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The Hartlib Papers on Protestant Revolt on the Continent in the 1620s to 1640s

Stéphane Haffemayer is professor of history at Université de Rouen. His research focuses on the history of information and the perception of revolts and revolutions. Haffemayer investigates the formation of political identities and relations between society and the state in early modern France and England. In his contribution to our collective volume “Rebellion and Diplomacy in Early Modern Europe”, he discusses the role of Samuel Hartlib in 17th-century English diplomacy:

This chapter covers the extensive communication network of Samuel Hartlib during the English Revolution. Hartlib, who had a thoroughly transnational biography and was dedicated to the Protestant cause, contributed to secret as well as public diplomacy. These activities were closely intertwined with the expansion of the European newspaper market. Hartlib was dedicated to structured, regular communication between governments and the people and openly promoted his ideas in addresses to the English Parliament. He personally supplied his correspondents with handwritten news and was able to validate information because of his many continental-European contacts. From January 1645, he was even paid by Parliament as a political correspondent. Haffemayer reflects on how Hartlib’s career became possible in the changeful era of the English Civil War and how he profited from active networking with political leaders of his time. In this sense, Hartlib’s activities foreshadow the transition from diplomats as unaffiliated agents selling intelligence to diplomats as committed and officially employed servants of the rising nation-states.

The Thirty Years' War, Dutch print, 1620-1630, (c) educational use granted by the Rijksmuseum of the Netherlands

The Thirty Years’ War, Dutch print, 1620-1630, (c) educational use granted by the Rijksmuseum of the Netherlands


Stéphane Haffemayer’s university website:
http://www.crhq.cnrs.fr/_index.php?page=biblio/H/Haffemayer&suite=


OpenEdition suggests that you cite this post as follows:
Monika Barget (June 8, 2015). The Hartlib Papers on Protestant Revolt on the Continent in the 1620s to 1640s. Revolts as Communication. Retrieved November 5, 2024 from https://doi.org/10.58079/towb


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