1 day Ago By Girish Shukla
Sir Isaac Newton, renowned for his groundbreaking theory of gravity and later a prominent figure in London’s financial elite, had deeper financial connections to the transatlantic slave trade than previously recognized, according to a new book. Also Read: Meet The Author Creating Fantasy Worlds That Feel All Too Real The book 'Ricardo’s Dream' delves into the life of economist David Ricardo, a pioneer in economic theory and a leading stock trader of his era. It also sheds new light on Newton’s three-decade tenure as master of the Royal Mint, during which time he transitioned from academia at Cambridge to a position of immense political and financial power.
During this period, Newton presided over a significant influx of gold mined by enslaved Africans in Brazil. As master of the mint, he profited personally by taking a small fee for every coin produced, further intertwining his wealth with the exploitative systems of his time. Nat Dyer, author of 'Ricardo’s Dream', stated, “I show, in part with his own correspondence, digitised by the Newton Project, that he benefited from gold primarily from Brazil mined by enslaved peoples.
” “Despite losing a lot of money on the stock market crash of the day, Newton died an incredibly wealthy man,” Dyer continued. “A lot of that was intimately connected with the transatlantic slave trade.” Much of the gold came to the Royal Mint through trade with Portugal, which dominated Brazil’s expanding goldmining industry.
British merchants trading cloth in Lisbon were often paid in gold, a significant portion of which was converted into coins under Newton’s supervision at the mint. Before joining the Royal Mint in 1696, Newton earned £100 annually (around £36,000 in today’s terms) as the Lucasian professor of mathematics at Cambridge, where he developed his revolutionary theory of gravity—possibly inspired by a falling apple. By 1702, Newton’s earnings had risen to nearly £3,500 per year (approximately £1.
26m today), enabling him to accumulate substantial wealth. Upon his death, an inventory of his possessions included a pair of sterling silver chamber pots, reportedly used by male guests during dinner, hidden behind a screen. The book also highlights evidence that during Newton’s tenure, the Royal Mint produced £14m worth of gold coins, a sum equivalent to the total minted in the previous 136 years.
Newton’s correspondence offers clear evidence of the gold’s origins, including a 1701 note stating, “We can have no bullion but from the West Indies [South and Central America] belonging to Spain and Portugal.” In 1717, he wrote to the Treasury describing the west of England as “full of Gold” from Portugal, which brought “into the Mint great Quantities of Gold.” Nat Dyer commented, “He was at the very centre of this gold rush.
The more gold that poured into the Tower of London, the richer he got.” He added, “I don’t think this should radically change every aspect of what we think of Newton. He’s an epoch-defining thinker.
But even the greatest scientists are part of their time.” For some experts, it’s unsurprising that Newton benefited financially from slavery, which was integral to transatlantic trade. Prof Leonardo Marques, a historian from Fluminense Federal University in Brazil, emphasized that Iberian America was a major source of gold bullion during this period.
“You can find this in Locke, in Davenant, and in many other mercantilist writers of the time,” Marques explained. “Thus it is not surprising to me that Newton – apparently unlike many of his biographers – was aware that this gold was coming from Brazil. Everyone involved with banking and finance in early 18th-century Britain in a sense was somehow connected to the history of slavery and the slave trade to Brazil.
” Dr Patricia Fara, an emeritus fellow at the University of Cambridge and author of 'Life After Gravity', has previously pointed out Newton’s connections to other enterprises linked to slavery. Newton worked with officers of the East India Company, commissioning them to conduct tidal measurements worldwide, and he also invested in the South Sea Company, a notorious slave-trading venture. Read More: Why Stephen King Almost Quit Writing Before Becoming a Legend “We can’t apply our own moral criteria to people who lived three or four hundred years ago,” Fara observed.
“Newton was more culpable than some and far less culpable than others. But it’s important to recognise that people who are up on a pedestal in Westminster Abbey were involved in slavery.” Get Latest News Live on Times Now along with Breaking News and Top Headlines from Features, Lifestyle and around the world.
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