Named an Outstanding Academic Book of 1989-1990 by Choice

"Not only offers a wide-ranging synthesis but also stimulates further inquiries and debates. For both reasons it constitutes a superior achievement."--Journal of Modern History

"A persuasive corrective to earlier interpretations."--American Historical Review

"This is a very useful and judiciously written book, in which the author, a recognized authority on early Dutch history, places his own findings within the context of ongoing debate on Dutch commercial activity. He has refined and modified conclusions drawn previously by Braudel and Immanuel Wallerstein about the role of the Dutch in the overall seventeenth- and eighteenth-century world economy, and has made a genuinely important contribution to our knowledge and understanding of the economic history of the Early Modern world."--The International History Review

"Jonathan Israel has written a masterful book and has provided us with the best summary of seventeenth-century Dutch trade to date. The book is full of illustratyions and tables on particular branches of the trade."--Hispanic American Historical Review

"This volume is essential reading for specialists and for anyone who wants an up-to-date analysis of the essential place of the Netherands in the development of world capitalism in the early modern period."--Journal of World History