V - More than Meets the Eye: Traces of a Colonial Past in the City of Rotterdam

Summary

INTRODUCTION

From the beginning of the seventeenth century until well into the twentieth century, Dutch entrepreneurs and the Dutch government traded with and ruled over various countries in Asia, Africa and the Americas. Testimonies of these connections remain in the form of buildings, memorials and street names; indeed, in many Dutch towns and villages entire districts can be found that hark back to this period in general and colonization in particular. Despite the complete erasure of its historic urban core in the German bombardment of 14 May 1940, the city of Rotterdam is no exception.

TRACES OF THE EAST AND WEST INDIA COMPANIES (SEVENTEENTH-EIGHTEENTH CENTURIES)

Colonial traces are not always overt and, as Rotterdam shows, can be ambiguous. For although Rotterdam's city centre does not overtly present its colonial links, they are there for those who know where to look and what to look for. An interesting example is the twelve large merchants’ dwellings on Haringvliet 78-98 (Ill. 5.1). The houses annex warehouses, which miraculously survived the German bombardment, are situated on a street where, after Hoogstraat, the most directors of the Dutch East India Company, Dutch West India Company and Maas Admiralty resided during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Although the specific connection between the houses and their former residents requires further investigation, it is safe to assume the homes are connected to Rotterdam's colonial past — and consequently demonstrate the affluence and the social status of high-ranking colonial officials in the city of Rotterdam.

In another area of Rotterdam, at numbers 405-407 on Rechter Rottekade, the interior of a relatively modest eighteenth-century merchant's house clearly hints at its colonial connections. On the first floor, a ceiling painting depicts Mercury, the Roman god of trade, and two female figures: Liberty and perhaps Victory. For a colonial connection, the trunk pictured with ‘No 6’ on the front and the East India Company logo on the side is an obvious reference. Two walls on the second floor contain more colonial references. The first has a mural of a ship under full sail. The ship, a frigate with a lion figurehead and an American flag on the stern, can be dated to c. 1800 and is a reference to trade with the Americas. The second mural, albeit stylistically different, contains a further hint of the building's relationship with the colonies.