Abstract:

Both China and Europe encompass vast territories with significant internal differences. To conduct thorough and objective comparative research, it is essential to choose regions with high comparability. From the perspective of economic history, the Yangtze Delta in China and the Netherlands in Europe are two regions with the highest comparability in early modern times. Using the Historical System of National Accounts (HSNA) methodology, this study compares the economic conditions of these two regions in the early 19^th century. It reveals significant similarities and differences in their levels of economic development in the early modern period. This result effectively challenges the biases inherent in previous studies that used the “British model” as the standard to examine the economic history of China and Europe, helping to promote our understanding of the history of China and Europe in early modern times.

Key words: the early 19^th century, the Yangtze Delta, the Netherlands, economic history