the world of private banking
the world of private banking
the world of private banking
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CHAPTER 13<br />
Protestant Banking<br />
Martin Körner †<br />
The previous chapter has addressed Jewish <strong>private</strong> banks. This chapter will address<br />
Protestant banks. The explicit choice <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> two groups mentioned implies a special<br />
sense given here to <strong>the</strong> term ‘minority.’ It is <strong>the</strong> affiliation to a distinct religious or<br />
confessional minority that makes <strong>the</strong>ir exploration attractive and interesting. But<br />
regarding <strong>the</strong>se two particular minority groups, I would say that <strong>the</strong> second cannot<br />
easily be compared with <strong>the</strong> first.<br />
It seems undisputed that Jews were a minority in all <strong>the</strong> countries where <strong>the</strong>y<br />
lived during <strong>the</strong> medieval age and all over early modern and modern Europe.<br />
The case <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> Protestants is not so clear. In Lu<strong>the</strong>ran and Calvinist countries,<br />
Protestants undoubtedly became <strong>the</strong> majority during <strong>the</strong> sixteenth century and<br />
even kept <strong>the</strong> position <strong>of</strong> an exclusive confessional group until <strong>the</strong> end <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong><br />
Ancien Régime. As regards economic activity, we may say that in most Protestant<br />
countries <strong>the</strong>re is no knowledge <strong>of</strong> Roman Catholic <strong>private</strong> bankers’ activities.<br />
At least with regard to Switzerland, we do not find any <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>m in <strong>the</strong> Protestant<br />
towns <strong>of</strong> Basel, Geneva, Bern or Zurich from <strong>the</strong> sixteenth to <strong>the</strong> end <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong><br />
eighteenth century. <br />
With regard to <strong>the</strong> definition <strong>of</strong> <strong>private</strong> <strong>banking</strong> I wish in my chapter to discuss<br />
<strong>the</strong> various forms <strong>of</strong> <strong>banking</strong> as generally related in <strong>the</strong> historiography <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong><br />
subject: merchant bankers, investment bankers, financiers. The important thing is<br />
that during <strong>the</strong> whole early modern period bankers were generally merchants too,<br />
and had at <strong>the</strong>ir disposal an international network for payment and capital transfer<br />
as well as being able to export <strong>the</strong> sums entrusted to <strong>the</strong>m by <strong>the</strong>ir clients and place<br />
<strong>the</strong>m at interest in public loans, industrial and colonial investments. In addition<br />
to this, we should do well to remember that <strong>the</strong>se special aspects <strong>of</strong> <strong>banking</strong> must<br />
be seen as an almost exclusively urban phenomenon. First <strong>of</strong> all, we shall answer<br />
<br />
J.-F. Bergier, Wirtschaftsgeschichte der Schweiz von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart<br />
(Zurich, 1983, 1990), pp. 329–33.<br />
<br />
J.-F. Bergier, ‘Le dynamisme de la banque privée (VIIe–XIXe siècles)’, in A. Vannini<br />
Marx (ed.), Credito, banche e investimenti, secoli XIII–XX (Florence, 1985). For general and<br />
specific information on economic history with regard to this chapter, see also P. Léon (ed.),<br />
Histoire économique et sociale du monde, vols I–IV (Paris, 1977–8); F. Vittingh<strong>of</strong>f et al.<br />
(eds), Handbuch der europäischen Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte, vol. 3–4 (Frankfurt,<br />
1986, 1993); L.H. Mottet, Geschichte der Schweizer Banken: Bankier-Persönlichkeiten aus<br />
fünf Jahrhunderten (Zurich, 1987); A.-M. Piuz et al. (eds), L’Economie genevoise de la<br />
Réforme à la fin de l’Ancien Régime, XVIe–XVIIIe siècles (Geneva, 1990).