When enough people share a short-lived delusion, vast sums of money can be acquired overnight. The “tulip mania” in Holland in the mid-seventeenth century was such a time. Tulips had been imported into Holland for forty years before the madness hit. By 1635, a single tulip bulb was swapped for a collection of valuable articles, which included the following: • four tons of wheat • eight tons of rye • a bed • four oxen • eight pigs • a suit of clothes • two caskets of wine • four tonnes of beer • two tons of butter • one thousand pounds of cheese • a silver drinking cup
