Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
De Waag - Amsterdam
The 'Onze Liewe Vrouwgilde van der Metselaars', or 'Our Lady's Guild of the
Bricklayers', in Amsterdam, dates from the fifteenth century and continued
until the abolishment of the craft guilds 'in the Netherlands in 1808, by vir-
tue of the constitution of 1798 (Batavian Republic)' (De Vries, 2006, 3247).
In 1617, the guild took residence in one of the former old city wall gateways
(Saint Anthonispoort)
d
.1488, situated in the Nieuwmarkt. This medieval
brick building, with round towers at each of its four corners was later called
De Waag, as it also functioned as a 'weighhouse' for goods as they went in and
out of Amsterdam. There is a seventeenth-century classical styled 'Bentheim
Sandstone' surround to an entrance doorway of the north-east tower, in the
pediment of which is a carved bust of Hendrick de Keyser, the master sculp-
tor/mason, holding aloft a crowned trowel. The tools of the crafts of the
bricklayer, mason, slater and 'pumpmaker' [plumber] surround him. These
represent their four guilds, bricklayers being foremost, with three masters, one
as Dean and two as surveyors, compared to one master for the masons and
a single person serving as master for the other two crafts. These people met
from three to five every Monday at De Waag (De Vries, 2006, 3250).
This particular doorway to the tower was once the entrance leading to a
spiral stairway rising up to the first floor where the bricklayers/masons had
two rooms. The first, and smaller, anteroom, where all income and payments
were made, led directly into the main bricklayer's guild room, or 'metse-
laargilderkamer'. It was in the hallowed latter room, that the finest of the city's
master bricklayers and masons would meet to discuss the mysteries of their
craft and teach their finest apprentices advanced studies. One master, Simon
Bosboom (1614-62), an artisan architect, translated and elaborated the popu-
lar Renaissance treatise, 'L'idea della architettura universale', by the Venetian
architect Vincenzo Scamozzi (1548-1616), which originally appeared in 1615.
A copy of the translation of this topic was kept in the guild room and on the
front page in reference to the apprentices who were encouraged to read it,
Bosboom had written, 'Very easy for young pupils and useful for all young
lovers of architecture' (Kurpershoek, 1997, 28).
From 1681 the city municipality, in order to maintain De Waag, had given the
bricklayer's guild the authority to work on the fabric. This formalised what in
fact had been a long-standing practice, for inside their guild rooms the brick-
layers had decorated and improved the rooms by placing apprentice's master-
pieces of gauged brickwork around the walls. These are part of the classical
and more theoretical approach that was sweeping Dutch architecture at that
time, deriving its heritage from the Renaissance and the classical proportions
of the orders. Almost all of the original medieval wall surfaces of the guild
rooms and spiral staircase, where the work follows the angle of rake (incline),
