Scientific culture in the Dutch Republic

In the mid-seventeenth century the young Dutch Republic had become one of the most
flourishing countries of early modern Europe, not only in terms Of commerce but
also in terms Of art, learning, science and technology.5 During the Dutch Revolt
many Protestants had fled the Catholic South and started a new life in the North.
'This had far-reach-ing consequences: while intellectual life in the sixteenth
century had been concentrated in the Southern Netherlands, especially in Antwerp
and Louvain, the emphasis now shifted to the North.6 The Amsterdam region became a
particular hub of trade, traffic and technology, drawing not only Protestant
refugees from the Spanish Netherlands, but also many Scandinavians and Germans who
escaped the Thirty Years' War, as well as Sephardic Jews and (later in the
seventeenth century) French Huguenots. This mixture of persons, ideas and goods
provided a fertile soil for the exchange and creation of knowledge. In a recent
volume, Sven Depur� and Christoph L�thy state:

the 'circulation of knowledge' was perhaps nowhere as

intense as in the early modern Low Countries, and this had to
do as much with the circulation of scholars which was, in the
Carrefour de la R�publique des Lettres, particularly lively, as
with the extraordinary nodal points that cities like [firstl Ant-
werp and [later] Amsterdam represented in the international
exchange of goods, news, and skills.7

Lacking an older scholastic tradition, the newly founded Protestant universities of

the North, especially those of Leiden (established in 1575) and Utrecht
(established in 1636) could be more innovative than most Of the older universities.
They attracted many students, professors and visitors from abroad. To give a few
examples: the Leiden medical faculty improved upon the new approach introduced by
the Italian universities in the sixteenth century. A theatrum anatomicum was
established in 1590, as well as a hortus botanicus in 1594, both supported by huge
collections of curiosities. In 1634 the university founded an astronomical
observatory (the first of its kind in Europe) and clinical teaching started two
years later, becoming famous through out Europe during the professorship of the
iatro-chemist Francis de le Bo� Sylvius (1614-1672). Up to the era of Boerhaave
(1668-1738), Leiden's medical faculty was considered the best in Europe, attracting

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