pratique et théorie en histoire [de l’école des cliometricians Americains], contraste a mon sens avec la bonne entente entre pratique et problematique qui characterise les grands historiens de l’École des Annales.” See John Day, “Terres, marchés et monnaies en Italie et en Sardaigne du Xllème au XVIIIème siecle,” Histoire Économie et Société II (1983) 187–203.
The major problematiques of the Annales school kept the history of prices at the heart of its historiography. European monographs in social history gave much attention to price movements, both as indicators of change and as sources of inferential knowledge about other subjects. European scholars achieved a new level of sophistication in the construction of historical price series, a labor that Americans have been encouraged mistakenly to despise as inferior to “theory-testing.” Leading examples include the work of Ernest Labrousse in France, Astrid Friis in Denmark, Nicolaas Posthumus in the Netherlands, and especially Lennart Jörberg’s History of Prices in Sweden, 1732-1914 (2 vols., Lund, 1972), a model work that is more comprehensive, more rigorous, and also more analytic than previous compilations. Price history continued to be a progressive science in Europe, while it languished in the theory-centered social sciences of North America.
These countertendencies in Europe and the United States have had important substantive consequences for the progress of historical knowledge. French monographs in social history routinely examine price movements with close attention. American monographs tend to ignore them. Price history is almost entirely absent from the social history of New England, except for the excellent work of my able student Winifred Rothenberg noted below. It has appeared only in works of the Chesapeake school, especially the excellent scholarship of Russell Menard who gives much attention to the prices of tobacco and slaves.
A comparison of articles in the American Journal of Economic History with leading European journals shows that American economic historians have recently shown comparatively little interest in studying price movements for their own sake. The result has been a lost generation of price historiography in the United States and a failure of institutional memory about price movements in the past.
This is also the case with historians who work in other fields. Every early American historian with whom I discussed this work expressed entire ignorance of the fact that prices were rising in the eighteenth century. All American economists whom I consulted believed that inflation in the twentieth century began with Lyndon Johnson and the war in Vietnam. Most scholars in both disciplines were aware of the price-revolution in the sixteenth century, but nearly all believed that it was a simple reflex of the supply of American treasure in Europe. None remembered the medieval price revolution. Even medievalists expressed surprise and even skepticism, until they were invited to examine the data, which was largely unknown to them.
This state of affairs is beginning to change. We are already seeing a revival of interest in price history by young American economists and historians, in new scholarship of unprecedented creativity and refinement. The starting point for the next generation will be the excellent corpus of scholarship in price history that was so laboriously produced in the past.
Historical Compilations by Place
A large body of published primary sources on the history of prices is available in many nations. These materials are divisible into two parts: historical compilations and current surveys. General works and local studies of long duration are listed here by continent and nation. More specialized studies, limited to a single great wave or equilibrium, will be listed in later sections of the bibliography. For a general survey of quantitative sources, see Val R. Lorwin and Jacob M. Price, eds., The Dimensions of the Past: Materials, Problems, and Opportunities for Quantitative Work in History (New Haven, 1972).
International Historical Compilations
B. R. Mitchell, European Historical Statistics, 1750–1975 (1975, 1980, 2d rev. ed., New York, 1980); idem, International Historical Statistics: Africa and Asia (New York, 1982); idem, International Historical Statistics: The Americas and Australasia (London, 1983). New editions of these works (1995) are updated to 1988.
Another compendium, issued by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, is Consumer Price Indices: Sources and Methods and Historical Statistics (Paris, 1980).
Continental Compilations: Europe
Most European price history has appeared in national and local studies, but two broad European works contain much primary material. One of them is Wilhelm Abel, Agrarkrisen und Agrarkonjunktur in Mittel Europa vom 13 bis zum 19 Jahrhundert (Berlin, 1935; new eds. 1966, 1978), English translation by Olive Ordish as Agricultural Fluctuations in Europe (London, 1980); an appendix includes data for prices of wheat and rye in silver for fourteen German localities from 1341 to 1935, and also price data for six European nations. The English edition has a forword and a second bibliography of English-language materials by Joan Thirsk.
Another continental work of high importance is Fernand P. Braudel and Frank Spooner, “Prices in Europe from 1450 to 1750,” The
Cambridge Economic History of Europe (Cambridge, 1967), 4:378–486. This major interpretative essay brings together much European data, drawn mostly from local studies listed below.
Latin America
In Latin America more than Europe, many publications with primary material are continental rather than national in scope. A brief but helpful survey is E. Florescano, “La historia de los precios en la época colonial de Hispanoamérica: Tendencias, métodos de trabajos y objetivos,” LatinoAmérica: Anuario de Estudios Latinamericanos (1968) 111–29.
In a class by itself is Ruggiero Romano, “Movimento de los precios y desarrollo económico: El caso de Sudamérica en el siglo XVIII,” Desarrollo Económico 3 (1963) 31–43; idem, “Mouvement de prix et développement économique: le cas de l’Amerique du Sud au XVIIIe siècle,” 2e Conference Internationale d’Histoire Économique, Aix-en-Provence, 1962 (The Hague, 1962) 2:141–53; idem, Historia colonial hispanio-americana e historia de los precios (Santiago, 1963); idem, “Some Considerations on the History of Prices in Colonial Latin America,” in Lyman L. Johnson and Enrique Tandeter, eds., Essays on the Price History of Eighteenth-Century Latin America (Albuquerque, 1990), 35–72. Romano argues a thesis that price trends in Latin America were the opposite of those in Europe (see appendix D).
Johnson and Tandeter include twelve essays, most of which take issue with Romano. A broad perspective also appears in Steven A. Mange, “Commodity Price Movements in the Andes and La Plata during the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries” (thesis, Chicago, 1988).
National Compilations: Argentina
Historical price series appear in Lyman L. Johnson, “The Price History of Buenos Aires during the Viceregal Period,” in Lyman L. Johnson and Enrique Tandeter, eds., Essays on the Price History of Eighteenth-Century Latin America (Albuquerque, 1990), 137–72; Juan Alvarez, Temas de historia económica Argentina (Buenos Aires, 1929); Direccion General de Estadistica, Precios unitarios dearticulos de consuma y servicios, capital federal y provincia, 1901–1963 (2 vols., Buenos Aires, 1964–65?)
Australia
Prices are included in in Jennifer A. S. Finlayson, Historical Statistics of Australia (Canberra, 1970). Still useful is Douglas B. Copland, Currency and Prices in Australia (Adelaide, 1921).
Austria
A. F. Pribram et al., Materielen zur Geschichte der Preise und Löhne in Osterreich (Vienna, 1938) is the leading collection of historical prices for Austria. It is based mainly on institutional prices. Other studies include Luschin von Ebengreuth, Vorschlage und Erfordernisse für eine Geschichte der Preise und Löhne in Osterreich (Vienna, 1874); K. T. Inama-Sternegg, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Preise (Vienna, 1873); idem, “Die Quellen der historischen Preisstatistik,” Statistiche Monatschriften 12 (1886); Alois Gehart, Statistik in Osterreich, 1918–1938: Eine Bibliographie (Vienna, 1984). Price records for Austria-Hungary were also published by B. Von Jankovich in Bulletin de l’Institut Internationale de Statistique 19 (1911).
Belgium: General Studies
H. van Houtte, Documents pour servir à une histoire des prix de 1381 à 1794 (Brussels, 1902) was a pathbreaking effort.
The inquiries of the second generation yielded M. Peeters, “Les prix et les rendements de l’agriculture belge de 1791 à 1935,” Bulletin des Sciences Économiques de Louvain (1936) 22–48; F. Michelotte, “L’évolution des prix de détail en Belgique de 1830 à 1913,” Bulletin de l’nstitute de Recherche Economique (Louvain, 1937); and François Loots, “Les mouvements fondamentaux des prix en gros en Belgique de 1822 à 1913,” Bulletin de l’nstitut des Sciences économiques 8 (1936) 23–47.
Postwar studies include P. Schöller, “La transformation économique de la Belgique de 1832 à 1844,” Bulletin de l’nstitute de Recherche Économique (Louvain, 1948) and, for the price revolution of the sixteenth century, C. Verlinden, J. Craeybeckx, and J. Scholliers, “Mouvements des prix et salaires en Belgique au XVIe siècle,” Annales E.S.C. 10 (1955) 173–98. Cahiers d’histoire des prix (Louvain, published by the Inter-University Center for the History of Prices and Wages in Belgium, 1956–58) includes bibliographical materials.
Belgium: Local Studies
[Antwerp] E. Scholliers, Loon arbied en Honger de Levensstandaard in de XVe en XVIe eeuw te Antwerpen (Antwerp, 1960).
[Antwerp] H. Van der Wee, The Growth of the Antwerp Market and the European Economy (3 vols., Louvain, 1963); idem, “Prices and Wages as Development Variables: a Comparison between England and the Southern Netherlands, 1400–1700,” Acta Historiae Neerlandicae 10 (1978).
[Brabant] C. Verlinden et al., “Dokumenten voor de Geschiedenis van Prijzen en Lonen in Vlaandaeren en Brabant (XVe-XVIIIe eeuw)” (4 vols. in 5, Bruges, 1959–73); idem, Documents pour l’histoire des prix et salaires (XIVe-XIXe siècles) (Bruges, 1965).
[Brabant] M.-J. Tits-Dieuaide, La formation des prix céréaliers en Brabant et en Flandre au XVe siècle (Brussels, 1975).
[Namur] L. Genicot, “Les prix du froment à Namur de 1773 à 1840,” Annales de la Societé Archéologique de Namur 43 (1938–39) 129.
[Namur, etc.] J. Ruwet et al., Marché des ceréales à Ruremonde, Luxembourg, Namur et Diest aux XVIIIe et XVIIIe siècles (Louvain, 1966).
J. Ruwet, L’agriculture et les classes rurales au pays Herve sous l’ancien régime (Liége, 1943).
Bolivia
Enrique Tandeter and Nathan Wachtel, “Prices and Agricultural Production: Potosí and Charcas in the Eighteenth Century,” in Lyman L. Johnson and Enrique Tandeter, eds., Essays on the Price History of Eighteenth-Century Latin America (Albuquerque, 1995), 201–76.
Brooke Larson, “Rural Rhythms of Class Conflict in Eighteenth-Century Cochabamba,” in Lyman L. Johnson and Enrique Tandeter, Essays on the Price History of Eighteenth-Century Latin America (Albuquerque, 1990), 277–308.
José Maria Dalence, Bosquejo estadístico de Bolivia (Chuquisaca, 1851).
W. L. Schurz, Bolivia: A Commercial and Industrial Handbook (Washington, 1921).
United Nations Economic Commission, El desarrollo económico de Bolivia (Mexico, 1957), includes data from the 1920s to the 1950s.
Cornelius H. Zondag, The Bolivian Economy (New York, 1966) publishes data for the period 1952–65.
Brazil
Dauril Alden, “Price Movements in Brazil before, during, and after the Gold Boom, with Special Reference to the Salvador Market [circa 1670–1769],” in Lyman L. Johnson and Enrique Tandeter, eds., Essays on the Price History of Eighteenth-Century Latin America (Albuquerque, 1990), 335–72.
H. Johnson Jr., “A Preliminary Inquiry into Money, Prices, and Wages in Rio de Janeiro, 1763–1823,” in Dauril Alden, ed., Colonial Roots of Modern Brazil; Papers of the Newberry Library Conference (Berkeley, 1973), 230–83.
Katia M. de Queiros Mattoso, “Conjoncture et société au Brésil à la fin de XVIIIe siècle. Prix et salaire à la veille de revolution de alfaiates, Bahia, 1798,” Cahiers des Ameriques Latines 5 (1970) 3–53.
Mirceu Buescu, 300 anos de inflaçâo (Rio de Janeiro, 1973).
Armin K. Ludwig, Brazil: A Handbook of Historical Statistics (Boston, 1985).
Canada
F. Ouellet and J. Hamelin, “Le mouvement des prix agricoles dans la province de Quebec (1760–1815),” n.p., n.d.; idem, “La crise agricole dans le Bas-Canada,” Études Rurales 7 (1962) 36–57.
H. Michel et al., Statistical Contributions to Canadian Economic History (2 vols., Toronto, 1931), includes statistics on banking, foreign trade, and prices.
M. C. Urquhart and Kenneth A. Buckley, Historical Statistics of Canada (Toronto, 1965).
F. H. Leacy, ed., Historical Statistics of Canada (Ottawa, 1983).
Newfoundland Statistics Agency, Historical Statistics of Newfoundland and Labrador (St. Johns, 1970).
Chile
Ruggiero Romano, “Une économie coloniale: le Chili au XVIIIe siècle,” Annales E.S.C. 15 (1960) 259–85; idem, “Historia colonial hispanoAmericana e historia de los precios,” in Tres lecciones inaugurales (Santiago de Chile
, 1963).
José Manuel Larraín, “Gross National Product and Prices: The Chilean Case in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,” in Lyman L. Johnson and Enrique Tandeter, eds., Essays on the Price History of Eighteenth-Century Latin America (Albuquerque, 1990), 109–136; idem, “Movimento de precios en Santiago de Chile, 1749–1808,” Jahrbuch für Geschichte von Staatwirtschaft und Gesellschaft Latinamerikas 17 (1980) 199–259.
Armando de Ramón and José Manuel Larraín, Origines de la vida económica chilena, (Santiago, 1982), includes price series from 1659 to 1808.
Marcello Carmagnani, Les mecanismes de la vie économique dans une societé coloniale: Le Chile (Paris, 1973), with much statistical data for the period 1680–1830; idem, El salariado minero en Chile colonial: au desarrollo en una sociedad provincial: el Norte Chico, 1690–1800 (Santiago de Chile, 1963).
Markos J. Mamalakis, Historical Statistics of Chile (5 vols, to date, Westport, Conn., 1978–85+), includes prices from 1860 to 1982.
China
Period-specific price histories with primary data from the fourteenth to the twentieth centuries include:
Ch’uan Han-sheng, “Sung-Ming chien pai-yin kou-mai-li ti pien-tung chi ch’i yuan-yin” [Fluctuations in the purchasing power of silver and their cause from the Sung to the Ming dynasties] Hsin-ya-hseuh-pao [New Asian Journal] 8 (1967) 157–86, with a summary in English.
M. Cartier, “Notes sur l’histoire des prix en Chine du XIVe au XVIIe siècle,” [1368–1644] Annales E. S. C. 24 (1969) 1876–89; idem, “Les importations de metaux monetaires en Chine: Essai sur la conjoncture chinoise,” ibid. 36 (1981) 454–66.
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