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Summary: THE PHANTOM ROTHSCHILDS
Comment: What has Ferguson not told about the Rothschilds in his seemingly exhaustive two volume set? />
He all too facilely dismisses Victor Rothschild's being the fifth man in the World War II
Soviet spy ring of Blunt, Burgess, et. al. He does not bring up the 1776 Masonic Illuminati order of
Adam Weishaupt with alleged connections to Mayer Amschel. And he dosen't discuss the Rothschilds'
connection with Freemasonry at the highest level, and their gift to Israel of the Supreme Court
building, a New World Order artifact, heavily laden architecturally with Freemasonry symbolism.
Likewise, glaringly absent from note are 19th, 20th, and 21st century Illuminati activities, which
the family has been widely thought to be involved with. History Professor Ferguson could fill in his
blanks on some vital but shady Rothschild history from Henry Makow, a researcher and writer--and a
Jew.

According to an article on Ferguson in Harvard Magazine (May/June '07), he is
about to take on biographical writing of Henry Kissinger, at Kissinger's request. This should
generate caution. Could Kissinger's "papers" be entirely relied on? Kissinger probably saw what
sheen Ferguson could put on the Rothschild's archives as raw material, ignoring or minimising
important but dark concerns.

Same question on the Warburg's family papers that he is
availing himself of. What will Ferguson tell us about Paul Warburg's role in establishing the
egregious Federal Reserve, and Max Warburg financing the Bolshevik revolution?

Let's
hope that Ferguson can either put this and other allegations to rest once and for all or illuminate
them if true--but now that he's shown his colors with the Rothschilds, I doubt that he will, either
way.

It seems that sympathetic academic interest in these elitist families and
individuals is inevitable in part because that is where the big bucks for research and publishing
would be, especially for a scholar who professes to have, as he says in the Harvard Magazine
article, "become a thorough philo-Semite".

Is there a whiff of opportunism here at the
expense of objectivity?

Customer Rating:

Summary: The author must be an anti-Semite
Comment: the book had some good pictures, however prof Ferguson not once, but on numerous occasions, claims
to refute the story of how Nathan brilliantly deceived the London Stock Exchange players after the
battle of Waterloo, earning $40 billion (2007 prices) in one day. A bit jealous I suppose. />
Verdict: Ignore the anti-semitic propaganda and the book is worth a look.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Great book by Ferguson on monied surrupticious Euro family...
Comment: [Also see: Fritz Springmeier's Bloodlines of the
Illuminati]. Ferguson, who teaches at a
Northea-
stern University in the US, did yeoman work here
on at least defusing some of
conspiracy talk about
how fools like Bernard Piper-Collins claim Roths-
childs
alledgedly control ALL things.The Rothschilds
never ran the bank of England, the gentile
Baring
Bros. did. They are however a very corrupt family.
Author Ferguson did excellent
work here.

Customer Rating:

Summary: A little too detailed
Comment: I have to start out by saying overall I enjoyed the book but I would only rate it as an average
book. It is a little too detailed and didn't keep my interest from one chapter to the next. It would
have been better if it left out 150 pages or so. I found myself doing a lot of skiming over what I
would say was boring filler in the book. You can learn a lot about the type of business that that
Rothschilds were in but not a lot of how they went about doing it.

After reading this
it seems that the Rothschilds were in the business of making large loans to governments and then
packaging these loans as bonds and selling them to the public. They were as much bond and commodity
traders as they were bankers, which I found interesting. There are numerous quotes from letters
written back and forth between family members that will give you a sense of their personalities. The
family history is very detailed so if this is the kind of thing you are interested in then you will
probably enjoy the book more then I did.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Much more than a family saga
Comment: Those who already know Niall Ferguson do not need any praise for the books he writes: a few years
ago I chanced to read his excellent "The Cash Nexus" and this led me to "The Pity of War" and
finally to "The House of Rothschild".

Ferguson is a scholar who loves challenges: not
just challenging arguments, but also challenges in the sheer volume of sources and research, and
finally challenges to the reader in presenting controversial theses (I think specially of those
advanced brilliantly, and contentiously, in "The Pity of War" - see my review if interested). />
This last effort is mainly an attempt to unveil the Rothschild mythology, restoring an
historically accurate perspective both of the family saga and of the banking and financial European
history from 1798 to 1848.

The book is a masterpiece for many reasons: not just story
of a family (circumscribed to the male members), not just story of a great banking institution in
the past two centuries, but also comprehensive financial history of the first half of XIX century...
"a rich and nuanced portrait" as the book leaflet reads - that reveals and hides, but also creates
an appealing and fascinated image of those turbulent years.
So, it can appeal the history
buff, and all those readers interested in financial history (and speculative bubbles) as well as
those interested in biography and cultural history.

The essay definitely has also -
obviously maybe - a literary dimension: because in describing the five brothers Ferguson uses those
same "colors" used by contemporaries, a literary dimension that cannot but appeal and enrich the
more serious economic investigation: for Nathan the "meteoric" larger than life Napoleon-like image
(passion for risk, high stakes on the table and the ruthlessness of a general), for James that
richly colored literary portrait (full of mid-tones) we have been used by writers like Balzac, Zola
and Stendhal (the mix of secretiveness and candid frankness, detachment and savoir vivre), for the
others three brothers the age-old mythologies of Midas and the wandering Jew (specially in the
portrait of the German and Austrian branch: they seem consciously prisoners of the Jewish stereotype
in their inability to enjoy life and relax).

Every reader interested in the story of
the House of Rothschild want to know the why and how a middle class Jewish family confined in the
Frankfurt ghetto was able in just one generation to become the richest family in the world. />Ferguson's study is very good in the pars destruens, that is in taking down and unveiling the old
mythologies (like the Waterloo myth, or the Hesse Kassel myth), less good in the pars construens
that is substituting a coherent explanation. The surviving accounts are of course too tiny to cast
light, and the accounting techniques used by the family in the early days too backward to be
critically useful.
So the impression is that of an unending race over speed limits, a sheer
willingness to accept often uncalculated risks and to play for the highest stakes and at the same
time an impressive luck (or God's favor) that stuck contemporaries (always expecting the meteoric
rise of Nathan to end like the parallel story of Napoleon).
So was their preeminence produced
only by chance?
Yes and no. Chance - according to Ferguson - played a striking role in the
early stages - the building up, but consolidation and enlargement were due to specific attitudes of
the family: solidarity between brothers, their informative network, their ability in cultivating
diplomacy and - not least - to the fact that the family systematically reinvested in the business
about 96percent of the net income produced (unlike - say - the Barings brothers, that in 1816 had
almost the same size)

The book will be also hugely helpful to readers interested in
European history, casting a different - unusual to most readers - light in the inner mechanism of
the early XIX century European politics.
As for the nature of the Restoration, often
liquidated by historians as a narrow and backward attempt to turn back the clock to
pre-revolutionary times, Ferguson shows how different in reality was this period from the Ancien
Regime and how the seeds of modernity were well present and working: the sheer preference of the
banking institution for financing representative-backed monarchies, the consolidation in Jewish
emancipation all over Europe, but also the frailty of arch-conservative governments (not just the
case of Spain, but also of the Holy Alliance) compared to more pragmatic approaches.
A rather
under-developed theme is the rise of modern anti-Semitism: Ferguson - unlike most scholars -
indicates the first traces in France well before the Affaire Dreyfus and hints how the irresistible
rise of the Rothschild family (with their devotion to Judaism) was very instrumental in
consolidating anti-Jewish mythologies (out of a sense of envy but also perceived in France
especially as a alien "evil" power).

As a reader interested also in financial themes, I
was truly fascinated by those chapters dedicated to the bond and stock markets, particularly those
regarding the default of Spanish and Portuguese consols.
The Rothschild were the first bankers
to export the financial facilities, long enjoyed in Great Britain, to Continental Europe and were
decisive in creating a retail market for bonds and stocks.
But the most interesting part is
the one dealing with financial speculation, bubbles and defaults. Most remarkable is the feeling of
a déjà vue: if you substitute Spain and Portugal with Argentina, you will observe striking
similarities both in price, negotiations and very likely in the final outcome. Nihil sub sole novi,
or at least it seems so.

This is a book I greatly enjoyed.
I cannot but
recommend it to every reader interested in serious history.
That is not to say that it is
perfect: I was - as many other reviewers - incensed by the lack of bibliography (shame on Penguin),
but on the average it is an outstanding achievement.

Likewise, if you happen to be
interested in the argument, you may be interested in other works I chanced to read about the same
themes:
- Muhlstein, Anhka - "James de Rothschild", this is a book I read long time ago, but
it was more a biography in the classical way and as far as I remember, I found it rather
inconsequential
- Chancellor, Edward - "The Devil Takes the Hindmost" - a colorful and
well-informed essay focusing specially on the XIX century. There are chapters dedicated to
defaulting bonds in the XIX century as well as to the railway stocks bubble in the United
Kingdom.
- Conor Cruise O'Brien - "The Siege: The Saga of Israel and Zionism". I have many
works dedicated to Sionism and Judaism, but this is the most concise and clear exposition of the
birth of anti-Semitism in Western Europe in late XIX century.

You are most welcome if
you can suggest other readings or just share ideas and comments!
Thanks for reading.

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