Elite Violence and Elite Numeracy in Europe from 500 to 1900 CE: A Co-Evolution?

Joerg Baten
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Thomas Keywood

No 14013, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

Abstract: We develop a new indicator for elite numeracy in order to investigate trends in European elite numeracy since the 6th century CE and describe its co-evolution with elite violence over this period. During the early medieval period, Western Europe had no advantage over the east, but the development of relative violence levels changed this. After implementing an instrumental variable strategy and a battery of robustness tests, we find a substantial relationship and conclude that violence had a detrimental impact on human capital formation. The drastic increase in human capital since the High Middle Ages was at least partially due to declining violence.

Keywords: Elite human capital; Elite violence; Great divergence; Europe; Middle ages; Early modern period (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: N00 N13 N33 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019-09
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-gro and nep-his
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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