Forgotten Funding

'Forgotten Funding: The Tontine and its cultural and societal impact on Britain and Ireland, 1693-1900' is a four-year project funded by the Science Foundation Ireland and Irish Research Council Pathways Fellowship.  It will investigate the financial, cultural and societal impact of the tontine.

This research is an entirely novel, holistic exploration of the tontine. It will investigate how the scheme, which was part life-annuity and part life-lottery, developed as a financial instrument in different locations in conjunction with a wider study of its cultural impacts. This will include how women interacted with the tontine; how the public sphere was enlarged through tontine-funded spaces; how spaces were created for education and the performing arts with money raised via tontine; and how popular cultural was influenced by the concepts of gambling and death tied to this largely forgotten financial scheme.