16

Gerrit Lundens (1622- ca. 1683)
The fire in the old town hall, Amsterdam, 1652. Signed and dated G. Lundens 1652. Panel, 29.5 x 33.5 cm.

Amsterdam, Amsterdams Historisch Museum, cat.nr.255, inv.nr.B 4512. Acquired at the W.J.R. Dreesmann sale, Amsterdam (F. Muller), 22 March 1960, lot 523 (as Egbert van der Poel).

When Amsterdam welcomed Maria de' Medici in 1638, one of the founding professors of the Athenaeum, Caspar van Baerle, composed an official poetic description of the event. When he came to the old town hall, he wrote: 'Its antiquity and dilapidation lend the building a certain venerableness. A city which is otherwise so splendidly built shows here how simple she was of old.' This symbol of what we might call Republican virtue was being replaced by a building of imperial pretension when fire did the work of the demolition crew at 2 o'clock in the morning of July 7, 1652. The city was abuzz with rumours of arson, and the mood was so tense that the burgomasters called out the guard to prevent looting.

Of course the fire was seen as an omen. On July 6, twelve Dutch men-o'-war had been sunk in the English Channel, the first act of overt hostility in the disastrous Anglo-Dutch War. The news must have reached Amsterdam in the course of the 7th, while the ashes of the town hall were still asmoulder. And there were those who saw the hand of God in the fire, a punishment to the impious town government, which was elevating itself above God's church (see nr. 17). One artist who felt that way, I believe, was Cornelis de Bie, who painted a picture of the fire in 1653. Another artist who painted it was Claes Moyaert, who was in sympathy with the town council. The ruins were drawn by Rembrandt and drawn and painted by Beerstraten.

Dudok van Heel 1976, p. 34. Cat. Amsterdams Historisch Museum I975/ 1979, nr.255, and under nr. 54. A. Blankert, review of W. Stechow, Dutch landscape painting, in Simiolus 2 (1967/1968), p. 106.