KINGS CONCENTRATE WEALTH, THEN MAKE IT CIRCULATE

THEY CONTROL COMMERCE
AND DISTRIBUTE ITS GAINS 

• In 13th-century Afghanistan

Marco Polo negociates rubies with a king,

but he avoids a "wild" place 

where he cannot trade
because there is no ruler

Internet, no source named
-- The voyage of Marco Polo by V. Chklovski, n.d.

• In 19th century Africa...

Ashanti king, Internet, photographer not named

Showing wealth, an aspect of royalty

° The Ashanti suzerain (Ghana) uses weights that are one-third heavier than others and declares that only kings or men of high rank deal with commerce, "as I do." 

° The Mossi ruler (Burkina Faso) has a monopoly. 

° The wives of the Yoruba king (southern Nigeria) wrap their wares in a cloth that lets them be housed and avoid tolls...

-- -- Aubin 445 ; references and a page of examples, n. 42

• In 17th-century France,

the same system on a much larger scale

Louis XIV grants their privileges to the East India Company, 1664, India Company Museum, town of Lorient

Colbert presents members of the Royal Academy of  Sciences to Louis XIV by Henri Testelin, 1667, chateau of Versailles

• Royal control is much more extensive

than usually said:

These details are examples of
clues slipping into accounts

without further comment 

° Monarchs set up state monopolies: Catherine de Medicis initiates silk production a century before Louis IV establishes the famous production of mirrors and tapestries (and more).

° The independent search is under the king's control, indirect (through the guilds) or direct (Louis XIV gives Madame de Montespan, a favorite, three pirate ships to raid the Levant). 

-- ° The king's way: by Françoise Chandeneggor, 1981, 294

But Nicolas Fouquet makes his Brittany fortress a center of Atlantic commerce without informing Louis XIV, hastening his fall. 

° Fouquet's project described:

 Fouquet's trial by Simone Bertière, 2013, 103 (in French)

• Suzerains distribute the wealth

to retain or gain supporters

and maintain the balance between clans,
practices that keep it from being invested 

Thirteenth-century Roman fresco, Internet, source not named

• Such distribution -- or its absence --

can indicate stability or change

° When an Anglo-Saxon chief is called "ring-giver" he is behaving as expected, and his society is probably cohesive.

° When the formula "The Pharaoh gave this" suddenly appears in Egyptian tombs, it may show that he seizes and distributes wealth, which suggests a growing economy. 

° France's Henri IV establishes a much more powerful kingship and amasses treasure at the same time (toward 1600). 

° "The queen is too kind..." is nobles' formula of thanks when Henri's widow, Marie de Médicis, shores up the start of her regency by distributing that treasure. Later she gives royal income to a favori, a sign of growing power. 

"Greedy" kings do not redistribute.

Mention of them usually means that 
their power expands. 

*     *     *

Next,

African kings, prestige and constraint