List of figures -- Foreword / by Mario Draghi -- A Napoleonic prelude -- The origins of the committee -- The response to global monetary turbulence : Barre and Werner -- The snake and other animals -- Negotiating the European monetary system -- The malaise of the 1980s -- The Delors committee and the relaunching of the central bank governors -- Designing a central bank -- The EMS crises -- Conclusion: the euro and the legacy of the Committee of Governors -- Appendix A: The governors' drafts and the treaty text of the statutes of the ECB and EMI -- Appendix B: Members of the committee of governors -- Appendix C: Dramatis personae -- Appendix D: Chronology -- Appendix E: Figures -- Abbreviations used in the text -- Notes -- Acknowledgments -- Index.