How did Edward Misselden become a deputy-governor of a merchant company at 15?
Upvote:2
Edward Misselden was an economic philosopher. In 1622, he published this missive on free trade, which probably helped him get the deputy governor job.
http://socserv.mcmaster.ca/econ/ugcm/3ll3/misselden/freetrad.txt
Most other sources cite his lifespan as 1608-1654. That would make him 14 when he published the missive, and 15 when he became deputy governor. That would make him a child prodigy, an unlikely, but by no means impossible achievement.
In those days, few people of ANY age could read or write. Those that were wealthy enough to learn, and had enough talent to produce pieces like those above, were promoted to positions of authority as soon as their ability became obvious, because they basically had a monopoly of "brains" (intelligence plus education).
In a somewhat later (but similar) time, the Marquis de Lafayette of France was made a general (albeit in the AMERICAN army), while still a teenager. In those days, birth (and the resulting education) counted for more than age or "development."
Upvote:14
According to the Wikisource document that article is based on, Wikipedia accidentally left out an "fl." in the age span (i.e. it ought to be "MISSELDEN, EDWARD (fl. 1608-1654)"). "fl." (Latin Floruit) means "flourished", i.e. we know that Misselden was active in the period 1608 to 1654, but we don't know when he was born or died.
If that's true, then he probably wasn't born in 1608, and wouldn't have become a deputy governor in his teens (which, as you say, sounds pretty odd).
More post
- 📝 Why was Japanese Unit 731 immune from War Crime trials?
- 📝 Treatments for the Plague
- 📝 Were lay people ever forbidden to read the Bible in the Christian world?
- 📝 Long time to reach news in Thirty Years' War
- 📝 Did Kampfgeschwader 6 operate Me-262s and Bf-109s from the same airfield? If so, which one?
- 📝 How did cities operate in medieval times?
- 📝 Are there any hypotheses on how the Dorset people disappeared?
- 📝 Financial ramifications of peerages created since the 19th century
- 📝 Why did China not seem to have cared about the Nanking Massacre?
- 📝 How did Mao Zedong's policy abuse affect those in the Five Black Categories during the Cultural Revolution?
- 📝 How did Europeans first acquire gunpowder?
- 📝 Why did the US insist on invading Japan instead of blockading it in WWII?
- 📝 Has the US army ever fought an urban battle?
- 📝 Since when has there been a clear distinction between sciences?
- 📝 How accurately could ancient astronomers find latitude and longitude?
- 📝 What were the dates & details of assassinations in Vienna, Austria of Bulgarian defectors Veselin Stoyov, Peter Niezamov, and Ivan Kolev (circa 1974)?
- 📝 Could there be frozen animals under Antarctica's ice sheets?
- 📝 How many ships did the fleet of the Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie (VOC) possess at its peak (around 1670)?
- 📝 What role did War elephants play in the battle of Thermopylae?
- 📝 When did cheese enter the Korean diet?
- 📝 Were there historical examples of "citizen's arrest" concept in history independent of British common law?
- 📝 Who accompanied Canónigo Fernández to Mexico City in 1822?
- 📝 When did Europeans make their first well-attested visit to mainland Alaska?
- 📝 How long would the average sword last in the middle ages?
- 📝 What type of military uniform is this?
- 📝 What happened to the undergrad students who attended the Feynman Lecture Series in 1961-63?
- 📝 Is the Bible considered a reliable historical resource?
- 📝 Are images of the original tablets for the Epic of Gilgamesh available online?
- 📝 What did Buddhism vs. Hinduism mean politically?
- 📝 How did changes in the balance of land versus naval balance of power prevent England from being successfully invaded by foreign powers after 1066?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 How did Edward Misselden become a deputy-governor of a merchant company at 15?
- 📝 When and how did the USA and the UK become allies?
- 📝 How did Moscow become the capital/most important city in Russia?
- 📝 Were secret treaties ratified? How did they become official while remaining secret?
- 📝 When and how did the Han ethnic group become by far the biggest ethnic group in China?
- 📝 How and why did trade unions in America become influenced by organised crime, but unions in Britain didn't?
- 📝 How did Moldova and Romania become separate in the first place?
- 📝 How did former Spanish colonies in the Americas become so fragmented?
- 📝 How did Saudi Arabia become and remain strongly Wahhabi?
- 📝 How did residents of Estonia and Latvia prove that their family settled in the country prior to 1940, in order to become citizens in 1989?
- 📝 How much did Didius Julianus pay to become emperor of Rome?
- 📝 How did corn become the most produced crop in the world?
- 📝 How did slavery become permissible in the French West Indies when it was forbidden in France?
- 📝 How did New York become the financial hub of America?
- 📝 How did Egypt become a protectorate of the British empire?
- 📝 How did the Catholic Pope manage to become more powerful than Kings in old Europe?
- 📝 How did the South USA become more overtly Christian than the North?
- 📝 How did India become a founding member of the UN?
- 📝 How did the Dutch East India Company (VOC) have so much revenue when they only control small part of Indonesia?
- 📝 How did South Korea become one of the most developed nations on Earth?
- 📝 How did St Sebastian become a gay male icon?
- 📝 How did the French word 'familier' become associated with the concept of Magical Familiars, historically?
- 📝 How did a scientist who came from China in 1935 become a US Army Colonel by 1945?
- 📝 How did Charles de Gaulle become the leading figure of French liberation movement?
- 📝 When and how did Thailand cease to be Siam and become the modern Thailand?
- 📝 How did ruffs become fashionable and then went out of fashion?
- 📝 How did the Russian-American Company respond to employee desertion?
- 📝 How did horses become animals of fancy while donkeys largely didn't?
- 📝 How did the Russian-American Company hire serfs?
- 📝 How did letters become published?