Search
Log in
  • Home

  • Categories

  • Audiobooks

  • E-books

  • For kids

  • Top lists

  • Help

  • Download app

  • Use campaign code

  • Redeem gift card

  • Try free now
  • Log in
  • Language

    🇩🇰 Danmark

    • DK
    • EN

    🇧🇪 Belgique

    • FR
    • EN

    🇩🇪 Deutschland

    • DE
    • EN

    🇪🇸 España

    • ES
    • EN

    🇫🇷 France

    • FR
    • EN

    🇳🇱 Nederland

    • NL
    • EN

    🇳🇴 Norge

    • NO
    • EN

    🇦🇹 Österreich

    • AT
    • EN

    🇨🇭 Schweiz

    • DE
    • EN

    🇫🇮 Suomi

    • FI
    • EN

    🇸🇪 Sverige

    • SE
    • EN
  1. Books
  2. Nonfiction
  3. Business

Read and listen for free for 14 days!

Cancel anytime

Try free now
4.5(36)

Debt - Updated and Expanded : The First 5,000 Years

Now in audio, the updated and expanded edition : David Graeber’s “fresh . . . fascinating . . . thought-provoking . . . and exceedingly timely” (Financial Times) history of debt

Here anthropologist David Graeber presents a stunning reversal of conventional wisdom: he shows that before there was money, there was debt. For more than 5,000 years, since the beginnings of the first agrarian empires, humans have used elaborate credit systems to buy and sell goods—that is, long before the invention of coins or cash. It is in this era, Graeber argues, that we also first encounter a society divided into debtors and creditors.

Graeber shows that arguments about debt and debt forgiveness have been at the center of political debates from Italy to China, as well as sparking innumerable insurrections. He also brilliantly demonstrates that the language of the ancient works of law and religion (words like “guilt,” “sin,” and “redemption”) derive in large part from ancient debates about debt, and shape even our most basic ideas of right and wrong. We are still fighting these battles today without knowing it.


Author:

  • David Graeber

Narrator:

  • Grover Gardner

Format:

  • Audiobook

Duration:

  • 17 h 49 min

Language:

English

Categories:

  • Nonfiction
  • Business

More by David Graeber

Skip the list
  1. Altings begyndelse : En ny historie om menneskeheden

    David Graeber, David Wengrow

    audiobookbook
  2. Bullshit Jobs : A Theory

    David Graeber

    audiobookbook
  3. Perimmäinen salattu totuus maailmasta

    David Graeber

    audiobookbook
  4. Alussa oli... Ihmiskunnan uusi historia

    David Graeber, David Wengrow

    audiobookbook
  5. Brudstykker af en anarkistisk antropologi

    David Graeber

    audiobook
  6. The Utopia of Rules

    David Graeber

    audiobook

Others have also read

Skip the list
  1. His Very Best : Jimmy Carter, a Life

    Jonathan Alter

    audiobookbook
  2. A Spectre, Haunting

    China Miéville

    audiobook
  3. The Great Leveler

    Walter Scheidel

    audiobook
  4. Inheritance : The Evolutionary Origins of the Modern World

    Harvey Whitehouse

    audiobook
  5. All The Houses I've Ever Lived In : Finding Home in a System that Fails Us

    Kieran Yates

    audiobookbook
  6. Milton Friedman : The Last Conservative

    Jennifer Burns

    audiobook
  7. Colonialism : A Moral Reckoning

    Nigel Biggar

    audiobook
  8. Money : A Story of Humanity

    David McWilliams

    audiobookbook
  9. How Economics Explains the World : A Short History of Humanity

    Andrew Leigh

    audiobook
  10. Visions of Inequality : From the French Revolution to the End of the Cold War

    Branko Milanovic

    audiobook
  11. The Future is Degrowth

    Matthias Schmelzer, Andrea Vetter, Aaron Vansintjan

    audiobook
  12. The Murder of Professor Schlick

    David Edmonds

    audiobook

  • 7 books

    David Graeber

    David Graeber (1961–2020) was a Professor of Anthropology at the London School of Economics. His bestselling books include The Dawn of Everything, cowritten with David Wengrow, and DEBT: The First 5,000 Years. He was a contributor to Harper’s Magazine, The Guardian, and The Baffler.

    Read more

Help and contact


About us

  • Our story
  • Career
  • Press
  • Accessibility
  • Partner with us
  • Investor relations
  • Instagram
  • Facebook

Explore

  • Categories
  • Audiobooks
  • E-books
  • Magazines
  • For kids
  • Top lists

Popular categories

  • Crime
  • Biographies and reportage
  • Fiction
  • Feel-good and romance
  • Personal development
  • Children's books
  • True stories
  • Sleep and relaxation

Nextory

Copyright © 2025 Nextory AB

Privacy Policy · Terms ·
Excellent4.3 out of 5