Les mercuriales du XIXe siècle. Le contrôle et la surveillance des prix et de l’offre de grains en France et en Belgique, 1789-1914

The mercuriales, the nineteenth-century records of market prices and trade volumes in France and Belgium, constitute one of the main sources used to study market integration during this era. We look into the price administrations of the two countries and their purposes for collecting these data. Also, we draw attention to the diverse methods and people involved in registering the data, and the specific difficulties in monitoring the grain trade throughout the nineteenth century. Finally, we also discuss price manipulation. We conclude by discussing the possible ambiguous relationship between the mercuriales and the market they strove to document: they strove to accurately reflect the trade in agricultural products, but at the same time also influenced that trade. Therefore, one can wonder if the production and publication of mercuriales was among the factors contributing to market integration.

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