Artikelen

• Tegen de stroom van de tijd

  According to most modern historians mentioned here it is likely that it wasn't until the Romantic Movement that the past was studied for its own sake. Had historiographers completely lost sight of the famous historians of classical antiquity since the time of Charlemagne? Was even Herod no longer known to them, the historiographer from the fifth century BC. whom Cicero had called the pater historiae?

  Although Herod may have been criticized frequently in antiquity, he was and continued to be the great example for historiographers even until the end of the second century AD - if we are to believe Arnaldo Momigliano. Then his work and that of other major historians of antiquity passed into oblivion.

  Herod did study the past for its own sake and he was fully aware of the difference between his own culture and that of the past. Among other things this appears from his description of the history of Egypt. Take, for instance, the passage on the mystery play of Osiris. According to Herod this mystery play had been handed down from Egypt to the Peloponnesos by the daughters of Danaos, but later, ‘after the Dorian migration the whole ritual on the Peloponnesos fell into disuse. Only among the Arcadians, who were not expelled from their settlements, has the ritual survived’.

  Whether this course of events is correct or not in the light of the most modern studies, it is a fact that Herod describes a phenomenon that was characteristic of Egyptian culture. Moreover, he discovered that the mystery play was later adopted by the Greeks and that it subsequently disappeared again due to certain social changes, notably the Dorian migration. He adds that the mystery play only survived among a people that had not been expelled by the migration.

  The way in which Herod tries to interpret such cultural phenomena in their historical context does not appear to differ essentially from modern historical studies. How could the historiographers of the Middle Ages have ignored this specific intellectual heritage of classical antiquity so completely? If the breach with classical antiquity was so large in this respect, there may be some ground for continuing to call the Middle Ages dark after all.

  According to most modern historians mentioned here it is likely that it wasn't until the Romantic Movement that the past was studied for its own sake. Had historiographers completely lost sight of the famous historians of classical antiquity since the time of Charlemagne? Was even Herod no longer known to them, the historiographer from the fifth century BC. whom Cicero had called the pater historiae?

  Although Herod may have been criticized frequently in antiquity, he was and continued to be the great example for historiographers even until the end of the second century AD - if we are to believe Arnaldo Momigliano. Then his work and that of other major historians of antiquity passed into oblivion.

  Herod did study the past for its own sake and he was fully aware of the difference between his own culture and that of the past. Among other things this appears from his description of the history of Egypt. Take, for instance, the passage on the mystery play of Osiris....

  According to most modern historians mentioned here it is likely that it wasn't until the Romantic Movement that the past was studied for its own sake. Had historiographers completely lost sight of the famous historians of classical antiquity since the time of Charlemagne? Was even Herod no...

  Wim Denslagen

  102-107

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• De moeizame vormgeving van het verleden

  Dealing correctly with the built past is the key question of each individual case of preservation of monuments and historic buildings. After all, a thorough refurbishment inevitably implies a form of intervention in the 'natural' course of history. At the same time the final result of not doing anything, often implies that eventually nothing is left. However, once a drastic restoration has been decided on for that reason, it is tempting to do more than what is strictly necessary for preservation: removing annoying additions from earlier centuries, eliminating previous restorations, perfectioning the object aesthetically by making it stylistically uniform. Thus falsification of history sometimes threatens, because a building is made to look 'old'.

  In this article five categories of such deliberate designing of the past are distinguished. The first relies on a frequently commercially inspired nostalgia. Long lost buildings that nobody is acquainted with anymore are newly erected for the sake of an intended historical image, such as the planned donjon of the Valkhof in Nijmegen. The second group concerns reconstruction in the old style after acts of war or fire damage, in an attempt at restoring destroyed national heritage that everyone has been acquainted with: the Lakenhal in Ieper. However, the longer this is postponed, the more forced the restoration becomes.

  In the third group the intervention is more fundamental. Not repair of damage is the motive, but the deliberate reconstruction of a specific phase of a monument, while anything incompatible with this is purged out: palace Het Loo. Such a reconstruction can be so drastic that in practice the boundary between historical reliability and historical fiction is exceeded, as in Cuypers's approach to the Munster church in Roermond. Often this is also (partly) based on political ideological motives: a specific past is required in the present. One step further and we are in category five: the use of this historical fiction as a starting point for new buildings, which are legitimised by this historical fiction, such as the Karlskirche in Vienna, the layout of which was based on an incorrect reconstruction of the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem.

  Dealing correctly with the built past is the key question of each individual case of preservation of monuments and historic buildings. After all, a thorough refurbishment inevitably implies a form of intervention in the 'natural' course of history. At the same time the final result of not doing anything, often implies that eventually nothing is left. However, once a drastic restoration has been decided on for that reason, it is tempting to do more than what is strictly necessary for preservation: removing annoying additions from earlier centuries, eliminating previous restorations, perfectioning the object aesthetically by making it stylistically uniform. Thus falsification of history sometimes threatens, because a building is made to look 'old'.

  In this article five categories of such deliberate designing of the past are distinguished. The first relies on a frequently commercially inspired nostalgia. Long lost buildings that nobody is acquainted with anymore are newly...

  Dealing correctly with the built past is the key question of each individual case of preservation of monuments and historic buildings. After all, a thorough refurbishment inevitably implies a form of intervention in the 'natural' course of history. At the same time the final result of not...

  Thomas H. von der Dunk

  108-122

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• In de ban van Rembrandt, huizen en herdenkingen

  Four hundred years after Rembrandt's birth all sorts of exhibitions are to be seen in the Dutch museums. An effort was made to show different aspects of the artist's oeuvre and ask new questions as regards realization and interpretation. What happened to the houses in which the artist lived and what value can be attributed to this? After a wrong location had initially been designated and in doubt about what to do with the house in which Rembrandt died (Rozengracht 184 Amsterdam), it is exactly one hundred years ago that the foundation Stichting Het Rembrandthuis turned the premises Jodenbreestraat 4 into a museum.

  The aim was a set-up that did justice to the spirit of the genius of Rembrandt by means of a layout in harmony with the historical starting-point, being a largely reconstructed 17th-century shell. New-development architect K.P.C, de Bazel executed this with the consent of architect A.W. Weissman and art connoisseur J.P. Veth. They were against bringing in 17th-century furniture, because they feared that the large public would mistakenly associate it with Rembrandt, but the furniture was brought in all the same.

  The modernist, detached early 20th-century approach was given new shape around 1998 with the construction of the extension by architects Sas and Jansma/Zwarts. The matter of the removal of De Bazel's interior from the old part of the building was contested in court, even though a seemingly 17th-century design merges with what may still be authentic.

  There are some interesting similarities with the Dürerhaus, which served as an example for Amsterdam in 1906, but had already been acquired by the city of Nürnberg in 1826 and was made into a museum in 1871. Just as Rembrandt, Dürer functioned as a national symbol, a national figure to be proud of. (In retrospect) both artists were thought to deserve a more spacious and comfortable accommodation than was actually available, and this is also evident from the painstaking reconstruction of the buildings.

  It is ironical that Rembrandt had bought a house in Amsterdam beyond his means, and moreover in a neighbourhood that was on its way down from a social point of view. In the 19th and 20th century depopulation, redevelopment and industrial compression afflicted Amsterdam, and under these circumstances it is a miracle that the Amsterdam Rembrandthuis was preserved.

  Things went differently for Rembrandt's birthplace in Leiden, which due to ignorance was drastically altered in the 19th century and swept away in the 20th century after a few impracticable attempts at reconstruction had been made. The fact that the Dürerhaus in Nürnberg survived the war is also a lucky coincidence.

  Unfortunately, this does not go for Dürer's birthplace, which was bombed and rebuilt in a contemporary form after the war. As far as research and justification are concerned in connection with a drastic reconstruction, Amsterdam can learn from Nürnberg once again, where in 2006 a congress, an exposition and various publications have been devoted to the Dürerhaus.

  Four hundred years after Rembrandt's birth all sorts of exhibitions are to be seen in the Dutch museums. An effort was made to show different aspects of the artist's oeuvre and ask new questions as regards realization and interpretation. What happened to the houses in which the artist lived and what value can be attributed to this? After a wrong location had initially been designated and in doubt about what to do with the house in which Rembrandt died (Rozengracht 184 Amsterdam), it is exactly one hundred years ago that the foundation Stichting Het Rembrandthuis turned the premises Jodenbreestraat 4 into a museum.

  The aim was a set-up that did justice to the spirit of the genius of Rembrandt by means of a layout in harmony with the historical starting-point, being a largely reconstructed 17th-century shell. New-development architect K.P.C, de Bazel executed this with the consent of architect A.W. Weissman and art connoisseur J.P. Veth. They were against bringing in...

  Four hundred years after Rembrandt's birth all sorts of exhibitions are to be seen in the Dutch museums. An effort was made to show different aspects of the artist's oeuvre and ask new questions as regards realization and interpretation. What happened to the houses in which the artist lived...

  Dirk Jan de Vries

  123-137

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• Sporadisch kleinood te Maastricht, een seinhuis naar ontwerp van Sybold van Ravesteyn (1889-1983)

  At the railway yard in Maastricht just north of the NS railway station the one and only completely preserved signal box after a design of architect ir. Sybold van Ravesteyn (1889-1983) is to be found. During his long active life Van Ravesteyn constructed many buildings for the Netherlands Railway Company, but the greater part of his oeuvre was demolished in consequence of new requirements of use and changed circumstances.

  The signal cabin in Maastricht (1935), known as Post T, was not demolished and still contains the original electric control equipment as it was made by the Vereinigte Eisenbahn Signalwerke in Berlin. In the thirties of the twentieth century this equipment was considered very modern. It concerns a so-called multi-tier appliance, which is compact and conveniently arranged in spite of its 168 control switches. Because of its large weight (10,000 kilogram) the equipment was hoisted up in parts.

  Signal cabin Post T was constructed of reinforced concrete and is still in the original state. In accordance with its nature and function it was placed high above the rails and is supported by two reinforced concrete pillars. The northernmost pillar is massive, the other one hollow. The slender construction, the optimal glazing of the control space, and the roof on the northern side executed in an elegant W-shape give the signal cabin a striking architectonic presence, which in spite of its moderate dimensions can be called both monumental and graceful. The author describes the signal cabin against the background of the railway history of Limburg and sketches the consistent orientation of this province and its capital towards the neighbouring foreign countries.

  Besides, the significance of Maastricht as a fortified town, the development of the railway yard and of the station quarter are passed in review. Incidentally, he tries to supplement the headword seinhuis (signal cabin) as it is defined in the architectural dictionary ‘Verklarend woordenboek van de westerse architectuur- en bouwhistorie’ of E.J. Haslinghuis and H. Janse (a 'building where the signals and switches of a railway network are operated') with remarks on the visual functionality of signal cabins, compares it to related types of buildings, and brings up the specific building form of signal cabins.

  In 1998, despite the fact that Post T had not been in use as a signal cabin for quite a while, the Netherlands Railway Company made a list of work to be executed, initially aimed at carrying out major repairs; gradually this work expanded to a complete restoration of the object as regards nature and function.

  In close cooperation with the Netherlands Railway Company, the municipality of Maastricht and the Department for the Preservation of Monuments and Historic Buildings (RDMZ) a modest restoration took place, in which respect for the historical substance of the signal cabin was put first and foremost. The commissioning authority considered the building designed by Van Ravesteyn the target image; distracting additions of a later date were therefore removed, while the original materials were optimally respected.

  Consequently, the restoration could be successfully completed in the autumn of 2003. The result is a signal cabin stripped from distracting elements, with overdue maintenance remedied and small material imperfections put right. Since 2003 the brisk, modern presence, as it was referred to by various authors in 1935, is worth to be looked at again by both train traveller and critical observer.

  At the railway yard in Maastricht just north of the NS railway station the one and only completely preserved signal box after a design of architect ir. Sybold van Ravesteyn (1889-1983) is to be found. During his long active life Van Ravesteyn constructed many buildings for the Netherlands Railway Company, but the greater part of his oeuvre was demolished in consequence of new requirements of use and changed circumstances.

  The signal cabin in Maastricht (1935), known as Post T, was not demolished and still contains the original electric control equipment as it was made by the Vereinigte Eisenbahn Signalwerke in Berlin. In the thirties of the twentieth century this equipment was considered very modern. It concerns a so-called multi-tier appliance, which is compact and conveniently arranged in spite of its 168 control switches. Because of its large weight (10,000 kilogram) the equipment was hoisted up in parts.

  Signal cabin Post T was constructed of reinforced...

  At the railway yard in Maastricht just north of the NS railway station the one and only completely preserved signal box after a design of architect ir. Sybold van Ravesteyn (1889-1983) is to be found. During his long active life Van Ravesteyn constructed many buildings for the Netherlands...

  Michiel S. Verweij

  138-151

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