French tyranny at school : the Disaster Year (1672) and the Nieuwe Spiegel der Jeugd

Abstract

In 1674, the Amsterdam publisher Jan Claesz ten Hoorn printed a new schoolbook, the Nieuwe Spiegel der Jeugd, of Franse Tiranny (New Mirror of Youth, or French Tyranny). The work, based on a chronicle of the recent ‘Disaster Year’ (1672), during which the Dutch Republic was invaded and nearly overrun by a French-led coalition, provided a concise but highly graphic and violent history of these turbulent events for the Dutch youth. The Nieuwe Spiegel became a run-away success, and was one of the most popular Dutch schoolbooks of the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This article provides a comprehensive overview of the production, content, circulation, use and legacy of the Nieuwe Spiegel, and situates the book in the broader context of the political, literary and pedagogical culture of the Dutch Republic. Based on a detailed bibliographical reconstruction, this article also includes an appendix listing the fifty-two editions that appeared between 1674 and 1780.