The merchants of Buenos Aires, 1778-1810 : family and commerce / Susan Migden Socolow.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Socolow, Susan Migden, 1941- author.

Series:

Cambridge Latin American studies ; 30.

Cambridge Latin American studies ; 30

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Merchants--Argentina--Buenos Aires--History.

Merchants.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xv, 253 pages) : digital, PDF file(s).

Place of Publication:

Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1978.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

By the end of the eighteenth century, Buenos Aires was one of the major commercial entrepots of the Spanish American empire. Chief among the beneficiaries of the new prosperity of the area were the wholesale merchants, a group of men who came to control the commerce of the entire Viceroyalty of Rio de la Plata. This study, a contribution to the fields of social history and group biography, looks at the formation of the merchant group, and at the social patterns which assured the merchants' primacy in the economic and social life of the colony. Origin, education, recruitment, group perpetuation and social mobility are treated in depth. The role of women and marriage in recruiting individual merchants into mercantile families and clans is a central issue. Professor Socolow also looks at the merchants' roles in commerce and society, lay religious institutions and local government. A biography of one merchant, Gaspar de Santa Coloma, provides a case study of the multiple roles of a porteno merchant.

Contents:

1. The merchant population; 2. Women, marriage and kinship; 3. Commerce and investment; 4. Life style; 5. Religious participation; 6. Political and social awareness; 7. Gaspar de Santa Coloma, merchant of Buenos Aires.

Notes:

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 05 Oct 2015).

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781139241618

1139241613

9780511759826

0511759827

Publisher Number:

2027/heb05121 hdl