Christiaan Huygens – A family affair - Proeven van Vroeger

advice to the Stadholder. 139 This extra tie to the House of Orange proved vital when there was
no longer a Stadholder to serve in the Stadholderless period and thus no secretary needed,
because it was in this period that the Oranges, more than ever, needed their Council to protect
their possessions and their crucial Principality of Orange against the aggressive geographical
politics of Louis XIV (see Chapter VI, section ii). 140
The Princes of Orange, like other aristocratic rulers in Europe, could safely attract
ambitious courtiers to their core of power. The social elevation of the Huygens family was at
least partly dependent on the incubation of a public function within the family, as was the social
mobility of other upper-bourgeois families. This contrasted with the old, established nobility
that had an independent status and could thus pose a threat to the ruler. Paradoxically, though
courtiers like the Huygens could grow socially, they would never be able to acquire a status
that would bring the position of the ruler in danger. In other words, as a relationship of
dependency existed between courtier and ruler, the latter could control the former and limit
his possibilities. Huygens validated the social and economic possibilities of courtly love, the
princes appreciated its restrictions too.
b. Following the example of the old Dutch, French, German and English nobility and
putting Van Aerssen’s adage “that good meat hardly knows itself appreciated without a
sauce” 141 to work, Constantijn Sr. obtained several lordships and titles. Constantijn Sr. was
knighted in England by James I, as we have seen, and later, in 1633 at the French Court by
Louis XIII through the brokerage of Henri de Beringhen – the King’s First Knight – he was
made a knight in the Order of Saint Michel. Huygens was given the right to carry a golden lily
on a blue field in his armament, an important sign of stature. 142 Of equal strategic worth,
though coming at considerably higher price, was Huygens’s getting hold of different lordships
and their connected titles, and the building of two prominent houses – one at the central Plein
in The Hague and the other a ‘retraite’ at Voorburg.
139 MÖRKE, O. (1997) The Orange Court as a Centre of Political and Social Life during the Republic
IN KEBLUSEK, M., ZIJLMANS, J. & MUSEUM, H. H. (Eds.) Princely display: the court of Frederik
Hendrik of Orange and Amalia van Solms. The Hague; Zwolle, Historical Museum; Waanders., p61
140 HOFMAN, H. A. (1983) Constantine Huygens (1596-1687) : a christian-humanist bourgeois-gentilhomme in
service of the House of Orange, Utrecht, HES Uitgevers., p168. Huygens, by that time chair of the Council
(since 1654), played a central role in this conflict.
141 Quoted in: Ibid., p65.
142 STRENGHOLT, L., HUYGENS, C. & HEER, A. R. E. D. (1987) Constanter: het leven van
Constantijn Huygens, Amsterdam, Querido., p60. HUYGENS, C. (1911) BW., Vol. I, xlix. Even after
Louis XIV cleaned up the list of Knights later on, Huygens kept his position high on the list.
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