Tulip Mania

Posted on | November 14, 2008 | View Comments

Orange Tulip

Tulips are pretty flowers.

So pretty in fact it caused an outright hysteria in the 1630s.  A hysteria on such a grand scale, it is said to have created the first recorded speculative bubble and subsequent burst.

Here is some detailed information from the Library of Congress, taken from a Harper’s Magazine article of 1876.  Click on the link tilted “View the page images (at Cornell University)”:

Library of Congress – Tulip Mania

Inside the link from Cornell, you can read about the worth of the tulip at the height of the hysteria:

Tulip Prices

And here is one last link to a Tulip Mania article, from Harper’s Magazine again, this time the year is 1850, a little earlier than the previous article.

Fascinating, yes?

–Todd, the intern.

***Update – Using the purchasing power calculator at Measuring Worth, today the price of a single tulip would be equivalent to $14,459.00!

Tulips aren’t that pretty!

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