World’s largest bonfire (61,5m) built to celebrate a Dutch/English victory at the Battle of the Boyne 332 years ago, but do Dutch people actually know about it?

29 comments

  1. Northern Ireland is currently celebrating the Protestant King William (of Orange) III victory over the Catholic King James (of England) II in the 1690 Battle of the Boyne. This was one of the defining battles of the Glorious Revolution which cemented Protestant British rule over Ireland for the coming centuries.

    The event is marked in Northern Ireland by Unionist/Loyalist communities with bonfires burning the Irish flag and pictures of Nationalist/Republican politicians along with marching bands parading through predominantly Catholic areas.

    I’m curious, are Dutch people taught about this battle and victory in school, and if so, what is the general consensus of it by the Dutch public? Do the Dutch view this and the wider events as the English people inviting William III to take the throne or do you view it as ‘that time we conquered the UK & Ireland’?

  4. Tbh I think this is pretty much glossed over in our history books. If you ask a random Dutch person whether there was ever a Dutch king of England I estimate that at least 2/3rds to 3/4 will say nah are you crazy. The focus of Dutch history for that time period is much more on the Republic, the parliamentary government and the Dutch-Anglo wars with their associated admirals of a decade or two earlier. We had quite a lot of stuff going on around that time and schools can only cover so much.

  5. Maybe some Dutch historians know about it. But the average Dutch person definitely not. Some may remember having learned that Dutch king at one time ruled Britain but not in any detail.

  6. It’s not really Dutch history though, is it? It’s British history. Just because the guy is called William of Orange doesn’t suddenly make it hugely relevant to Dutch people. It’s not a Dutch victory, it was a British victory.

    This was one of the events after what is known as the Glorious Revolution took place. James the Second was ousted and replaced by his daughter Mary the Second and her husband William the Third (who was a nephew of James the Second) as joint monarchs. So it’s not even as if the reigning monarch was Dutch, because there were two.

    Although it was called the Glorious Revolution, it was also referred to as the Bloodless Revolution. Which is far from true as the resulting takeover led to a great loss of life in Scotland and Ireland in the form of oppression due to differing religious beliefs. The Battle of Boyne was one of the resulting conflicts.

    Edited to add:

    Given how royal families pretty much played musical thrones in Europe during the course of history, I’m sure there’s plenty of other things that can be claimed to be part of a nations history just because a monarch was born there and married into the royal family of a different country. Doesn’t make mean it can be claimed as the history of the monarch’s country of birth.

  9. Not about this battle. But we know that Willem married a queen of Scots. That they were successful fighting the English. And that that’s the reason for the protestant orange-marches in N.Irl.

  11. It’s British history, not Dutch. It was a British war, not a Dutch one. The British king was also the Stadholder of the Republic, but that’s where the Dutch involvement stops.

  12. All I can think about when I see this (rather impressive) wooden construction…. is that [Scheveningen Bonfire gone wrong](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1eyX7nDJlYY&t=7s) in 2018/19. Please take care, lol.

    To answer your question: I know you had a Dutchie for a King, but not the details of how that all came to pass and the aftermath of it. Will add it to my reading list come summertime 😉

  13. [https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slag_aan_de_Boyne](https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slag_aan_de_Boyne)

    [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Boyne](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Boyne)

    Just the size of these articles makes the difference clear.

    Tolerance is part of our national narrative. Not acceptance and the narrative and our behavior could be different too… but still. We don’t identify with this behavior.

    Our king is also head of the church but we’ll hardly ever see this role in public. I don’t think religion is very important to the king. Orange isn’t associated with protestants generally speaking. More with soccer, kingsday etc.

  14. I know about it, but I’d never attend one of these celebrations. The sectarian context of it all is very off putting.

  19. All we know is we tried to make the biggest bonfire couple years ago and didn’t end so great, so curious to see how this whole neighborhood is gonna light on fire. Go brexit! Show me what you got!

  20. Ier hier. Dit is voordat ze die pallets bekleden met vlaggen van katholiek kerk, spandoeken met “KAT” dat staat voor ” Kill all Taigs”. Een “taig” is dus een iers katholiek. Ook vaak te zien nep ophangingen , posters van leden uit de politieke partij Sinn Fein, shirts van celtic (vaak geassocieerd met katholieke immigranten in Glasgow).
    Koppel deze met marsen door katholieken wijken met anti katholieke sentimenten, leuzen zoals ” Id rather be a paki than a taig”, zijn best trieste mensen allemaal.

  23. They generally don’t but this is one of my favourite periods in Dutch history so I was familiar with it. It is a fascinating piece of history to me and still a bit weird that this piece of history is still so relevant in Ireland and N Ireland while it is largely forgotten here

  27. Yes. My partner is from Ireland and we went to Belfast last year. It’s mad, the whole thing is mad. But tbf for the Northern Irish it really has nothing to do with the Netherlands, so for us to not know about it I don’t see as too much of an issue.

  28. If we have to remember all pur victories with bonfires we’re gonna be out of wood soon.

    But I am interested, what happend?

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