This is a frustrating article, but perhaps the book is better. The key work here is really Earl Thompson's "The tulipmania: Fact or artifact?" in Public Choice

This is a frustrating article, but perhaps the book is better. The key work here is really Earl Thompson's "The tulipmania: Fact or artifact?" in Public Choice. The article at least does not make any mention of Thompson or his argument. In particular, his argument is that there was a legal change in how the tulip contracts worked and so it didn't make sense to compare the previous price history with the history after that change.