1573

In the book, 1573 is the date attached to the Spanish victory in the siege of Haarlem, a prolonged struggle remembered for the resolve of its defenders and the extremity of their isolation. The year enters through a conversation among the travelling boys, turning a date into a point of departure for recounting how an entire city resisted before hunger forced a desperate choice.

The siege of Haarlem

Ben identifies the siege as having taken place in 1573 and says that the Spaniards prevailed after the Dutch had held out for months. The city was encircled by forces under Frederic of Toledo, son of the Duke of Alva, and its inhabitants were cut off from outside help. They continued to defy the besiegers, even throwing bread into the Spanish camp to demonstrate that they were not afraid of starvation.

Resistance included women as well as men. Three hundred women served under Kanau Hesselaer, whom Ben compares to Joan of Arc; they fought alongside husbands and fathers. This detail makes the defense a collective civic effort rather than an exclusively military one, with the city’s population sharing the risk and the work of holding out.

The eventual crisis came when provisions were exhausted. Many weakened inhabitants died, and those still living could scarcely bury them. The besieged then resolved that the strongest would form a square around the weakest and attempt to break through the Spanish lines, accepting near-certain death rather than wait for a slower end. When the Spaniards learned of the plan, they offered terms. The account establishes the offer and the Spanish victory, but does not specify the terms or describe what followed their offer.

A date in conversation

The year is introduced not by an impersonal historical summary but by a question from Lambert, who says that he knows little about the siege beyond its date and asks who won. Ben answers with a vivid account, shifting the boys’ journey from present-day Dutch places to the remembered ordeal of a besieged city. Their exchange also sets Haarlem beside the siege of Leiden: Ben regards Haarlem’s resistance as exceptionally heroic and says it gave the people of Leiden an example of courage and endurance before their own turn came.

The book presents this recollection as shared historical memory, carried through conversation and judgment. Ben’s account emphasizes not only the eventual defeat but the choices made under pressure: defiance while food remained, the participation of women, and the last plan to protect the weakest. In this form, 1573 is both a chronological marker and a means of measuring the human cost of resistance to Spanish rule.

The wider historical setting

The book places the siege within a Netherlands long suffering under Spanish tyranny, while keeping it distinct from another catastrophe dated shortly before it. In 1570, a violent gale drove North Sea waters against the Dutch coast; dikes failed, and the resulting inundation devastated parts of the country. The account describes Friesland as overwhelmed and reports that one hundred thousand people perished in a few hours. The flood and the siege are separate events, but together they frame a national history of danger, endurance, and collective response.

That history also appears beyond the boys’ conversation. In an English schoolroom, children recite a lesson about the Hero of Haarlem, whose father served as a sluicer. The lesson explains that dikes and sluices protect land lying below sea level, and that a moment’s neglect can bring ruin. Set beside the siege narrative, it connects the city’s remembered resistance with a broader account of Dutch life: survival depends on vigilance and on people acting together against threats that can overwhelm a community.