Abstract: While the debt owed by sixteenth-century English reformers to their connections in Zurich and Basel has been acknowledged, and travel and intellectual engagement during the Enlightenment have also been explored, relatively little attention has been given to links between the British Isles and the Swiss

Confederation in the seventeenth century. The few moderately familiar examples – especially the ecumenical embassy of John Durie, the Swiss efforts at mediation in the Anglo–Dutch war, and the shared concern for the persecuted Waldensians – appear to come almost from nowhere. But they did not. Academic and religious interchange, a traffic in books, commercial links, and diplomacy were wellestablished; travellers overcame linguistic barriers and religious suspicions, and traversed mountains. English puritan writing gained popularity in the Protestant Cantons, while for English commentators the oligarchic republics presented a thought-provoking model of Protestant states directing their own political affairs, dominating their churches, and – depending on the point of view adopted – coexisting or warring with their Catholic neighbours. This chapter addresses perceptions of Switzerland in Stuart England, but also highlights individual friendships, which over decades sustained old connections, built new ones, and ensured the transmission of ideas and publications.