In 1883 Marxian economics appeared to be a relatively simple matter. Its substance was contained in a handful of basic texts, in effect volume I of Capital supplemented by the Communist Manifesto and Anti-Dühring. These writings were subject to interpretation only by Marx and Engels themselves, and their intellectual dominance over their followers was unquestioned. They had concentrated upon a range of issues which, though immensely important, was also rather narrow. Marxian political economy consisted of the theories of value and exploitation, capital and surplus value, accumulation and crisis, the emergence and imminent transcendence of capitalism, all viewed from the vantage-point of contemporary Britain.