Introduction

Religious coexistence was an urgent problem facing post-Reformation Europe. This monograph aims to rethink early modern religious coexistence from the bottom-up perspective of Catholics in the Dutch Republic, in particular in the city of Utrecht during the seventeenth century, offering a theoretical reassessment of the public/private distinction. The Introduction articulates the main argument concerning Catholic agency in the process of delimiting the public. After describing how Utrecht developed into a stage of religious diversity, it offers a historiographical analysis of the early modern Dutch history of coexistence, focussing on Catholics and the public/private distinction. Finally, it introduces the methodology of this study within a civic community framework, and outlines its two-part structure on, respectively, Reformed governing strategies and Catholic survival tactics.