The seventeenth century witnessed a great flourishing of Dutch trade and culture. Over the course of the first half of the century, the northern Netherlands secured independence from the Spanish crown, and the nascent republic sought to establish its might in global trade, often by way of diplomatic relations with the Ottoman Empire and other Muslim powers. Central to the political and cultural identity of the Dutch Republic were curious foreign goods the Dutch called “rarities.”
Rarities of These Lands explores how these rarities were obtained, exchanged, stolen, valued, and collected, tracing their global trajectories and considering their role within the politics of the new state. Claudia Swan’s insightful, engaging analysis offers a novel and compelling account of how the Dutch Republic turned foreign objects into expressions of its national self-conception.
Rarities of These Lands traces key elements of the formation of the Dutch Republic—artistic and colonialist ventures alike—offering new perspectives on this momentous period in the history of the Netherlands and its material culture.
Claudia Swan is the Mark S. Weil Professor of Early Modern Art in the Department of Art History and Archaeology at Washington University in St. Louis. She is the author of Art, Science, and Witchcraft in Early Modern Holland: Jacques de Gheyn II (1565–1629) and The Clutius Botanical Watercolors: Plants and Flowers of the Renaissance. Twitter @raritiesof
"Claudia Swan’s masterful study explores the Dutch taste for consumption, and the means by which distant lands were reached and foreign goods accessed, first by seizing and plundering Portuguese and Spanish cargoes, then by engaging in war and conquest. . . . Rarities of these Lands provides a rich narrative about the circulation of exotic material culture and the history of collecting in the seventeenth century."—Annemarie Jordan Gschwend, Journal of the History of Collections
"The early modern phenomenon of the kunstcamer or rariteytencamer (cabinets of curiosities) is a recurrent theme for Swan, and indeed each chapter might be likened to its own self-contained kunstcamer, packed with amazing images and a wide array of intriguing anecdotes. . .All of these wonders and more await the reader in lavishly illustrated pages."—Ellsworth Hamann, CAA Reviews
"This is a book of impressive learning on a vital and timely topic in art history. Written with flair, surety, and nuance, Rarities of These Lands is a major work by a scholar at the height of her powers."—Joseph Leo Koerner, author of Bosch and Bruegel: From Enemy Painting to Everyday Life
"Rarities of These Lands is clear and authoritative, based on extensive research and deep familiarity with the material, as befits the work of a mature scholar. This is a book that we have needed for some time."—Larry Silver, author of Marketing Maximilian: The Visual Ideology of a Holy Roman Emperor
