Strolling through 17th-century Amsterdam
UvA historian Bob Pierik has written a book about life in Amsterdam in the 17th and 18th centuries ranging from sexual escapades and neighborhood squabbles to carriage drivers passing by. “My book is about normal city life – the way it smelled, sounded, and how people moved through it.”
Dolly the Fox Terrier pulls her leash tight as soon as we approach historian Bob Pierik. On the Magere Brug he and his dog are waiting for us for our walk. The Magere Brug is part of the city walk from his book Zo veel leven voor de deur (So much life on the doorstep), published on October 5th, based on his dissertation on the normal Amsterdammer of the 17th and 18th centuries.
Historian Bob Pierik received his PhD from the Amsterdam School of Historical Studies (ASH) in February 2022 as part of the project “The Freedom of the Streets” on street life, mobility, and gender. In his own words, he is an “imported Hollander,” a reference to the old, 17th-century region. In addition to Amsterdam, he studied in Leiden and The Hague as a native of Zwolle.
For his dissertation on the social life of the city in the 17th and 18th centuries, he conducted research in the Amsterdam notarial city archives, one of the largest city archives in the world.
But who exactly is this normal Amsterdammer? According to Pierik, they are “people who chat on the street, get into conflicts, or have a love affair in the deepest secrecy, and the 17th and 18th centuries were no different. So my book is not about how the city was governed or larger developments, but more about what normal life in that city looked like. The way it smelled, sounded, and how people moved through it.”
17th-century sexual escapades
As we walk down Nieuwe Kerkstraat from the Magere Brug, we are hemmed in on either side by elegant 17th-century warehouses. “We know that one particular stable on this street was the scene of a number of sexual escapades between Jewish men and Christian women in the neighborhood," Pierik says. Behind the three-meter-high stable doors in the street, there was quite a bit of hanky panky going on. “They did their utmost to meet in secret in the stables, but the staff of the stables later saw everything happen.” And that was not without reason. “For women, it was important to show that it was a somewhat honorable relationship so they would not be accused of prostitution and to prove the identity of the father if they became pregnant. Witness statements from people in the neighborhood who had seen or heard something were very important in that context.” Historians of today draw heavily on those recorded testimonies.
18th-century tax evasion
We walk along Reguliersgracht and Herengracht to the University Library of the UvA. Pierik says: “Many of those notarial deeds consist of detailed descriptions of crime, strife, and discord in Amsterdam. Most of the cases I used ended up with the chief officer's secretary. In 1750, for example, that was one Cornelis Staal.” These are everyday or sometimes even banal things in Pierik's work. “Near here, on Koningsplein, was Zijtje Schouten's waffle stall in the eighteenth century. It turned out that she purchased butter illegally, probably to evade taxes. The only reason we can find this information about her life and waffle stall is because witnesses reported at length to the chief officer.
A little further down the Beulingstraat, we pause. “This is the street of the shrimp maid, nicknamed 'Anne with the flat nose,'” Pierik says. “This is where a quarrel arose between Anne and one Elias Gerritse. With terms such as 'knave, thief, dog, horned beast, or rake,' the shrimp maid tried to force the man out of his house. The Dutch word for rake, 'rekel' means 'big male dog,' and thus is actually similar to 'bitch' but for men.” Hundreds of people gathered in the narrow street. Pierik doesn’t know the cause of the argument. “What we do know is that Elias Gerritse then rounded up his neighbors to tell the notary that 'Anne with the flat nose' was a ‘famous whore.’” At that moment, a window opens next door and a curious listener sticks his head out. “That's the way things were back then,” Pierik laughs.
“The man found the situation so humiliating that he tried to restore his honor through these witness statements,” Pierik continues. This example shows that notarial deeds not only document business or financial matters but also contain scenes from a lively street life.
The speed of the city
Pierik also describes transportation in the city in his book. “In the 17th and 18th centuries, everybody walked. Wheelbarrows, carts, carriages, and coachmen had to adapt to walking speed: it was a walking society. In practice, this still caused conflicts and for a while, carriages were banned altogether. “The change of speed in the city is striking,” Pierik says as streetcars, biros, VanMoofs, and other electrically powered transportation whizzes by us.
By now we are on our way to our final destination, the Stadsarchief or City Archives of Amsterdam. “Now Amsterdam really is a city of bicycles,” Pierik continues. “Before, people had to adapt to pedestrians, now they have to adapt to bicycles.” While there is currently a discussion about electric cargo bikes, there used to be a discussion about carriages zooming past.
Our walk ends around the corner at the City Archives, the source of information for Pierik's book, which is full of anecdotally chronicled street scenes. From polluting peat smoke, the function of double doors, to the phenomenon of the 'sleepkoets' (horse-drawn covered sledge). As a reader, you slowly begin to imagine what life on the streets looked like in the early modern era.
Right now, there are people who walk by with their coffee to-go, those who hurriedly press the boost button on their VanMoof bike, and those who, from around eleven o'clock, take a seat on the terrace for a pint.
Bob Pierik. Zo veel leven voor de deur (So much life on the doorstep). A history of everyday Amsterdam in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. (Zo veel leven voor de deur. Een geschiedenis van alledaags Amsterdam in de zeventiende en achttiende eeuw). Amsterdam: Meulenhoff, 2023.
