The Nobility of Holland: From Knights to Regents, 1500-1650

Description

This book is the first full-scale analysis of the social and political transformation of the nobility of Holland during the revolt against Spain. In the late medieval county of Holland the nobility played a significant role, but in the seventeenth century it appears to have been obliterated by bourgeois merchants and urban regents. The author argues that this 'decline' needs re-examination and bases his study on three key aspects: the demographic evidence for the decline of the nobility; the economic vicissitudes of the sixteenth century, which gave rise to the myth of its impoverishment; and finally the political and administrative powers of the nobility in the reigns of Charles V and Phillip II during the Dutch Revolt in the Republic. The conclusions are surprising. The nobility of Holland was extremely successful in maintaining its position in a bourgeois republic. In conjunction with the urban regents, the nobles formed the country's administrative, political and economic elite and from a social point of view, they maintained a strict apartheid by marrying exclusively within their group. Widely acclaimed in the Dutch edition of 1984, this is an important contribution to the history of the Netherlands as well as to the more general study of European elites.

"...essential to any study of the European nobilty in this period." Douglas Clark Baxter, The Historian "...Van Nierop offers a new and clear history of the nobility of Holland in a turbulent period. He also surprises us with a lot of fascinating petite histoires on abductions, mesalliances, and bankruptcies." Richard F. J. Paping, Journal of Economic History "This is a welcome addition to the literature in English on Dutch history for this period, and it is also an important contribution to the history of the nobility in early modern Europe." J.L. Price, American Historical Review "Van Nierop's important study of the nobility in the province of Holland during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, first published in Dutch in 1984, is now available in an eloquent English translation....This book can rightfully be called a classic in its field. Despite significant new research since its initial publication, its conclusions remain sound. The impressive archival work and masterful writing allow a convincing picture of the nobility to emerge from a background of limited evidence and, sometimes confusing, contrasts....This is a first-rate work by one of the leading Dutch historians of our time, and it is well served by Ultee's translation." Andrew C. Fix, Journal of Interdisciplinary History