Coastal and River Trade in Pre-Industrial England: The Bristol Region, 1680-1730

This is the first-ever book-length analysis of England's pre-industrial domestic trading economy, drawing on extensive quantitative data provided by the computerisation of Britain's Portbooks Programme . It is now recognised that internal trade, for too long overlooked by economic historians, provided a vital link in the organization of pre-industrial economics. This book sheds new light on the volume, nature, structure, and mechanisms of coastal and river trade. In addition, the extent to which Bristol acted as a "quasi-metropolis," influencing the direction and conduct of the internal trade of a geographically-extensive region, is exposed to a more critical analysis.