Note 185-2 — Chapter IV

Thus, in England, by virtue of 37 Henry III., c. 9, the legal interest was = 10 per cent.; by 21 James I, c. 17 = 8; about 1651 = 6 per cent. (confirmed in 1660); by 12 Anne, ch. 16 = 5 per cent. In the time of George II., where the security was good, only 3 per cent. was, as a rule, paid. In France, the legal rate of interest, at the beginning of the 16th century, was 1/10 of the capital; after 1657, 1/12; 1601 (Sully), 1/16; 1634 (Richelieu), 1/18; 1665 (Colbert), 1/20. Compare Forbonnais Recherches et Considérations, I, 48, 225, 385 ff. It continued at this rate of 5 per cent. with short interruptions until the revolution. (Warnkönig, Franz. Staats. und Rechtsgeschichte, II, 588 seq.)

The rates of interest in Russia, in the 16th century, had already declined to 20 per cent. (Herberstein, Reise, 41 ff.; Karamsin, Russ. Geschichte, VII, 169.) In Holland, in 1623, it was estimated that land purchases paid 3 per cent.; hypothecations, 4 to 6; deposits, 5 to 6; a flourishing business, 10 per cent. Compare Usselinx in Laspeyres, Geschichte der volkswirthschaftl. Anschauungen der Niederländer, 76. About 1660, the rate of interest usual in Italy and Holland was at most 3 per cent. (in war times, 4); in France, 7; in Scotland, 10; in Ireland, 12; in Spain, 10 to 12; in Turkey, 20 per cent. (Sir J. Child, Discourse on Trade, French translation, 75 ff.) Side by side with 6 per cent. as the rate of interest in England, it was (a little later) 10 in Ireland. Petty, Political Anatomy of Ireland, 74.

The same course of things is to be observed in ancient times. In Solon's time, and again in that of Lysias, it was 18 per cent. (Böckh, Staatshaushalt der Athener, I, 143 ff.) I am of opinion that the rate of interest declined during this long interval, but rose again in consequence of the Peloponnesian[TN 21] war. Among friends, in the time of Demosthenes, 10 per cent. (adv. Onetor., I, 386.) Aristotle, Rhet., III, 10, mentions 12 per cent., which Aeschines, adv. Ctes., 104, and Demosthenes, adv. Aph., I, 820, 824, call low. The rate of commercial interest in Egypt (146 before Christ) seems to have been 12 per cent. per annum. (Letronne, Recompense promise à celui, etc., 1833, 7.) Contemporaneously in Rome, a similar rate of interest must have been considered usurious. (Cicero, ad. Att., I, 12.) Under the emperor Claudius, 6 per cent. (Columella, De Re rust., III, 3.) Justinian allowed to personae illustres 4 per cent. per annum. (L. 26 Cod., IV, 32.)