Tieranny van Eigenbaat (1679): staatsgezinde propaganda in de Amsterdamse Schouwburg

In 1677 the burgomasters of Amsterdam banned all plays with political-actual themes from the city theatre. Although the art society ‘Nil Volentibus Arduum’ supported this measure in a number of theoretical writings on the theatre, it published in 1679 the allegorical play Tieranny van Eigenbaat (Tyranny of Selfishness). This was ostentatiously an innocent text, a translation of an Italian play. The context of translation however indicates anti-orangist and rationalist intentions, which is confirmed by the distribution of so-called ‘sleutels’ (keys) which provided a republican reading for the play. Until 1747 the play would be used as an anti-orangist weapon in the political battle between orangists and republicans in the Dutch Republic