Word: rothschild
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...slim, handsome man with heavily lidded blue eyes, Guy, at 54, is every inch a Rothschild. He personifies much of what the family name stands for: a flair for business, a love of sport, a taste for wine, art and conversation. Dressed in the British-style clothes that he prefers (he also speaks perfect English), Guy blends well against many backdrops: he is a friend and confidant of some of France's ranking politicians, raises championship horses, is a good skier and a devoted golfer. With his handsome wife, he is ready to try the latest dances, from...
...Rothschilds' heritage of drive and power traces back 200 years to the Frankfurt ghetto. Merchant Meyer Amschel Rothschild, a small man with a large dream hidden behind his beard and caftan, built up such a lively trade in cloth, commodities and old coins that he was able to branch into the more promising pastime of moneychanging. As he prospered, Meyer moved to the ghetto's five-story "House with the Green Shield" (he had been born in the humbler "Red Shield House" that gave the family its name-Rot Schild) and sent his bumptious sons...
Prepared for just such an opening, the Rothschilds had created a communications system of fast coaches and a Yiddish-German cipher to link the family diaspora. Meyer sent Prince William's Hessian thalers to London, where Son Nathan's speculations multiplied them and won the family a small fortune and big reputation. When the British asked Nathan to smuggle gold to Wellington's troops trapped in Portugal during the Napoleonic wars, he shipped the gold straight to France, where Brother Jakob slipped it through the Pyrenees. Nathan found out about Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo before...
...order to build the Austrian Empire's first important railway. Brother Jakob, who had a lease on both the Bourbons and Napoleon III, laid down France's first railways (on which he made a great profit by artificially running up prices of the shares). The British Rothschilds ignored the country's industrial boom, but propped the young government of the U.S. with loans and, in combination with de Rothschild Frères, made loans to Brazil. "Money is the God of our times, and Rothschild is his prophet," sang Heinrich Heine, who marveled at seeing a French...
When the khedive of Egypt in 1875 put his Suez Canal shares on the market, Britain needed $19 million to outbid other countries. Lionel de Rothschild, sucking on a grape, casually agreed to get the money for his friend Dizzy (Disraeli)-at only 3% interest. The Rothschilds helped to bankroll the empire-building exploits of Cecil Rhodes, and took home a large bundle of stock in the De Beers diamond and gold trust...