The economic relationship between Great Britain and the Netherlands during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries has attracted some of the best minds of historical scholarship of both countries. Their fascinating studies have demonstrated convincingly that the antagonism, bitter rivalry and open conflict dividing the two nations in the seventeenth century did not necessarily result from economic or commercial causes. Nor was the development of ‘uneasy political neutrality’ during the eighteenth century due to any change in their economic relations, even though these relations obviously did change. At the time Dutch capital exports to Britain were gaining in importance. Accordingly, the mutual financial alliance between the two nations may have been strengthened, but this implied ‘no increased warmth’.

As far as the Dutch side of the matter is concerned, the above views have been derived almost exclusively from sources relating to the main centre of Dutch commerce and finance, the city of Amsterdam. Such an approach to the matter is certainly to the point. That city, after all, to a very large extent controlled not only the country's economy but also its political affairs. On the other hand, this view tends to overlook the fact that commercial relations with Britain were far from centring on Amsterdam. It is indeed a moot point whether Rotterdam–on the whole second only to Amsterdam – was not in this particular case of greater importance. The town's nickname, ‘Little London’, was not unjustified.