The best-known of all Dutch writers is the Catholic playwright and poet Joost van den Vondel (1587–1679), who mainly wrote historical and biblical tragedies. In 1625 he published what seemed an innocent study from the antique, his tragedy of "Palamedes, or Murdered Innocence", but which was a thinly veiled tribute to Johan van Oldebarnevelt, the Republic's Grand Pensionary, who had been executed in 1618 by order of stadtholder Maurice of Nassau. Vondel became in a week the most famous writer in the Netherlands and for the next twelve years, until the accession of stadtholder Frederick Henry, had to maintain a hand-to-hand combat with the Calvinists of Dordrecht. In 1637 Vondel wrote of his most popular works on the occasion of the opening of a new Amsterdam theatre: "Gijsbrecht van Aemstel", a play on a local historical figure loosely modeled on material from the "Aeneid" that is still staged to this day. In 1654 Vondel brought out what most consider the best of all his works, the tragedy of "Lucifer", from which it is said Milton drew inspiration. Vondel is considered the typical example of Dutch intelligence and imagination at their highest development.