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IMAGES OF EVERYDAY LIFE

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Dutch Domesticity

During the golden age of the Dutch Republic, Dutch painters delighted in painting scenes of domestic life, especially the lives of the wealthy burghers who prospered from trade, finance, and manufacturing. The Dutch painter Pieter de Hooch specialized in painting pictures of Dutch interiors, as can be seen in three of his paintings. In The Mother (below left), de Hooch portrays a tranquil scene of a mother with her infant and small daughter. The spotless, polished floors reflect the sunlight streaming in through the open door. The rooms are both clean and in good order. Household manuals, such as The Experienced and Knowledgeable Hollands Householder, provided detailed outlines of the cleaning tasks that should be performed each day of the week. In The Linen Cupboard (below right), a Dutch mother, assisted by her daughter, is shown storing her clean sheets in an elegant cupboard in another well-polished Dutch room. The Chinese porcelain on top of the cupboard and the antique statue indicate that this is the residence of a wealthy family. In Two Women Teach a Child to Walk (at the right), the artist again shows a well-furnished and spotless interior. A small girl is learning to walk, assisted by a servant holding straps attached to a band around the girl’s head to keep her from falling.

Gemaeldegalerie, Berlin//© Bildarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz/Art Resource, NY

Museum der Bildenden Kuenste, Leipzig//© Erich Lessing/Art Resource, NY

Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam//© Alinari/Art Resource, NY

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KING JAMES I AND PARLIAMENT Upon the death of Queen Elizabeth in 1603, the Tudor dynasty became extinct, and the Stuart line of rulers was inaugurated with the accession to the throne of Elizabeth’s cousin, King James VI of Scotland (son of Mary, queen of Scots), who became James I (1603–1625) of England. Although used to royal power as king of Scotland, James understood little about the laws, institutions, and customs of the English. He espoused the divine right of kings, the belief that kings receive their power directly from God and are responsible to no one except God. This viewpoint alienated Parliament, which had grown accustomed under the Tudors to act on the premise that monarch and Parliament together ruled England as a “balanced polity.” Parliament expressed its displeasure with James’s claims by refusing his requests for additional monies needed by the king to meet the increased cost of government. Parliament’s power of the purse proved to be its trump card in its relationship with the king.

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James I on the Divine Right of Kings (1609)

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Some members of Parliament were also alienated by James’s religious policy. The Puritans—Protestants in the Anglican Church inspired by Calvinist theology—wanted James to eliminate the episcopal system of church organization used in the Church of England (in which the bishop or episcopos played the major administrative role) in favor of a Presbyterian model (used in Scotland and patterned after Calvin’s church organization in Geneva, where ministers and elders—also called presbyters— played an important governing role). James refused because he realized that the Anglican Church, with its bishops appointed by the crown, was a major support of monarchical authority. But the Puritans were not easily cowed and added to the rising chorus of opposition to the king. Many of England’s gentry, mostly well-to-do landowners below the level of the nobility, had become Puritans, and these Puritan gentry not only formed an important and substantial part of the House of Commons, the lower house of Parliament, but also held important positions locally as justices of the peace and sheriffs. It was not wise to alienate them.

CHARLES I AND THE MOVE TOWARD REVOLUTION The conflict that had begun during the reign of James came to a head during the reign of his son, Charles I (1625–1649). In 1628, Parliament passed the Petition of Right, which the king was supposed