Introduction to Dutch and Spanish History 1550-1650

Introduction

When answering the question ‘Why did Spain lose the Netherlands ?’ it is important not only to concentrate on the situation in the Low Countries in the years 1566 – 1648 but also the conditions within Spain and indeed to a lesser extent throughout Europe. Also the straightjacket of the term “Eighty Year’s War’ has to be loosened because the years of the Voorspel 1559-1566 have to be combined if an explanation is to be made. When Philip II left the Netherlands in 1559 his sister Margaret Duchess of Parma was appointed as Regent. Governors were appointed to the separate provinces including William of Nassau Prince of Orange. Margaret had been told to use only a consulta of these men including Cardinal Granvelle. Philip has thus abandoned the nobility by the creation of the consulta and his refusal to summon the States General must have made it seem as if he was attempting to increase his power at their expense. More importantly, but also in connection with this, the greatest source of tension was religious policy. Philip wanted the reorganization of the bishoprics in the Netherlands and the elimination of heresy.

Religion

The officials of the Inquisition such as Lindanus in Holland and Titelmans in Flanders were not only hated on humanitarian grounds but also because the magistrates resented the intrusion of the ecclesiastical authority into municipal jurisdiction and feared the effects of persecution on the economic life of the cities. Philip II’s determination to wipe our heresy steamrollered over the privileges of the magistrates. The right of the ‘de non evocando’ where local inhabitants could not be cited before ecclesiastical or civil courts outside their place of residence was infringed as were privileges of non confiscation in heresy cases. The edicts dealing with heresy were ‘ deitet du cas privilegie’ and an accused could not evoke privileges which would have spared him from torture. Above all the legal principle used in the edicts and the methods use to convict heretics were considered to infringe traditional views of justice because they left out preliminary enquiries or ‘infomati precedente’ and Inquisitors did not even have to state the cause of someone’s arrest. This may account for the opposition of the cities and the influential to Philip II but not everyone opposed him.

Ancient family rivalries e.g. Croy-Nassau rivalry divided the nobles. More importantly – how were the ordinary people influenced by religion ? Calvinism was a very strong force in favour of levelling society in theory. However, although the Calvinist divines were not democrats they magnified the contrast between the elect and the damned and by giving all men access to the Scriptures they undermined the old social hierarchy. The bout of image breaking in 1566 was not unique but spread rapidly. A far more widespread movement was hedgepreaching led by the Calvinist ministers. The success of hedgepreaching and the iconoclasts enabled the Reformers to introduce the practices of Calvinism in many towns and villages. Many listened to important Calvinist like Jean Leseur, Guy de Bris, Peregrine de la Grange and Herman Moded because they articulated their own hopes and fears. These preachers may have offered their audience a sense of restored authority in the absence of effective government. Preche was a peaceful, communal microcosm of society and many believed the preaching was legitimate because the government and the high nobility did nothing to stop it. The nobles wanted to guard their privileges, legislate on religious matters and dispense patronage and the preche was a statement of collective solidarity against the Inquisition and the foreign government but this was implicit rather than explicit. However, the advent of Alva in 1567 altered all this and renewed persecution after Philip’s inactivity in suppressing hedgepreaching which had been taken as acquiescence led to the acceptance of Calvinism as a revolutionary doctrine.

Propaganda

Thus we have explored one of the causes of the Dutch Revolt and ultimately one of the reasons Spain lost the Netherlands. The suppression of heresy could only be accompanied by an increase in Philip’s power and loss of privileges for many which effected both Catholic and Protestant. Calvinism provided justification for disobeying the King. A combination of socio-religious motives was one of the principle reasons for Spain’s defeat. Religious quarrels were not helped by the smear campaign conducted against the Inquisition by the printers and propaganda experts, two notable examples being “The Articles of the Inquisition” and the”Advice of the Inquisition”. Indeed the flood of propaganda against Spain was probably a contributory factor towards the Spanish loss of the Netherlands. Attacks were made on the King after 1580 by William of Orange in his “Apology” and Marnix of St Aldegarde was actively creating myths about Spaniards. Alva was denounced as a ‘bloodhound, tigerbeast, rascal of all rascals’ and the Spanish people’s cruelty was attacked in a number of broadsides including the publication of Las Casas tract on the destruction of the West Indian people accompanied by a host of barbaric drawings at the hand of Joost de Winghe. It is true that the Spaniards were capable of acts of great cruelty and Alva massacred the inhabitants of Mechlen, Zutphen and Naarden but many of the acts may have been exaggerated and William’s armies could hardly claim to be as pure as the driven snow.

Economic Factors

But perhaps too much emphasis has been placed on religion to the exclusion of other factors. It is a fact that the most violent elements of several stages of the revolt such as the image breaking of 1567 and the disturbances of 1572 came from workers in occupations of unemployment or poverty and the owns feared for their economic well-being e.g. Antwerp thought that the activities of the local bishop would make the port inaccessible to German Lutheran merchants. Economic factors contributed to exasperation in a general way but in 1566 food prices in the Netherlands were not particularly high and there is no reason to assume there was widespread economic ruin but it was the fear of ruin which made the lower and middle classes nervous – the economy was slackening off after a post Cateau-Cambresis boom. Although we are now in the dangerous realms of psycho-economics such fears may explain why the middle classes hardly tried to stop the iconoclastic movement because they would not feel much loyalty to a church and government that was unable to control development. However, even this example shows that religion underpinned most of the problems and its strength is emphasized when one considers that the iconoclasts merely wrecked images and did not resort to looting. Religion continued to play a large role throughout the struggle, for example one of the stimulants to the 1579 Union of Arras and Utrecht were religious differences between north and south after the Calvinists had encroached over the limits of the earlier Pacification of Ghent.

Military Factors

I now want to turn away from the issues of religion for two reasons. Firstly by overemphasizing religion we are in danger of a kind of crude determinism i.e. that religion was responsible for the loss of the Netherlands and it should be noted that old family rivalries, antagonism between Walloons and Flemings and economic interest often determined the side that one followed. Many Catholics were opposed to the excesses of Alva, some were amongst the Sea Beggers and not all Protestants automatically sided with William of Orange. Secondly I want to concentrate on the military and strategic aspects of the struggle. In the final analysis the Netherlands was lost because Spain simply did not have the military capacity to fight the Dutch, maintain her vast overseas empire and guard against the Turks. Some specific examples will be useful. Philip II forces had suffered reversal against the Ottoman sultan at Djerba and he concentrated his resources on rebuilding his fleet and in capturing the stronghold of Penon. this coincides with Philip’s recall of the hated Granvelle. He was further hampered from enforcing the heresy laws by a Turkish offensive on Malta but after the Iconoclastic Fury had begun Suleiman the Magnificent died and Philip had his hands free to send many veterans of the Mediterranean campaign to the Netherlands under Alva in 1567.

Even the decisive victory of the Holy League at Lepanto in 1571 did not really aid Philip as far as the Netherlands were concerned because of the sheer expense and the fact that he was fighting on two fronts. The repudiation of the debts of the crown in 1567 led to mutinies in the Netherlands and the initiative being seized by his opponents. The seizure of the Portuguese crown and the Spanish Armada and Philip’s intervention in the French Wars of Religion on the side of the Catholics all helped to divert manpower and resources from the Dutch Revolt. After Philip II’s death the problem continued and Spinola’s success were due to previous peace signed at Vervins in 1598 and London in 1604. The coming of the Thirty Year’s War saw Spain fighting on many fronts yet again, especially in northern Italy, but the menace was worsened by internal revolts in Portugal and Catalonia which certainly contributed to the shattering of the legend of Spanish invincibility at Rocroi and Lens. It can be clearly seen that such wars diverted the war effort away from the Netherlands. Spanish fear of France as illustrated by the Mantuan succession and the Wars of Religion was perhaps the main concern followed by the defence of the Mediterranean and Italy

Other Issues – Resources and Geography

But there are other factors to be considered apart from diversion of resources. Firstly the resources themselves were not inexhaustible. Spain relied heavily on the finance and manpower of Castile as well as American silver which had important consequences. It used to be believed that the vicissitudes of Spanish policy in the Netherlands could be accounted for by the cyclical fluctuations of Spain’s trade with the New World but this is not necessarily true because the amount sent to support the troops in the Netherlands did not vary as a direct proportion of the income of Spanish trade in America. Furthermore the amount of money sent to the Netherlands did not necessarily guarantee the success or failure of the army. For example in the 1580s Parma’s army was conquering on a very limited budget. Castile’s influence was also important in other ways. Many old Italian families were very loyal e.g. Colonna, Pescara, Doria, Spinola and Farnese but they were mistrusted by Castile which would in turn influence the King. Even if we put the financing of the war aside there are complex logistical problems in fighting the Dutch. Here geography has a very important role and accounts to a certain extent for the Spanish loss of the Netherlands. The sea was especially important because it was from there that William was able to seize Brill in 1572 with the help of the Sea Beggers and ultimately dominate Holland and Zealand. The threat of inundation would usually halt the Spanish army but there were staggering successes at sea itself. In 1572 a fleet carrying 1,200 Spanish recruits was crushed and the Sea Beggers based at Dover and La Rochelle would harry Spanish vessels.

If the sea was closed to Spain many of the troops would have to go by land – the largest number travelling along the Spanish Road from Genoa, Lombardy, Piedmont, Savoy, Franche-Comte and Lorraine before reaching the Netherlands. Most of the land was owned by the Spaniards and close alliances formed with territories on the Road. However, as a glance at a map will show the distance involved is great and so the lag time between sending men from Spain and their arrival in the Netherlands could be months. Distance was indeed Spain’s worst enemy and one which they certainly had to run the gantlet of because of the activities of the Sea Beggers, Dutch holdings of all the best shipyards and the stranglehold they could put on trade. To combat the problem mercenaries could be levied locally and these came from Burgundy, Germany, Walloons and Britain but the real hard core were Spanish tercios and particulares who were in increasingly short supply especially during plague years 1598-1602 in the homeland and when demand in the Thirty Years’ War was absorbed by the Germans. Most important of all was the problem of feeding and maintaining an army which could number upto 80,000 in time of crisis in the Netherlands attended by myriad flunkies, hangers-on and prostitutes. This had a two fold effect because would have had difficulty in paying and provisioning the army and the alternative of billeting them on the civilian population would, and did, cause untold resentment.

Leadership

The problem of distance must also account via delayed communications for the failure of the Spanish high command because Philip II could hardly have kept in touch with the very latest developments. The governor generals acted on their own initiatives but perhaps leadership in general and that of the King should also be examined. Philip II is perhaps one of the most enigmatic and controversial of figures. His slowness in decision making was notorious and he personally disliked war except for defensive purposes and even Lepanto was against his orders. He firmly believed in his duty to God for the just governance of his subjects which is something of a paradox and is hard to reconcile with Alva’s mass slaughterings. But in one thing he was inflexible – hid defence of the Catholic faith against heresy and perhaps this partly accounts for his mishandling of the Netherlands as well as his very absence. After the Iconoclastic Fury Margaret was making a rapprochement with the Catholic nobles but the advent of Alva changed all this. The whole decision to treat the Netherlands in this way was based on a false assessment of what had happened. Many regarded Alva;s methods as unjustified, illegal despotism and this misguided policy utterly failed as the Conseil des Troubles summoned 12,000 people and his ‘tenth penny’ taxation of 1571 precipitated revolt. His successor Requesenes fared little better as his attempts to negotiate at Breda in 1575 show. However, it could be argued that Philip II was not entirely responsible for the actions of the governors but he has appointed them in the first place and his inflexible stance on religion fuelled the problems. We should also remember that Philip inherited a relatively bad position due to Burgundian centralizing tendencies and the ancient privileges enjoyed by the Netherlands since the days of Charles the Bold or even the ‘Joyeuse Entree’. In addition Philip II’s reign can hardly be regarded as a total failure because he absorbed Portugal, maintained most of his empire and prevented the spread of heresy. In any case the evidence is sketchy because Philip left no autobiography or testaments for his son and we must assemble a picture of his policies from instructions to his viceroys and ministers.

Conclusion

Nor can the loss of the Netherlands simply be attributed to Spanish incompetence. Quite aside from Dutch military tenacity perhaps the most remarkable element of the confusing series of events was the speed and determination with which the opposition in Holland managed to set up a government of its own. This can only be explained by the long tradition of particularism and the old fashioned pattern of the Burgundian ‘state’ which maintained its old institutions. Finally it must be mentioned that Spain did not lose the entire Netherlands, she still retained ten of the seventeen provinces. When one considers this fact it seems to put the Dutch victory into perspective. Perhaps more emphasis could be placed on the strength of Spain in managing to hold onto the south. Despite this the Dutch Revolt was certainly a defeat for Spain and a multiplicity of factors had contributed to this in which religion and politics, military strategy and socio-economic conditions had figured prominently.

Dr Simon Harding

www.chronosconsulting.com

www.biblon.com

About the Author

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