The Iberian Monarchies of Spain and Portugal and the Dutch Republic in a Century of Change

This volume explores the entanglements among Spain, Portugal, and the Dutch Republic during the seventeenth century to understand how inter-imperial relations evolved from violence and conflict during the Iberian Union (1580–1640) and the Dutch quest for independence (1579–1648) into collaboration and coexistence in the century’s second half. The chapters gathered here interrogate, at different temporal and geographic points, the ways in which the commercial, colonial, financial, and diplomatic interests of the governments of Spain, Portugal, and the Dutch Republic collided, intertwined, and evolved as they encountered each other and non-European powers in the Far East, Southeast Asia, West Africa, and the Americas. While struggles between the Spanish and the Dutch during the Dutch Revolt, the rise and fall of the Iberian Union, and competition between Portugal and the Dutch Republic in Southeast Asia have been investigated, the focus has often been on two empires and, with a few notable exceptions, are either disconnected or consider only the first half of the seventeenth century. The essays in this volume take all three empires into account, focusing on areas of the world where Portugal, Spain, and the Dutch Republic were active, demonstrating that Ibero-Dutch entanglements stood at the center of the geopolitical shifts of the entire seventeenth century. The advent of the Bourbons in Spain and the major conflict that followed with the War of the Spanish Succession (1701–1713) rendered a new geopolitical order and explains our decision to end the volume in 1700.