Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/278148 
Year of Publication: 
2022
Series/Report no.: 
WWZ Working Paper No. 2022/04
Publisher: 
University of Basel, Center of Business and Economics (WWZ), Basel
Abstract: 
We argue that market forces shaped the geographic distribution of upper-tail human capital across Europe during the Middle Ages, and contributed to bolstering universities at the dawn of the Humanistic and Scientiffc Revolutions. We build a unique database of thousands of scholars from university sources covering all of Europe, construct an index of their ability, and map the academic market in the medieval and early modern periods. We show that scholars tended to concentrate in the best universities (agglomeration), that better scholars were more sensitive to the quality of the university (positive sorting) and migrated over greater distances (positive selection). Agglomeration, selection and sorting patterns testify to an integrated academic market, made possible by the use of a common language (Latin).
Subjects: 
Upper-Tail Human Capital
Universities
Discrete choice model
Scholars
Publications
Agglomeration
JEL: 
N33
O15
I25
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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