Afschrift van de resolutie over de vervolging van de uitgever van de Latynsche en Nederduitsche keurdichten, 1735 1735

This is a handwritten document from 1735, now held at the Rijksmuseum. It is a transcription of a resolution concerning the persecution of the publisher of satirical poems. In 18th-century Netherlands, the Dutch Republic was a relatively tolerant place, yet this document reveals the limits of that tolerance. The resolution suggests a clampdown on printed material deemed libelous or critical of the government. The reference to "Latynsche en Nederduitsche keurdichten" points to the use of both Latin and Dutch in these satirical verses, indicating a readership among the educated elite as well as the wider public. The act of recording and preserving this resolution speaks to the institutional memory of state power and the ongoing tension between freedom of expression and the control of information. To fully understand this document, historians would consult legal archives, literary histories, and studies of print culture in the Dutch Republic. The meaning of art is always contingent on its social and institutional context.