From diaspora to “imagined minority”. Memories of persecution and the cross-generational transformation of Protestant migrant networks in early modern Europe

Abstract

Most early modern religious diaspora groups in Europe cultivated narratives of persecution and martyrdom and handed them on to future generations. Yet the function of such narratives changed in each migrant generation. Focusing on printed publications of Netherlandish exile communities in Germany and the Northern Netherlands, this article argues that the reception of persecution narratives underwent drastic changes and stimulated new religious identities that allowed believers to see themselves as part of a religious minority even if they now belonged to the dominant groups in society.

Keywords

• early modern diasporas
• early modern Christianity
• generational change
• early modern memory
• Netherlands
• Germany