Money, Power, and Influence in Eighteenth-Century Lithuania

It has often been claimed that Jews have a penchant for capitalism and capitalist economic activity. With this book, Adam Teller challenges that assumption. Examining how Jews achieved their extraordinary success within the late feudal economy of the eighteenth-century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, he shows that economic success did not necessarily come through any innate entrepreneurial skills, but through identifying and exploiting economic niches in the pre-modern economy—in particular, the monopoly on the sale of grain alcohol.Jewish economic activity was a key factor in the development of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and it greatly enhanced the incomes, and thereby the social and political status, of the noble magnates, including the powerful Radziwiłł family. In turn, with the magnate's backing, Jews were able to leverage their own economic success into high status in estate society. Over time, relations within Jewish society began to change, putting less value on learning and pedigree and more on wealth and connections with the estate owners. This groundbreaking book exemplifies how the study of Jewish economic history can shed light on a crucial mechanism of Jewish social integration. In the Polish-Lithuanian setting, Jews were simultaneously a despised religious minority and key economic players, with a consequent standing that few could afford to ignore.

"Likely to become the next standard work on early modern Polish Jewish history, Money, Power, and Influence is breathtaking in its coverage and detail, and grounded in a rich array of Polish archival and inner Jewish sources. It is mandatory reading for anyone wishing to understand the noble-Jewish economic symbiosis that underwrote the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Teller shows us how the whole system worked.", "This exceptionally important book reveals the inner workings of the early modern Lithuanian seigneurial economy in which Jews came to play a vital role. Based on deep archival research and written with great conceptual clarity, Money, Power, and Influence is one of the finest studies ever written about the dynamics involved in Jews' integration into a particular economic system.", "Teller's study is an addition to the economic history of Polish Jews. However, it is also an exceptional analysis of 'an estate'—a type of enterprise which constituted the agrarian economy of the late Commonwealth....The story of the Radziwiłł Jews is also the story of the rise of the 'ethnic-controlled economy', particularly in towns. Living in dispersed small towns, Jews replaced the non-existent urban start of Polish society and became important agents of gradual modernization. Thus, Teller's book shows that Jews happened to be successful not only in the capitalist world, but also in feudal, rural society, and this is what makes his study of particular importance.", "Teller eschews hasty generalization, focusing his attention tightly on Lithuania in the first two-thirds of the eighteenth century, and even more specifically on one large estate....Steeped in the extensive Radziwiłł archive and supplemented by the few surviving local Jewish community records form the period, as well as some memoirs and rabbinic literature, this meticulous case study offers a rich insight into the forces that shaped cross-cultural relations in the demographic heartland of European Jewry.", "Teller's Money, Power, and Influence is an important addition to existing studies on Jews in early modern Poland. It sheds a new light on the political and economic transformations of the state and raises further compelling questions not just about the "Jewish" part of the story but also about the larger contexts."

Adam Teller is Professor of History and Judaic Studies at Brown University.