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Urban Achievement in Early Modern Europe

Golden Ages in Antwerp, Amsterdam and London

Patrick Obrien editor Derek Keene editor Herman van der Wee editor Marjolein 't Hart editor

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Cambridge University Press

Published:12th Apr '01

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Urban Achievement in Early Modern Europe cover

Comparative urban history examines early modern economic and cultural achievements in Antwerp, Amsterdam, and London.

This work in comparative urban history explores why outstanding achievements in material and intellectual culture in early modern Europe tended to cluster in certain maritime cities. Eighteen distinguished historians have collaborated to compare economic, architectural, artistic, publishing, and scientific achievements in Antwerp, Amsterdam and London during their golden ages.This innovative work in comparative urban history explores why outstanding achievements in material and intellectual culture in early modern Europe tended to cluster in certain maritime cities. Patrick O'Brien and his co-editors have assembled a team of eighteen distinguished historians from Belgium, the Netherlands, Britain and North America, who have collaborated to make detailed comparisons of economic, architectural, artistic, publishing and scientific achievements in three renowned mercantile and imperial cities during their golden ages: Antwerp (c. 1492–1585), Amsterdam (c. 1585–1659) and London (c. 1660–1730). The book examines growth and fluctuations in the fortunes of all three cities in the context of broader trends in the growing urbanization of Europe's populations, cultures, societies and economies. The study is located in the histories of politics, warfare and culture in early modern Europe and offers fascinating insights to scholars and students of economic, social and cultural history.

"...[an] useful and interesting book of essays that are, in their own right, uniformly knowledgeable, clearly written and eminently readable. There is a great deal here to admire and savor..." Bryn Mawr Review of Comparative Literature
"All of the essays are...useful to general audiences, as well as to specialists in the sub-field of early modern urban history." Journal of Interdisciplinary History
"...a superb overview of current work on early modern cultural history." Christopher P. Heuer, Historians of Netherlandish Art
"This is a good book where the individual chapters all manifest high quality scholarship and the overall realization is successful." American Historical Review
"This collection of essays presents some of the best current scholarship on each of the three cities during the early modern period, and is crucial reading for both specialists and for those interested in a comparative urban history in a more general sense." Sixteenth Century Journal
"...well thought-out and finely executed volume...this is an unusually rich and thought-provoking collection of essays, and will doubtless prove of interest to an exceptionally wide range of readers." Renaissance Quarterly
"This highly informative, well prepared, and coherent collection is recommended to all students of early modern business history. May it open up a new field of comparative golden-age studies." Business History Review
"[O'Brien] poses basic questions with refreshing openness, advances ideas but does not proscribe answers. His introduction is noteworthy for setting context and spinning ideas instead of merely summarizing papers...The authors of the fifteen essays are all experts who deliver important chapters." Journal of Modern History

ISBN: 9780521594080

Dimensions: 234mm x 159mm x 24mm

Weight: 767g

376 pages