Oud wachthuis met plein te Maastricht 1857

Alexander Schaepkens made this print of the Oud wachthuis met plein te Maastricht. It pictures a guardhouse and town square in the Netherlands. Notice the figures: horse-mounted soldiers contrasted with a group of well-to-do citizens socializing. These people represent social roles that were still quite new at the time. The army evolved out of the medieval system of nobility and this print shows how that structure existed alongside a growing middle class. The location itself is critical. Maastricht was a garrison city and the center of government. The architecture, most notably the church tower, symbolizes the entrenched history of religious, political, and military power. Studying prints like this, we can learn more about the history of the Netherlands, using local archives, newspapers, and even military records to reconstruct the social and institutional context in which it was made.