Schoemaker

Size: The collection of manuscripts by Andries Schoemaker in the KB consists of more than 60 volumes.
Accessibility: The Schoemaker manuscripts can be consulted at the Special Collections reading room. Microfilms or photographs of some of the manuscripts are available. The complete topographical works by Andries Schoemaker have been made available in a black and white edition on microfiche and in an edition on 6 cd-roms with full-color reproduction of the illustrations and advanced searching possibilities by MMF Publications in Lisse. The cd-rom's and microfiches can be consulted at the Special Collections reading room.
More information: Ad Leerintveld 070-3140320.

Collection description

Andries Schoemaker (1660-1735) was an Amsterdam merchant whose passion was collecting historical and visual information on the towns and villages, churches and castles and other topographical features of his native country. Especially in the period 1725-1735 he devoted himself to assembling material on the history of the various localities. Consulting different sources, which he usually cited in the margins of his manuscript, he wrote a historical description of each place that he illustrated with drawings, many in handsome colors, that he either made himself or had made for him by contemporary artists, such as Cornelis Pronk (1691-1759) and his student Abraham de Haen (1707-1748) with whom he made summer voyages throughout the Dutch republic in order to set as much of the topography as possible down on paper. At times he also made use of published prints, many from sources now lost, which showed the topographical situation in previous periods. .
These he cut out and pasted into his own large-format notebooks or he copied them himself in color. Now and then he also sketched his own maps and city plans or made use of exisiting ones. In his 'atlas', as these works were referred to, he also included other illustrations such as family and town arms and other heraldic devices, coins, seals, medallions and historical costumes. In the end Schoemaker's atlas included some 9,000 pages with more than 2,600 pages of color illustrations. It covers all the provinces of the country existing at the time and is arranged alphabetically by locality within each province. After his death, his works disintegrated, but fortunately most parts ended up in public collections of various Dutch musea, libraries and archives.
The KB possesses in all 28 manuscripts by Andries Schoemaker, of which 11 deal with topographical and 11 numismatical themes. The other 6 manuscripts mainly deal with genealogical subjects. Four topographical manuscripts are available via the cd rom of MMF Publications in Lisse (the city of Utrecht and the provinces of Gelderland, Friesland en Zeeland).
Most Schoemaker manuscripts in the possession of the KB, come from the collection of the Dutch magistrate J. Romswinckel and were bought by the KB in 1807. The other Schoemaker manuscripts entered the KB through donations or auction purchases.

Literature

M. Nahuys. 'Andries en Gerrit Schoemaker' [I-IV]. In: Dietsche Warande. Nieuwe Reeks 1 (1887-1888), p. 158-164, p. 313-322, p. 426-439, p. 529-546.
J. Otten. 'De Atlas Schoemaker'. In: Voor Nederland bewaard. De verzameling van het Koninklijk Oudheidkundig Genootschap in het Rijksmuseum. Red. J.F. Heijbroek e.a. Baarn 1995. (Leids Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek: 10).
The historical-topographical 'atlas' of Andries Schoemaker. Lisse 2000. Folder in PDF format (1,1 Mb) with the cd-rom publication.