Tulip Mania

▪ 1995

      In 1994, 400 years after the first Dutch tulip bloomed, The Netherlands staged celebrations to commemorate the introduction of this colourful flower, with which it has become indelibly identified.

      Tulips, however, reportedly originated in south-central Asia, across a wide swath of territory from the Bosporus of western Turkey to the northern slopes of the Himalayan mountains. The bulbs, cultivated by the Turks as early as AD 1000, were taken to Europe in the mid-1500s by Augier Ghislain de Busbecq, Austria's ambassador to the Ottoman Empire.

      The introduction of tulips to The Netherlands has been traced to Carolus Clusius, prefect of the Imperial Herb Gardens in Vienna, who took seeds and bulbs with him when he immigrated (1593) to The Netherlands to serve as head botanist of the newly established botanical garden at the University of Leiden. Clusius bred tulips primarily for medicinal purposes, but the plants became popular among the Dutch for their beauty as well.

      As demand for these Asian rarities grew among the wealthy merchants and outstripped supply, parts of Clusius' collection were stolen. The illicit bulbs were propagated and were sold as ornamentals. A speculative frenzy, known as Tulip Mania, which began in the early 1600s and reached its height in 1633-37, seized many Dutch, from the aristocracy to the working class.

      Though Holland's North Sea climate was ideal for the cultivation of tulips, propagation was slow, which caused tulip prices to soar. In 1624, for example, only a dozen bulbs of the variety Semper Augustus existed in the country, and each was worth about 1,200 guilders.

      By the mid-1630s a single bulb of particular merit could command up to 4,000 guilders, a sum equivalent to the value of a ship filled with goods! At the height of the frenzy, even tradesmen and workers speculated in bulbs, which remained in the ground and were bought and sold over and over, on the basis of the future value of production. The business, which could blow away at any time, was dubbed the "Wind Trade."

      When the tulip market crashed in 1637, those who had bought at the height of Tulip Mania went bankrupt. In 1994 high-quality Dutch tulip bulbs sold for less than a dollar each. (SHEPHERD OGDEN)

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▪ European history

also called  Tulip Craze,  Dutch  Tulpenwindhandel,  

      a speculative frenzy in 17th-century Holland over the sale of tulip bulbs. Tulips were introduced into Europe (Europe, history of) from Turkey shortly after 1550, and the delicately formed, vividly coloured flowers became a popular if costly item. The demand for differently coloured varieties of tulips soon exceeded the supply, and prices for individual bulbs of rare types began to rise to unwarranted heights in northern Europe. By about 1610 a single bulb of a new variety was acceptable as dowry for a bride, and a flourishing brewery in France was exchanged for one bulb of the variety Tulipe Brasserie. The craze reached its height in Holland during 1633–37. Before 1633 Holland's tulip trade had been restricted to professional growers and experts, but the steadily rising prices tempted many ordinary middle-class and poor families to speculate in the tulip market. Homes, estates, and industries were mortgaged so that bulbs could be bought for resale at higher prices. Sales and resales were made many times over without the bulbs ever leaving the ground, and rare varieties of bulbs sold for the equivalent of hundreds of dollars each. The crash came early in 1637, when doubts arose as to whether prices would continue to increase. Almost overnight the price structure for tulips collapsed, sweeping away fortunes and leaving behind financial ruin for many ordinary Dutch families.

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