The Arsenal or 's Lands Zeemagazijn
The 's Lands Zeemagazijn was the arsenal of the Amsterdam admiralty, built in nine months and containing enormous supplies for the building and equipping of warships. Johann Jakob Wilhelm Heinse saw, when he was travelling in Holland: "wood, coils of rope of 150 fathoms in length and as thick as a woman's leg, all sorts of sails, bullets, anchors, cannon, muskets and guns, lamps, compasses and hourglasses". The First Anglo-Dutch War ended infelicitously for the Dutch, and this added to the city administration's readiness to have the arsenal built. On 12 August 1655, the Admiralty was given the entire western strip of Kattenburg island for the construction of a warehouse and timber-wharf, in exchange for so far enclosed grounds it had occupied in the area.
In the night of 5/6 July 1791, the Zeemagazijn went up in flames. It was a spectacular fire, and only the main supporting walls remained standing, for after a sack in 1740 extra load-bearing supports had been put in from the outside.
The building now houses the Nederlands Scheepvaartmuseum. At the Oosterdok wharf is moored a replica of a ship of the Amsterdam admiralty, the Amsterdam. The admiralty yacht lay in the yacht harbour in the River Amstel.
Read more about this topic: Admiralty Of Amsterdam
Famous quotes containing the words arsenal and/or lands:
“We enter parliament in order to supply ourselves, in the arsenal of democracy, with its own weapons.... If democracy is so stupid as to give us free tickets and salaries for this bear’s work, that is its affair.... We do not come as friends, nor even as neutrals. We come as enemies. As the wolf bursts into the flock, so we come.”
—Joseph Goebbels (1897–1945)
“Joseph, when I had jewels and lands and palaces, I was often weary and discontent. When everything was taken away, except my life, I learned that the way to be really happy is to serve others, to be needed.”
—Adele Comandini. Edward Sutherland. Madam Tanya (Maria Ouspenskaya)