Secrets of Amsterdam

Corneeltje Arents didn’t want to get buried in the church.  After all, she was a committed catholic and the church in the Begijnhof in the centre of Amsterdam, had become protestant.  The story goes that her coffin was left overnight in the church prior to internment; as was the custom.   The next morning it was outside, leaning against the church wall.  However, against her wishes, Corneeltje was buried in the protestant church.  Seven months later, in 1655, she was laid to rest where she preferred to be: in the gutter outside, close to the bleaching field, where everyone could walk over her grave.  Each year, on the 2^nd of May, her grave is decorated with flowers.

Cornelia lived in the Begijnhof.  Begijnen were religious women, living together in communal or separate houses, often around a courtyard. Though not nuns, they were supposed to live a chaste and charitable life as long as they lived in the community.  One of the most beautiful of these community living arrangements can be seen in the centre of Amsterdam; less than a stone’s throw away from the principal shopping street, the Kalverstraat.  Begijnen have been living there since the 1300s.

From ‘het Spui’ a large wooden door, unlocked during daytime, leads a few steps down to the courtyard.  Notice the rail alongside it, to take bicycles up or down.  On the left one of the oldest (wooden) houses of Amsterdam, built around 1530.  On the right you see the church where Corneeltje refused to get buried.  It is now called the English Reformed Church; every Sunday a service is held in English.  Past the church you can see what used to be the bleaching fields, around it a lovely collection of private houses.  Nothing remains of the original buildings; what you see are structures built mainly in the 16^th and 17^th century and restorations from later periods.  Amazingly, these houses are still occupied by single women, though the last ‘real’ Begijn, Sr Antonia, died in 1971.

Linked to the Begijnhof is the Historical Museum of Amsterdam.  Built in a former orphanage it explains Amsterdam, the city and its people, to visitors from home and abroad.  The Civic Gallery, part of the museum but free to walk through is worth a visit, as is the whole museum.

There is another church in the Begijnhof.  Its entrance is opposite the English Church, but you need to look twice to see that it is a church.  It is one of the many ‘hidden’ churches of Amsterdam.  In 1578 the city became protestant, almost overnight and without any bloodshed.  Catholics were not allowed to worship in public and most catholic buildings changed hands.  The Begijnhof Church became the home for English and Scottish Calvinists who had fled persecution.  The houses in which the Begijnen lived where at the time private property and the women continued to live there.  The priest would celebrate Mass in one of their houses, but by 1650 they needed for a separate building.  Two of the houses were knocked into one;  inside a catholic chapel was built.  The civil authorities gave permission for this in true Amsterdam fashion: a catholic chapel was tolerated if it wasn’t too obvious.  And it isn’t; from the back of the building you would never guess the existence of a chapel and even the entrance is pretty unobtrusive.  Inside it is a different story.

The practice of ‘hidden’ churches was common during this period; one of the best known is ‘Ons’ Lieve Heer op Zolder’ or ‘Our Dear Lord in the Attic’, now a museum.  It was built in the same period as the Begijnhof Chapel in the attic of three canal houses.  It sits over a hundred people; explain that to the civil authorities: a hundred people coming to visit a private house on a Sunday morning?  No doubt the existence of this hidden church was known to the authorities but ‘het gedoogbeleid’ –the policy of tolerance and turning a blind eye to something not quite legal- was then, as it is now, prevalent in the city of Amsterdam.

Visitors are welcome in the Begijnhof but should remember that they are in a private place; no large tour groups are allowed, noise should be kept down and behaviour unobtrusive. 

Amsterdam is well worth a visit and has many more secrets to discover; historical, architectural, cultural and culinary.  Read ‘Amsterdam. A brief life of the city’ by Geert Mak before you come.