Dam, Nieuwe Kerk en het monument Naatje te Amsterdam c. 1875 - 1885

Albert Greiner captured this albumen print of the Dam square in Amsterdam sometime in the mid-19th century. It shows the social space between the secular and the sacred, the commercial and the commemorative. Here we see the Nieuwe Kerk, a late Gothic church that was the traditional site of royal coronations in the Netherlands. Juxtaposed against this imposing structure, we have the 'Naatje' monument, dedicated to the Dutch naval hero, Lieutenant-Admiral Jan van Speyk. The monument represented Dutch nationalism but was controversial in the period. The scene is populated with pedestrians, who animate this civic stage. What makes the image so interesting is the way it illustrates the 19th-century transformation of urban space. The photograph makes visible the way that the commercial, religious, military and civic all existed cheek by jowl in the modern city. To understand this image better, we might turn to historical maps, city archives, and photographic surveys to reconstruct the changing social geography of Amsterdam.