I took this course as an elective, and summarized every lecture (history literature art) and all of the literature for this course (The Cambridge Companion to the Dutch Golden Age A Wordly Art texts for literature). I got a 8.5 for my midterm and a 7.5 for my final exam.
Lecture 1A
Habsburg dynasty ruled by Karel V/Charles V (1509-1555) and later Filips 2 (1555-
- Burgundy, Spain and the Low Countries were part of this dynasty
- Karel V connected all of his land together and decided that is was 1 region in law
Characteristics of the dynasty
- very urbanized, compared to other European countries
- economy was based on trade
- a lot of cloth manufacturing was done
- a lot of political influence
The Low Countries in the 1550s
- no united language
- no national borders
- no political unity every gewest had its own government
- heavily fragmented cultures and identities
- high levels of urbanization and literacy
- it had no actual name
The Dutch Revolt
- 3 tensions emerged towards the politics of Karel V and Filips 2
1. Particularism vs centralization
Charles and Filips used centralization in which they ran the dynasty from Brussels, with
stadhouders in every gewest that had to represent them locally
the Low Countries weren’t big fans of this and wanted to each run their own gewest in their own
way (particularism)
2. Rise of Protestantism
Charles and Filips wanted everyone in their dynasty to be catholic, but there was a big rise of
Protestantism after Luther started the first form of it
the different gewesten of the Low Countries wanted to decide for themselves whether or not
Protestantism was allowed
3. Economic crisis
1566: Beeldenstorm
- Calvinists in the Low Countries started to destroy the catholic churches
started in Flanders bc most Calvinists lived here at the time
Margaretha v Parma (landvoogdes 1556-1567) was able to shut the unrest down
1567: Duke Alva/Alba send to Low Countries to punish protestants
- Alva introduces the court of inquisition that enabled him to punish/kill the Calvinists for what they’d
done
- he also introduced a new form of tax, which he did without consulting with the governments of the
gewesten
war becomes inevitable for Alva’s mingling
1
,1568: Willem v Oranje fights back
- stadhouder of the gewesten Zeeland and Holland
- started sort of guerilla war against Alva
- geuzen (Calvinists that had fled from Alva) had gotten permission from Willem to fight Alva in the
Low Countries and at sea
- Den Briel: first success of the geuzen
start of the Dutch Revolt
There were 3 groups of people in the Low Countries during this fight
- Habsburgers: supporters of Filips and Alva
- protestants/Calvinists
- middle group: wanted catholicism but didn’t agree with the way that Alva handles the Calvinists
the first 2 groups had to get the 3rd one on their side to win the conflict
Alva vs Willem v Oranje
- Alva’s tactic: scaring the middle group
he did some attacks on Calvinists cities to show that joining the protestants would end badly
- Willems tactic: uniting the Low Countries by their “not-being-Spanish”
1576: Pacification of Gent
- the Spanish soldiers weren’t paid anymore at this time bc Alva ran out of money to pay them
they started robbing Dutch cities
the Dutch gewesten united to get rid of the soldiers, which worked
1579: Willem wants religion peace in the Low countries: Union of Utrecht and Union of Atrecht
- catholics and protestants didn’t want this peace of religion and decided to split up again
1. Union of Utrecht protestants that continued the war against Spain
2. Union of Atrecht support to Filips 2
How the Union of Utrecht became a Republic
- this union wanted to form a cooperation against the Spanish, but they needed help from the
outside to do that successfully
- started seeking help in France and GB
brother of the French king was asked to become their leader and said yes, but first the union had
to declare themselves independent from Spain
they did that with the Act of Adjuration/Plakkaat van Verlatinghe (1581)
eventually this regulation with their new leader didn’t work and they decided to move on without
a king, and they decide to handle it themselves
1648: Peace of Münster
- the official end of the war between Spain and the Republic
not in 1581, but only now the Spanish officially recognized the Rep. as an independent state
- it was at some point a defeat for both:
NL had to give up Antwerp, which was such an important part of their economy
Spain had to give up their aim to make everyone in their dynasty catholic
How did the Dutch ‘win’?
- is it winning if you didn’t even know what you were fighting for? Is it winning if only half of the
region becomes part of your state?
- their ‘victory’ isn’t anymore explained simply as the consequence of Dutch heroics
there are 2 things that helped them to survive:
2
,1. Filips 2’s ‘grand strategy’
Filips had a lot of other priorities he wanted to do that he saw as more important than fighting
the Low Countries
only when there was time and money, Spain would fight in NL
2. Logistics
- Filips wasn’t great at micromanaging, especially due to the fact that NL was far away from
Brussels
- Dutch ground was hard to battle on for the Spanish (wet, holes, mud etc.)
- urbanization in NL was also problematic bc this meant that he had to take down all of the cities
1 by 1, which would cost a lot of work and time
Consequences of the revolt
- by chance, not on purpose, a new state was formed
the course of the revolt shaped the geography, political structure, economic policies, and
culture of the Dutch Republic
- Republic’s global extension was inspired by the conflict with Spain
- ‘Dutch’ identity (not being Spanish) was deemed a necessary precondition for success in the
struggle with Spain
- (collective) war memories shaped Dutch mentalities throughout the Golden Age
Chapter 5: The cult and memory of war and violence
War was central to the Dutch self-image, but the Dutch didn’t see themselves as warlike at all
the early history of the Revolt was rewritten as a story of victimhood (victim of the cruel
Spanish) and civic courage against foreign enemies
reality was different: there were actually many voices missing from the din (kabaal) of
publicity and discussion surrounding matters of war and peace, mostly the voices of those who
had no representation in the States General
these unrepresented groups (in frontier zones in east and south/Generality Lands and people
living far away from VOC and WIC) felt burdens of war most acutely, yet no one showed any
interest in their wishes
- acts of oblivion: the Dutch tend to only remember certain parts of the Revolt; the parts that
make them look heroic or like victims of the Spanish
- the Republic saw itself as a small and vulnerable, but other states started to see it as an
aggressive superstate
3
, Lecture 1B
Dutch Republic in the 17th century
- urbanized west
- rural (plattelands) east
- generality lands = ran like occupied land, violent are where the war with the Spanish was fought
mentality that didn’t quite fit with the rest of the Rep.
Republic: making money out of war
- usually war is bad for a country’s economy, but this wasn’t the case for the Rep.
migration: due to the war, people started fleeing towards the big cities. This meant that these
cities gained a lot of knowledge, with which they were able to boost the economy
blockade of Antwerp: good for the Dutch economy, bc now Amsterdam could become the new
port city
WIC and VOC: war-ish activities sponsored by the Dutch government, with which the Dutch made
a lot of money
Dutch politics on paper (formal)
- the 3 key principles upon which the Rep. was based
1. The fiction of continuity
the Dutch tried to preserve the Habsburg monarchial institutions
- Stadhouder: stayed intact even though there was no one to represent anymore
- Staten Generaal/States General: here the representatives from the different cities came
together to talk. Had responsibility for matters of war, foreign policy, taxation and religion
- Raad van State/Council of State: originally this was an advising body, but in the Rep. it
became basically the government
2. Union of Utrecht: a contradiction
- the 7 provinces/gewesten of the union pretended to be 1 province/state towards other the rest of
the world, but internal they stayed 7 separate provincial states confederation
particularism
3. Bottom-up politics in the Rep.
- politic structure in Rep.: towns/nobility (regents = certain families that were often also rich and had
a lot of power) Provincial States States General
- urban pride: in this way the regents have a lot of power and rule the Rep. kind of
Politics in practice (informal)/political culture
1. Political participation
- print culture: this culture was really important for political communications and almost everyone
was involved with the politics. This culture had its roots in the revolt
pamphlets = early form of the newspaper; informed the Dutch about events in the world, but was
also full of propaganda for certain parties
this propaganda was very important for the creation of factions/sides, which were very important
to belong to for Dutch identity (bijv. Oranje vs van Oldenbarnevelt: print with scales)
- discussion culture: the Dutch culture exists for a great part out of discussion, mostly about politics
the term ‘discussion’ however, might be too friendly for the harsh realities of the public debate
the debate wasn’t as open-minded as the term suggests: entire groups of people were excluded
from the Dutch debate (women bijv.)
4
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