Dissenting Daughters: Reformed Women in the Dutch Republic, 1572–1725. Amanda C. Pipkin. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022. xiv + 264 pp. $100

• Published in: Renaissance quarterly Vol. 76; no. 4; pp. 1558 - 1559
• Main Author: Spaans, Joke
• Format: Journal Article Book Review
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge Cambridge University Press 01.12.2023
• Subjects: Religion
• ISSN: 0034-4338; 1935-0236
• DOI: 10.1017/rqx.2023.584

According to Pipkin, they assumed leadership positions in their communities through their writings, which circulated in manuscript form before they were published, often posthumously. Prominent ministers supported them in their work, either in person or through the publication of domestic advice books that gave mothers an equal role with men in fostering devotion within their households. Throughout, Pipkin justly emphasizes how devout women built networks of influence in the local church, among family and friends, and in their households. [...]she makes far-reaching claims, such as that Van Schurman, through her correspondence, “impacted foreign and domestic reformed theology,” and that ministers’ daughters like Nevius “studied for the ministry” and for a future as an active ministers’ wife.