The question I keep coming back to in my research right now, and in this newsletter too, is why London expanded so extraordinarily over the course of the century 1550-1650. It is, to my mind, perhaps the most important piece in the puzzle of Britain’s unprecedented economic expansion — a crucial precursor to any acceleration of innovation, let along an Industrial Revolution. Here was a city that grew tenfold, from a mere town of 50,000 to a globally distinguished capital of half a million, almost single-handedly starting the