Holland is the steeply-pitched gable. It was derived from Gothic
sources. Gables owning this influence almost invariably have the
lines of their two ascending sides broken by a series of steps which
continue upwards from base to apex. They are consequently called
"stepped," and such gables will be observed in the drawing from
Middelburg mentioned above. The acute rake of the gables determined
the slant of the roofs. This circumstance, together with the fact
that houses usually had little frontage to the streets, gave great
roof spaces incapable of being adequately lighted by windows inserted
in the walls. So the fore part consisted of a room (or rooms) which
was generally assigned to servants, and the rear area, lighted by
dormers, was used for storing and kindred purposes, one all-important
among the latter being that of "drying washing." These dormers were
quite important factors in architectural composition; each had hinged
and painted shutters and a little steep roof. Sometimes they were
elaborated, as may be seen, for instance, in the drawing from Hoorn
(page 37). The dormer eventually became a much developed feature. In
examples such as those shown from Leiden (page 39), where two of the
houses are not ended by a gable, the main roof would be hipped back. A
certain number of dwellings were built with one of the longest sides
occupying the main frontage. The house at Hoorn (page 36) was so
constructed. The floor-joists, carried through the walling, are exposed
to view; they project beyond the face of the ground floor wall and
support an overhanging upper storey. Similar examples occur at
Vlissingen (Flushing), and there the joist-ends are carved with
representations of small human heads, each of different design.
Very noticeable, both in early and later work, is the great height
of ground-floor rooms and passages. They not uncommonly measure from
eleven to thirteen feet, or even more, from floor to ceiling. The
windows, proportionate to the rooms, are extremely lofty. Over entrance
doorways are fanlights of conspicuous size, which are occasionally
nearly as large as the doors themselves. Some houses, with very high
front rooms abutting on the street, have at the back two stories
contained within this same height. The example from Woudrichem (page
38) is disposed in this way; the fore part of the hall, from which
the drawing was made, together with the adjoining room are almost
twice as lofty as the passage seen beyond; the stairs give access to
the imposed intermediate floor. Heights of rooms gradually diminish
upward from the ground, and the string-courses that externally mark
the position of the floors, are consequently nearest together far up
the walls and gables.
It will be seen by the foregoing how construction and practical
arrangement went hand in hand with design, neither one being divorced
from the other. Especially is this demonstrated by the Gothic
buildings and those which primarily betray a Gothic origin. The house
from Middelburg (page 40) is given as an example. It is a highly
successful piece of grouping, and the features show with admirable
effect. The walls are of brickwork and the dressings of stone. On the
gable-end bands of stone alternate with courses of bricks, while set
back in the angle the well-placed turret, steep-roofed and soaring,
dominates the composition. How accurately the value of horizontal and
vertical elements was estimated, and how cunningly they were opposed
to each other, will be observed. The gateway from Nijmegen (page 41)
was conceived in much the same spirit as the above, and here again
the turret was effectively employed. Both it and the pointed archway
are in quite the Gothic manner; but the crow-stone, or terminating
member of the gable, the band of diaper executed in brick and stone,
and the details of the windows (near to which the date of 1606 appears)
point to other influences.
On the exterior walls of the house from Zutphen (page 43) can be seen
the sunk panels, set back from the main face of the brickwork, which
served for the insertion of windows. They often extend from near the
ground to well up the gable. The dividing projections, turned with
arches at their extremities, give bold upright lines. In the example
cited these lines have evidently been broken by the rebuilding of the
first-storey wall. It is dated 1547. The upper part, showing the sunk
panel bordered by moulded bricks, the arched head--in this instance
pointed and supported on each side by small circular turrets--and
the shuttered window, is given in detail on page 42.
A noticeable treatment of the ground floor elevation is exemplified
by the two drawings from Alkmaar and Hoorn (pages 33 and 34), already
considered, and by that from Veere (page 44). Each is constructed
principally in woodwork, and the many windows amply serve to light the
lofty rooms. The wooden mullions are simply shaped and enriched, while
over them is a moulded cornice. Above the lower series of windows in
the Alkmaar example is a projecting hood, which affords protection from
the weather. The date of 1609 is carved upon it, and other buildings
having this characteristic usually belong to the opening years of the
seventeenth century. A more artistic and satisfactory solution to the
difficult problem of adequately lighting the entire side of a high room
or shop would not easily be found in the old work of any other country.
It is not possible to make any hard and fast division between Gothic
and Renaissance work. The actual dates of the buildings form no
conclusive key, for it has been demonstrated in the Introduction
how the later development did not advance evenly throughout the
country. Houses built in the traditional way, and in a mixture of
styles, are to be seen in almost all old towns (page 45). Sometimes
one influence shows predominantly, sometimes another. The brick and
stone façade at Delft (page 46) has all the attributes of Gothic work,
pointed arches, overhanging stories, stepped gable and pinnacles. But
the spirit of the carved details is different. The heads in circles,
cherubs, vases, cornucopias, lion-heads, dolphins, eagles and acanthus
ornament are all subjects far removed from Gothic ideas, as are the
delicately carved corbels from which the arches spring.
Two other houses that owe much to Gothic influences are those from
Haarlem (page 47) and Alkmaar (page 48). The first-named was built in
1637 and the second in 1673. The more recently dated example shows,
in point of style, the earlier architectural form. Both have the
customary stepped gable and window-heads, the Alkmaar examples being
elliptically arched and those at Haarlem pointed. But in the latter
instance the keystones are furnished with Renaissance ornaments,
as is the crowning pediment of the gable.
The three following buildings mark a further step forward in
architectural development. In general disposition of masses they
accord with olden practices, but the decorative details approximate
Renaissance ideas. "De Crimpert Salm" at Dordrecht (page 51), of 1608,
presents a rich appearance, but the profuse elaboration of the front
was not achieved by accident or haphazard use of material. The balance
of the design was obviously well considered. Horizontal motives,
intensified below the first-floor level, give a stable base for the
lavishness overhead; above, they repeat with less force and are finally
carried up the gable by the steps. The vertical lines, obtained
principally by the window openings and frames, are similarly reduced
towards the top, and there the curved elements are concentrated. Upon
a low wall of stone and brick stands the woodwork front of the ground
floor. Next in order comes a broad band of mosaic decoration executed
in brick and stone (page 50), bounded at each end by lion-heads in high
relief, and divided centrally by a stone panel with a salmon carved
upon it. Other mosaics show in the arched spaces over the windows of
the next storey (page 50), while the equivalent space in the gable is
filled with arranged brickwork. Moulded bricks and stonework, plain and
carved, all contribute to the exuberance of the scheme. The small
example from Franeker (page 49) is built in brick and stone and was
erected in 1634. It has the traditional gable but the old type of step,
small in height and width, was not followed. Two steps only suffice to
reach the gable-head and the side of each is finished with shaped
stonework, a method of completion not employed in earlier times. Later
in date than these two houses, that from Workum (page 52) gives an
instance both of the persistence of established practice and of the
human desire for newness and change. The builder evidently could
neither forget nor abandon the general form of house arrangement that
he knew so well, and to it he kept. This is especially obvious in the
gable which mounts up in quite the Gothic way. The pilasters on the
ground and first storey, however, plainly show that an attempt was
made to keep in touch with the prevailing mode of the period. Each is
terminated by a Corinthian capital and festoons of fruit are carved
upon the panels. In these particulars the work, which was completed
in 1663, was in agreement with the then advancing Classic taste. The
bricks used in the walls are plum coloured and measure but 1-1/4
inches wide.
Designers were thus getting farther away from Gothic architecture. The
political and religious events of the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries revolutionized old beliefs. Time-honoured faiths were not
only given up, but were viewed with positive distrust. The powers
that had swayed the people of the Middle Ages, the mysticism, ideals,
and poetry of their lives, were unrealities to the great majority of
seventeenth-century Hollanders; such doctrines fell meaningless upon
their senses, and were to them but unintelligible and empty forms. They
not unnaturally turned from a creed in whose name loathsome crimes
had been committed and countless lives had been sacrificed. It was
a time of new life and faith. This change in the trend of thought is
amply reflected in the domestic architecture. The Gothic tradition,
already more or less alienated from the public sympathies, had almost
spent itself. Its vitality was gone and only as a survival, a mere
shadow of former glory, was it carried on. The old order gave place
to the new. But it was long before a fresh system of planning came
to be generally accepted and mediæval methods of construction and
workmanship still persisted. Classic motives, however, were
increasingly applied to the elevations. All the features, and the
entire decoration of many of the houses, were often the direct
outcome of Renaissance influences. In some few cases--such as the
gateway at Arnhem of 1642 (page 53)--the whole schemes were conceived
in the Classic spirit and were evidently designed by men of advanced
intelligence, who were able to comprehend the significance of the
style in which they worked.
Rembrandt's house at Amsterdam (page 54) is an able achievement,
sober and dignified. The walls are built of ochre-coloured bricks,
with stone used for the dressings. The date of 1606 appears on the
upper storey. It has no gabled front, but a projecting cornice and
pediment make division between the roof and wall surface. Above
are two dormers placed in balanced order; while the roof, steeply
rising and hipped and having a chimney at each end of the ridge,
completes the studied arrangement. So far the work is in the style
of the Renaissance, and it is only by the windows below that earlier
influences are recalled: but the two themes are so well blended as
to be perfectly harmonious. The net result is simple and reasonable
and by no means lacking in scholarship. Very different is the Guild
Hall at Zwolle (page 55), erected thirty-five years earlier. Its too
fussy elaboration is in sharp contrast with the comparative
restraint of Rembrandt's house, just mentioned. Classicism was
applied without the Classic spirit and with little understanding
of its real import. The general effect is rich and complex, but the
composition lacks breadth and is overladen with ornament. Some of the
details disclose good craftsmanship, notably the frieze which runs
across the entire front at the first floor level, carved with cupids
on horseback, old men with tridents, satyrs and flowing foliage,
and broken at intervals by lion-heads worked on the bases of the
pilasters. At the second storey is a Doric frieze, with sculptured
circular ornaments and heads of bulls appearing in the metopes between
the triglyphs. The gable, mediæval in feeling, is curly in outline;
it is further complicated by the introduction of reclining satyrs and
lascivious demi-gods that quaintly break the skyline. The designer
evidently proposed to himself the Italian ideal, but did not grasp
the meaning or refinement of it. Many details came to be used in
a similar way, such, for instance, as those shown from Dordrecht
(page 50) and Flushing (page 56), but, although often of admirable
workmanship, they were never coherent parts of a self-evolved whole.
A house of somewhat unusual appearance is that in the Voorstraat at
Dordrecht, dated 1626 and illustrated on page 57. At the top is an
open arcade constructed wholly in bricks, with the exception of the
stones upon which the arches rest. The brick walls are relieved by
stonework, while projecting pilasters separate the large lead-glazed
and shuttered windows.
Houses that depended upon dormers for their controlling architectural
idea were common in the seventeenth century. The front wall is usually
only one storey high and the dormers rise from it at the line of the
eaves. When the frontage is wide and the building long and low, as
is the case at Kampen (page 59), these features--shaped and carved
and fundamentally valuable in lighting the rooms of the roof--show
with good effect. A smaller house in the same town, given on page
58, has a single dormer only. It contributes the necessary interest
to what would otherwise be a very dull effort of building. On the
frieze at its base is a carved stone representation of the Nativity,
while below appears the inscription "IN BETHLEHEM 1631."
Those principles that imparted to the domestic architecture of Holland
its picturesqueness, and so gave to it its most valued possession,
were strained to the uttermost as the freshness of the Transitional
style declined. The influences bequeathed from former ages were running
out. Extreme freedom of design, although showing certain originality
and character, was not accompanied by necessary restraint. Architects
sometimes cast aside all the limitations of their art and gave
themselves up to unreasonable over-elaboration and the grotesque;
they ignored the fact--true for all time--that construction must form
the basis for ornamental detail. But it must not be thought that this
was always so. There is, however, certain work of this period that
cannot seriously be accepted as good. Brickwork and stone continued
to be employed and were still associated with excellent workmanship,
as was the carpentry. There was evidently yet, as the many dated
buildings prove, a large body of men who had complete mastery of
their particular crafts, men versed in that traditional skill which
had come down unbrokenly from mediæval days. Prominence was given to
the numerous door and window openings, which were heavily moulded and
often surmounted by pediments. Gables were shaped in endless ways and
upon them almost every conceivable combination of curves was employed.
Pilasters and cornices, swags and festoons, with strap ornament,
scrolls and ornate iron wall-ties, all generally of debased
Renaissance character, contributed to the rich profusion.
Whither events in architectural history were tending will be seen
in the following illustrations. The "Goudkantoor" at Groningen (page
60), bearing a motto and date of 1635, and a house near to it of the
year 1661 (page 61), have quaint gables, curiously shaped and laden
with carved stone decorations. On the walls below the same complex
treatment continues, especially on the "Goudkantoor," the entrance
doorway of which is emphasised by the work surrounding it. At Franeker
(page 62) is an extreme development of the step gable, with the four
steps supporting masses of coarsely-designed ornamentation. The
heavy pediments to the windows are conspicuous, as are the many
stone details. Two panels are inscribed with "ANNO 1662." With the
above-mentioned may be compared the two gables at Alkmaar (page 65)
which betray the same source of origin. Each is crowned by a stone
pediment, and the steps have carvings resting upon them. Applied
to the wall of the farthermost house, and placed centrally between
the windows of the second storey, is a notable iron wall-tie of much
larger size than was usual. An enlarged drawing of it is reproduced
on page 64. Another variation of gable outline is illustrated from
's Hertogenbosch (page 63). In this case the stone-capped sides follow
the lines of sweeping curves, and on them, facing outwardly, are little
carved bunches of fruit and flowers. The front face of this building is
remarkable for the use of pilasters. They are boldly carried up from
bases to the head of the gable. The pillars, executed in unrelieved
brickwork, have stone capitals of the Ionic order which carry an
entablature. There appears the date of MDCLXXI. The bricks are 2 inches
wide by 9 inches long and are laid about five courses to one foot.
It eventually came to pass that the gabled treatment, which had
been the guiding principle of house design for so many generations,
was given up. And with the disappearance of it there went that
which had given character to the architecture of Holland. The links
of the tradition were broken. The old sources of inspiration no
longer served. Inherited ability and skill, originality and vigour,
were being lost, and the last traces of native ideas are to be
found in inconspicuous buildings such as that given from The Hague
(page 66). Although hipped roofs, wide projecting cornices and other
Renaissance features were employed, as is shown by the drawings from
Velsen (page 67), and Zutphen (page 69), a pure Renaissance domestic
architecture did not become established. When the traditional style,
owning both Gothic and Renaissance motives, had ceased to hold its
ground, the stream of design--which until then had flowed continuously
--ebbed low, and houses became uninteresting and commonplace. Away in
the country the town architecture is mirrored in the brick buildings
of the numerous villages. Less pretentious in appearance, their style
is well suited to the simpler conditions that there obtain; for the
crowded activity of the town waterways is absent on the calm canals
that wind between meadows, and give communication from village to
village; on the quays life moves placidly. Spaarndam (page 71)
furnishes a typical village view, with its gabled brick and
white-fronted houses, screened by delicate greenery. The Ferry House,
near Gennep (page 73), has more ornate gables, curved and stepped, and
on the front is diaper brickwork.
There also developed a type of building peculiar to the countryside. It
is shown by the many farmhouses and cottages. Their outward forms
were determined by constructional principles, and added adornment was
but little employed. They are unobtrusive examples of honest work,
not claiming especial distinction, yet in thorough harmony with their
natural environment. They were brought into being by prevailing needs,
and are the local representatives of that phase of native art which
is to be found in almost every country. Such village homes exist in
all parts of Holland. The style of them shows little variation in the
different localities. They are equally suited to the windswept
Friesland landscape, the watered provinces of North and South Holland,
or the beautiful country of North Brabant, with its hedgerows and woods
and distant hills. Grouping, perchance, around old brick churches and
sheltered by trees, as at Spaarwoude (page 68), they are pleasant and
rustic to see.
Under one great thatched or tiled roof all the covered accommodation
necessary for farm life is contained. One side of the building
is occupied by living apartments, the remainder providing a huge
barn, stalls for cattle, and other conveniences for the farmer's
work. These buildings were solidly constructed on a timber basis
in the manner shown by the sectional view from Halfweg (page 70),
where centre and side aisles are divided from each other by the stout
upright timbers. Extreme durability was the keynote and the materials
were employed according to their quality. This traditional form of
building, practised for many generations, continues in use to the
present day. An illustration of the exterior of a similar homestead
to that mentioned above, and from the same village, also appears on
page 70. The great roof, hipped at each end and covered with pantiles,
will be observed. Beneath the eaves are the domestic rooms, in this
instance all upon the ground floor; often they extend to a second
storey in the roof, which is then lighted by dormers. The cottages
follow the same general constructive principles as the farms, and
have similar low walls and large roofs. A lean-to was frequently
added to give an additional room, and the main roof brought down
over it at a less steep pitch. The roof space, valuable as a store,
is in many cases reached from the exterior by a ladder. In addition
to the customary steeply-pitched roofs, those of the Mansard pattern
occur less frequently, as is exemplified by the drawing from Schooten
(page 72).
Country work does not exhibit a great variety of building
materials. Bricks, being made from the natural product and consequently
readily available, were principally used for the walls. Rather than
left in their normal state, they were often thinly coated with plaster
on the outer face, and the lower parts, for about two feet upwards
from the ground, were tarred. Houses and cottages of this description
together form a characteristic group in the country architecture of
Holland. They were built upon a traditional system which grew out of
the accumulated experience that was transmitted from generation to
generation. Customary examples are shown in the two drawings from Beek
(pages 74 and 76), and by that from Broek in Waterland (page 78). The
farmhouse from Brigdamme (page 75) is of a similar character; at the
entrance are two stone gate-piers, dated 1622. Two influences are to
be traced in the farm at Bloemendaal (page 77). The main building has
the white plastered walls and large roof--which in this case comes
forward to cover an open verandah--while the adjoining gable is of
natural coloured bricks and more in the style of town work.
Houses with wooden walls are prevalent, especially in North
Holland. Upon a low brick wall, tarred, and varying in height from
18 to 30 inches, the timber frame was erected. Boards were simply
nailed to it and the framing was commonly left exposed to view on
the exterior. The boarding was well coated with paint or tar for
protection against the weather. A roof of thatch or tiles, well
projecting at the eaves, covered the whole. There was thus provided,
by simple and economical means, a type of building well suited for
its purpose. The village of Broek has many examples of timber houses,
such as those here given on page 79; while near by, at Monnikendam,
Volendam, and on the Island of Marken, are numerous others.
An extravagant use of paint is conspicuous in the country as well as
the towns. It is renewed at frequent intervals and, in the main,
it is well applied. Shutters and doors and window frames, and
frequently the whole house front, are freely covered with it. But
the effects are not unpleasing. They give to the villages an air of
gaiety and freshness. Plain schemes of colour are wisely adhered to,
while throughout a district one general note will be followed. On the
island of Walcheren it is apple-green and white; north of Amsterdam
bluey-green and cream; while the woodwork of the house at Beek (page
81) is painted in the tones of buff that find favour in the locality
of Nijmegen.