Based on one of the richest surviving diaries of the Dutch Golden Age, Princely Power in the Dutch Republic recaptures the social world of William Frederick of Nassau (1613-1664). As a Stadholder and relative of the Prince of Orange, William Frederick was among the key players in a fragmented republican state system. This study offers a vivid analysis of his political strategies and reveals how unwritten codes of patronage guided his daily contacts and shaped his mental world. As a patron at his court and as a client of the Prince of Orange, William Frederick developed distinctive patronage roles, appropriate to different social spheres. By assessing these different roles, Janssen provides a unique insight into the ways in which a seventeenth-century nobleman negotiated and articulated clientage, friendship and corruption in his life. This study offers an in-depth analysis of political practices in the Dutch Republic and reconsiders the way in which patronage shaped early modern politics, affected religious divisions and framed social identities.
| ISBN: | 9780719077586 |
| Publication date: | 1st December 2008 |
| Author: | Geert H Janssen |
| Publisher: | Manchester University Press |
| Format: | Hardback |
| Pagination: | 215 pages |
| Series: | Studies in Early Modern European History |
| Genres: |
European history General and world history |