What's especially interesting is the mention of "joint-stock companies". There's a little more detail on that here: [1] It's not clear whether these were ongoing entities or shares in a venture.
"Venture" in this sense comes from shipping, where a number of people would put in money to buy shares in a single ship voyage. When (and if) the ship came back, the profits were divided in proportion to the investment. (This is the source of the phrase "waiting for (their) ship to come in".)
But it's not a corporation. It's not a permanent organization. This is significant. The Roman Empire, even though it had a legal system and a stable government for several centuries, never developed the concept of the corporation, or of a common carrier. They had rich individuals as sole owners, and family businesses, but not larger multi-owner organizations. Something like a multi-city merchant company was out of reach. Even a commercial delivery service comparable to Wells Fargo (the stagecoach operation) was never developed.
Did Kanesh get past that hump and figure out how to set up a big business?
"Venture" in this sense comes from shipping, where a number of people would put in money to buy shares in a single ship voyage. When (and if) the ship came back, the profits were divided in proportion to the investment. (This is the source of the phrase "waiting for (their) ship to come in".)
But it's not a corporation. It's not a permanent organization. This is significant. The Roman Empire, even though it had a legal system and a stable government for several centuries, never developed the concept of the corporation, or of a common carrier. They had rich individuals as sole owners, and family businesses, but not larger multi-owner organizations. Something like a multi-city merchant company was out of reach. Even a commercial delivery service comparable to Wells Fargo (the stagecoach operation) was never developed.
Did Kanesh get past that hump and figure out how to set up a big business?
[1] https://books.google.com/books?id=vYMmrenUywQC&pg=PA131&lpg=...