Making Merchants: The Cultural Construction of a Merchant Class in Early Modern Germany

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Martha C. Howell (Columbia University)

Making Merchants

The Cultural Construction of a Merchant Class in Early Modern Germany

Martha C. Howell (Columbia University)

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English

Cambridge University Press
01 November 2025

History; European history; Early history: c 500 to c 1450&1500; Social & cultural history; Economic systems & structures; Economic history

Using a rare collection of personal narratives written by successful merchants in early modern German-speaking Europe, this study examines how such men understood their role in commerce and in society more generally. As they told it, their honor was based not just on riches won in long-distance trade but, more fundamentally, on their comportment both in and outside the marketplace. As these men described their experiences as husbands and fathers, as civic leaders, as men who “lived nobly,” or as practitioners of their faith, they did not, however, seek to obscure their role as merchants. Rather, they built on it to construct a class identity that allowed them entry into the period's moral economy. Martha C. Howell not only disrupts linear histories of capitalism and modernity, she demonstrates how the model of mercantile honor these merchants fashioned would live beyond the early modern centuries, providing later capitalists with a narrative about their own self-worth.

By: Martha C. Howell (Columbia University)
Imprint: Cambridge University Press
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Weight: 364g
ISBN: 9781009647687
ISBN 10: 1009647687
Pages: 280
Publication Date: 01 November 2025
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming

Martha C. Howell is Miriam Champion Emerita Professor of History at Columbia University. She specializes in the late medieval and early modern history of Germany, the Low Countries, and France. Previous publications include Commerce before Capitalism in Europe, 1300–1600 (Cambridge, 2010).