Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The United Kingdom did not seek to adopt the euro as its official currency for the duration of its membership of the European Union (EU), and secured an opt-out at the euro's creation via the Maastricht Treaty in 1992, wherein the Bank of England would only be a member of the European System of Central Banks. United Kingdom opinion polls showed ...
Norman institutions, including serfdom, were superimposed on an existing system of open fields and mature, well-established towns involved in international trade. [2] Over the five centuries of the Middle Ages, the English economy would at first grow and then suffer an acute crisis, resulting in significant political and economic change.
The economics of English towns and trade in the Middle Ages is the economic history of English towns and trade from the Norman invasion in 1066, to the death of Henry VII in 1509. Although England's economy was fundamentally agricultural throughout the period, even before the invasion the market economy was important to producers.
Britain was a top importer of foodstuffs, raw materials, and finished goods, much of which were re-exported to Europe or the United States. [110] In 1880 Britain purchased about half the world total in traded tea, coffee, and wheat, and just under half of the world's meat exports. [111]
The kingdom of Wessex, which eventually laid claim to England as a whole, evolved a centralised royal administration. One part of this was the king's council, the witenagemot, comprising the senior clergy, ealdormen, and some of the more important thegns; the council met to advise the king on policy and legal issues. [81]
A triangular trade occurred in this period: between Africa, North and South America, and Europe; and it worked in the following way: Slaves came from Africa, and went to the Americas; raw materials came from the Americas and went to Europe; from there, finished goods came from Europe and were sold back to the Americas at a much higher price.
Trade flourished in Italy (albeit not united, but rather ruled by different princes in different city-states), particularly by the 13th century. Leading the trade in Mediterranean Europe were traders from the port cities of Genoa and Venice. The wealth generated in Italy fueled the Italian Renaissance. Main trading routes of the Hanseatic League
The United Kingdom's failed applications to join the European Communities (EC) in 1963 and 1967 were vetoed by the president of France, Charles de Gaulle, who said that "a number of aspects of Britain's economy, from working practices to agriculture" had "made Britain incompatible with Europe" and that Britain harboured a "deep-seated hostility ...