Tom Holland

in one of history's absolutely top revolts, the Dutch Revolt.

So why is the Dutch Revolt one of history's absolutely top revolts?

Well, I think for a number of reasons.

Firstly, it is very seismic in terms of the geopolitics of Europe.

It erupts in the 1560s and it precipitates what will ultimately become an 80-year war between the Dutch rebels and the Spanish, who are the colonial power in the low countries.

And this makes it one of the longest and most sustained independent struggles in the whole of European history.

And it's an incredible kind of David and Goliath story because it begins with a ragbag assortment of pirates taking on Europe.

the professional armies of the greatest empire on the face of the earth at the time.

And the consequences of the success of those rebels are still with us today and imprinted on the map of Europe.

So the northern half of the low countries that were ruled by Spain in the 16th century, they won their independence from Spain.

And today they constitute the kingdom of the Netherlands.

And to simplify massively, they're kind of the Protestant half.

And the southern half, that remained under the rule of the Spanish royal dynasty, the Habsburgs, and today constitutes the kingdom of the Belgians.

And again, to oversimplify, that's kind of vaguely the Catholic half.

Yeah.

And the founding fathers certainly believed that.

They looked to the Dutch revolt as a great source of inspiration.

You can see why, because it's a revolt that ends up replacing an imperial monarchy with a kind of federal republic.

And this federal republic, it comes into existence in 1588, and it gives itself the name of the United Provinces of the Netherlands.

So you can see why that story would have a resonance with Washington and