External Trade

Abstract

Because it has long been an important source of revenue to governments, external trade provides more statistical material at an earlier date for most countries than does any other economic activity. Indeed some statistics go back to mediaeval times. These are all partial, however, for it was not until some of the rising nation-states of the seventeenth century began to see external trade as an instrument of policy that the statistics covered more than the goods on which duties could be conveniently levied. In any case, in all countries the customs duties were practically always ‘farmed’ until the late eighteenth century, though the central government took over in England as early as 1696.