Includes bibliographical references (p. 359-394) and index.

The invention of interest : Sumerian loans / Marc van de Mieroop -- Roman shares / Ulrike Malmendier -- How business was conducted on the Chinese silk road during the Tang Dynasty, 618-907. Part 1. The resolution of an international dispute on the silk road ca. 670 / Valerie Hansen ; Part II. Records from a seventh-century pawnshop in China / Valerie Hansen and Ana Mata-Fink -- The origins of paper money in China / Richard von Glahn -- Paying in paper : a government voucher from the southern Song / William N. Goetzmann and Elisabeth Kèoll -- From tallies and chirographs to Franklin's printing press at Passy : the evolution of the technology of financial claims / William N. Goetzmann and Laura Williams -- Fibonacci and the financial revolution / William N. Goetzmann -- Bonds and governement debt in Italian city-states, 1250-1650 / Luciano Pezzolo -- Venture shares of the Dutch East India Company / Larry Neal -- Perpetuities in the stream of history : a paying instrument form the golden age of Dutch finance / William N. Goetzmann and K. Geert Rouwenhorst -- Amsterdam as the cradle of modern futures trading and options trading, 1550-1650 / Oscar Gelderblom and Joost Jonker -- Annuities in early modern Europe / James M. Poterba -- John Law : innovating theorist and policymaker / Antoin E. Murphy -- The invention of inflation-indexed bonds in early America / Robert J. Shiller -- The origins of mutual funds / K. Geert Rouwenhorst -- Transatlantic paper and the emergence of the American capital market / Ned W. Downing -- The origins of the New York stock exchange / Richard Sylla -- The first "Eurobonds" : the Rothschilds and the financing of the Holy Alliance, 1818-1822 / Niall Ferguson -- German debt in the twentieth century / Timothy W. Guinnane -- King Leopold's bonds / Robert Harms.