ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces a comparative method to measure deep monetization levels (DMLs) across time and space. An initial overview of DMLs at the end of the nineteenth century is possible for several countries in the North Atlantic. Since the late Middle Ages, England, when it ceased to mint its own coins, had for many centuries apparently gotten accustomed to much lower DMLs than the continent. Building on earlier work on monetization intensities in India and on DMLs in the Low Countries, the chapter demonstrates that the DML concept is appropriate for the analysis of long-term trends in major parts of Eurasia. It offers a provisional overview of the available evidence on the emergence of and fluctuations in deep monetization in some important parts of Eurasia. Interestingly, the chronology, which was rather similar between western and southern Eurasia, is different in China.
