An overview of the Dutch Golden Age
Nowadays, the Netherlands is a successful country by almost any measure — a high-income nation with good universities, attractive cities and a tolerant, easygoing population. As European countries go, it is of middling influence and power: with a population of over 17 million people and the world’s 17th largest economy, it plays a bigger role in world affairs than other small countries like Ireland, Sweden or Austria, though it is dwarfed by the much bigger Germany, France and Britain.
In the 17th-century, however, the Netherlands was anything but a middling country — it was, in fact, the world’s leading economic force, and a giant in military affairs, science, colonialism and the fine arts, particularly painting. The impact of this era still lingers today, so this article will explain the remarkably obscure Golden Age for readers new to the period.
The United Provinces of the Netherlands was formed in 1588, during a period of rebellion again Spain. At this point, Spain and the Holy Roman Empire (which included much of modern Germany and Austria) were united under the House of Hapsburg, with Spain becoming the more important partner in that empire as it established colonies in the Americas.
The Netherlands had many irreconcilable differences with their Spanish rulers, the most obvious being that the Netherlands, unlike…
