Part 219

"According to the terms of the marriage treaty between Maximilian and Mary, their eldest son, Philip, succeeded to the sovereignty of the Netherlands immediately upon the death of his mother [March 26, 1482]. As he was at this time only four years of age, Maximilian obtained the acknowledgment of himself as guardian of the young count's person, and protector of his states, by all the provinces except Flanders and Guelderland. The Flemings having secured the person of Philip at Ghent, appointed a regency." To reduce the Flemings to obedience, Maximilian carried on two campaigns in their country, during 1484 and 1485, as the result of which Ghent and Bruges surrendered. "Maximilian was acknowledged protector of Flanders during the minority of Philip, who was delivered by the Ghenters into the hands of his father, and by him entrusted to the care of Margaret of York, Duchess-dowager of Burgundy, until he became of age." Three years later (1488)—Maximilian having been, in the meantime, crowned "King of the Romans," at Aix la Chapelle, and thus cadetted, so to speak, for his subsequent coronation as emperor—the Flemings rose again in revolt, Maximilian was at Bruges, and rumor accused him of a design to occupy the city with German troops. The men of Bruges forestalled the attempt by seizing him personally and making him a prisoner. They kept him in durance for nearly four months, until he had signed a treaty, agreeing to surrender the government of the Netherlands to the young Duke Philip, his son; to place the latter under the care of the princes of the blood (his relatives on the Burgundian side); to withdraw all foreign troops, and to use his endeavors to preserve peace with France. {2254} On these terms Maximilian obtained his liberty; but, meantime, his father, the Emperor Frederic, had marched an army to the frontiers of Brabant for his deliverance, and the very honorable King of the Romans, making haste to the shelter of these forces, repudiated with alacrity all the engagements he had sworn to. His imperial father led the army he had brought into Flanders and laid siege to Ghent; but tired of the undertaking after six weeks and returned to Germany, leaving his forces to prosecute the siege and the war. The commotions in Flanders now brought to life the popular party of the "Hooks" in Holland, and war broke out in that province. In neither part of the Netherlands were the insurgents successful. The Flemings had been helped by France, and when the French king abandoned them they were forced to buy a peace on humiliating terms and for a heavy price in cash. In Holland, the revolt languished for a time, but broke out with fresh spirit in 1490, excited by an edict which summarily altered the value of the coin. In the next year it took the name of the "Casembrotspel," or Bread and Cheese War. This insurrection was suppressed in 1492, with the help of German troops, and proved only disastrous to the province. "It was the last effort made for a considerable time by the Hollanders against the increasing power and extortion of their counts. … The miserable remnant of the Hook or popular party melted so entirely away that we hear of them no more in Holland: the county, formerly a power respected in itself, was now become a small and despised portion of an overgrown state." In 1494, Philip having reached the age of seventeen, and Maximilian having become emperor by the death of his father, the latter surrendered and the former was installed in the government of the Netherlands.

_C. M. Davies, History of Holland, part 2, chapter 3 (volume 1)._

NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1494-1519. Beginning of the Austro-Spanish tyranny. Absorption in the vast dominion of Charles V. The seventeen Provinces, their independent constitutions and their States-General.

"In 1494, Philip, now 17 years of age, became sovereign of the Netherlands. But he would only swear to maintain the privileges granted by his grandfather and great-grandfather, Charles and Philip, and refused to acquiesce in the Great Privilege of his mother. The Estates acquiesced. For a time, Friesland, the outlying province of Holland, was severed from it. It was free, and it chose as its elective sovereign the Duke of Saxony. After a time he sold his sovereignty to the House of Hapsburg. The dissensions of the Estates had put them at the mercy of an autocratic family. Philip of Burgundy, in 1496, married Joanna, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella. In 1500 his son Charles was born, who was afterwards Charles V., Duke of the Netherlands, but also King of Spain, Emperor of Germany, King of Jerusalem, and, by the grant of Alexander VI., alias Roderic Borgia and Pope, lord of the whole new world. Joanna, his mother, through whom he had this vast inheritance, went mad, and remained mad during her life and his.

See SPAIN: A. D. 1496-1517.

Charles not only inherited his mother's and father's sovereignties, but his grandfather's also.

See AUSTRIA: A. D. 1496-1526].

… The peril which the liberties of the Netherlands were now running was greater than ever. They had been drawn into the hands of that dynasty which, beginning with two little Spanish kingdoms [Castile and Aragon], had in a generation developed into the mightiest of monarchies. … Charles succeeded his father Philip as Count of Flanders in 1506. His father, Philip the Handsome, was at Burgos in Castile, where he was attacked by fever, and died when only 28 years of age. Ten years afterwards Charles became King of Spain (1516). When he was 19 years of age (1519) he was elected emperor.

See GERMANY: A. D. 1519.

The three nations over whom he was destined to rule hated each other cordially. There was antipathy from the beginning between Flemings and Spaniards. The Netherlands nobles were detested in Spain, the Spaniards in the Low Countries were equally abhorred. … Charles was born in Flanders, and during his whole career was much more a Fleming than a Spaniard. This did not, however, prevent him from considering his Flemish subjects as mainly destined to supply his wants, and submit to his exactions. He was always hard pressed for money. The Germans were poor and turbulent. The conquest and subjection of the Moorish population in Spain had seriously injured the industrial wealth of that country. But the Flemings were increasing in riches, particularly the inhabitants of Ghent. They had to supply the funds which Charles required in order to carry out the operations which his necessities or his policy rendered urgent. He had been taught, and he readily believed, that his subjects' money was his own. Now just as Charles had come to the empire, two circumstances had occurred which have had a lasting influence over the affairs of Western Europe. The first of these was the conquest of Egypt by the Turks under Selim I (1512-20). … Egypt had for nearly two centuries been the only route by which Eastern produce, so much valued by European nations, could reach the consumer. … Now this trade, trifling to be sure to our present experience, was of the highest importance to the trading towns of Italy, the Rhine, and the Netherlands. … But the Netherlands had two industries which saved them from the losses which affected the Germans and Italians. They were still the weavers of the world. They still had the most successful fisheries. … The other cause was the revolt against the papacy" [the Reformation—see PAPACY: A. D. 1516-1517, and after].

_J. E. T. Rogers, The Story of Holland, chapters 5-6._

The seventeen provinces comprehended under the name of the Netherlands, as ruled by Charles V., were the four duchies of Brabant, Limburg, Luxemburg, and Guelderland; the seven counties of Artois, Hainault, Flanders, Namur, Zutphen, Holland, and Zealand; the five seigniories or lordships of Friesland, Mechlin, Utrecht, Overyssel, and Groningen; and the margraviate of Antwerp. "Of these provinces, the four which adjoined the French border, and in which a French dialect was spoken, were called Walloon [see WALLOONS]; in the other provinces a dialect, more or less resembling German, prevailed, that of the midland ones being Flemish, that of the northern, Dutch. They differed still more in their laws and customs than in language. Each province was an independent state, having its own constitution, which secured more liberty to those who lived under it than was then commonly enjoyed in most other parts of Europe. … {2255} The only institutions which supplied any links of union among the different provinces were the States-General, or assembly of deputies sent from each, and the Supreme Tribunal established at Mechlin, having an appellate jurisdiction over them all. The States-General, however, had no legislative authority, nor power to impose taxes, and were but rarely convened. … The members of the States-General were not representatives chosen by the people, but deputies, or ambassadors, from certain provinces. The different provinces had also their own States."

_T. H. Dyer, History of Modern Europe, volume 2, pages 221-222._

NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1512. Burgundian provinces included in the Circle of Burgundy.

See GERMANY: A. D. 1493-1519.

NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1521-1555. The Reformation in the Provinces. The "Placards" and Persecutions of Charles V. The Edict of 1550. The Planting of the Inquisition.

"The people of the Netherlands were noted not less for their ingenuity shown in the invention of machines and implements, and for their proficiency in science and letters, than for their opulence and enterprise. It was their boast that common laborers, even the fishermen who dwelt in the huts of Friesland, could read and write, and discuss the interpretation of Scripture. … In such a population, among the countrymen of Erasmus, where, too, in previous ages, various forms of innovation and dissent had arisen, the doctrines of Luther must inevitably find an entrance. They were brought in by foreign merchants, 'together with whose commodities,' writes the old Jesuit historian Strada, 'this plague often sails.' They were introduced with the German and Swiss soldiers, whom Charles V. had occasion to bring into the country. Protestantism was also transplanted from England by numerous exiles who fled from the persecution of Mary. The contiguity of the country to Germany and France provided abundant avenues for the incoming of the new opinions. 'Nor did the Rhine from Germany, or the Meuse from France,' to quote the regretful language of Strada, 'send more water into the Low Countries, than by the one the contagion of Luther, by the other of Calvin, was imported into the same Belgic provinces.' The spirit and occupations of the people, the whole atmosphere of the country, were singularly propitious for the spread of the Protestant movement. The cities of Flanders and Brabant, especially Antwerp, very early furnished professors of the new faith. Charles V. issued, in 1521, from Worms, an edict, the first of a series of barbarous enactments or 'Placards,' for the extinguishing of heresy in the Netherlands; and it did not remain a dead letter. In 1523, two Augustinian monks were burned at the stake in Brussels. … The edicts against heresy were imperfectly executed. The Regent, Margaret of Savoy, was lukewarm in the business of persecution; and her successor, Maria, the Emperor's sister, the widowed Queen of Hungary, was still more leniently disposed. The Protestants rapidly increased in number. Calvinism, from the influence of France, and of Geneva, where young men were sent to be educated, came to prevail among them. Anabaptists and other licentious or fanatical sectaries, such as appeared elsewhere in the wake of the Reformation, were numerous; and their excesses afforded a plausible pretext for violent measures of repression against all who departed from the old faith. In 1550, Charles V. issued a new Placard, in which the former persecuting edicts were confirmed, and in which a reference was made to Inquisitors of the faith, as well as to the ordinary judges of the bishops. This excited great alarm, since the Inquisition was an object of extreme aversion and dread. The foreign merchants prepared to leave Antwerp, prices fell, trade was to a great extent suspended; and such was the disaffection excited, that the Regent Maria interceded for some modification of the obnoxious decree. Verbal changes were made, but the fears of the people were not quieted; and it was published at Antwerp in connection with a protest of the magistrates in behalf of the liberties which were put in peril by a tribunal of the character threatened. 'And,' says the learned Arminian historian, 'as this affair of the Inquisition and the oppression from Spain prevailed more and more, all men began to be convinced that they were destined to perpetual slavery.' Although there was much persecution in the Netherlands during the long reign of Charles, yet the number of martyrs could not have been so great as 50,000, the number mentioned by one writer, much less 100,000, the number given by Grotius."

_G. P. Fisher, The Reformation, chapter 9._

"His hand [that of Charles V.] planted the inquisition in the Netherlands. Before his day it is idle to say that the diabolical institution ever had a place there. The isolated cases in which inquisitors had exercised functions proved the absence and not the presence of the system. … Charles introduced and organized a papal inquisition, side by side with those terrible 'placards' of his invention, which constituted a masked inquisition even more cruel than that of Spain. … The number of Netherlanders who were burned, strangled, beheaded, or buried alive, in obedience to his edicts … has been placed as high as 100,000 by distinguished authorities, and have never been put at a lower mark than 50,000. The Venetian envoy Navigero placed the number of victims in the provinces of Holland and Friesland alone at 30,000, and this in 1546, ten years before the abdication, and five before the promulgation of the hideous edict of 1550. … 'No one,' said the edict [of 1550], 'shall print, write, copy, keep, conceal, sell, buy, or give in churches, streets, or other places, any book or writing made by Martin Luther, John Ecolampadius, Ulrich Zwinglius, Martin Bucer, John Calvin, or other heretics reprobated by the Holy Church; … nor break, or otherwise injure the images of the holy virgin or canonized saints; … nor in his house hold conventicles, or illegal gatherings, or be present at any such in which the adherents of the above-mentioned heretics teach, baptize, and form conspiracies against the Holy Church and the general welfare. … Moreover, we forbid … all lay persons to converse or dispute concerning the Holy Scriptures, openly or secretly, especially on any doubtful or difficult matters, or to read, teach, or expound the Scriptures, unless they have duly studied theology and been approved by some renowned university; … or to preach secretly, or openly, or to entertain any of the opinions of the above-mentioned heretics. … Such perturbators of the general quiet are to be executed, to wit: the men with the sword and the women to be buried alive, if they do not persist in their errors; if they do persist in them they are to be executed with fire; all their property in both cases being confiscated to the crown.'"

The horrible edict further bribed informers, by promising to them half the goods of a convicted heretic, while, at the same time, it forbade, under sharp penalties, any petitioning for pardon in favor of such heretics.

_J. L. Motley, The Rise of the Dutch Republic, part 1, chapter 1, and part 2, chapter 1 (volume 1)._

ALSO IN: _J. H. Merle d'Aubigne, History of the Reformation in Europe in the Time of Calvin, book 13, chapters 9-11 (volume 7)._

{2265}

NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1539-1540. The revolt and enslavement of Ghent.

See GHENT: A. D. 1539-1540.

NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1547. Pragmatic Sanction of Charles V. changing the Relations of his Burgundian inheritance to the Empire.

In the Germanic diet assembled at Augsburg in 1547, after the Emperor's defeat of the Protestant princes at Muhlberg (see GERMANY: A. D. 1546-1552), he was able to exercise his will almost without opposition and decree arbitrarily whatever he chose. He there "proclaimed the Pragmatic Sanction for the Netherlands, whereby his old Burgundian inheritance was declared by his own law to be indivisible, the succession settled on the house of Hapsburg, it was attached to the German empire as a tenth district, had to pay certain contributions, but was not to be subject to the Imperial Chamber or the Imperial Court of Judicature. He thus secured the personal union of these territories with his house, and made it the duty of the empire to defend them, while at the same time he withdrew them from the jurisdiction of the empire; it was a union by which the private interests of the house of Hapsburg had everything to gain, but which was of no advantage to the empire."

_L. Häusser, The Period of the Reformation, chapter 16._

NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1555. The Abdication of Charles V. Accession of Philip II. His sworn promises.

"In the autumn of this year [1555] the world was astonished by the declaration of the emperor's intention to resign all his vast dominions, and spend the remainder of his days in a cloister. … On the 25th of October, the day appointed for the ceremony [of the surrender of the sovereignty of the Netherlands], the knights of the Golden Fleece, and the deputies of all the states of the Netherlands assembled at Brussels. … On the day after the emperor's resignation the mutual oaths were taken by Philip and the states of Holland; the former swore to maintain all the privileges which they now enjoyed, including those granted or confirmed at his installation as heir in 1549. He afterwards renewed the promise made by Charles in the month of May preceding, that no office in Holland, except that of stadtholder, should be given to foreigners or to Netherlanders of those provinces in which Hollanders were excluded from offices. In the January of the next year [1556] the emperor resigned the crown of Spain to his son, reserving only an annuity of 100,000 crowns, and on the 7th of September following, having proceeded to Zealand to join the fleet destined to carry him to Spain, he surrendered the imperial dignity to his brother Ferdinand." He then proceeded to the cloister of St. Just, near Piacenza, where he lived in retirement until his death, which occurred August 21, 1558.

_C. M. Davies, History of Holland, part 2, chapter 6 (volume 1)._

ALSO IN: _W. Stirling, Cloister Life of Charles V._

_O. Delepierre, Historical Difficulties, chapter 10._

NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1555-1559. Opening of the dark and bloody reign of Philip II. of Spain. His malignity. His perfidy. His evil and plotting industry.