Topics / Forgotten Fortunes
Currencies & Inflation
Coinage debasements, hyperinflations, currency pegs, and the monetary regimes that determine what money is worth.
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The 1609 Founding of the Bank of Amsterdam and the Birth of the Bankgulden
Amsterdam founded its exchange bank in 1609 to make payments more reliable amid inconsistent coinage. Bank money and the agio helped transform European trade…
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Owls, Plated Coppers, and Public Testers: Monetary Enforcement in Classical Athens
Classical Athens struggled to keep its coins trusted across a trading network. Emergency money and public coin testers reveal how a city tried to…
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Solon’s Seisachtheia, the Wappenmünzen, and the 483 BCE Laurion Silver Strike
Debt reform, early coinage and silver mining helped transform ancient Athens. Solon’s measures and the Laurion windfall show how public finance influenced the city’s…
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India’s 1991 Gold Airlift, Flexible Inflation Targeting, and the 2016 Demonetization
India pledged gold during its 1991 payments crisis, later adopted an inflation-targeting framework and withdrew high-value banknotes in 2016. The policies had very different…
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Erasing Six Zeros: Türkiye’s Chronic Inflation and the 2005 New Turkish Lira Reform
Decades of high inflation made the Turkish lira’s numbers unwieldy. After the 2001 crisis and monetary reforms, Türkiye removed six zeros from its currency…
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The ‘Hard Drachma’ Policy, the 1998 ERM Devaluation, and Greece’s Euro Entry
Greece used an exchange-rate anchor and painful adjustments to bring inflation down before adopting the euro. The hard-drachma years show how demanding that transition…
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The 1923 Rentenmark Miracle and Hjalmar Schacht’s Mefo Bills
Germany stabilized its shattered currency with the Rentenmark in 1923. A decade later, hidden Mefo bills helped finance rearmament—two very different uses of financial…
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From the 1960 Nouveau Franc to Mitterrand’s 1983 Austerity Turn
France replaced 100 old francs with one new franc in 1960. Two decades later, a fresh currency crisis forced Mitterrand to choose between economic…
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What Is Economic History? How Money Changed the World
Discover what economic history is, how money and banking shaped societies, and why historical financial crises still matter today.
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Bretton Woods 1944: The Keynes–White Rivalry That Built the Postwar Monetary Order
In July 1944, 730 delegates from 44 nations met at Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, where the competing designs of John Maynard Keynes and Harry…
