Seeds of Wealth: Four Plants that Made Men Rich

Henry Hobhouse was the first to recognise plants as a causal factor in history in his Seeds of Wealth. In this new book, he examines four plants: rubber, timber, tobacco and the wine grape, each of which enormously increased the wealth of those who dealt in them, created great new industries and changed the course of history.

Ancient Rome's monopoly on wine production had huge economic and hygienic importance. Without rubber, there would have been no development of cars, buses and trucks, b...