Private Enterprise and the China Trade : Merchants and Markets in Europe, 1700-1750 / Meike von Brescius.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Acknowledgements -- List of Figures and Tables -- Introduction: Contextualising the Early China Trade in Europe -- 1 Commercial Polymaths: Supercargoes and Interlopers in the China Trade -- 2 Trading Conditions in Canton -- 3 Private Trade and Monopoly Structures: A Network Perspective -- 4 The Archives of Private Trade: How to Assess the (In)visible -- 5 Source Material -- 6 Structure of the Study -- 1 British Interlopers in the Canton Trade  A Group Portrait -- 1 Charles Irvine: Canton Supercargo, Wholesale Trader, Family Patron -- 2 Irvine's Wider Network -- 3 Ways into the China Trade -- 4 New Companies and old India Traders: The Demise of the Ostend and the Rise of the Swedish East India Company -- 4.1 Britons Abroad, Interlopers at Home: Transnational Careers in the Making -- 5 Flexible Citizens: Nomads of the Canton Trade -- 2 Forging Markets  The European Re-Export Trade in Chinese Goods -- 1 Private Trade: Regulations and Realities -- 2 The Companies' Profits from Private Trade -- 3 Public Sales, Private Agreements -- 4 The Re-Export Trade -- 3 Treasures in the Cabin  Chinese Export Wares and the Special Commissions Trade -- 1 Chinese Export Wares and the Market for Private Commissions -- 2 Typology of Commissioners in the China Trade -- 3 Families and Consumers Associated with the East India Companies -- 4 Commanders and Supercargoes as Consumers, Suppliers and Entrepreneurs -- 5 Designs Made for Maritime Mobility -- 6 Making Room for Private Trade -- 4 European Geographies of Private Trade  Cadiz as a Cross-Company Hub -- 2 Port Cities, Merchant Communities and the Study of Networks -- 3 The Vanguards -- 4 Flows of Silver from a Network Perspective -- 5 The Cadiz Merchant Community and the China Trade -- 6 Cadiz as an entrepôt -- 7 Company Recruitments and Passenger Traffic to China -- 8 Financing the Private Trade -- 9 Sea Loans and the Cross-Company Money Market -- 10 Entangled cities of the China trade: Cadiz, Antwerp and Amsterdam -- Conclusion -- Bibliography -- Index.

This book examines the European commercial landscape of the early China trade, c.1700-1750. It looks at the foundational period of Sino-European commerce and explores a world of private enterprise beneath the surface of the official East India Company structures. Using rich private trade records, it analyses the making of pan-European markets, distribution networks and patterns of investment that together reveal a new geography of a trading system previously studied mostly at Canton. By considering the interloping activities of British-born merchants working for the smaller East India Companies, the book uncovers the commercial practices and cross-Company collaborations, both legal and illicit, that sustained the growth of the China trade: smuggling, wholesale trading, private commissions and the manipulation of Company auctions.

Description based on print version record.