Early Modern Overseas Trade and Entrepreneurship

This book is about the development of seventeenth-century northern European overseas business through the perspective of individuals. At the core of the book, is the way individuals acted in the overseas business, especially in connection to the Nordic trading companies.

Drawing on an impressive range of archival material, this monograph delves into the careers of two businessmen who worked for Nordic chartered monopoly trading companies to illuminate individual entrepreneurship in the context of seventeenth-century long-distance trade.The study spans the Caribbean to the Indian Ocean, examining global entanglements through personal interactions and daily trading activities between Europeans, Asian merchants and African brokers. It makes an important contribution to our understanding of the role of individuals and their networks within the great European trading companies of the early modern period.This unique book will be of interest to advanced students and researchers of economic history, business history, early modern global history and entrepreneurship.

Inhalt

1. Introduction

2. Formative Years of Overseas Entrepreneurship and Nordic Overseas Trade

3. Entrepreneurship in the Company

4. The Vulnerability of Being Connected

5. Knowledge and Overseas Business

6. The Sea Was a Violent Place to Work

7. Conclusion

8. Sources and Bibliography Index