Commerce and history

A friend of mine is trying to create a graphic history of the world. I have told him that all history is a creation from the present. I am not trying to make a Buddhist point. I am looking at the many histories I have encountered. They are all projections of current world views onto the past.

The present is always shaped by the histories we believe in.  The recent Norwegian bomber, Andrew Berwick, (his English name) spent most of his 1600 page declaration writing his view of the history of Europe and Islam.

When I look at history, I see the growth of commerce as the most significant human accomplishment.

In my view, the elements that make up the history of commerce, come from the Dutch Republic in the late 1590s and carry forward for the next century. That was the great primary source of modern commerce.

During that period, the bond and stock markets were invented, along with taxation systems run by civil servants.  I see the creation of modern technology based on the intellectual structures of the the Spinoza enlightenment and the explosion of publications from the Netherlands. (Source Jonathan Israel).

I also see the creation of most Democratic ideas in this era and I see it transmitted to the world from this tiny nation by its conquest of the seas and its conquest of England in 1688.