30 July 2014
FIETS (n): Origins Unknown
Following on from a previous post related to the Tour de France, this piece talks about the Dutch word ‘Fiets’. At first glance the word doesn’t seem to bear any resemblance to its equivalents in English (bicycle), French (vélo) or German (Fahrrad) and it was this realisation that prompted a spat of research on its etymology.
First port of call was the Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal, or Dictionary of the Dutch Language (WNT). The WNT is the largest etymological dictionary in the world, in any language. It is available online, but the British Library holds a copy on the open shelves in the Humanities 1 reading room (HLR 439.313).
Despite its erudition the WNT doesn’t provide a satisfactory etymology for the word ‘fiets’. It offers two possible sources, neither are conclusive. Not much fun there, then.
Image taken from page 211 of The Z.Z.G. or the Zig Zag Guide round and about the beautiful Kentish coast (London, 1897) 10352.g.28.
Some more digging around in the catalogue brought up a title that proved to be just the ticket. Ewoud Sanders’ Fiets! (The Hague, 1996; YA.2002.a.1177), brings together columns previously published in the Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad. The little book is beautifully bound in a hard grey cover, and printed in the best of Dutch printing traditions. In eight chapters, or ‘étappes’ (stages) Sanders discusses the various theories on the origins of the word ‘fiets’, as offered by etymologists, journalists and cycle fanatics alike. Apparently, no other word has kept the Dutch and Flemish so pre-occupied as ‘fiets’. When the bicycle was introduced to the Low Countries from France, it was knows as a ‘vélocipède. At the Language and Literary Congress in Leuven in 1869 heated discussions were held over the question whether a Dutch language variant should be found and if so, which one. Shortly after this congress cycling took off in The Netherlands, which had to have consequences for the vocabulary associated with it.
Fiets! gives a fascinating account of the history of cycling in the Low Countries as well as of the development of the word ‘fiets’. The WNT is mentioned several times, because its editors were heavily involved in the discussions around it. The bibliography reflects the fascination people had with ‘fiets’ and includes over 50 titles, ranging from the WNT to letters from the archives of the ANWB, the Dutch equivalent of The AA.
In the end Sanders supports the theory that ‘fiets’ originates in the vernacular as spoken by Dutch school boys, back in the 1870s. That is probably why the word was considered to be a sort of ‘F’ word by the educated classes. How different things are these days.
The Dutch language abounds in expressions around ‘fiets’ or ‘fietsen’, (to cycle), which proves just how much ‘fiets’ has become firmly settled in the Dutch language, just like the article itself has become an icon of Dutch culture. Sanders doesn’t go into this, but cycling (whipping) through the ‘Van Dale’ dictionary (Van Dale groot woordenboek, door W. Martin en G.A.J. Tops. (Utrecht, 1984-1986) HLR 439.313) will clarify how it is you can have a ‘bicycle rack’ in your mouth, as in when you have ‘gappy teeth’. If you suddenly see where I’m coming from, you may exclaim: ‘Oh, op die fiets!’ (‘Oh, on that bike!’).
Thieves’ slang gives a clue on how much a stolen bike would sell for one hundred years ago. A ‘Fiets’ to them is two ‘thalers’, or five guilders. Thieves also may have used bicycles to get away on; hence the use of ‘fiets’ for ‘arms and legs’. When by now you’ve had enough of me, you’re probably telling me to get on my bike, just like the Dutch say: ‘Ga toch fietsen!’
Marja Kingma, Curator Low Countries Studies
11 July 2014
You’ve got to shoot, or you can’t score.
This blog’s title is a famous saying amongst the Dutch and came from Johan Cruijff, former football player, coach and true football expert: I just know a lot about football. It is a typical ‘Cruijffinian’ remark: brilliant and blindingly obvious at the same time. He could have said it after Wednesday’s semi-final against Argentina, when Holland just couldn’t score, not even at the penalty shoot-out. Apparently it is received wisdom that you can’t train on penalties, something Jan Mulder, sports journalist and author doesn’t agree with. “Indestructibly lodged in heads: one cannot train on penalties, it’s a lottery.”
Photo of Johan Cruijff from Wikimedia Commons
But then “every disadvantage has its advantage”, another one of Cruijff’s sayings one cannot argue with and that has become part of colloquial Dutch. Playing the host nation Brazil tomorrow should be more fun than playing Germany, who will win anyway, won’t they? “Soccer is a game for 22 people that run around, play the ball, and one referee who makes a slew of mistakes, and in the end Germany always wins," is one of Gary Lineker’s staples and seems to hold true so far.
Browsing both books and websites for quotes on the beautiful game threw up gems like Johan Cruijff Uitspraken, collated by Sytze de Boer (2011), which saw three editions in 2 years. It makes for a very entertaining read, almost like a biography, with the quotes in Cruijff's unique style grouped according to themes.
Cover of Johan Cruijff Uitspraken (Amsterdam, 2011) YF.2012.a.34510
Cruijff is one of the most written and talked about football players ever to have graced the pitch. Henk Spaan, a sports journalist and poet, published De zoon van Cruijff en andere gedichten (‘The Son of Cruijff and other poems’) a collection of poems about players such as Ronald de Boer, Ronaldo and Jordi Cruijff. He co-edited a collection of essays by and about authors writing about football, which doubled as the catalogue for an exhibition at the Literary Museum in The Hague. And he forms part of the editorial team of probably the only literary football magazine in the Netherlands, if not the world: Hard Gras. Although the Library does not subscribe to this magazine, we do buy loose issues.
Cover of Henk Spaan, De zoon van Cruijff en andere gedichten (Amsterdam, 1995) YA.1996.a.5432
The already quoted Jan Mulder, former player for Ajax (1972-1975) and RSC Anderlecht (1965-1972), swapped his boots for the pen. In the nineties he teamed up with Remco Campert, one of the most distinguished Dutch authors of the 20th Century to write columns for a national newspaper. Between 1997 and 2006 these writings were compiled into annual overviews and published as books.
Simon Kuper writes prolifically about football (in English!), examining and exploring technical, economical and historical aspects of the game. His book Ajax, the Dutch, the war gives a remarkable insight in Dutch history by studying the war through the lens of football.
Cover of Jacques Thibert and Max Urbini, Johann Cruyff: Superstar, translated by Helen Paniguian (London, 1975) X.619/15177
The reason these titles make it into our Dutch Language collections is that they represent an important part of popular Dutch culture. Both academic dissertations on football as well as compilations of newspaper columns offer great opportunities for historic, sociological and other research and therefore deserve to be read.
As for the game against Brazil tomorrow, the Orange team better keep ball possession, because as Cruijff acutely observed: ‘As long as you have the ball, they can’t score’.
Marja Kingma, Curator Dutch Language Collections.
THE SQUAD :
Sytze de Boer, Johan Cruijff Uitspraken. (S.l., 2011) YF.2012.a.34510
CAMU 1996. Amsterdam, 1997; YA.1999.a.9994
Johan Cruijff, Voetbal. (Amsterdam, 2012) YF.2014.a.18466.
Simon Kuper, Ajax, the Dutch, the war (London, 2011) YK.2012.a.4425
Simon Kuper, Soccernomics. (London, 2012) YK.2013.a.3978.
Henk Spaan (ed.), Literatuur met een doel. (Amsterdam, 2000) YA.2000.a.14353
ON THE BENCH/ FOR FURTHER READING:
Frits Barend, Henk van Dorp, Ajax, Barcelona, Cruyff (London, 2000) YK.2000.a.4838
Chris Keulemans (former Arsenal), Overal om me heen is ruimte: verhalen uit de bovenhoek. (Amsterdam, 1992) YA.1993.a.20545
C.G.M. Miermans, Voetbal in Nederland, (Assen, 1955) 7920.c.51
Nico Scheepmaker, Cruijff, Hendrik Johannes: fenomeen 1947-1984. (Weesp, [1984]) X.629/24721.
24 February 2014
The Battle of the Floods
The media reports on the recent floods in England regularly mention how the Netherlands deals with floods. That’s not surprising, considering the Low Countries’ long history of struggling to keep their feet dry. The Netherlands are in effect a river delta where three big rivers, the Rhine, Waal and Meuse converge to flow into the North Sea. 18% of the land is under sea level and around 50% sits at less than one metre above the sea. Floods have always been a fact of life for the inhabitants, with floods like the St Elizabeth Flood in the 15th century creating whole new landscapes – or should that be waterscapes?
It wasn’t only the sea that threatened the country; lakes and rivers flooded equally regularly. Take the Haarlemmermeer for example. This huge inland lake just south of Amsterdam was nicknamed the Waterwolf, for its ferocious appetite for land. As early as the 17th century engineers thought up plans to drain it, but it wasn’t until the mid-19th century that the Waterwolf was finally tamed. It is now the location of Schiphol airport, as well as towns, fields and roads.
The Lion of the Netherlands fights the Waterwolf; image from Provisionneel Concept Ontwerp ende Voorslach dienende tot de bedyckinge van de groote Water Meeren ([Amsterdam], 1641)
BL Maps * 32635.(1.)
The last major flood the Netherlands experienced occurred twenty years ago, when meltwater from the Alps came rushing down the canalised rivers and the Meuse burst its banks, flooding towns, farms and industrial estates in Limburg and South-Holland. Almost 250,000 people had to be evacuated.
The extent of these floods revealed the lack of maintenance of the dykes and other defences against the rivers at the time. Most resources had gone into the sea defences, especially after the flood disaster of 1 February 1953, the biggest natural disaster the Netherlands had seen since the Middle Ages. Circumstances then resembled those along the British coast this year: a violent South-Westerly storm combined with high spring tides caused a surge in sea levels no one had expected and huge waves crashed into the coastal defences. Dykes were breached in numerous places and the low lying houses and farms were flooded in hours, sometimes minutes.
The pictures shown below are from The Battle of the Floods: Holland in February 1953 (Amsterdam, 1953; 09406.l.4), an English edition of De Ramp, which was published soon after the disaster in aid of the flood victims. All authors and photographers contributed to the book for free and the publisher, the Dutch Booksellers’ Association (KVB) kindly gave permission to reproduce the images here free of charge.
The most interesting feature of this book is without doubt the fold-out map (below), showing the extent of the floods, the places were the dikes broke, and the number of casualties. It really brings home the magnitude of this disaster.
The photos not only show the damage done to land, houses and livestock (nearly 50,000 were lost), but also the relief effort and the support that came from all over Europe, including Britain. At the time of publication not all facts had been firmly established and had to be adjusted later on, up to 2003, when it was discovered that a newborn baby had drowned.
Flood relief from Great Britain (from The Battle of the Floods)
The latest information (in English) can be obtained from the Flood Museum’s website. Overall 1,835 people lost their lives, 200,000 hectares of land were flooded, more than 3,000 properties were completely destroyed and 43,000 damaged. The total cost of the damage came to over 1.5 billion guilders.
The events of February 1953 resulted in the 35- year long project known as the ‘Deltaworks’, which not only built dams and dykes around most of Zeeland, but de facto overhauled the whole infrastructure of the islands. Land was redistributed with new roads as boundaries, to make agriculture more efficient. Waterways were cleaned up to reduce the amount of brackish water, thus creating natural wetlands.
The initial decision to close off the Oosterschelde completely was changed in favour of a shutter dam, which could be closed when necessary. This allowed the tides to come in and out and thus saved the mussel banks that are so vital for the local economy. Due to the unprecedented scope and scale of the project new technologies and machineries had to be developed that have subsequently been used all over the world. Somerset got their pumps from the Netherlands for a reason!
Marja Kingma, Curator Dutch Language Collections
The Oosterscheldekering. Image by Vladimír Šiman from Wikimedia Commons
07 February 2014
Children’s author wins LGBT award
Last Sunday, the Netherlands Association for the Integration of Homosexuality COC. (N.V.I.H. COC) announced the winners of this year’s Bob Angelo medal. The medal is awarded to a person who has in some way advanced the interests of LGBT people. One of this year’s winners is children’s and teens’ author Carry Slee. Slee writes about LGBT issues in a down-to-earth way, rather than emphasising the ‘otherness’ of lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender people. In doing so, the jury remarked, Slee made a special contribution to the emancipation of young LGBT people especially, by making it easier for them to identify with the characters in her books.
The fight against prejudice for LGBT people in the Netherlands has come a long way, but remains necessary.
The N.V.I.H.-C.O.C. is the world’s oldest still active advocacy group that works to support equal rights for LGBT people and is one of very few gay rights organisations with a special advisory status at the UN. It was founded in 1946 as ‘The Shakespeareclub’, but changed its name to Centre for Leisure and Culture C.O.C.
It had to tread very carefully and meetings were held in secret, because of the semi-illegal nature of homosexuality in those days. Article 248bis of the Dutch Penal Code rendered non-heterosexual activity practically illegal. It wasn’t finally scrapped until 1971.
Advocating equality for LGBT people remains necessary, even in the Netherlands with its reputation of tolerance towards people of different sexual orientation. The British Library’s Dutch language collections include works on the history of homosexuality in the Netherlands. D.J. Noordam, Gert Hekma and Rob Tielman all discuss the infamous prosecutions against homosexual men in 1731, resulting in severe punishments, including death. We can get a glimpse of these practices from a series of sentences, handed to 33 men accused of ‘sodomy’. They all went on trial at the Court of Holland, Zeeland and Vriesland on the 5 October 1731. The verdict is printed as a standard document of barely two pages long, in which only the name of the defendant needed to be inserted. They were all sentenced to banishment for life from the lands under the jurisdiction of the Court and all their goods were confiscated.
Sententien van den Hove van Holland, tegens verscheide Persoonen ter saake van gepleegde sodomie: in dato 5 October 1731. (’s Gravenhage, 1731) BL shelfmark D.NA.4.
The British Library holds two bound volumes of the journal Vriendschap (‘Friendship’), COC 1950-1954. The recommended book lists it contains give a clue as to which authors were gay.
An early issue of Vriendschap. (Reproduced by kind permission of the COC)
This journal was superseded by Dialoog, co-edited by the Dutch novelist and polemicist Gerard van het Reve.
The Netherlands’ best novelist, Louis Couperus, was known to be homosexual, although he could not openly express this. He hints at it in some of his novels, such as De Komedianten (‘The Comedians’). Similar authors are Anna Blaman (1905 -1960), and Gerard Reve (1923-2006). While Blaman and Reve were gay, Harry Mulisch (1927-2010) was straight. Yet he wrote Twee Vrouwen (‘Two Women’), generally regarded as a very sensitive depiction of lesbian relationships. The novel brought him great acclaim from the international lesbian movement. (Dutch lesbians were less impressed: see Marita Mathijsen, Twee vrouwen en meer: over het werk van Harry Mulisch [Amsterdam, 2009; YF.2009.a.26196].) In 1979 the novel was made into a film with Bibi Andersson and Anthony Perkins.
In the 1980s the Gay & Lesbian Switchboard Nederland was founded and a few years later published a small guide to Amsterdam for gays and lesbians. It lists gay cafes and bars, coffee shops, clubs, shops and cinemas.
Front cover of Information Amsterdam (Amsterdam, [1988?] ) YF.2014.a.3001. (Reproduced by kind permission of Switchboard Netherlands)
In the 21st century the topic of sexual diversity has become mainstream in Dutch literature – and not just for adults.
Marja Kingma, Curator Low Countries Studies
References
D.J. Noordam, Riskante relaties: vijf eeuwen homoseksualiteit in Nederland, 1233-1733. (Hilversum, 1996) YA.1996.b.1210.
Gert Hekma, Homoseksualiteit in Nederland van 1730 tot de moderne tijd (Amsterdam, 2005) YF.2005.a.7764
Rob Tielman, Homoseksualiteit in Nederland. [2e druk.] (Meppel, 1982.) YA.1994.a.4386
Vriendschap : Maanblad voor de leden van het Cultuur- en ontspanningscentrum. (Amsterdam, 1950-1954) Cup.820.cc.17.
Dialoog : Tijdschrift voor homofilie en maatschappij. (Amsterdam, 1969- )
Cup.365.p.18
Louis Couperus, De komedianten (Rotterdam, 1917) 012582.bb.15. [English translation: The Comedians. A story of ancient Rome … trans. by Jacobine Menzies Wilson (London, 1926) 12582.t.13]
Anna Blaman, Op leven en dood. (Amsterdam, 1955) 012580.b.11. [English translation: A Matter of Life and Death (New York, 1974) X.989/35532]
Gerard Reve, The Acrobat and other stories (Amsterdam, 1956) X.908/35371.
Harry Mulisch, Twee Vrouwen (Amsterdam, 2008). YF.2012.a.14789
10 January 2014
The ‘Prize Papers’: letters as loot
Five sea-battles were fought between the Dutch and the English in the North Sea and elsewhere in the world’s oceans during the 17th and 18th centuries.
The National Archives in Kew, London, houses the High Court Admiralty archives. These not only contain papers relating to the jurisdiction of the courts but also ships’ books and papers, ships’ logs and documents related to prizes. The term ‘prize’ refers here to a ship’s cargo captured in naval warfare. In 1980 a Dutch researcher stumbled upon archival material at Kew containing papers from Dutch prizes 1652-1832. These ‘Prize Papers’ consist of 1,100 boxes containing about 38,000 letters. Of these 16,000 are private letters. Some of the letters had never even been opened!
An index to the contents of 700 boxes in the Prize Papers has been made available online. This free resource also contains digitised images of the letters.
In 2004 the national library of the Netherlands, the Koninklijke Bibliotheek, started a project called ‘Sailing Letters.’ This project resulted in the publication of a series entitled Sailing letters journaal. The British Library has purchased all titles in this series. Each volume consists of essays written by scholars and specialists in their field. In their contributions they analyse letters which are grouped around a common theme.
De dominee met het stenen hart en andere overzeese briefgeheimen (Zutphen, 2008; shelfmark YF.2009.a.19867) is the first volume in this series. The letters in this volume were written in the second half of the 17th century. The authors and addressees lived all over the world, from Batavia and Curaçao to Hoorn and Zierikzee. The contents of the letters cover all sorts of occasions from the murder of the De Witt brothers, a New Year’s poem, an issue of a newspaper in Suriname, the Surinaamse Courant of July 3, 1782 to news items from Batavia, Indonesia, and the last page of a ship’s logbook.
The third volume entitled De voortvarende zeemansvrouw : openhartige brieven aan geliefden op zee (Zutphen, 2010; YF.2011.a.11834) presents letters written by two wives to their husbands De Cerff and Buyk who were sailors employed by the Dutch East India Company. The letters are not only of interest to historians but also to linguists. Two further volumes in the BL’s collection are: De gekaapte kaper : brieven en scheepspapieren uit de Europese handelsvaart (Zutphen, 2011; EMF.2012.a.51) and De smeekbede van een oude slavin : en andere verhalen uit de West (Zutphen, 2009; EMF.2010.a.5). The latter gives the reader some startling examples of everyday life in the colonies such as the letter written by Wilhelmina, an elderly lady who once was a slave or the letter written by a medical doctor in charge of the slaves in a plantation.
In 2013 appeared the fifth and last volume in the series: Buitgemaakt en teruggevonden : Nederlandse brieven en scheepspapieren in een Engels archief. Chapter 3 addresses the question of whether any archives in the Netherlands hold letters seized from English ships captured by the Dutch.
Buitgemaakt en teruggevonden: Nederlandse brieven en scheepspapieren in een Engels archief / onder redactie van Erik van der Doe, Perry Moree, Dirk J. Tang ; met medewerking van Peter de Bode. (Zutphen, 2013.) YF.2014.a.1041.
As a cataloguer, I regularly stumble upon my own ‘prizes’ which experience I have tried to share in this blog.
Annelies Dogterom, Dutch/German cataloguer
30 December 2013
Anatomy of two anatomists
You probably know Rembrandt’s ‘The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Tulp’. Painted in 1632, it show Dr Nicolaes Tulp, praelector of the Amsterdam Surgeons’s Guild, dissecting the corpse of Aris Kindt (Adriaen Adriaenszoon), who was executed for killing a man in the course of stealing a coat. Dr Tulp is addressing seven beruffed gents, one of whom is taking notes. With his right hand he is securing the flexores digitorum with his forceps. His left hand is raised to chest height in a modest pose of explication.
You may not know:
Anatomia completa del hombre con todos los hallazgos, nuevas doctrinas, y observaciones raras hasta el tiempo presente ... segun el methodo con que se explica en nuestro theatro de Madrid. Por el doctor don Martin Martinez (Madrid, 1752) British Library RB.23.a.12905
It has 23 plates showing various grisly parts, but what catches my attention is the engraved frontispiece, signed ‘ F. Mathias Irala inv. et sculp.’. (That is, Mateo Irala both designed and engraved it).
Frontispiece of Anatomia completa del hombre
Not for ‘doctor don Martín Martínez’ grubbling round in the innards of a corpse, possibly that of a lowly criminal. He leaves that to foreigners like Dr Tulp. In the ‘Amphitheatrum Matritense’ [of Madrid] Dr Martínez has a man to do that for him, leaving him free to point in lordly fashion at salient features with an outstretched finger in a pose reminiscent of that of a Roman general. Tulp stands up and Martínez sits down. The Dutch audience strain their necks to see; the Spanish students point their fingers in rhetorical fashion.
Hands-on experience apparently still plays only a small part in the education of doctors in Spain in our own time: I understand they study largely with books. By the way, in the etching of Rembrandt’s picture by Johannes de Frey (Baillieu Library Print Collection, University of Melbourne) a folio book has appeared in the bottom right-hand corner, so learning and experience both have a role to play.
It’s tempting to think of these two images as typifying practical Protestantism contrasted with theory-driven Catholicism, but we must resist the temptation. There was, for example, no Catholic ban on the dissection of corpses. A fairer contrast would I think be nation-based: Dutch versus Spanish, not Protestant versus Catholic.
Barry Taylor, Curator Hispanic studies
References:
Dolores Mitchell, ‘Rembrandt’s The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Tulp: A Sinner Among the Righteous’, Artibus et Historiae, 15 (1994), 145-56. DSC 1734.085000
20 December 2013
Deventer does Dickens - and much more: literary heritage in a Dutch city
Deventer is a town of about 100,000 souls, situated on the banks of the river IJssel in the East of the Netherlands. It was founded by the English missionary Lebuinus around 768. In the Middle Ages it was part of the Hanseatic League, which brought great wealth to the city. This can still be seen in the many beautifully restored old houses in the city centre.
One of these is the building of the Latin School (1300), where famous mediaeval scholars like Erasmus and Geert Grote, founder of the Devotia Moderna movement, studied and taught. Under the direction of Alexander Hegius, who introduced new study methods, the Latin School reached its peak. His new curriculum included Greek and required new text books, which were printed nearby by Richard Pafraet and Jacob van Breda.
Conjugationes verborum graecae (Deventer, [1488?]). British Library G.7536. One of Pafraet's textbooks; the authorship is sometimes ascribed to Alexander Hegius.
Deventer had been quick to adopt the new technique of printing with movable type and became a centre of the printing and publishing industry that continues to this day with offices of Wolters Kluwer publishing based in the city. Deventer also harbours the oldest scholarly library in the country: the Stadsarchief en Athenaeumbibliotheek (SAB), founded in 1560.
With such a strong tradition in learning, printing and publishing it may not come as a surprise that Deventer has two major book festivals. In August it hosts the biggest second hand book fair in Europe, with 6 km of stalls lined up along the banks of the IJssel.
In December there’s the Dickens Festival. This takes place in the medieval quarter of the city centre, the Bergkwartier, with its many beautifully restored houses. In 1990 the local inhabitants and businesses wanted to attract more visitors and custom to their area and came up with the idea to have a Dickens Festival, featuring concerts, Christmas markets and of course street performances by participants dressed up as Dickens characters, 950 in total this year.
Last weekend (14-15 December) saw the 23rd Festival, which attracted around 140,000 visitors, from all over the country and beyond. With a total city population of just under 100,000 that’s not bad going. Photos of the event are available on Flickr.
Almost exactly coinciding with the Dickens Festival in Rochester, Kent, it is rather like a tale of two cities!
Marja Kingma, Curator, Dutch studies
References:
The British Library holds 115 titles published by Richard Pafreat, between 1477 and 1511, as listed in Johnson, A.F. and Scholderer, V. Short-Title Catalogue of Books printed in the Netherlands and Belgium and of Dutch and Flemish books printed in other countries from 1470 to 1600 now in the British Museum (London, 1965) YD.2011.a.3918; RAR 094.209492 BL
14 November 2013
Gilt and gingerbread - celebrating a rare binding sample
In an earlier blog post I wrote about a remarkable and unique object that Printed Historical Sources and Dutch Language Collections bought with the generous support of the Friends of the British Library.
On 6 November we celebrated this purchase with the Friends, the Dutch Ambassador and some colleagues. Dr. Jan Storm van Leeuwen and Professor Mirjam Foot, renowned experts on Dutch bookbindings, gave us their ideas on what this strange object might be, followed by a viewing in small groups of the item itself in the finishing studio of the BL’s Conservation Centre , where Book Conservator Doug Mitchell showed his mock-up of the object especially made by for the occasion and gave a demonstration of gold tooling (described here by Christine Duffy) .
Doug Mitchell (centre) displays his mock-up; the original sample can be seen to the left. (Photograph by Elizabeth Hunter )
Meanwhile Conservation Team Leader Robert Brodie entertained guests in the Conservation Centre’s Foyle Room by displaying some of the Centre’s own book decoration tools and answering questions from fascinated guests. There was a real sense of excitement in the air, which made it a very lively and interesting afternoon. Guests offered their own theories about what the object might be and are very interested to hear of any further developments in the research on this item.
Robert Brodie (left) shows colleagues and visitors some of the Library’s own binding tools (Photograph by Elizabeth Hunter )
We hope that this event will generate further research interest from the academic, professional and arts world, so that together we may solve the puzzle of the ‘Book Binder’s Specimen. Sample book cover. Utrecht/Amsterdam c. 1730’ (C.188.c.43). It did inspire me to bake and gild some traditional Dutch gingerbread!
Marja Kingma, Curator Low Countries Studies
Further reading:
Jan Storm van Leeuwen, Dutch decorated bookbinding in the eighteenth century ('t Goy-Houten, 2006) YD.2006.b.1244
Mirjam M. Foot, Studies in the history of bookbinding (Aldershot,1993)
93/18864 and 667.u.132
For the Love of the Binding: studies in bookbinding history presented to Mirjam Foot, ed. by David Pearson. (London, 2000) 667.u.169
Eloquent witnesses : bookbindings and their history, ed. by Mirjam M. Foot. (London, 2001) YC.2006.a.2251 and m05/.10663
Marja presents her gilded gingerbread men to the speakers (Photograph by Elizabeth Hunter )
29 July 2013
Registering the registrars
Our summer exhibitions Propaganda: Power and Persuasion and Poetry in Sound: The Music of Benjamin Britten (1913-1976) exhibit items from our own rich collections as well as items borrowed from other heritage institutions, in the UK and abroad. At the same time the Library contributes to exhibitions by other libraries and museums, such as The Lindisfarne Gospels in Durham and Vermeer and Music: The Art of Love and Leisure in the National Gallery.
When I recently travelled to the J.P. Getty Museum in Los Angeles, escorting a collection item for their exhibition ‘Looking East: Rubens’s Encounter with Asia’, I got an idea of how much work goes into arranging loans and the vital role the registrars play in this. They deal with the huge amounts of paper work that comes with every single loan request, including all travel arrangements. They pack up the items to go out on loan, so all I had to do was turn up with my paperwork and hand luggage and enjoy the trip.
Collaborating with other libraries and museums on exhibitions gives us a great opportunity to present our collection items to the outside world and to foster relationships with other heritage institutions. I found it very interesting to meet with the Getty’s curators, especially the lead-curator Stephanie Schrader, who specialises in sixteenth- to eighteenth century Dutch and Flemish art. She and her colleagues did a stellar job in putting together the small, but exquisite exhibition around the print by Peter Paul Rubens of a ‘Man in Korean Costume’ (ca. 1617), which is part of the J. Paul Getty’s collections.
The exhibition was a great hit, especially with the Korean community in Los Angeles and it attracted some very high profile visitors. The Library’s contribution consisted of a copy of the first eye-witness account about Korea known in the West. It was written by Hendrick Hamel, survivor of a shipwreck of a Dutch East India Company (VOC) vessel, in September 1653. The ship had been on a journey from Batavia to Taiwan, when it ran into a heavy storm and stranded on the coast of Korea. Hamel and some 30 other surviving crew members spent 13 years in Korea, being prevented from leaving the country by the authorities. In 1666, after several failed attempts to escape, Hamel and seven other men succeeded to get away and sailed in an open boat to Nagasaki in Japan and from there to Amsterdam (exchanging their open boat for a VOC ship!).The Board of the VOC commissioned Hamel to write an account of Korea, its people and society, which was published around 1670. It became very famous throughout Europe, as well in Korea and saw several editions in a short period of time.
The Dutch National Archives hold the original account. The British Library holds three editions of the published version (shelfmarks 10057.dd.32. 10057.dd.28, and 1295.c.28 the copy present in the exhibition).
The shipwreck from Hamel's account of his Voyage
Hamel has become an important ‘ambassador’ in fostering relationships between the Netherlands and Korea. Exchanging collection items between heritage institutions can do the same and without the registrars this would not be possible.
Marja Kingma, Curator Dutch Language Collections
17 June 2013
Marketing tools
One of the British Library’s latest antiquarian acquisitions, purchased jointly by European Studies and our Curator of Bookbindings, is a very rare example of a book cover dating from the 18th century. Actually, it isn’t really a book cover at all, but a single board, about A4 size, covered with a fine piece of calf’s leather. It is sumptuously decorated with 33 different bookbinder’s tools, all in gold, which makes it look rather expensive.
Amongst the decorations are scrolls of a hunting scene – including, unusually, a hunting lodge; another scroll depicts musicians playing various instruments, interspersed with animals both real and mythological. In the centre there is a coat of arms, as yet unidentified, surrounded by intricate corner and spine pieces depicting pomegranates, angels, vases, etc.
The leather is in very good condition: there are no visible tears or cracks, and the gilding is undamaged. It must have been passed on and cherished from one generation to the next, something very unusual for bookbinding samples which were more commonly discarded when no longer needed. But this was no ordinary sample piece, we think, and that may well be the reason why it survived.
So who made it and why? Experts we consulted offered two possibilities.
First, it could be a test-piece by a bookbinder’s apprentice. Could be – but he must have stood in very good stead with his master to be given such a prime piece of leather to work on. In general apprentices had to make do with offcuts.
The second possibility is that a master bookbinder made it in order to show off his skills to rich potential clients. Therefore he used a high-quality piece of leather and as many different tools as he possibly could.
Tools used by bookbinders differ from one region to another. Although the individual tools used on this sample are not as yet identified and cannot therefore be linked to a particular binder, the experts told us that they are very similar to those used in 18th-century Amsterdam and Utrecht, and that it is almost certain the piece was made in one of these two cities.
An image of the cover will appear in our online Bindings Database to join over 200 18th century Dutch bindings already listed there from both the BL and the Royal Library in The Hague.
We hope that this sample book cover will stimulate the interest of researchers and practitioners in the fields of bookbinding and gilding. Personally I hope that it will also inspire young people to develop their creative skills to make similarly beautiful and enduring items.
We would like to extend our thanks to the Friends of the British Library for their support in purchasing an item which is unique in itself and a perfect complement to our existing collections.
Marja Kingma, Curator Dutch Language Collections.
Reference:
Jan Storm van Leeuwen, De achttiende-eeuwse Haagse boekband in de Koninklijke Bibliotheek en het Rijksmuseum Meermanno-Westreenianum=the Hague bookbindings of the eighteenth century in the Royal Library and the Rijksmuseum Meermanno-Westreenianum ('s-Gravenhage, 1976). 667.m.27
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