Newsletter
Volume 6, Number 5, November 2003

The Williamite Universe

The Williamite Universe, in collaboration with the Centre for Early Modern Studies, and supported by grants from the British Academy and the Association for Low Countries Studies, will hold its second annual conference, Inside out and outside in: a new look at the 17th-century republic of letters, from 12 to 13 December at the University of Aberdeen. The organisers are Drs. Esther Mijers, Hugh Dunthorne and David Onnekink.

The provisional programme is given below. For a registration form contact: thewilliamiteuniverse@yahoo.com.

12 December Inside the republic of letters

08.45-09.15 Registration (Marischall College)

09.15-09.45 Opening (Picture Gallery, Marischall College) Principal; Dr. Hugh Dunthorne (Swansea)

09.45-10.30 Plenary lecture I (Marischall College) Howard Hotson (Aberdeen) Cultures of communication in an age of crisis: the multi-layered networks of Hartlib, Dury and Comenius

10.30-11.30 Individuals, circles and networks I (Marischall College) Chair: Tony Claydon (Bangor) Dirk van Miert (Amsterdam): Education in the republic of letters Richard Maber (Durham): Gilles Ménage (1613-1692) and his Protest-ant correspondents

11.30-12.00 Coffee (Picture Gallery, Marischall College)

12.00-13.00 Individuals, circles and networks II (Marischall College) Mark Jardine (Edinburgh): Rivals in radicalism: the 'true' Scots Presbyterian struggle for recognition 1679-1688 Elizabeth Edwards (Canterbury): Horticulture and diplomacy: politi-cians, diplomats and gardeners in the late seventeenth century

13.15-14.20 Lunch (Linklater Rooms, King's College)

14.30-15.30 Politics I (KCF8, King's College) Chair: Roger A. Mason (St Andrews) Astrid Stilma (Amsterdam): The life and times of the negative confes-sion: Dutch translations of Scottish protestant politics Charles-Edouard Levillain (Picardie): Liberty against monarch?: Tac-itean trends in the Anglo-Dutch republic of letters (1651-1698)

15.30-16.00 Tea (Linklater Rooms, King's College)

16.00-17.00 Politics II (KCF8, King's College) Steve Pincus (Chicago): Debates on political economy in late seven-teenth century intellectual exchange Emma Bergin (Hull): The treatment of England in Dutch pamphlet lit-erature 1685-1690

13 December Confrontation and co-operation with the outside world

09.30-10.15 Plenary lecture II (KCF8, King's College) To be announced

10.15-11.15 Foreign(ers) and strange(rs) I (KCF8, King's College) Chair: Steve Murdoch (Aberdeen) Werner Thomas (Louvain): Spanish public opinion on Protestantism and its roots in Iberian anti-Semitism Jakub Basista (Cracow): Protestants in Poland-Lithuania in the second half of the seventeenth century

11.15-11.45 Coffee (JM Hall, King's College)

11.45-12.45 Foreign(ers) and strange(rs) II (KCF8, King's College) Sugiko Nishikawa (Kobe): Across the Continent: the Society for Pro-moting Christian Knowledge (SPCK) and its network of communications Esther Mijers (Aberdeen) Scottish theology students in The Nether-lands

13.15-14.15 Lunch (JM Hall, King's College)

14.14-15.15 The outsiders' impact I (KCF8, King's College) Chair: Frits Broeyer (Utrecht) Jeanine Delandstheer (Louvain): Protestant reaction to Justus Lipsius' Holy Virgin treatises Robert von Friedeburg (Rotterdam): Passions, patriotism and resist-ance against princes in seventeenth century German Protestant thought: the case of Johannes Althusius

15.15-15.45 Tea (JM Hall, King's College)

15.45-16.45 The outsiders' impact II (KCF8, King's College) Martine van Ittersum (Dundee): Recte igitur dicit Victoria: Hugo Grot-ius (1583-1645) and the Relectiones theologicae XII of Francisco de Vitoria (1485-1546) Laura Manzano Baena (Florence): Natural law as a way of surmounting confessional differences in the Catholic monarchy and the United Pro-vinces around the Peace of Munster (1648)

16.45-1700 Concluding remarks Tony Claydon (Bangor)

The ALCS Fifth biennial conference

This will be held from Thursday, the 8th, to Saturday, the 10th, of January 2004 at the University of Sheffield.

The programme is:

8 January 2004

14.00-16.00 Registration, Tapton Hall of Residence

16.00-1615 Formal opening

16.16-17.30 Opening lecture (Dr. Bob Moore)

17.30 Drinks

18.15 Dinner in Tapton Hall

20.00-21.00 Two parallel sessions (Linguistics & Literature in Dutch)

9 January 20004

07.30-08.30 Breakfast

09.00-13.00 Two parallel sessions (Language pedagogy & literature)

12.30-14.00 Lunch

14.00-17.30 Two parallel sessions (Literature & History)

18.30 Evening's entertainment and dinner (Millenium Gallery)

10 January 2004

08.00-09.30 Breakfast

09.30-10.30 ALCS business meeting

10.30-11.00 Coffee

11.00-12.30 Closing plenary (Prof. Michael Perraudin)

12.30-14.00 Lunch

14.00 Departure

Workshop on resources for Dutch and Scottish history

Dr Esther Mijers is hoping to hold a workshop at the University of Aberdeen in May 2004 on resources for Dutch history in Scotland and on those for Scottish history in The Netherlands. It is hoped that six speakers will take part.

CODART: Dutch and Flemish art in museums

The export of works of art may be considered the single greatest cultural success in the history of the Low Countries. Building on this success, CODART, which was set up in January 1998 by the Netherlands Institute for Cultural Heritage upon the suggestion of the American art historian, Gary Schwartz, brings together in a single organization the hundreds of people in countries all over the world who are in charge of collections of art from the Low Countries. This gives fresh current value to an historical development.

Its aims are:

Reinstall the Netherlands and Flanders at the centre of the worldwide dissemination of the art produced there.
Help museums derive more profit from their holdings of Dutch and Flemish art.
Bestow recognition on the individuals who care for art from the Low Countries.
Solidify cultural ties between the Netharlands and Flanders.
Support the role of the curator in museums.
Stimulate international cooperation in the exhibition and study of Dutch and Flemish art.
Serve as a platform for contact with museum curators in Central and Eastern Europe.

To date CODART has achieved the following:

Assembled a list of about four hundred museums with significant collections of Dutch and Flemish art.
Identified and approached the functionaries responsible for the care of these col-lections. More than three hundred and fifty functionaries of one hundred and ninety museums and research centres in thirty five countries have accepted membership to date.
Set up a website, http://www.codart.nl , with a survey of museums and their member-curators, furnished with links to the websites of these museums.
Created an Internet discussion list.
Funds have been raised to make it possible for curators from Central and Eastern Europe to attend Codart's congresses.
Established close ties with the diplomatic services of the Low Countries.

Forthcoming lectures of interest to ALCS members

On Thursday, the 13th of November 2003, Professor Benjamin Kaplan of UCL's Department of History will give his inaugural lecture on religiously mixed marriages in the Dutch Republic. On Friday, the 23th of January 2004, his seminar will hold a joint session with the European History 1500-1800 one, when Geert Janssen of the University of Leiden will present his work on political patronage. Further details on these and other events can be obtained by email: b.kaplan@ucl.ac.uk , by telephone: (0)20-7679 1338 or by fax: (0)20 7413 8394.

Love letters: Dutch genre painting in the age of Vermeer

Just as e-mail today dominates written communication, the writing of personal letters became widespread and fashionable in the seventeenth century. Although letters had long existed, the notion that they could convey private feeling and emotions suddenly captured the popular imagination and transformed personal communication. During this period not only were The Netherlands the most literate country in Europe and a Leading publishing centre, it was also the focus of an explosion of epistolary activity. In turn seventeenth-century painters became the first to depict anonymous people writing, reading, dispatching and receiving letters. Leading painters such as Gerard ter Borch, Gabriel Metsu, Frans van Mieris, Pieter de Hooch and Johannes Vermeer made the letter a central feature of their scenes of everyday life, defining the subject and creating memorable images which would influence generations of painters to come. The exhibition now on at the National Gallery of Ireland from 1 October to 31 December 2003 includes over forty paintings drawn from both public and private collections around the world. It is curated by the Northern Baroque specialist and Executive Director of the Bruce Museum, Dr. Peter C. Sutton, who is also co-author of the accompanying catalogue (price: euros 25,00, Gallery Shop). This handsome book is the first comprehensive study of the subject and includes essays by Lisa Vergara and Ann Jensen Adams as well as contributions by Jennifer Kilian and Mar-jorie E. Wieseman.

New online reference work on pre-1800 Low Countries imprints

The Abt. Historische Drucke of the Deutsche Staatsbibliothek

Preussischer Kulturbe-sitz is currently preparing to mount on its website a new reference work, which has been rejected by three publishers as far too specialised to be a commercial success in the present economic climate. Compiled by W.A. Kelly, Reference resources for cata-loguing German and Low Countries imprints to ca. 1800 will contain entries for over seventeen hundred and fifty works, supported by a Subject index and a Names and titles index. Such is the wealth of reference materials on early printed books from the Dutch- and German languages areas of Europe that not all relevant titles could be included in this forthcoming edition. An update, which will possibly include over one hundred more titles, is already in preparation.

Subscriptions

The Treasurer would like to inform all members that it would save her much time and effort and them money i.e. £15.00 instead of £16.00 p.a. (or £9.00 instead of £10.00, if payment is at the reduced rate), if they were to pay their subscriptions in future by banker's order rather than by a one a year method. A banker's order can be obtained from her at her new address: Dr. Nicola McLelland, Department of German, Univers-ity Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD; nicola.mclelland@nottingham.ac.uk.

Recent publications of interest to ALCS members

S. Stupp, Beneden de zeespiegel: een Amerikaan in Holland . Amsterdam: Balans, 2003.

This is a collection of entertaining stories, anecdotes and essays about the Dutch and their culture written by an American who has lived and worked in The Netherlands. In contrast with many other books by foreigners it avoids the usual clichés and distorted perspectives inspired by stereotypes.

The dictionary of seventeenth and eighteenth-century Dutch philosopher s. Editors: W. v. Bunge [and others]. Bristol: Thoemmes Press, 2003. 2v.

'Philosophers' is used here in its widest sense of 'scholars', the work being essentially a 'who was who' of Dutch intellectual life in these two centuries. In addition to bio-bibliographical information on native Dutch scholars, the work includes foreign figures such as Descartes, Locke and Hobbes, who had an influence there In addition it contains entries on the leading organs of intellectual thought of the time such as periodical and the publications of learned societies and on leading publishers and institutions of higher learning.

Material for the next Newsletter

Material to be included in the next number of the Newsletter should be sent to the editor at William_A_Kelly@compuserve.com or at 54 Edderston Road, PEEBLES EH45 9DT, Scottish Borders before the end of May 2004.

Newsletter Volume 6, Number 5, November 2003