BEING THE FORD LECTURES DELIVERED AT OXFORD IN 1910 BY THE REV. GEORGE EDMUNDSON, M.A. F.R.G.S. F.R. Hist. S. LATE FELLOW AND TUTOR OF BRASENOSE COLLEGE HONORARY MEMBER OF THE DUTCH HISTORICAL SOCIETY (UTRECHT) FOREIGN MEMBER OF THE SOCIETY OF NETHERLANDS LITERATURE (LEYDEN) OXFORD AT THE CLARENDON PRESS 1911 HENRY FROWDE, M.A. PUBLISHER TO THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD LONDON, EDINBURGH, NEW YORK TORONTO AND MELBOURNE...

The varying fortunes of the obstinate and fiercely contested struggles with the Dutch for maritime and commercial supremacy in the days of the Commonwealth and the Restoration are familiar to all readers of English history, and especially of English naval history. Never did English seamen fight better than in these Dutch wars, and never did they meet more redoubtable foes. The details of the many dogged contests marked by alternate victory and defeat are now more or less unintelligible save to t

The last two decades of the sixteenth century hold a place apart in English History. The exploits of the great Elizabethan seamen helped to shatter the supremacy of Spain upon the sea, but they did more than this. They aroused in the English people the instinct of their true destiny, as a maritime, trading, and colonizing power. The granting of Charters to the Eastland (Baltic) Company (1579), to the Levant Company (1581), to the Guinea Company (1588), the foundation of the great East India Comp

The resolve of the King in 1610 to postpone any action in the matter of his proclamation on the fisheries question seems not to have aroused any popular expression of disapproval. The English people were from the political and religious standpoint well disposed to the Dutch. What they suspected and dreaded was the King's obvious leaning to Spain. Their intense dislike to the Spanish marriage, concerning which it was common knowledge that negotiations were on foot, led them to favour a good under

In the Netherlands the minds of all men were throughout the year 1618 preoccupied with the fierce political and religious discords that had brought civil strife into the land. The sword of Maurice had, in the name of the States-General of the Union, overthrown the power of the provincial oligarchies, and despite the strenuous opposition of the States of Holland under the leadership of Oldenbarneveldt, had made good the claim of the States-General to sovereign authority in the Republic. The aged

The embassy of 1622 returned to the Netherlands early in February, 1623. A few weeks later Prince Charles, accompanied by the Duke of Buckingham, was on his way to Madrid to woo in person his prospective Spanish bride. No more conclusive proof could have been shown of the lack of success of Aerssen in obtaining any assurance of armed support from King James for the States in their renewed war with Spain or for the recovery of the Palatinate. Yet, strangely enough, at this very time of increasing

The foreign policy of Charles I during the eleven years of autocratic rule which followed the dissolution of Parliament in 1629, was conditioned by his lack of money. His schemes were ambitious and were obstinately pursued, and the charge that has frequently been preferred against him of inconstancy and fickleness, though it has a basis of truth, is on the whole unjust. Charles's projects had to be frequently modified, because he found himself without the means for carrying them out. In November

The marriage of the Princess Royal with the son of Frederick Henry, Prince of Orange, on May 12, 1641, took place at an ominous time. Ten days later Strafford was executed. There can be little or no doubt, that the eagerness of the King and Queen for the accomplishment of this union was due to the desire to secure the goodwill of the Stadholder, and through him of the States, in the troublous times which they saw before them. It fulfilled two objects. It gave satisfaction to the Puritan party in

From the nature of the land, Holland and Zeeland were always the home of fisher-folk. The herring fishery off the coast of Great Britain was from early times an industry pursued by many Hollanders and Zeelanders, but it was comparatively limited, until the invention of 'curing' made by Willem Beukelsz of Biervliet in the latter part of the fourteenth century (he probably died in 1397) converted a perishable article of food into a commercial commodity. The method of Beukelsz, which remained pract

The expression 'the Narrow Sea', or 'the Narrow Seas', which so often appears in seventeenth-century diplomatic dispatches and controversial writings, is a term upon whose exact signification geographically there has been much dispute. The English kings from ancient times claimed 'sovereignty'— dominium maris —in the 'narrow seas' or mare britannicum . Evidence is fairly conclusive that the term under the Tudors and until the friction with the Dutch arose on the questions of free fishery and the

The death of John William (March 9, 1609), the mad Duke of Jülich-Cleves, without issue, raised the important question of the succession to his territory, which lay astride the Rhine on the eastern frontier of the United Provinces. It was felt to be essential for the protection of Protestant interests in Germany and the Netherlands that the Duchies should not fall into the hands of a partisan of the house of Habsburg. Duke John William had four sisters, but only the claims of the descendants of

The Fellowship of Merchant Adventurers has the distinction of holding the first place, not only in England, but in Western and Central Europe, as the pioneer of great trading corporations. The Gilds of the Middle Ages were municipal and local institutions. The Hansa League in Germany was a bond, not between merchants dealing in particular wares, but between a group of towns. England in the fourteenth century had no manufactures. Her only industries were cattle-breeding and agriculture; her expor

This name for the smugglers who, despite the exclusive rights of the Merchant Adventurers, carried English woollen goods to other Dutch ports than the privileged Staple, was derived from the Dutch term inter- or entre-loopers , i. e. 'runners-in'. During the whole time that the Court and Staple were at Middelburg, the port of Flushing, only a few miles distant on the same island of Walcheren, was in English hands, being one of the so-called 'cautionary' towns, which were a pledge to Queen Elizab

Bodies of English volunteers were to be found fighting under the Prince of Orange against the Spaniards from the very beginning of the Dutch War of Independence. In 1572 a force of 1,500 men under Sir Humphrey Gilbert landed at Flushing, with the connivance of Queen Elizabeth, and from this time forward English troops took part in all the fiercest fighting. In 1571 there were four English regiments in the field, commanded by Colonels Norris, Cavendish, Cotton, and Morgan. During the time of Leic

Whereas our Father of blessed memory King James did in the seuenth yeere of His reigne of Great Brittaine, set forth a Proclamation touching Fishing; whereby for the many important reasons therein expressed, all persons of what Nation or quality soeuer (being not His naturall borne Subjects) were restrained from Fishing vpon any the Coasts and Seas of Great Brittaine, Ireland and the rest of the Isles adjacent, where most vsually heretofore Fishing had been, vntill they had orderly demanded, and

Aitzema, L. Saken van Staet en Oorlogh in en omtrent de Vereenigte Nederlanden, 1621-68. 6 vols. fol., The Hague, 1669-71. Albèri, E. Relazioni degli ambasciatori veneti. Ser. iv, Inghilterra. Florence, 1846-62. Beaujon, A. Overzicht der Geschiedenis van de Nederlandsche Zeevisscherijen. Leiden, 1885. Birdwood, Sir G. , and Foster, W. The first letter-book of the East India Company, 1600-19. London, 1893. Blok, P. J. Geschiedenis der Nederlandsche Volk. Vol. iv, Groningen, 1899. Borough, Sir Joh