Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
classical gauged work, one has to consider the possibility that bricklayers from
the Netherlands were working in England, especially alongside the influential
and highly-skilled city craftsmen.
It is not impossible that Dutch bricklayers, possibly from Leiden or Amster-
dam, did come to London to ply their craft. The collapse of the 'tulip mania'
commodities in 1637 could have been one economic reason and later, in the
post-Restoration period, they may have come for the extensive re-building work
in the city following the Great Fire of 1666. A Royal Proclamation to consoli-
date the Building Act of 1667 allowed 'foreigners' (native craftsmen living out-
side the old city boundaries and in the surrounding shires) as well as 'aliens'
(craftsmen from abroad) liberty to work as freemen on the re-building. Working
alone, or as a 'gang', Dutch bricklayers would have found much work specialis-
ing in producing elements of gauged brickwork. To date, however, extensive
research in England and in the Netherlands has failed to find evidence to
support this theory.
The names of these bricklayers may, of course, be anonymous within build-
ing accounts listed under an English Master Craftsman, or they may have angli-
cised their names; a common practice for immigrants. Certainly the city master
bricklayer, Edward Helder (Holder) who was used by Wren on the Temple,
has a Dutch surname, and his skills in gauged brickwork were undoubted (see
Chapter 3.
Discussion with various architectural historians in the Netherlands suggests
that the idea of a proliferation of Dutch bricklayers working in London to
be negligible and unlikely. Dirk De Vries (De Vries, 1998), a respected senior
historian with the Dutch Monumentonzorg who discussed the possibility with
his colleague and noted historical architect, Wouter Kuyper (Kuyper, 1998),
upholds this view:
He (Kuyper) does not think that Dutch bricklayers came over to England, except
two of four sons of Hendrick de Keyser, Willem (1613-74) and Hendrick the
younger (1613-65).
It is of interest to note that Kuyper refers to these craftsmen as bricklayers,
when we would term them stonemasons. The same terminological confusion
does arise in Dutch transcripts, translated by a Dutch architectural historian,
where many of the seventeenth-century master bricklayers, working out of
Amsterdam, are sometimes referred to as stonemasons. One can see this as
again, reinforcing the fact that when called upon these craftsmen could, and
certainly did, cross from stonework to high-quality refined brickwork with con-
summate ease if called upon to do so.
Research has indicated that Willem and Hendrick de Keyser trained in
England under their uncle, Nicholas Stone. By 1640, Willem was back in
Amsterdam working as city mason from 1647-53. He then returned to England
