Abstract
Financial history studies facts and institutions of the past. Such facts and institutions are interesting subjects in themselves, or they can help us interpret the present through analogy. History & Finance reverses the role of history in finance research: it exploits natural experiments of the past as a means to directly explaining current financial outcomes through the long-run persistence of economic and social phenomena. I first define the History & Finance approach and its relationship to Economic and Financial history. Then, I survey the work based on History & Finance across the subfields of finance. I discuss the challenges raised by History & Finance, and how researchers have thus far tackled them. Finally, I comment on the avenues for future research that History & Finance opens to finance scholars and economic historians alike.