Artifacts of Capitalism artifact_mw14695 https://www.artifactsofcapitalism.org/index.php/Main_Page MediaWiki 1.44.0 first-letter Media Special Talk User User talk Artifacts of Capitalism Artifacts of Capitalism talk File File talk MediaWiki MediaWiki talk Template Template talk Help Help talk Category Category talk Form Form talk GeoJson GeoJson talk Data Data talk Module Module talk Draft Draft talk 0 1 2375 2374 2026-04-02T21:09:54Z Abrano 3 2375 wikitext text/x-wiki <!-- |Title=Main Page --> {{#seo: |title=Artifacts of Capitalism in the Pre-Modern World |description=An archive of early modern artifacts that illuminate how people experienced, represented, and resisted capitalism. |image=https://www.artifactsofcapitalism.org/images/artifacts-logo.svg |keywords=capitalism, early modern, economy, archives, history, artifacts, pre-modern, literature, objects |robots=index, follow }} __NOTOC__ {{DISPLAYTITLE:Artifacts of Capitalism in the Pre-Modern World}} {{#tag:html| <style> .firstHeading { display: none; } .homepage-copy { font-size: 1.4em; line-height: 1.7; max-width: 800px; margin: 0 auto; } .homepage-copy p { margin-bottom: 1em; } </style> <div style="text-align:center; margin-bottom:15px;"> <img src="/images/banner-2026.png" style="width:100%; max-width:900px; height:auto; border-bottom:3px solid #8c6b3f;"> </div> }} <div class="homepage-copy"> <div style="max-width:1100px; margin:0 auto; color:#000000;"> <div style="max-width:860px; margin:0 auto 24px auto; font-size:1.2em; line-height:1.75; text-align:center;"> This repository gathers texts and objects that reveal how pre-modern people understood work, exchange, obligation, risk, and material life. </div> <div style="display:flex; flex-wrap:wrap; gap:16px; margin:0 0 24px 0;"> <div style="flex:1 1 240px; background:#fbf7ee; border:1px solid #d8cfbf; border-top:4px solid #8c6b3f; border-radius:6px; padding:16px 18px; box-shadow:0 1px 2px rgba(60,42,19,0.08);"> <div style="font-size:1.08em; font-weight:bold; margin:0 0 8px 0;">Defining "artifact"</div> An artifact may be a husbandry manual, guild rule, personal letter, legal document, sermon, sextant, ship, calculator, or any other trace of economic experience. </div> <div style="flex:1 1 240px; background:#fbf7ee; border:1px solid #d8cfbf; border-top:4px solid #8c6b3f; border-radius:6px; padding:16px 18px; box-shadow:0 1px 2px rgba(60,42,19,0.08);"> <div style="font-size:1.08em; font-weight:bold; margin:0 0 8px 0;">Defining "capitalism"</div> Not as a fixed definition, but as a question. We begin with the archive itself and let the evidence reshape the language we use to describe early modern economic life. </div> <div style="flex:1 1 240px; background:#fbf7ee; border:1px solid #d8cfbf; border-top:4px solid #8c6b3f; border-radius:6px; padding:16px 18px; box-shadow:0 1px 2px rgba(60,42,19,0.08);"> <div style="font-size:1.08em; font-weight:bold; margin:0 0 8px 0;">Narrowing focus</div> The archive centers on Anglophone materials from 1500-1700 while also welcoming artifacts that illuminate wider networks, cross-border exchange, and global economic experience. </div> </div> <div style="max-width:860px; margin:0 auto 24px auto; line-height:1.8;"> <p>Our aim is not to locate a single origin story. It is to document how economic life was lived, imagined, and contested in the early modern world. In that sense, the project is phenomenological before it is definitional: it begins with experience, then asks what concepts can adequately describe what the archive shows.</p> <p>The archive may confirm the language of capitalism, complicate it, or point toward economic formations that do not fit modern categories at all. That openness is part of the method.</p> <p>As an open-source project, Artifacts of Capitalism invites scholars, students, and interested readers to contribute artifacts that help document the economic experience of pre-modern subjects.</p> </div> <div style="max-width:860px; margin:0 auto 30px auto; padding:16px 18px; background:#f7f1e4; border:1px solid #d4c5a9; border-radius:8px; text-align:center;"> <div style="font-size:0.88em; letter-spacing:0.08em; text-transform:uppercase; color:#6c5837; margin-bottom:6px;">Join the archive</div> <div style="margin-bottom:10px;">Browse the collection, read the featured entry, or submit an artifact of your own.</div> '''[[Browse_Artifacts|Browse the archive]]''' · '''[[Submit_an_Artifact|Submit an artifact]]''' · '''[[About_the_Project|About the project]]''' </div> == Featured Artifact == {{Featured Artifact}} == Newly Added Artifacts == {{Recent Artifacts|limit=6}} === Download Data === You can also export artifact data as a CSV file: {{#cargo_query: tables=Artifacts |fields=Title,Artifact_type,Creator_author,Date,Start_date,Period,City_and_country_of_origin,Economic_theme,Keywords,Latitude,Longitude |format=csv |limit=1000 }} </div> jfj1138ni1b1ljs5jcobzuf6u5kqfxu