Comites Hollandiae et Seelandiae.

Title

Comites Hollandiae et Seelandiae.

Description

Family tree of the royals of Hollandia and Zeelandia from 903 - 1433, with decorative coat of arms and floral allegories. At the bottom a total view of Den Haag.

ca. 1626

Artist

Albizzi (1547-1626)

Antonio Albizzi (1547 - 1626 ). Writer, jurist and genealogist from a noble Florentine family. Albizzi was born in Florence. Little is known about his life. In 1576 he was in the service of Cardinal Archduke Andrew of Austria. In 1585 he converted to Lutheranism. From 1608 he spent the rest of his life in the Protestant imperial city of Kempten (Bavaria), where he died in 1626.

Historical Description

After the division of the Franconian Empire, the lower lands belonged to the East Franconian Kingdom (Regnum Teutonicum) and then to the Holy Roman Empire. Under Emperor Charles V, who was also King of Spain, the country was divided into seventeen provinces and also included what is now Belgium and parts of northern France and western Germany. The rift between Catholics loyal to Spain and radical Calvinists was torn too deep and led to the Calvinist provinces of Holland, Zeeland and Utrecht joining together in a defensive alliance in 1579, the Union of Utrecht. This treaty became the charter of a new state, the Republic of the United Netherlands. Only after an eighty-year war was the independence of the Netherlands from Spain recognized in the Peace of Westphalia in May 1648. This date is considered the birthday of today's Netherlands. As a result, as the republic of the Seven United Provinces, the Netherlands grew to become the greatest trading and economic power of the 17th century. This era is known as the Golden Age. However, this did not come from the state, but from the first two public companies in history, the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and the Dutch West India Company (WIC). The founding of New Amsterdam is well known (Nieuw Amsterdam), which was later renamed New York. In Asia, the Dutch created their colonial empire, the Dutch East Indies, what is now Indonesia. The Netherlands also gained colonies in northeastern South America. In Europe, the Netherlands was a great power in the 17th century, led by bourgeois politicians like Johan van Oldenbarnevelt and Johan de Witt.