Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/225508 
Year of Publication: 
2020
Series/Report no.: 
eabh Papers No. 20-03
Publisher: 
The European Association for Banking and Financial History (EABH), Frankfurt a. M.
Abstract: 
From its foundation as a private corporation in 1694 the Bank of England extended large amounts of credit to support the British private economy and to support an increasingly centralized British state. The Bank helped the British state reach a position of geopolitical and economic hegemony in the international economic order. In this paper, we deploy recalibrated financial data to analyse an evolving trajectory of connections between the British economy, the state, and the Bank of England. We show how these connections contributed to form an effective and efficient fiscal-naval state and promoted the development of a system of financial intermediation for the economy. This symbiotic relationship became stronger after 1793. The evidence that we consider here shows that although the Bank was nominally a private institution and profits were paid to its shareholders, it was playing a public role well before Bagehot's doctrine.
Subjects: 
Bank of England
State-building institutions
National defence
JEL: 
H41
N13
N23
N43
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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