Modern History

Inspired by the world’s first major stock-market crash, the South Sea and Mississippi Bubbles, Het groote tafereel der dwaasheid (‘The Great Mirror of Folly’) was published in Amsterdam in late 1720. The book was a compilation of written and visual documents that had circulated during the ‘bubble’. In the present volume, 16 illustrated essays discuss aspects of the Tafereel and the light it sheds on finance and human folly; while a section of plates reproduces 69 of its original pages.

In this study, Weinstein considers the development of London's liberal political culture between the general election of 1832 and the establishment of the Metropolitan Board of Works in 1855. He offers a fresh interpretation of the city's political life, arguing that Whiggery was a potent force, exerting a 'powerful "negative influence" on the construction of early Victorian metropolitan radical identity'.