The French Rothschilds: The Great Banking Dynasty Through Two Turbulent Centuries

by Herbert R. Lottman

The Rothschilds, the bankers to kings, were among the world's paramount financial powers in the 19th century. Their wealth remains the stuff of legend. The French Rothschilds is an award-winning biographer's penetrating portrait of the most regal & influential branch of this international family, one that came to prominence under Napoleon in France & has ever since been locked in a turbulent relationship with its adopted state. Throughout much of the 19th century, the Rothschilds were the single most important source of funds in Europe for governments in war & peace, for the extraction of raw materials from the earth & for the factories that turned them into wealth. They were instrumental in bringing capitalism to maturity. There have been a number of books on the Rothschilds, but never one that focused so closely on the French branch of the family. Yet the French Rothschilds, with their eventful careers in both the 19th & 20th centuries & the anti-Semitism they faced; their contribution to the settlement of Palestine; the assaults they endured from the Petain regime & later the Mitterrand Socialists; & their famous racehorses & prestigious wines, are in many respects the most fascinating branch of this family.

Genres: History, Biography

413 pages, Hardcover

First published April 11, 1995

About the author

Herbert Lottman was an American journalist and author who spend most of his life in France.
He majored in English and biology at the University of New York, graduating in 1948 and earned a master’s in English from Columbia in 1951.
In 1956 he moved to Paris and became the manager of the Paris branch of the publisher Farrar, Straus and Giroux. He also was writing for Publishers Weekly for four decades and wrote a novel, Detours From the Grand Tour.
But he is most reknowned for his biographies on French personalities and his writings on French intellectual life.

Reviews

[Arminius]

I read about the family which created the banking industry. I first learned of the Rothschild family through the fantastic anti-federal reserve book "Creature from Jekyll Island." That book provides great details of American economics but drifted to the ludicrous assumptions of one-world government leaders. The Rothschild’s seem to often be billed as part of this group.

[Louise]

Ancestors are fun.