“The British Lions Crouched to a Nest of Owls”: The South Sea Bubble through the Lens of the London Press

Abstract

The South Sea Bubble is one of history's most iconic economic events. While much ink was spilled during the bubble year to make sense of events as they unfolded, commentators were left scrambling for ways to grasp what happened because no one had ever experienced a stock market bubble before. This article focuses on how the London press covered the events that later became known as the South Sea Bubble. A review of every newspaper article in which the company was mentioned during the year of 1720 captures how the movement of the price of the company's stock was interpreted, as well as how it was related to broader social, political, and geopolitical affairs.