Een 'wonderlijke' scheepsstrijd Feit en fictie in nieuwsprenten rondom de Slag bij Duins (1639)

Unlike sieges or land battles, naval battles often took place out of sight, without eyewitnesses or accurate sketches and maps by trained surveyors and artists. As a result, the reliability of the many paintings, drawings, prints, and other materials depicting naval battles is frequently debated. Later artworks are often seen as fictionalized, while contemporary prints made shortly after battles- news prints or news maps- are generally regarded as more factual or even journalistic. This article challenges that assumption by examining the maps and vies published shortly after the 1639 Battle of the Downs. The Dutch victory under Admiral Tromp was widely reported and celebrated in the Republic through texts, images, and maps by printmakers like Crispijn de Passe, Cornelis Danckerts, Claes Jansz Visscher and Salomon Savery. Yet, even in this early media coverage, false or misleading information circulated- either intentionally or unintentionally. This article argues that these news and commemorative prints - 'story maps'- conveyed not only facts but also fiction. This is demonstrated by an analysis of a key moment from the battle: the dramatic destruction of the Portuguese flagship Santa Teresa or the 'monster ship'. The scene captured the public imagination and continued to do so for ages. The earliest news prints played a key role in shaping the mythical dimension of this event. This article calls for a more critical view of even seemingly reliable visual sources, seeing them not as objective records but as highly entangled with other textual and visual sources- both accurate and erroneous- that helped shape historical narratives. Rather than neutral illustrations, these publications were part of a fragile but rich news culture in which publishers competed to deliver sensational visual narratives. They contributed to a broader culture of memory in the Dutch Republic, helping construct national heroes and a collective identity, in which myths are sometimes needed.