Secrets of Amsterdam’s oldest building
The Oude Kerk is the oldest building in Amsterdam. The building was the center of late medieval urban life. They partied, married, prayed and mourned. It was church, community center and burial in one. In addition to a floor with under 10,000 dead Amsterdammers, the church contained an ultra-secret room that no one is allowed to enter and a tower with Amsterdam’s oldest masonry. A time capsule was recently found in that tower.
The first requirement in a village or city is the presence of a place of worship, it was thought in earlier times. The original therefore not long before the first church version in the fledgling Amsterdam. It was a wooden building and stood exactly on the site of the current Oude Kerk at the end of the 13th century. Around 1300 this wooden building was replaced by a stone church. This church was 41 by 18 meters in size and had a tower of 9×9 and 28 meters high. As a tower as a tower has grown and expanded over the centuries, originally the original material went from that first ‘primal’ church. Except in one place: the inside of the lower part of the lower church tower still consists of the original fourteenth-century masonry of that very first Amsterdam church.
The Oude Kerk in the middle of the old center of Amsterdam, schools of origin between the Warmoestraat and Oudezijds Voorburgwal.
Impression of Amsterdam at the end of the 13th century: the first Amsterdam families lived in one-storey wooden houses of 10×3 meters, the wooden predecessor of the Oude Kerk can be seen at the top right. (Illustration: Paul Maas)
Original fourteenth-century stones from the first early church from the early 300s in the lower part of the old church tower, photo from 1984. The outside was covered with a new layer of stone, but the inside remained damaged. The body is still inside the fourteenth-century tower.
Oldest dead Amsterdammer
The Oude Kerk is the center of city life in religion-soaked late medieval Amsterdam. There is prayer, marriage, celebration and burial. Even before the construction of the Oude Kerk, Amsterdam’s first cemetery was located on this spot. This became clear when during archaeological research in 1963 a so-called tree coffin grave from around 1200 was discovered under the Oude Kerk. In the grave lay the skeleton of an approximately 35-year-old man. The tree coffin grave is the oldest grave ever found in Amsterdam. Unfortunately, we don’t know anything else about the man. Was it someone who meant something special for the young village on the Amstel bank? One of the first Amsterdam fishermen farmers? We do not know.
The oldest Amsterdammer: skull from the grave found in 1963 under the Oude Kerk. (Photo: F. Gijbels, Institute for Pre- and Protohistory IPP dan ACASA, UvA)
30 square meters of living space
Later excavations around the Oude Kerk revealed remains of wooden houses from the 13th century, these insights gained about the neighborhood must have looked like around 1250. The wooden houses were 10x3x5, which means that the first Amsterdam families had an average living space of 30 square meters. Part of a stone house was also found, making it the oldest stone house in Amsterdam.
The oldest known depiction of the Oude Kerk on the first map of Amsterdam by Cornelis Anthonsz from 1538.
The vegetable market on Oudekerksplein, 1778. Drawing by Herman Schouten.
Same place today.
Busiest cemetery
In addition to being a church and meeting place, the Oude Kerk was also a covered cemetery. Between 1300 and 1865 there were about 10,000 people in the church. The church contained 2000 graves, each 4, sometimes 5 chests deep and were regularly cleared when burial rights expired or were sold. This happened, for example, with the poor painter Rembrandt van Rijn. In 1662 he could no longer pay the burial rights for his deceased wife Saskia van Uylenburgh, so he sold her grave. It is not clear whether her remains were immediately cleared, but it is clear that her tombstone disappeared and her place was used by other dead from that moment on. It was not until 1953 that the exact spot of Saskia’s grave was located and a new tombstone with her name placed on it.
Map from 1834 with tombstone floor of the most compact cemetery in Amsterdam, the Oude Kerk. Under the more than 2000 gravestones, the graves were 4 to 5 chests deep. This means that about 10,000 Amsterdammers were buried on an area the size of half a football field. From 1617 it was forbidden to bury or clear away on Sundays and during the services ‘also by opening graves, great stanck comes’.
All in all, it must have been a constant bustle in the old church for centuries with regard to funerals and grieving relatives. In addition, it is possible to guess what other aspects are associated with so many deaths in such a small area in a covered space. From 1865, burial in the church is therefore granted for hygienic reasons. In 2021, all graves have been cleared in the back of the church. The contents of the charnel pit can be seen through a glass plate in the floor: bones, a skull. Perhaps from Saskia herself.
A group of people stands and admires a window in the Oude Kerk, the gravedigger digs a grave, drawing by Herman Schouten from 1786.
Iron Chapel
The Oude Kerk was the most important place in the city for centuries. The most important documents were also kept in a specially designed place shrouded in secrecy: the Iron Chapel. No one could or should enter this space. The solid iron door to this chapel is 5 meters above the ground and could only be reached by a ladder. In addition, 4 keys were needed to open the door. Behind the door is a small space with a so-called charter cabinet, a chest with drawers to store documents. This charter contains, among other things, the well-known toll privilege from 1275, the first official document in which Amsterdam is mentioned as a city. From 1515 to 1892, the Iron Chapel was the city’s hermitage. It happened that the space was not entered for years. In 1892 the charter cabinet was moved to De Waag on the Nieuwmarkt. It put an end to the Iron Chapel as Amsterdam’s most secret place, although the space has retained its mystique to this day.
High above the ground the door of the iron chapel, secret room of the Oude Kerk.
Inside the Iron Chapel. The charter cabinet with documents was in the alcove on the left. The dress is now on display in the treasury of the city archives.
500 year old wrought iron door: view from the Iron Chapel.
Time Capsule
During recent renovation work, a time capsule was found in the golden sphere of the Oudekerkstoren. Despite the age of the Oudekerkstoren, the found time capsule turned out to be a bit of a disappointment. The capsule turned out to be no older than 80 years and was placed in 1939. The copper tube contains 3 letters with maintenance history to the tower. The current restorer has also added a letter with an overview of recent work on the tower and the weather. Perhaps this time capsule is a bit disappointing: with its graves, mysticism and 7 centuries of history, the Oude Kerk is a time capsule in its own right.
The time capsule with a new message to future church tower restorers. (Photo: Koninklijke Woudenberg)