Pieter Geyl

Geyl, Pieter 

Born Dec. 15, 1887, in Dordrecht; died Dec. 31, 1966, in Utrecht. Dutch historian. Member of the Netherlands Academy of Sciences.

Geyl was a professor at the University of London from 1919 to 1935 and at the University of Utrecht, with one interruption, between 1936 and 1958. He was a member of the Social Democratic Labor Party of the Netherlands, which became the Labor Party in 1946.

Geyl produced numerous works on Dutch history, particularly the 17th and 18th centuries. His works, written from the “Great Netherlands” standpoint, emphasize the leading role of military and political factors in national history and minimize or distort the role of the popular masses. A number of Geyl’s works deal with questions of historiography and methodology. After World War II, Geyl actively propagandized against communism and for an Atlantic alliance and a united European state.

WORKS

Kernproblemen van onze geschiedenis. Utrecht, 1937.
Geschiedenis van de Nederlandsche stam, vols. 1–3. Amsterdam, 1948–58.
Die Diskussion ohne Ende. Darmstadt, 1958.
Oranje en Stuart, 1641–1672, 2nd ed. Zeist, 1963.