Jakob Fugger, born in Augsburg in 1459, amassed a fortune equal to about 2 percent of the European economy. This episode traces how he did it. Sent to Venice at 14, he learned double entry bookkeeping and the mechanics of metal trading at the headquarters of the German merchants. Back north, he lent to silver mine owners in exchange for shares rather than interest, which gave him the metal itself. He then made himself banker to the perpetually broke Habsburgs, paying an archduke’s creditors and court wages directly.

That position let Fugger steer events from behind a desk. He financed Emperor Maximilian I, became banker to the papacy, and in 1519 arranged the 850,000 guilders in bribes that made the teenage Charles V Holy Roman Emperor. When the imperial diet moved against monopolies, he reminded Charles in writing who had paid for his crown, and the laws were dropped. A loan to Albert of Brandenburg, repaid through the sale of indulgences, helped provoke Martin Luther’s 95 Theses.

• Church law banned interest, so Cardinal Melchior von Meckau invested 150,000 guilders with Fugger through a discretionary deposit that paid a supposedly voluntary gift.
• When the cardinal died in 1509 and heirs demanded the money, Maximilian claimed the inheritance and forgave the debt in exchange for funding a war against Venice.
• Fugger funded the recruitment of the Swiss Guard in 1506, leased the papal mint, and lent money to Pope Leo X for St. Peter’s Basilica.
• Half the proceeds from Johann Tetzel’s indulgence campaign went to Rome and half to Fugger’s agents, who collected on the spot to pay down Albert’s loan.
• In 1521 he founded the Fuggerei in Augsburg, the world’s oldest social housing complex. Rent is still the equivalent of one guilder a year plus three daily prayers for the Fugger family.