Amsterdam City Archives
Encyclopedia
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
and provides information about the city. With archives covering a shelf-length of about 35 kilometres, the Amsterdam City Archives is the largest municipal archive in the world.
History
In the Middle Ages, Amsterdam’s important documents were stored in a special cabinet that was kept in the so-called ‘Iron Chapel’ (IJzeren Kapel) in the Old Church (Oude Kerk). In the nineteenth century, the archives moved to the Waag building at the NieuwmarktNieuwmarkt
Nieuwmarkt is a square in the centre of the Dutch capital Amsterdam. The surrounding area is known as the Nieuwmarktbuurt ....
, and in 1914 to the former town hall of Nieuwer-Amstel. Since the summer of 2007, the Amsterdam City Archives have been located in the monumental building De Bazel
De Bazel
De Bazel is a monumental building on the west side of the Vijzelstraat in Amsterdam , and stretches from the Herengracht to the Keizersgracht...
, in the city-centre, which derives its name from the famous Dutch architect K.P.C. de Bazel, who designed it.
Preservation
The Amsterdam City Archives belongs to the government of Amsterdam. It preserves the archives of the municipal government and of the national government when related to Amsterdam, besides those of private institutions, families or individuals, and companies connected with the city. The municipalities of Ouder-AmstelOuder-Amstel
Ouder-Amstel is a municipality in the Netherlands, in the province of North Holland.-Population centres :The municipality of Ouder-Amstel consists of the following cities, towns, villages and/or districts: Duivendrecht, Ouderkerk aan de Amstel, Waver....
and Amstelveen
Amstelveen
' is a suburban municipality in the Netherlands, in the province of North Holland. It is part of the metropolitan area of Amsterdam. The municipality of Amstelveen consists of the following villages and/or districts: Amstelveen, Bovenkerk, Westwijk, Bankras-Kostverloren, Groenelaan, Waardhuizen,...
have also deposited their historical archives at the Amsterdam City Archives. In addition, the City Archives houses a large collection of images and audio-visual material, as well as a library.
Among the various documents of international significance kept at the Amsterdam City Archives are the archives of the Heineken
Heineken
Heineken is a Dutch beer which has been brewed by Heineken International since 1873. It is available in a 4.6% alcohol variety in countries such as Ireland. It is the flagship product of the Heineken company and is made of purified water, malted barley, hops, and yeast. In 1886 H...
brewery and the renowned Concertgebouw
Concertgebouw
The Concertgebouw is a concert hall in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The Dutch term "concertgebouw" literally translates into English as "concert building"...
, letters written by Charles Darwin
Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory...
and Mahatma Gandhi
Mahatma Gandhi
Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi , pronounced . 2 October 1869 – 30 January 1948) was the pre-eminent political and ideological leader of India during the Indian independence movement...
, an eighteenth-century trade agreement between the city and the newly founded United States of America, the book containing the excommunication of seventeenth-century philosopher Spinoza, and a police report about the theft of Anne Frank
Anne Frank
Annelies Marie "Anne" Frank is one of the most renowned and most discussed Jewish victims of the Holocaust. Acknowledged for the quality of her writing, her diary has become one of the world's most widely read books, and has been the basis for several plays and films.Born in the city of Frankfurt...
’s bike, dated April 13, 1942.
The Amsterdam City Archives also monitors the way the various departments within Amsterdam’s administrative structure manage their archives, ensuring that documents that are of significance for the city’s history are maintained.
Publication
Archival material is made available for consultation both on site and through the internet. In recent years, many documents have been digitized. The website of the Amsterdam City Archives features an Image Bank, containing more than 260.000 photos, drawings, and prints related to the city, and an Archives Database, providing scans of archival material on request, including a wealth of sources for genealogical research, accessible through several indexes. These scans now number more than seven million.The Amsterdam City Archives also shares the available expertise on Amsterdam and its history through publications and events. The Archives regularly presents temporary exhibitions, while noteworthy documents are on permanent display in the so-called Treasury (Schatkamer). Historical films about Amsterdam are shown in a small movie theatre.