A ‘Crusade Spirit’ in
Seventeenth-Century News Periodicals
A Comparison of Narrative Strategies in Early Modern
Newspapers in Spain and The Low Countries, 1660-1662
Master Thesis
Name: Els Ketting
Student number: 10641378 Program: Research Master History Supervisor: Yolanda Rodríguez Pérez University: University of Amsterdam Date: November 9th 2020
2 Illustration front page: detail from Gazeta Nueva nr. 5 (01-08-1662)
3
Abstract
Abstract
This thesis regards how the first Spanish official state gazette, the Gazeta Nueva or de Madrid, relates to other Spanish news sources circulating the Iberian Peninsula at that time through an analysis of its narrative strategies. Moreover, the Gazeta Nueva is regarded in an international context by comparing its narrative strategies to Dutch news periodicals, the Tydinghen uyt verscheyde quartieren and Courante uyt Italien, Duytsland &c., exploring how news differed between Catholic and Protestant contexts. Especially the reports on the Cretan War (1624-1648), fought between the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire, illustrate an interesting difference. The reports on the Cretan War take up most of the contents of the Gazeta Nueva, even though Spain did not actively participate in the conflict. In contrast to the Dutch news sources, the Gazeta Nueva uses this conflict to promote a ‘Catholic cause’ in a propagandistic manner through antagonization of the Ottoman ‘Other’, conveying what can be considered a ‘crusade spirit’. This is a strategy that is also used in other news media in Southern Europe in the early modern period, creating a Catholic news network.
Key Words:
5
Index
Introduction 7
1. Agents and revolutions: Contested theories on seventeenth-century print 12
1.1 Introduction 12
1.2 Print and social change: A print revolution? 12
1.3 Actors and agency 14
1.4 The development of news: different news sources and their function 17
1.5 Royal endorsement: An official state gazette 19
1.6 Early modern reading habits and the formation of public opinion 21
1.7 Conclusion 25
2. Analysing the source: Form and function: 26
2.1 Introduction 26
2.2 The arrival of a gazette in Spain 26
2.3 Design features 29
2.4 Content: A statistical analysis 34
2.5 Lexical choices 39
2.6 Conclusion 41
3. The ‘crusade spirit’ of the Cretan War: A discourse of self and other 43
3.1 Introduction 43
3.2 Cretan War: A complex conflict 43
3.3 Discourse: Self versus Other 45
3.4 Narrative choices: Representation of the facts 51
3.5 The end? 56
3.6 Conclusion 58
Conclusion 59
Bibliography 63
7
Introduction
‘A good newspaper, I suppose, is a nation talking to itself.’ ― Arthur Miller The quote by American playwright Arthur Miller highlights why newspapers could be of great interest to scholars studying (historical) societies. Newspapers, aside from providing information on current affairs of a certain period in time, are an even more interesting source of information of the people reading and creating them. They are far more than unilateral carriers of information about events: they give insight in the preoccupations of a certain society at a certain time and the formation of communities.
The pace at which these news media spread throughout early modern Europe and gained popularity amongst the general public was far from equal in the different regions of Europe. After the invention of the printing press, mass production of news pamphlets became possible. Occasional news media became increasingly popular. Early in the seventeenth century the more reliable and periodical newspapers appeared. The first weekly newspaper arrived in Germany in 1605, The Netherlands in 1618, England started importing Dutch newspapers in the 1620’s, France established its first periodical gazette in 1631, Italy followed later in the 1630’s and Portugal in the 1640’s.1
This periodicity is a very important development in de establishment of early modern news media. Even though new types of news media were rather additive than replacive, the arrival of the newspaper meant that the reader could expect the news to come at a certain day.2
It also meant a different type of reporting. Whereas occasional pamphlets were made only in case of particular events, a newspaper brought updates at a certain given time, regardless of the political developments.
It has long been said that Spain did not have any significant periodical newspaper until the 1660’s, when the Gazeta Nueva or de Madrid was first published in the Spanish capital. Recently, this assumption has been proven false by Spanish media historians Carmen Espejo
1 Simon Davies and Puck Fletcher, News in Early Modern Europe, p. 4. 2 Asa Briggs and Peter Burke, ‘The Print Revolution in Context’, p. 68.
8 and Javier Díaz Noci.3 As they have demonstrated, as early as the 1620’s periodical newspapers
were printed in the south of Spain, using the name gazette.4
It has been of interest to Spanish media historians to investigate a certain journalistic style that developed in the newspapers of the early seventeenth century. Díaz Noci has made a very interesting effort in capturing the narrative style of these early newspapers, and notes that: ‘There is much research to be done until the formation of a journalistic style in Spanish can be completely explained. While it is clear that both stylistic and thematic recurrence can be identified, such as that described from a narratological point of view, many variations helped to create a recognizable style in our days. More longitudinal research is needed, whereby we can incorporate more nourished corpora […].’5
His research has focussed on early Spanish language gazettes, circulating in the beginning of the seventeenth century. In the second half of this century the Gazeta Nueva was established in Madrid, claiming to be the first periodical gazette to reach the Iberian Peninsula. This newspaper offers an interesting case as it was not the first actual gazette, but the first to be endorsed by king Philip IV, making it an official state gazette. Moreover, Don Juan de Austria,
the illegitimate son of Philip IV,was closely involved in the production of the Gazeta, exercising
direct influence on its contents.6
The reason this official state gazette arrived in Spain relatively late is because king Philip IV was afraid certain media could convert into an instrument of subversion.7 As news
media grew in popularity in Spain (with non-periodical news media like the Gazeta Romana in Seville), Philip IV was obliged to prohibit the appearance of uncontrolled newspapers by law in
1627.8 Comparing this to The Low Countries, for example, a strong royal presence was
something that lacked. Print overall had a very rich tradition in the Netherlands, who were pioneering in format and techniques. Amsterdam can even be considered a seventeenth-century
3 See for example: Javier Díaz Noci, ‘The Iberian Position in European News Networks’, p. 193.
‘Spain was long thought not to have had a regular production of weekly miscellaneous gazettes until the publication of the Madrid-based (later printed in Saragossa) Gazeta Nueva, from 1661 onwards, which was regarded as having a monopoly over the development of commercial news in the Peninsula. Such beliefs have, however, been profoundly revised in recent years, with the emergence of a picture of the news trade in the Peninsula that is far richer, more varied, plural and complex than what had been accepted by Spanish scholars for over a century—since the original publication of Juan Eugenio Hartzenbusch’s Apuntes para un catálogo de periódicos madrileños (1661–1870) in 1873, and, almost a century later, of a facsimile with a good historical introduction to the newspaper itself by Eugenio Varela Hervías.’
4 The first being the Gazeta Romana, printed in 1621. Javier Díaz Noci, ‘Dissemination of news in the Spanish
Baroque’, p. 409.
5 Javier Díaz Noci, ‘Narrative strategies in the origin of journalism: An analysis of the first Spanish language
gazettes’ 2017
6 Javier Díaz Noci, ‘The Iberian Position in European News Networks’, p. 194.
7 Pedro Gomez Aparicio, historia del periodismo español, dl. 1, desde la ‘Gaceta de Madrid’(1661) hasta el
destronamiento de Isabel II.
9 publishing hub.9 Moreover, the environment was relatively more tolerant than other European
countries.10 A nation without absolutist rule gave way to the rise of a different type of print
media.
Moreover, religious differences in these two contexts poses an interesting opposition. Paul Arblaster claims that:
[…] far from there being clear differences in the stories covered by Catholic and Protestant newspapers, Habsburg and anti-Habsburg, the news printed was largely the same in all the newspapers studied. Minor differences of emphasis and editing can be explained by different confessional and dynastic loyalties, but in general the newspaper readership as a whole was provided with the same fairly complete coverage of the great public affairs of every part of Western Europe and occasionally beyond.11
Arblaster suggests that there was little difference in the reports in Catholic and Protestant newspapers. Nina Lamal has however suggested that news sources could be used to promote a certain catholic cause, as she has proven to be the case in Italy. 12 This suggests that there could
be distinguished different functions and narrative strategies in news media in different contexts. In light of this renewed interest in Spanish language gazettes and revised position of the Gazeta Nueva, this official state gazette offers an interesting case in need of new interpretation. The aim of this thesis is to analyse how the Gazeta Nueva relates to this journalistic style of newspapers that were already present in Spain, as well as how it fits in to the international news networks in Europe at that time. This analysis will help understand what the Gazeta had to offer the reading public in mid-seventeenth century Spain. To evaluate the position of the Gazeta Nueva internationally, in this thesis its contents will be weighed against Dutch news periodicals from the same period, analysing how they compare in topicality and narrative strategies.
A narratological approach would be especially interesting if we consider the news on one specific topic that is predominate in the first two years of the Gazeta Nueva: the Cretan War (1645-1669), a conflict between the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire over the control of the Mediterranean Sea.13 The war against the Turks was among the most important
news events in early modern Europe.14 Spain was not actively involved in this military conflict,
9 Karel Porteman en Mieke B. Sits-Veldt, Een nieuw vaderland voor de muzen. Geschiedenis van de
Nederlandse literatuur 1560-1700, p. 189;
10 John Merriman, A history of Modern Europe. From Renaissance to the Age of Napoleon, p. 237.
11 Paul Arblaster, From Ghent to Aix: How They Brought the News in the Habsburg Netherlands, Leiden: Brill,
2014, p. 9.
12 Nina Lamal, ‘Promoting the Catholic Cause on the Italian Peninsula’, p. 693.
13 David Quiles Albero, ‘Las Relaciones Hispano-Venecianas en el Contexto de la Guerra de Candia
(1645-1669)’, p. 381.
14 Carmen Espejo, ‘The Prince of Transylvania: Spanish News of the War against the Turks, 1595-1600’, in
10 but as this thesis will prove, the Gazeta Nueva exploits this topic to illustrate the dichotomy between a Catholic ‘Self’ versus an Ottoman ‘Other’, a default dichotomy that came to rise especially in times of turmoil.15 In these reports, a ‘crusade spirit’ dating back to medieval Spain
is present.16 How this opposition is created and how Spain brands itself as a powerful Catholic
nation is interesting from an imagological point of view, especially if compared to the Dutch news periodicals, proving regional and especially religious differences.
The approach of this micro-historical research will add to the more general theories on seventeenth-century news media, and help understand the function of different sources. Media historian Carmen Espejo has advocated the importance of international approach:
‘[…] beyond the national peculiarities, journalism emerges in the Modern Age as a powerful agent in the construction of a new community, one based on curiosity, shared by rulers, subjects and citizens here and there throughout Europe in relation to public affairs. The framework through which historians over the next few decades interpret such versatility must be capable of drawing, above and beyond specific details, the lines of this commercial, geopolitical and identarian network that is overlaid on the map of early European journalism.17
Focussing on a specific case can help understand this ‘identarian network’. As Jacques Revel proposes, ‘[…] combining different scales of analysis is not to populate macro-historical models, but to rethink general explanations through specific cases.’18 That is exactly what I
propose to do in this study, by exploring what the Gazeta Nueva offered the seventeenth-century reader as a news source, in comparison to its Dutch counterparts.
The focus of this study is to understand the position of the Gazeta Nueva and what it had to offer the reading public. The focus will therefore be on the Spanish sources. The comparison with the Dutch periodicals is however made to support the analysis of the function of this first Spanish periodical in a European context. The Dutch sources used for the comparison are the Tydinghen uyt verscheyde quartieren and the Courante uyt Italien, Duytsland &c., as they were well established periodical newspapers relating on international matters, such as the Cretan War.
The first chapter of this thesis will present a status questionis¸ and explore some of the historiography and contested theories regarding early modern news. Special attention will be given to the theories of periodicity as a paradigm shift, official journalism versus propaganda, and the newspaper as an agent. Moreover, this chapter will offer a historical background to the
15 Joep Leerssen, ‘Imagology: History and method’, p. 11.
16 David Quiles Albero, ‘La Guerra de Candia (1645-1669): ¿Causa común en una Europa dividida?’, p.186. 17 Carmen Espejo, ‘European Communication Networks in the Early Modern Age’, p. 198.
11 development of news, as well as an analysis of the early modern reading public as well as the development of public sphere.
The second chapter focuses on the Gazeta Nueva internally. It offers an in-depth analysis of the form and function of the newspaper, regarding general theory on the impact of material form on the reader. All physical aspects of the newspaper are considered, as well as discourse and topics treated. Only by understanding exactly what this source offered its readers, we can investigate how it potentially affected them. This chapter is rather descriptive in nature, but gives insight in the intentions behind the newspaper. As Robert Darnton states, ‘[…] texts themselves contain many clues about the responses anticipated by their authors and
publishers.’19 The contents of the Spanish news source will be compared to the Dutch
newspapers to map differences in form and content.
Finally, the fourth chapter will present the case study of Reports on the Cretan War, that will illustrate on a micro-level how the Gazeta Nueva used this conflict to promote a Catholic cause in comparison to the Courante and Tydinghen from the same period. This will regard especially the representation of the Ottomans and the ‘The Great Turk’ in opposition to the ‘European Christians’.
12
1
Agents and revolutions
Contested theories on seventeenth-century print
1.1 Introduction
To understand the narrative structure and function of early European newspapers, we must first assess how the development of newspapers and their functions are regarded in recent historiography. This chapter will delve into the historiography on news media and the development of early modern news periodicals, especially within the Spanish and Dutch contexts. The discussion on early modern print media vary from abstract topics like agency and the role of print media in social change, to more concrete debates on what can be considered a newspaper and the differences between journalism and propaganda.
Moreover, it is important to re-evaluate the position of the Gazeta Nueva in an international context. Research has moved from national peculiarities to international trends. An analysis of the research on these European networks will help place the Gazeta Nueva in this international context.
1.2 Print and social change: A print revolution?
The history of news begins with the history of print. The invention of the printing press brought a huge change in early modern Europe. Studying print media the question scholars wish to answer most is: what was the impact of a given source on the reader? Robert Darnton posed the question that was on top of mind for many historians studying print and its influence on society: ‘Do books cause revolutions?’.20 A question that is difficult to answer, but very important for
our understanding of the dynamics of early modern news media. How the influence of print and the printing press on society must be interpreted has been a subject of debate amongst scholars for over decades. If we wish to understand what narrative structures were used and to what end, it is important to grasp the theory of print and its impact on early modern society on an abstract level.
20 See Robert Darnton, ‘Chapter 3: Do books cause revolutions?’, In: Robert Darnton, The Forbidden bestsellers
13 The invention of the printing press is often described in terms of a revolution, mainly thanks to the great impact it had on the lives of people. It is not only in hindsight that this is recognised, a number of testaments from the seventeenth century express how people reflected on the changes brought about by print. For example, Sir Roger L’Estrange, chief censor of books in England in the 1660’s, asked ‘whether more mischief than advantage were not occasion’d to the Christian world by the invention of typography’. In 1672 the English poet Andrew Marvell wrote ‘O Printing! How thou hast disturbed the peace of Mankind!’21 Both
these quotes imply that print had a great impact on the lives of seventeenth century Europeans. One of the most interesting debates surrounding the development of print in the early modern period is the question of the so-called ‘printing revolution’, ascribing social change to the arrival of the printing press and printed media in the seventeenth century. As some scholars argue, it was because of the arrival of print that major social shifts could take place. The concept of a ‘print revolution’ was first introduced by Elizabeth Eisenstein in 1979. Eisenstein claims that the printing press had led to some of the major transformations of the early modern period, i.e. the Renaissance, the Reformation and the Scientific Revolution.22 Moreover, she argues
that printing was an ‘unacknowledged revolution’ and she emphasized the role of print as an agent of change. She concludes this on the basis of two developments she considers print to have caused: firstly, print standardized and preserved knowledge and secondly, critique of authority was encouraged by print.
Eisenstein thus puts the invention of the printing press at the centre of a wide array of historical developments. To view print as an important historical actor can be found in many other contemporary historians works. Andrew Pettegree, for example, accredits a great role to print and news in particular in his 2014 work on the development of news in the early modern period, claiming that ‘news publications were not only providing a day by day account of unfolding events, they could be seen to play an influential role in shaping them.’23
Although Eisenstein’s work was published in the late 1970’s, it remains of great influence today. It still proves a great source of inspiration for historians studying print. In more recent years, the discussion has moved in the direction of Eisenstein’s work as material determinism.24 What is problematic for many historians is the amount of influence that can be
21 Both quotes mentioned in Asa Briggs and Peter Burke, ‘The Print Revolution in Context’, p. 18. 22 Elizabeth Eisenstein, The printing press as an agent of change;
Anthony Grafton, ‘How revolutionary was the print revolution?’, p. 85.
23 Andrew Pettegree, The invention of news, p. 2.
24 See for example Mark Brewin, ‘Why Elizabeth Eisenstein might have been a technological determinist: And
14 ascribed to physical objects. As for Darnton’s question, do the actual books cause revolutions or do they just facilitate the transmission of ideas?
The question of material determinism has proven to be pressing in the field of print history up until this day. Especially in the years after her death, her influential work has been revisited and has still proven very influential. Mark Brewin, for example, made a case for the relevance of Eisenstein’s theory:
[…] even were we to concede that Eisenstein was a determinist, the questions raised by her study of the printing press continue to provoke interesting paths of research for historians of the early modern age. Perhaps her most important contribution has been to highlight the fact that technological artefacts can be considered social actors (or “agents of change”).25
Brewin is not the only one relying on Eisenstein’s work. Peter K. Fallon for refers to ‘[…] the advantages offered by the more objective approach offered by Eisenstein, while acknowledging the heuristic value inherent in more creative, ‘non-linear’, subjective approaches.’26
Print in this case seems interwoven with social change of the time, although without definitive proof it is impossible to state that a certain source has directly led to a certain outcome. In the case of Spain specifically, Carmen Espejo emphasises the great importance of media and journalism for social change. She claims that journalism emerged as a powerful agent in creating new communities.27It could thus be argued that not only the printing press, but more specifically certain types of news media, have had crucial roles in historical processes, as being ‘an agent of change’.
1.3 Actors and agency
If we return to the subject at hand, the Gazeta Nueva, should this particular object be considered an agent of change? Are objects themselves ‘agents of change’ or do they merely facilitate it? And if we think about print as an agent of change, how must we study it? For these questions we must turn to Bruno Latour, one of the ‘founding fathers’ of the Actor-Network Theory (ANT for short). He explains how ‘things’ can play an active role in the construction of social networks: ‘[…] things might authorize, allow, afford, encourage, permit, suggest, influence, block, render possible, forbid, and so on.’28
25 Mark Brewin, ‘Why Elizabeth Eisenstein might have been a technological determinist’, p. 287.
26 Peter K. Fallon, ‘Force of evidence: Elizabeth Eisenstein’s legacy and the responsibility of the media scholar’,
p. 311.
27 Carmen Espejo, ‘European communication networks in the Early Modern Age’, p. 198. 28 Bruno Latour, Reassembling the social, p. 72.
15 However, Latour adds that things cannot be considered as sole actors in such phenomena: ‘ANT is not the empty claim that objects do things ‘instead’ of human actors: it simply says that no science of the social can even begin if the question of who and what participates in the action is not first of all thoroughly explored, even though it might mean letting elements in which, for lack of a better term, we would call non-human.’29
The balance between actors and agency is a complex one. Asa Briggs and Peter Burke question Eisenstein’s theory that print was the agent of social change in the early modern era. In the chapter they wrote in A Social History of the Media, fittingly titled ‘The print Revolution in Context’, they offer an analysis of the question at hand and reconsider the term ‘revolution’ when we talk about print. To consider print as an agent of change does not sit well with Briggs and Burke, as they observe that: ‘To speak of [printing] as the agent of change is surely to place too much emphasis on the medium of communication at the expense of the writers, printers and readers who used the new technology for their own different purposes.’30 Briggs and Burke
alternatively propose that it would be more realistic to view print as ‘[…] a catalyst, assisting social change rather than originating them’.31
Burke and Briggs are not the only scholars who think attributing agency to inanimate objects is taking it too far. One of the most fierce opponents of Eisenstein’s ‘printing revolution’ is Adrian Johns. In his The nature of the book, Johns argues that to attribute this role to technology is falling short in human effort: ‘[…] The nature of the Book claims that the very identity of print itself has had to be made. It came to be as we now experience it only by virtue of hard work, exercised over generations and across nations.’32 He argues that there are more
actors involved, as do Burke and Briggs: ‘[…] print is not an agent, but a technology employed by individuals or groups for different purposes in different locales.’33
Latour’s Actor-Network-Theory could still be useful in analysing the function of news media and their part in social change. Latour namely suggests that we ask ourselves: ‘When we act, who else is acting? How many agents are also present?’34 Even if print is not the only actor
present, it can still have agency:
[…] things might authorize, allow, afford, encourage, permit, suggest, influence, block, render possible, forbid, and so on. ANT is not the empty claim that objects do things ‘instead’ of human actors: it simply says that no science of the social can even begin if the question of who and
29 Bruno Latour, Reassembling the social, p. 72.
30 Asa Briggs and Peter Burke, ‘Chapter 2: The Print Revolution in Context’. p. 22. 31 Ibid.
32 Adrian Johns, The nature of the book, p. 2.
33 Asa Briggs and Peter Burke, ‘Chapter 2: The Print Revolution in Context’, p. 67. 34 Bruno Latour, Reassembling the social, p. 43
16 what participates in the action is not first of all thoroughly explored, even though it might mean letting elements in which, for lack of a better term, we would call non-human.35
Actor-Network Theory has long been a debated subject. Even Bruno Latour himself has problems with it: ‘there are four things that do not work with actor-network theory: the word actor, the word network, the word theory and the hyphen!’36 Although it is an interesting theory,
it is said to be a confusing subject and an incoherent framework. By some it is even doubted if we can speak of a ‘theory’ at all.37 In an article on the ANT, sociologist Annemarie Mol claims
that ANT is ‘[…] a wild and creative theoretical tradition, but a term that stopped working a long time ago’.38 To think about actors and networks we thus have to go beyond the ANT but
use its critical look on actors and networks, and acknowledge that all participants in a communication network should be evaluated for their agency, whilst avoiding ‘[…] the implied
fantasy of a masterful, separate actor, what is highlighted is the activity of all the associated actors involved. A strategist may be inventive, but nobody acts alone.’39
The discussion on actors and agency in objects highlights the theoretical difficulty of understanding print sources. Overall, these theories focus on the fact that print as a whole has played a major part in social changes in early modern Europe. However, returning to the Gazeta Nueva in the light of this narratological study, it would be a bold claim to state this single source was an agent of change. What is interesting is to see it as a facilitating medium, that could be used to promote a certain message, in this case promoting a catholic cause in Spain.
Paul Arblaster recognises this function of news sources in his study of the glorification of Habsburg ‘heroes’ in newspapers of the 1620’s during nautical conflicts. He states that:
[…] even in the age of mercenaries and military contractors, governments were well aware that success in war to some extent depended on the willingness of ordinary folk to bear the burdens it entailed. Public opinion might be little considered when deciding whether or not to go to war, but once the decision to fight had been taken every effort was made to convince tax-payers, in particular, that it was in their interest to see it through.40
The newspaper is thus not the sole agent in bringing about change, but it facilitates the possibility to reach a large audience and influence opinion. It was therefore a useful tool in making change happen.
35 Bruno Latour, Reassembling the social, p. 72.
36 Latour cited in Annemarie Mol, ‘Actor-Network Theory’, p. 254.
37 For this point of view see for example Annemarie Mol, ‘Actor-Network Theory: Sensitive Terms and
Enduring Tensions’.
38 Annemarie Mol, ‘Actor-Network Theory’, p. 254. 39 Ibid. p. 256.
17 Moreover, Arblaster argues that newspapers gradually became a part of everyday life, and played a major organising role in oral and print culture, ‘clarifying what (and who) was ‘important’ in public affairs, what events one should discuss, what had actually happened, what configuration of circumstances determined the political and military outcomes which were the
subject of pamphlet reporting and copperplate engravings.’ 41 People came to look at
newspapers to help them understand the world around them.
1.4 The development of news: different news sources and their function
Moving beyond the theoretical, the actual development of the newspaper needs nuance and background information. How did newspapers become embedded in everyday life? Before the periodical newspaper came to be one of the most important sources of information, news spread through various other types of media. Already in the early modern period, significant international news networks began to take shape. As noted before, the focus on international networks has become increasingly important, focussing on how fast news spread, through which channels and in what areas.42 These news networks were larger and faster than long has
been assumed. Yann Ryan has pointed out that ‘news spread faster than would be expected in either a linear or diffuse model, much like the spread of information on Twitter or the global spread of contagious disease.’43
One of the most detailed works on the development of news in early modern Europe is Andrew Pettegree’s The invention of news. How the world came to know about itself. In this extensive account on this interesting progress, Pettegree traces the origins of news back to the fifteenth century, and links the invention of news directly to the arrival of the printing press, stating that:
‘If there was a time when news first became a commercial commodity, it occurred […] in the eighty years between 1450 and 1530 following the invention of printing. During this period of technological innovation, publishers began to experiment with new types of books, far shorter and cheaper than the theological and scholarly texts that had dominated the market in manuscripts.’44
41 Paul Arblaster, From Ghent to Aix: How They Brought the News in the Habsburg Netherlands¸ Leiden: Brill,
2014, p. 8.
42 See for example Puck Fletcher and Simon Davies, News in Early Modern Europe. Currents and connections,
or Raymond Joad and Noah Moxham, News Networks in Early Modern Europe.
43 Yann Ryann ‘”How the world jogges”: interconnectedness, modularity and virality in seventeenth-century
news’.
18 The possibility to publish shorter and greater amounts of print thus gave way for the arrival of pamphlets and so-called avvisi. The technological development of the printing press not only facilitated the creation of new news media, it was a necessary requirement for the mass production of it. As Pettegree emphasises, cheap print quickly became an important commodity and a big part of the entertainment industry.45
The attention for international trends has, moreover, led to a new appreciation of otherwise overlooked regions. It goes without saying that The Low Countries have been of interest for scholars studying the development of news as some of the earliest newspaper and design standards came from this region. The Iberian Peninsula, on the other hand, has long been regarded as a peripheral area, both literally and figuratively.46
In recent years, the idea that Spain played a minor role in international news networks in early modern Europe has been greatly revised. One major development in the historiography is that the monopoly of the Gazeta Nueva has been toned down, as a great number of other (serial) gazettes have been discovered to circulate the peninsula. As early as 1619, for example, there was a type of periodical newssheet published in Valencia.47 Moreover, apart from
periodical news, a wide variety of occasional news sources prevailed in Spain in the seventeenth century, among which the early avvisi and the popular relaciones de sucesos48 These occasional
news pamphlets remained popular until at least the end of the seventeenth century.49
Although its monopoly on the Spanish news market has been disproven, the Gazeta Nueva remains a very interesting historical source, due for an historiographical update. One of the major works on the first official and periodical newspaper in Spain, Gazeta Nueva 1661-1663. Notas sobre la historia del periodismo español en la segunda mitad del siglo XVII by E. Varela Hervias, dates back to 1960. The book was dedicated to the 400th anniversary of the
newspaper in the following year. Correspondently, the importance of the newspaper for the history of Spanish journalism is stressed multiple times, arguing that it marked a very important milestone for Spanish journalism that deserves recognition and commemoration.50 Varela
45 Andrew Pettegree, The invention of news, p. 6.
46 Javier Díaz Noci, ‘The Iberian position in European News Networks’, p 193. 47 Ibid. 194.
48 Javier Díaz Noci, ‘Narrative strategies in the origin of journalism’.
‘During the seventeenth century we find a confusing lexicon used throughout Europe—and of course in Spain— to refer to the great variety of printed and handwritten newsheets (a question highlighted recently by two of the most important scholars involved in studying and researching those forms of information in the Iberian Peninsula, Henry Ettinghausen and Carmen Espejo), an inconsistency in the terms (gazeta, aviso, relación de noticias, nuevas—in English, gazettes, avvisi, corantos, news[sheets]) and a lack of univocal correspondence with some other names given to such products in other countries of Europe and America.’
49 Simon Davies and Puck Fletcher, News in Early Modern Europe, p. 1. 50 E. Varela Hervias, Gazeta Nueva 1661-1663, p. ix.
19 Hervias’ study of the Gazeta goes into great detail to the first two years of the newspaper, analysing what topics are discussed. It is a valuable source, but focusses solely on the Spanish context.
The impact the Gazeta Nueva made when it was established must thus not be overestimated. As it turns out, the arrival of new types of media was more often than not additive rather than substitutive.51 So the ‘invention of the newspaper’ did not altogether
replace the other types of media or oral transmissions for that matter, it was just another type of source. Periodical gazettes like the Gazeta Nueva, however, did entail a big change in the way news was received by the public. As Fletcher and Davies emphasize in their account of early modern news networks, ‘Periodical news represented a paradigm shift in the business of news: periodicity creates the expectation of more news to come in the future, and it allows for much greater detail as reports are built up slowly and from a variety of perspectives across multiple issues’.52 The Spanish word for journalism explains it better than the English one:
periodismo, periodic news.
Media historian Carmen Espejo endorses this view of a ‘paradigm shift’ when she addresses several problems with the historical research to early modern news media and journalism of our time. She states that one of the biggest problems is that we confuse the beginning of journalism with what she considers to be pre-journalism.53 Furthermore, an
oversimplified connection has been assumed between the rise of the bourgeoisie at the end of the sixteenth century and the birth of journalism. Espejo claims that no single factor has initiated the birth of journalism, but that it is ‘this capacity to adapt to the political and environmental medium’ that is one of the historic constants of journalism, and in turn the ‘[…] cause of its success in the modern age’.54
1.5 Royal endorsement: An official state gazette
What makes the Gazeta Nueva especially interesting in the Spanish context is its endorsement by king Philip IV (Felipe IV), grandchild of Philip II, making it the first official state gazette. It
may not have been the first (semi) periodical source, but it was the first periodical source printed with a license. To begin with, the Gazeta was not an idealistic initiative of its printer, at least,
Original quote: ‘[…] fecha muy importante en la historia de la Prensa Española, quemerece ser conmemorada y recordada.’
51 Asa Briggs and Peter Burke, ‘The Print Revolution in Context’, p. 68. 52 Simon Davies and Puck Fletcher, News in Early Modern Europe, p.3.
53 Carmen ‘Un marco de interpretación para el periodismo europeo en la primera edad moderna’, p. 104. 54 Ibid.
20 not completely. According to Espejo, the Gazeta Nueva can be considered more as a manifestation of royal propaganda than a news source.55 The arrival of the official state gazette
went hand in hand with the establishment of the modern state.
It is without doubt that power dynamics are important in the development of every early European newspaper. The ‘license to print’ gave publishers the right to print for the state. They did not operate completely freely. But is Espejo right in stating that this means a gazette is a form of royal propaganda? Perhaps it would be better to add some nuance to this statement. Richard L. Kagan makes the subtle difference between propaganda on the one hand versus official journalism (periodismo oficial) on the other.56 In his study of the official writer for the
Spanish court, Kagan explains that writing for the monarchy is not simply presenting something other than the truth. As he noted, they did not ‘invent’ or ‘make up’ events, but simply organized the information in a way that it would serve the crown. As will become clear once we look at the content of the Gazeta Nueva, there is truth in both Espejo’s as well as Kagan’s claims, as different topics prove to require different strategies.
Royal involvement in print media of the seventeenth century can be seen not in the publications that did get published, but rather in the ones that did not. Censorship was an important tool in controlling the image of the monarchy. One of the reasons Spain did not have an official gazette was that Philip IV was afraid these types of media could convert into an
instrument of subversion.57 The concept of arcana imperii prevailed in more than one country
in Europe. In 1620’s, the English king James issued a ‘proclamation against excesses of Lavish and Licentious Speech of matters of State’.58 Censorship was thus common throughout Europe,
but its effect should not be overestimated as it was quite complicated to endorse.
Censorship by means of prohibiting the publication of a newspaper was thus a difficult task. Monarchs all over Europe, eventually including Philip IV, would resort to laying down
rules for these newspapers, as they came to recognize the power of information and the role of the newspaper herein. Instead of fighting it, they tried to exert influence on the production of these media by laying down rules, censoring and manipulating the news.59
The early modern reading public was well aware of the censoring process. An interesting quote by the first secretary of the Royal Society in London, Henry Oldenburg, proves that
55 Carmen Espejo, ‘Un marco de interpretación para el periodismo europeo’, p. 105.
56 Richard L. Kagan, ‘Las “Plumas Teñidas” de Felipe IV: ¿Periodismo o Propaganda?’ p. 93. 57 Ibid.
58 Lena Steveker, ‘Thomas Middleton’s A Game at Chess and Ben Johnson’s The Staple of News, p. 217 59 Joop W. Koopmans, ‘Oorlogen in het vroegmoderne nieuws. Nederlandse nieuwsbronnen over militaire
21 censorship (in this case of Turkish Sultan Mehmed II) was closely linked to despotism: ‘ye
Great Turk is an enemy to learning in regard of his subjects, because he finds it his advantage to have such a people on whose ignorance he may impose’.60
Philip IV’s censorship and his late acceptance of the printing of a newspaper have caused
a lack of scholarly interest in the development of news in Spain. Monica Stensland has treated the different ways in which both the Habsburgs communicated news almost a century earlier, during the Dutch Revolt. Stensland notes that, much like Spanish journalism in the seventeenth century, Habsburg public communication during the Dutch revolt has often been dismissed as non-existent or of bad quality.61 Stensland proved however that the Habsburg regime remained
highly visible on the public scene, and that there was considerable awareness among members of the regime of what was said in rebel pamphleteering on the Dutch side.62 A re-evaluation of
the Gazeta Nueva could help understand how Habsburg communication functioned in Spain in the mid-seventeenth century.
1.6 Early modern reading habits and the formation of public opinion
From the previous paragraph it has become clear that, although not an agent acting on its own, a newspaper like the Gazeta Nueva, especially through the royal endorsement by Philip IV,
could be considered an influential tool for shaping public opinion. But who was this public? When studying any source that is meant to be read, the actual reader cannot be overlooked.
Reception history has always proven to be a difficult field as it is rare historians find many evidence of people reflecting on a certain document. As this study focusses on the intentions of the newspaper and how it was meant to function more than on what its effect was on Spanish society, this paragraph will focus more on early modern reading in general than on specific reception in connection to the Gazeta. To quote Robert Darnton once more: ‘[…] the lack of information about reception does not mean that we should abandon the notion of capturing the contemporary experience of literature’, and the very same is true for newspapers.63
The first question that arises regarding early modern reading is that of literacy. Of course, the numbers of literacy were much lower than they are today. Claude Larquie has studied literacy in mid-seventeenth-century Madrid, concluding that in 1650 the level of
60 Asa Briggs and Peter Burke, ‘The Print Revolution in Context’, p. 16. 61 Monica Stensland, Habsburg Communication in the Dutch Revolt, p. 155. 62 Ibid.
22 analphabetism in 1650 Madrid is high, but not spectacularly so. That is, a little under half of the population was able to sign their name.64
Literacy is often tested on the ability to write (for example, being able to write a letter or even sign a name). There is however a difference between reading and writing. Being able to read doesn’t necessarily mean being able to write. It is thus not an easy task to estimate how many people were actually able to read.65 Moreover, newspapers were not read by one single
person, but by many. As mentioned before, oral culture remained strong even after the arrival of popular print. The practice of reading did not predominantly take place in silence, as we are used to it now, but out loud. Handwritten material as well as printed publications were often read out loud in taverns and streets.66
This brings up another related matter: the way people read. There is a growing interest for the study of early modern reading habits, for example through traces left by readers in marginalia.67 As mentioned before, it is very difficult to map the precise habits of the readers
of the Gazeta Nueva. Looking at the source, it is implied that the paper had a following of readers that frequently read the newspaper. In 8th edition from the 16th of May 1661, for
instance, a sentence is added to a report on the state of affairs of the Cretan War, stating that ‘considerable attention has been paid to this already in the previous gazettes’.68 This remark
seems to imply that no further explanation is needed because it has already been discussed at length and the reader would know this already. This may even mean that people held on to the previous gazettes, so that they could go back to them to recap their memory.
Comments like these, however, are scarce and offer no definite insights in the specific reading public of the Gazeta Nueva. But some general remarks can be made on early modern reading in general. A great source of information on this is the Reading Experience Database, RED for short, mapping reading experience throughout centuries.69 The database provides
notes made by readers, describing their relation to the text. On the sixth of November 1660, for example, the English Samuel Pepys wrote in his diary: 'Home and fell a-reading of the tryalls
64 Claude Larquie, ‘L'alphabetisation a Madrid en 1650’, p. 155.
Original quote: ‘Madrid est un ville où l'analphabétisme (en tout cas l'absance de personnes pouvant signer) domine, mais non d'une manière spectaculaire. un pue moins de la moitié des Madrilènes est capable de signer en 1650.’
65 Fernando Bouza, Communication and Knowledge in Early Modern Spain, p. x.
66 Femke Deen, Publiek debat en propaganda in Amsterdam tijdens de Nederlandse Opstand, p. 21. 67 Jennifer Richards and Fred Schurink, ‘Introduction: The textuality and Materiality of Reading in Early
Modern England’.
68 Gazeta nr. 8 (16-05-1661).
Original text: ‘[…] como ya se ha dado bastante noticia en las Gazetas antecedentes’
23 of the late men that were hanged for the King's death; and found good satisfaccion in reading thereof.’70
RED provides as much information as possible about the reading experience: where it took place, if it was silent or aloud, biographical information on the reader, the location, the text being read, etc. Unfortunately, as of yet the database does not provide any information about reader experience in early modern Spain. But what comments like the one made by Samuel Pepys (made in the period of this study) can prove is that readers engaged with texts and that they could provoke a wide range of emotions, such as satisfaction or disagreement.
Interestingly, a comment made by Baltasar Gracián, a best-selling writer of the time, illustrates another important aspect of reader response: expectation. In 1657, Gracián said in the third part of his El Criticón: ‘I wish to know about the future, because about the past and present anyone knows well; we are sick of hearing about victories and good events, which French people in their gazettes and Spanish people in their relaciones repeat and boast about’.71
He thus expresses his distaste for newspapers as they only relate about the positive events. He expects the news source to be biased, not offering a complete picture of current events.
The quote by Gracián highlights that news was not necessarily taken at face value. Gracián has a very critical approach to the information given in the relaciones. The critical reflection on sources by the reader should not be taken lightly. When discussing the way information in books was dealt with in early modern France, Robert Darnton remarks that ‘nowhere in all this material can one find any suggestion that books were simply “machines made to produce effects” and that readers were simply recipients with minds like “soft wax” ready to accept any message stamped on them.’72 The very same can probably be said about
newspapers. There was never only one source of information, alongside a newspaper there were pamphlets, letters, oral discussion etc.
Moreover, news was discussed in the streets, and these discussions were, for a long time, more important than any information provided in print. As Monica Stensland proved in her analysis on Habsburg communication, and as is confirmed by other historians studying public debate in the early modern period, in times of turmoil oral culture seems to be more decisive than print culture.73 She studies the way this ‘public debate’ functioned in the late sixteenth
70 Samuel Pepys in RED, consulted via: http://www.open.ac.uk/Arts/reading/UK/record_details.php?id=11643. 71 Baltasar Gracián quoted in Javier Díaz Noci, ‘The Iberian Position in European News Networks’, p. 202-203.
Original quote: ‘lo venidero, lo venidero querría yo ver, que esso de lo presente y lo pasado cualquiera se lo sabe; hartos estamos de oírlo, cuando una Victoria, un buen sucesso lo repiten y lo Vuelve a cacarear los franceses en sus gacetas, los españoles en sus relaciones, que matan y enfadan’.
72 Robert Darnton, The forbidden best-sellers of pre-revolutionary France, p. 226. 73 Monica Stensland, Habsburg communication in the Dutch Revolt;
24 century and, among many other historians, challenges Habermas’ assumption that a public sphere could only develop at the end of the eighteenth century.
Indeed, as the engraving in figure 1 shows, seventeenth-century Europeans were very conscious of the ubiquity of opinions (oral as well as in print). The figure shows opnia (opinion) on top of a tree covered with pamphlets. A ‘fool’, dressed in jester-like clothing, waters the tree. The dangers of print are recognized, as it is the fool who offers the fertile ground for the pamphlets to grow.
Figure 1: The world is ruled & governed by opinion, engraving by WENCESLAUS HOLLAR (1607-77), published 1642 However, it must not be overstated how big a role the Gazeta Nueva would have had in the formation of public opinion in early modern Spain. The newspaper circulated around Madrid, and only for two years after its first appearance.74 Moreover, as Andrew Pettegree remarks on
the function of newspapers in regard to public opinion, ‘[…] it would be well over a hundred years from the foundation of the first newspaper before it became an everyday part of life – and only at the end of the eighteenth century would the newspaper become a major agent of
opinion-Femke Deen, Publiek debat en propaganda in Amsterdam tijdens de Nederlandse Opstand, p. 20-21.
25 forming.’75 The Gazeta Nueva would likely rather be a source of information, of very particular
stately information, than a source for lively discussion and formation of opinion. 1.7 Conclusion
The study of early modern media goes hand in hand with difficult debates of influence, revolutions, actors and agency. It is beyond doubt that the arrival of print has been of great significance in early modern history. News media became a part of everyday life, helping people understand the world, telling them how to feel about certain events and people. Newspapers like the Gazeta Nueva were recognized as useful tools in shaping public opinion, although its success herein must not be overrated.
In recent years, a more international approach has been prevalent in the study of early modern news, where the focus has been on international networks rather than on national peculiarities. In the case of Spain, the monopoly of the Gazeta Nueva as Spain’s first newspaper has been disproven. Within the context of narrative strategies it however remains an interesting source, especially thanks to the print license provided by king Philip IV making it the first
endorsed state gazette of the country.
The following chapters will analyse the intended function of the Gazeta Nueva by studying the narrative strategies to reach its audience, first in a general sense, followed by the case study of reports on the Cretan War. In doing so, we can hope to understand how the Gazeta functioned in the context of both Spanish news as international news networks.
26
2
Analysing the source: Form and function
2.1 Introduction
This thesis focusses on the narrative structure of the Gazeta Nueva, putting it in perspective by weighing it against the Dutch counterpart. Narratology is a research method used to explain the structure and characteristics of any kind of narrative text or discourse. It is usually applied to fictional texts, but can be just as interesting a methodology for understanding non-fiction sources like newspapers.76 As mentioned in the introduction, Javier Díaz Noci has made a
narratological analysis of Spanish language gazettes from the beginning of the seventeenth century. Díaz Noci looks at the topics of news items, the origin of news, narrative strategies, authorship and readership of news, type of narrations, characters of news narrations, space and frequency. This analysis will build on this model, mapping how news was constructed in the Gazeta Nueva, focussing on the aspects that are relevant for this particular source.
This chapter will thus explore how information was ordered and presented in the issues of the first two years of the Gazeta Nueva. Attention will be payed to its distinguishing design features, topics discussed as well as discursive tropes used to relate the news. These aspects will be evaluated by contrasting them against Dutch newspapers from the same era to analyse a difference in news sources from catholic and protestant regions. Consequently, Paul Arblasters claim that there was little difference in content between the two will be tested.77
2.2 The arrival of a gazette in Spain
Before analysing some of the general features of the gazette, I will first delve into the specifics of one particular issue: the first number of the Gazeta Nueva. This first issue the official state gazette is particularly interesting because it provides an introductory text, explaining why the newspaper was established at that time and what it’s intended function was:
76 Javier Díaz Noci, ‘Narrative strategies in the origin of journalism’, p. 24.
27 As most of the populous cities in Italy, Flanders, France and Germany print every week (aside from particular pamphlets) something by the title of Gazettes, in which they report in the most notable things, both Political and Military, that have happened in the biggest part of the World: this would be the reason for introducing this genre of print, although not every week, but at least every month, so that the curious ones receive news of those events, and that the Spaniards do not miss out on those news that are abundant in Foreign Nations. And concerning the first, we give notice from the Provinces of Italy.78
It is in this fragment that a voice is given to the object, and hence where agency is most clearly expressed: the newspaper is introduced to give the people of Spain the news they lacked before. This statement showcases some interesting narrative strategies, for example the implicit comparison with an ‘Other’. The way a culture sees itself is closely linked with how they relate to others. Raymond Corbey and Joep Leerssen describe this phenomenon as follows: ‘All human cultures articulate, situate themselves by categorizing the world. Such a predicative act necessarily involves a distinction between that which is allowed into the sphere of culture, and that which is excluded; the circumscription of cultural identity proceeds by silhouetting it against a contrastive background of Otherness.’79
What becomes clear from this particular section is that Spain is comparing itself to other European nations, and wants to live up to them by mirroring them by means of providing the people in Spain with the same kind of international, periodical news. What is literally expressed is the sentiment that Spain lacked this news. Although this was by choice of Philip IV and his
censorship, the fact that this ban has been lifted is made evident in the statement. It is particularly interesting as it dismisses other periodical news in Spain at that time.
The importance of a fragment like this should not be understated. As Gerard Genette explains in his canonical work on paratexts, ‘More than a boundary or sealed border, the paratext is, rather, a threshold, or – a word Borges used apropos of a preface – a “vestibule”, that offers the world at large the possibility of either stepping inside or turning back.’80 The
reader is lured in with this statement, promising precisely what was absent.
78 Gazeta nr. 1 (01-01-1661), p.1. N.B.: All translations from the Gazeta Nueva, as well as from the Tydinghen and
Courante, are my own.
Original text: ‘Relacion o gazeta de algunos casos particulares […], January first 1661. Original text: ‘Svpuesto que en las mas populosas Ciudades de Italia, Flãdes, Francia, y Alemania se imprimen cada semana (demas de las Relaciones de sucessos particulares) otras con titulo de Gazetas, en que se da noticia de las cosas mas notables, assi Politicas, como Militares, que han sucedido en la mayor parte del Orbe: sera razon, que se introduzga este genero de impressiones, ya que no cada semana, por lo menos cada mes, para que los curiosos tengan aviso de dichos sucessos, y no carezcan los Espanñoles, de las noticias de que abundan las Estrangeras Naciones. Y en quanto a lo primero daremos principio por las Provincias de Italia.’
79 Raymond Corbey and Joep Leerssen, ‘Studying Alterity: Backgrounds and Perspectives’, p. vi.
For theory on imagology see: Joep Leerssen and M. Beller (ed.), Imagology: The cultural construction and literary representation of national characters. A critical survey, Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2007.
28 It could be said, therefore, that this statement provides some information about Spanish society in the seventeenth century and the emergence of a community ‘thirsty for news’. E. Varela Hervias claims that the publication of news in mid-sixteenth-century Spain was an answer to the social pressure for news: ‘to satisfy that curiosity and to calm all that anxiety, they publish in Spain numerous relaciones de sucesos and, also, anuas with the summary of the political and military news.’81 This ‘hunger’ for news had begun to grow already in the early
seventeenth century, during the Thirty Years War, creating a growing market for popular print.82
Taking into consideration that some editorial decisions were made in favour of the Habsburg monarchy, we should also consider who made and distributed the Gazeta Nueva and under what conditions. There are a couple significant external agents with their own intentions that need to be taken into account in the context of the establishment of the newspaper. First of all, there is Julián de Paredes, the publisher of the newspaper, whose main goal must have been to make a profit from this newspaper, as otherwise his business could not flourish. On the other hand there was Philip IV, who offered him the privilege to print the news, but it would have to
be worth his while as well. When looking at the contents of the Gazeta, it will become clear that these two interests are constantly at play with each other.
In the introductory text we can find the first clue towards the form and intended function of the Gazeta Nueva. The editor claims that the Gazeta Nueva is modelled after the broadsheets that circulate in other countries throughout Europe under the name gazette. A gazette is thus in the eyes of the editor a distinctive genre that is different from other news sources that might be present in Spain at the time. He even adds that in these foreign countries, gazettes circulate apart from other sources. Interestingly, no mention is made of the gazettes that circulated in Spain already since the beginning of the seventeenth century.
The fact that this newspaper was supposed to arrive at a given interval: ‘[…] this would be the reason for introducing this genre of print, although not every week, but at least every month [...]’.83 It is, however, hard to say what how new periodicity affected the reader,
especially as it has been proven that periodic newspapers already existed in Spain. The lack of recognition of other Spanish language gazettes, that arrived more or less periodically in the
81 E. Varela Hervias, Gazeta Nueva 1661-1663, p. xi.
Original quote: ‘Para satisfacer aquella aguda curiosidad y calmar tantas ansiedades, se publicaron en España numerosas relaciones de sucesos particulares y, también, anuas con el resumen de las novedades políticas y militares.’
82 Javier Díaz Noci, ‘Narrative strategies in the origin of journalism: An analysis of the first Spanish-language
gazettes’, p. 16.
29 decades before the Gazeta, seem to indicate that these newspapers were not legitimate and that only the Gazeta Nueva should be considered a lawful state gazette. Within this strategy, periodicity and the word gazette are used as unique selling points.
2.3 Design features
Another important aspect of the Gazeta that has to be taken into account is its design. How the information is ordered and presented is part of the editorial strategy, guiding the reader in a certain direction. In analysing the meaning of the Gazeta Nueva, the physical appearance should not be overlooked. As Roger Chartier has pointed out in his work Forms and meaning, the reading experience is limited by the form.84 So in in which form was the information presented
to the public?
The Gazeta Nueva was a broadsheet newspaper, consisting of 8 pages per edition with a single text column. The editions are numbered at the head of the first page, followed by the title of the paper. Considerable attention has been paid to the external aspects and lay-out, especially of the first edition of the Gazeta with its intricate initial on the first report. This might indicate that it was meant as more than a disposable news source, but something worth keeping. Maybe even more along the lines of a libel. It must however be noted that this type of initial only appeared on the first edition, not on any of the following.
The initial is not the only thing that changed after the first publication. When we look at the external characteristics of the Gazeta Nueva, one of the first things that catches the eye is the title, as it developed slightly over the years. The first edition is called RELACION O GAZETA DE ALGVNOS CASOS particulares, assi Politicos, como Militares, sucedidos en la mayor parte del Mundo, hasta fin de Diziembre de 1660. Interestingly, this first edition was thus not primarily marketed as a gazette, but still as a relacion. It may be that the aim was to attract readers with the term relacion, as that was known to be a carrier of news. However, as mentioned before, the Gazeta Nueva was not the first source with the title Gazeta, the first being the Gazeta Romana –already being published in Seville in the 1620’s.85
The second edition of the Gazeta has some small but very important changes in comparison to the first one. First of all, the word relacion is removed, establishing the importance of the concept gazette. It is in this subtle change that we see the intentions of the publisher in establishing a gazette in contrast to a relacion. Another interesting addition is the
84 Roger Chartier, Forms and meanings. Texts, Performances, and Audiences from Codex to Computer. 85 Javier Diáz Noci, ‘Dissemination of news in the Spanish Baroque’, p. 409.
30 word nueva. The fact that the gazette was new might interest potential readers. Interestingly, the novelty of the source is not expressed in the title of the first edition.
Figure 2: Front page of the first edition of the Gazeta Nueva versus the front page of an edition of the Tydhingen uyt verscheyde quertieren from around the same time.
These subtle title changes could indicate that the Gazeta Nueva did not receive the reception anticipated with the design and title of the first publication. The changes made from then on seem to aim at a larger audience, marking the novelty of the newspaper. It might be considered an early modern marketing technique, where attention is drawn to the distinctive features of the source: it is a gazette and it is new. Even though other gazettes had appeared in the Iberian Peninsula, it was the first one from the capital, with permission from the king.
The design of the Gazeta Nueva follows similar design features as the gazettes that had been published from the beginning of the seventeenth century.86 Carmen Espejo has traced the
origins of this particular design in Spain back to the beginning of the seventeenth century, when some (non-periodical) Gazettes already circulated in various cities like Seville:
‘[…] the stage during which European gazettes in Southern Europe —at least in Italy and Spain— shared motifs and forms lasted until the mid-seventeenth century. However, a journalistic event of enormous historical importance then took place. The immediate international success in France of
31 the official Gazette is common knowledge. Founded in 1631, it was the first to use the name ‘gazette’ in its header— its direct imitators, the London Gazette and the Gaceta Nueva or de Madrid, would not appear until the 1660s.’87
Broadly speaking, there was a wider trend in Southern Europe, where Spanish, Italian and French gazettes followed roughly the same style, with the Gazeta Nueva directly imitating the French Gazette de France.88 In Northern Europe other features had become popular. The
Gazette d’Amsterdam and the Oxford Gazette (predecessor of the London Gazette) have a much more functional design, getting straight to the point (see figure 3).89 Because of its two column
structure, the more subtle placement of the title and the size and amount of text printed on the page, these Dutch and English newspapers look more like what we call a newspaper today than the Spanish and French ones, filled to the brim with reports and making as much use out of the sheet as possible.
Figure 3: First page of the Gazette de France, a direct influence on the Gazeta Nueva
It appears that the publisher has tried to maintain a regular format, standardising the design of the Gazeta Nueva, especially from the second edition forwards. The intricate first letter is replaced with a simple enlarged one. All the reports are introduced by the place the news came from. In a variety of cases the source of the news is made explicit (with letters from …, they
87 Carmen Espejo, ‘The invention of the Gazette’, p. 310. 88 For the Gazette de France from January first 1661 see:
https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k64580780/f6.item
