...and Forgive Them Their Debts: Lending, Foreclosure and Redemption from Bronze Age Finance to the Jubilee Year (Tyranny of Debt)

Good look at the origins of debt and debt jubilees with not subtle commentary on how things have changed. Mostly focuses on Sumer/Ur/Babylon/other Near Eastern ancient civilizations with some coverage of Jewish, Greek, and Byzantine practices. (And the inevitable Roman screw up that set the world down a more tragic path) Goes through the cycle of debt forgiveness practiced to maintain a population capable of paying taxes/fighting/providing corvee labor and the inevitable rise of an oligarchic/aristocratic class that tried to take the population's land and labor. It's interesting that this class generally was the bureaucracy tasked with running the state and ended up working in opposition to the ruler and people. Last tidbit is on tyrants, and how initially they were good rulers, the subsequent bad rap is mostly caused by history being written mostly by creditors. Only reason the book didn't get 5 stars is it was a slow read for a not long book. Still highly recommended.