ABSTRACT
The year 1672 is the most dramatic year in the history of the Dutch Republic. Yet another name was given by contemporaries to the strange leap year 1672 which brought about such great changes in the Dutch state. They called it drukjaar, which is a pun, for it means at the same time the year of stress and the year of printing. It was indeed a year of incredible activity for the printing presses of the Republic. It is hardly an exaggeration to say that as many pamphlets were poured out in 1672 as during the three preceding quarters of a century. These pamphlets were not only greedily absorbed by the Dutch people, for whom they played the part which the leading article of the popular press plays nowadays, but foreign countries also kept an attentive eye upon these famous or notorious blue books, as they were called from the fact that they usually appeared in a blue cover.
