A Brill Calendar: September 4

Few characteristics of Dutch society throughout the ages have been more vital than its collegiate tradition.

The unilaterally taken decision, made by one individual has always been an exception, usually frowned upon and avoided, if possible at all. The virtual independence of truly prosperous cities was largely enabled by capable administrators and the tact and diplomacy they could bring to the resolution of conflict, and the fostering of solidarity within the small body of men running affairs on a day-to-day basis. The majority of these self-willed, practically independent mini-commonwealths were quite young: the thirteenth century saw the originating of most Dutch cities; few of them were older than four centuries when the struggle against aristocratic and feudal Habsburg Spain started.

The continuity in taking care of things on this basis is impressive in its own right; and it is seldom that it is better expressed than in the lives of one father and one of his sons, namely the Huygens family. The father Constantijn was born in 1551; the son Christiaanszoon died in 1687. The patrician dynasty served in just two generations William of Orange, Pater Patriae, and his princely descendants Maurice, Frederick Henry, William II and William III; as their private secretaries.

The patricians and the regents emerged as a separate class not long before the struggle for political freedom. In terms of politics it was an extremely class-knitted world; the Stad-Holder quarters represented a world of its own; even a leisurely walk would bring one within minutes to an important place in a Dutch town.