House of Rothschild: The World's Banker 1848-1999 [Hardcover]

Niall Ferguson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 1999

"A great biography..." --Time

"Absorbing....Their enthralling story has been told before, but never in such authoritative detail." --The New York Times Book Review

Formidable...rich and compelling...a feast," said The Wall Street Journal of Niall Ferguson's House of Rothschild: Money's Prophets, the first volume in his myth-shattering chronicle of the legendary, secretive Rothschild banking dynasty. Business Week, admiring its "fluid, masterful synthesis," named it one of the best business books of 1998.

Now, with all the depth, clarity, and drama with which he traced their ascent, Ferguson--the first historian with access to the long-lost Rothschild archives--captures in House of Rothschild: The World's Banker this far-flung family at the zenith of its power: its intricate relationships, and its unparalleled business finesse in the most unstable of times. Until the eve of the First World War they wielded power greater than that of any bank today. The root of their decline--failure to establish a sixth house in the new world financial center of New York--is pinpointed in this dynamic conclusion.

"This is a major achievement of historical scholarship and historical imagination. Ferguson's work reaffirms one's faith in the possibility of great historical writing." --Fritz Stern

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Continuing the sweeping narrative that he began with The House of Rothschild: Money's Prophets, 1798-1848, Oxford University historian Niall Ferguson conjures up a world in which widespread change and utter uncertainty held sway in the place of carefully ordered dynasties and universally observed mores. In the aftermath of the Napoleonic revolution, European Jews had been able to move within dominant societies somewhat more freely. Of no family was this more true than the Rothschilds, whose branches lived in Germany, France, Austria, and England, and whose vast financial empire enabled them to act as diplomats and power brokers throughout the world. Their influence was enormous. When Spain wanted to build a railroad, its ministers approached the House of Rothschild. When the Confederate States of America sought to be recognized by the states of Europe, it sought--unsuccessfully--the Rothschilds' support. When Ferdinand de Lesseps broke ground for the Panama Canal and Cecil Rhodes broke ground for his vast diamond and gold mines in South Africa, Rothschild funds backed them.

Until the 1920s, Ferguson demonstrates, there was almost no economic, technological, or political development in Europe in which the House of Rothschild did not play some role. The rise of nationalist and national socialist movements and of official anti-Semitism, coupled with the rise in the Jazz Age of a new generation of Rothschilds that cared more for the good life than for the hard work of maintaining their holdings, led to a substantial decline in the family's authority and wealth. But even today, as Ferguson writes in this richly detailed but eminently readable history, the Rothschilds figure in European finance, continuing a legacy that Ferguson's two volumes trace from the Middle Ages to the new millennium. --Gregory McNamee

From Publishers Weekly

Ferguson is not only publishing massive works of history at an astonishing rate; he is publishing well-written and controversial books. The Pity of War (Forecasts, Mar. 8) caused a stir by arguing that Britain bore the brunt of the blame for WWI. The completion of his two-volume history of the Rothschild banking empire begins at a high point of wealth, power and civic involvement, with Benjamin Disraeli a close family friend and Lionel Rothschild playing a leading role in gaining Jews the right to sit in Parliament. The book ends with the post-WWII rebuilding of the Rothschilds into a far-flung "mini-multinational." Drawing on thousands of letters from private Rothschild archives, Ferguson does a masterful job of showing how the Rothschild financial empire interacted with the governments of Europe. His account is peppered with countless refutations of previous interpretations and analyses. Yet the larger historical picture is often blurred as Ferguson furnishes blow-by-blow accounts of, for example, the French Rothschilds' ultimately successful decades-long battle against the Cr?dit Mobilier. Readers will be left wanting more analysis of the larger sea change that consigned the Rothschild style of private banking to its current secondary status. And while he follows the senior partners in Britain and France (other houses, in Naples, Vienna and Frankfurt, either closed or simply receded from Ferguson's view), Ferguson sticks to their public deeds and roles, rarely venturing into the personal or the psychological. Still, this history is teeming with soundly argued expositions on the role of a singularly important family. Illus., charts, tables, appendices. (Nov.) FYI: In November, Penguin will publish The House of Rothschild: Money's Prophets 1798-1848 in paperback.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 608 pages
• Publisher: Viking Adult; First Edition edition (November 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670887943
• ISBN-13: 978-0670887941
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.3 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #339,803 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

36 of 41 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars un-dumbed down, October 18, 2000

By 

"buggerer" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The House of Rothschild: Volume 2: The World's Banker: 1849-1999 (Mass Market Paperback)

let me begin by saying that i am not in the habit of handing out five stars in my reviews, but this fine book certainly deserves it. i am not quite sure what to make of some of the criticisms leveled at this book in the reviews until now--too many facts, overly exhaustive, too much about continental finances or politics? can a definitive work of non-fiction have too many facts or be too exhaustive? what meaning do the rothschilds have if not in the context of continental politics. i loved every one of those three qualities about this book and, to boot, though it was appallingly well written as well. i found ferguson exhiliratingly (is this an adverb? it ought to be one) willing to assume that i could assimilate mass amounts of data, only sometimes arcane, and still want to follow a linear, only sometimes, social history--that's what definitive works are all about, i think. i applaud ferguson's not dumbing down history. and perhaps that is the difference between those who very much this book and those who didn't. i wanted to read history, and got it; others, perhaps, wanted to read a good yarn and didn't.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Rothschild the world's banker, August 23, 2006

By 

Albert Broder (Montrouge(Paris)France) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The House of Rothschild: Volume 2: The World's Banker: 1849-1999 (Mass Market Paperback)

A very complete book, a mine of facts but the author was unable to sort what is important from miscellaneous. The mix of general european history, business history and family events is by moments as indigestible as porridge por a non-scot.

11 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The House of Rothschild, July 24, 2003

By 

Harry Rosenberg (Arlington, VA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The House of Rothschild: Volume 2: The World's Banker: 1849-1999 (Mass Market Paperback)

Ferguson insults the purchaser of the Penguin Paperback by omitting the bibliography and only providing sketchy footnotes. "Serious scholars" who desire these items are advised to buy the Harcover edition. Other than that, it is a good read