On the Empire State and Imperial Cities; Amsterdam and New Amsterdam

Imperialism is frequently thought of as a late nineteenth century phenomenon that was, perhaps, (at least partially) ended through decolonization. Yet, even if that’s true, empire is much older and more enduring. There is a nice visual representation of this point if we look at the history of the coat of arms of the city of Amsterdam. A city founded long after the collapse of the Roman empire. Here’s a picture of the current coat of arms (and I direct your attention to the crown):

The original version of the crown on top of the shield was added to the Coat of arms in 1489 as a kind of gift by Maximilian of Austria, who was then king of the Holy Roman empire. He only became emperor in 1493, and so only since then does the coat of arms represent an imperial crown.

However, the crown in the picture, a so-called Rudolphine crown (named after Rudolf II), originally dates from 1602. Rudolf II was the patron of Kepler (and Brahe), and he had commissioned the new crown. (It was not originally an imperial crown as such, but a house crown.) But the city of Amsterdam seems to have switched its coats of Arms fairly quickly to this crown. And if you walk around Amsterdam you will see this crown on several seventeenth century buildings including multiple times on top of the Westerkerk (right next to Anne Frankhouse). The church dates from 1620, and you can find this image on all kinds of sketches and paintings from the seventeenth century.

What’s odd about this is that Westerkerk was originally built as a protestant church, and Rudolf II was an important Catholic sovereign in a time of Catholic-Protestant European wars. In addition, by this point Amsterdam, and the province of Holland, were only nominally a part of the Holy Roman empire. In fact, it was in the middle of a long-running war of independence against the Spanish king (who was not the ruler of the Holy Roman empire—Charles V had split his holdings.)

In fact, Holland (and so Amsterdam) only formally left the Holy Roman empire in the aftermath of the (1648) Peace of Münster (not to be confused with the Treaty of Münster) when Spain formally acknowledged Dutch independence and the sovereignty of States General. It seems only the emperor formally acknowledged the departure of United Provinces from the Holy Roman Empire. (I need to do more research on this.)

Of course, by 1648, the Dutch had already created (in Boxer’s eloquent phrase) a seaborn empire (a so-called thalassocracy) through the Dutch East India Company (1602) and Dutch West India Company (1621). Amsterdam was the financial, commercial, and transportational central node of this empire (which didn’t call itself empire (rijk in Dutch). Both of these companies collapsed at the end of the eighteenth century, and were effectively nationalized and folded into the Batavian Republic de facto a protectorate of the French republic.

The Batavian republic was eventually (and briefly) folded into Napoleon’s empire. During this period, there was a continental blockade, so Amsterdam’s relationship to the remnants of the seaborne Empire were much more limited (and most of it occupied by the British). Even so, and the reason, I mention that episode is that during this period (1810-1813) Amsterdam became a so-called ‘bonnes villes de l'empire,’ and this meant a number of changes to Coat of arms (and also the way the mayor was appointed). Here’s a picture I got from the Wikipedia page:

After the defeat of Napoleon, the Netherlands became a kingdom (including modern day Belgium and Luxemburg) with overseas possessions. In Amsterdam the coat of arms returned to a pre-seventeenth imperial century crown. And it remained that despite the split with Belgium (1830). In the age of imperialism, the coat of arms was changed again in 1897 and the Rudolfine crown was restored—that coat of arms was replaced in 1947 after WWII (it’s the one at the top of this post). The two nineteenth century coat of arms are reproduced below this paragraph.

Now, the nineteenth century was a new period of growth of Amsterdam not the least because of the industrial revolution, but also the growing commerce with Dutch colonies. Interestingly enough, these colonies were grouped together (rather late in 1920s) as ‘Nederlandse Overzeese Rijksdelen,’ which translates as Dutch/Netherlands Overseas Imperial parts/territories. (Despite the Netherlands being a kingdom domestically.) After decolonization, most of the remaining Dutch territories are not formally treated as belong to an empire.

So, where are we? The city of Amsterdam has maintained a nearly continuous symbolic affiliation with empire for about five hundred years. This is visible, even if not much remarked upon, all over town where one can find different iterations of representations of the coat of arms. Obviously, neither the Holy Roman empire nor Napoleon’s empire are an important part of the current self-image of the city. But other imperial epochs/ages are (even if the Dutch rarely use cognates for empire in discussions about these). To what degree Amsterdam should be understood as an imperial city in the present is a topic for another time.

But I do want to add a coda to this story. As is well known the nickname for New York state is the Empire state. And this shows up in many contexts there. As I learned from Wikipedia, the origin of this nickname (which is already in use during President Washington lifetime) is shrouded in mystery. But unsurprisingly, when in the context of the rule of the Dutch West India company, coat of arms were drafted for New Amsterdam and New Netherlands, these were modeled on Amsterdam’s coat of arms including (at least for New Amsterdam) an imperial crown (see here).

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