Knowledge and the Early Modern City

Knowledge Societies in History KNOWLEDGE AND THE EARLY MODERN CITY

A History of Entanglements

The expertise if the history of knowledge is essential in tackling the issues and concerns surrounding present-day global knowledge society. Books in this series historicize and critically engage with the concept of knowledge society, with conceptual and methodological contributions enabling the historian to analyse and compare the origins, formation and development of knowledge societies. The first volumes in the series are the result of a project `Creating a Knowledge Society in a Globalizing World, 1450-1800', which received funding through an internationalization grant from NWO (Dutch Science Foundation). The project explores manifestations of knowledge societies, moving away from a teleological model inherent in many discussions of modernity. Edited by Bert De Munck and Antonella Romano Series Editors: Sven Dupre, Utrecht University and University of Amsterdam, Netherlands, and Wijnand Mijnhardt, Utrecht University, Netherlands.

In this series:

Knowledge and the Early Modern City A History of Entanglements Edited by Bert De Munck and Antonella Romano

For more information about this series, please visit: www. routledge. corn/Knowledge-Societies-in-History/book-series/KSHIS

Routledge €2 Taylor & Francis Group LONDON AND NEW YORK First published 2020 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon 0X14 4R1 and by Routledge 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 CONTENTS Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Frands Group, an informs business 2020 selection and editorial matter, Bert De Munck and Antonella Romano; individual chapters, the contributors The right of Bert De Munck and Antonella Romano to be identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyńght. Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No pan of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. List of figures British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data List of contributors A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Acknowledgements Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Munck, Bert De, 1967- editor. Ι Romano, Antonella, editor. Tide: Knowledge and the early modem city : a history of entanglements Knowledge and the early modern city: an introduction / edited by Bert De Munck and Antonella Romano. Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY: Routedge, 2020. Bert De Munck and Antonella Romano Series: Knowledge societies in history Includes index. Identifiers: LCCN 2019012722 (print) Ι LCCN 2019018341 (ebook) ISBN 9780429442223 (Ebook) Ι ISBN 9781138337695 (hbk : alk. PART' paper) ISBN 9781138337718 (pbk.: alk. paper) ISBN Knowledge and the staging of the city 31 9780429442223 (ebk) Subjects: LCSH: City and town life-Europe-History. Ι Cities and towns-Europe-History. I Knowledge, Theory of-Europe-History. Ι 1 The theatrum as an urban site of knowledge in the Ι Ι Social change-Europe-History. Europe-Intellectual life. Europe- 33 Social conditions. Low Countries, c. 1560-1620 Classification: LCC HT131 (ebook) Ι LCC HT131 .Κ56 2020 (print) Ι Anne-Laure Van Bruaene DDC 307.76094-dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019012722 2 Artisanal `histories' in early modern Nuremberg 58 ISBN: 978-1-138-33769-5 (hbk) Hannah Murphy ISBN: 978-1-138-33771-8 (pbk) ISBN: 978-0-429-44222-3 (ebk) 3 Boatmen, Druids and Parish in Lutetia: archaeologising Parisian Typeset in Bembo by Swales & Willis, Exeter, Devon, UK society in eighteenth-century civic epistemology 79 Stephane Van Damme vι Contents

PART Η Urban agency, science, technology and the making of the city 99

4 Stench and the city: urban odors and technological innovation FIGURES in early modem Leiden and Batavia 101 Marius Buning

5 Cities, long-distance corporations and open air sciences: Antwerp, Amsterdam and Leiden in the early modern period 126 Karel Davids

6 Technology transfer, ship design and urban policy in the age of Nicolaes Witsen 149 Dciniel Margόcsy

PART ΙΙΙ 1.1 Main stage of the landjmveel festival in Antwerp in 1561, designed by Imperial cities, knowledge for empires? 171 Cornelis Floris — woodcut in Spelen van sinne. © Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. 37 7 Andre de Avelar and the city of Coimbra: spaces of knowledge 1.2 A `Greek' theatre — woodcut for the prologue of Spelen van sinne. © and belief during the early modern Iberian Union 173 Rijksnnuseum, Amsterdam. 38 Leonardo Ariel Carrid Cataldi 1.3 Allegorical representation of Africa — print from the engraved series of `The Four Continents' by Pieter Nagel (?) after Gerard van 8 Roman urban epistemologies: global space and universal time in Groeningen, c. 1571. © Print Collection, Miriam and Ira the rebuilding of a sixteenth-century city i97 D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, The 40 Elisa Andretta and Antonella Romano New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations. 1.4 Title page of the Theatυυm orbis terrarum (1570) with the allegorical representation of the four continents. © Library of Congress, 9 The library, the city, the empire: de-provincialising Vienna in the Geography and Map Division. 42 early seventeenth century 223 1.5 The `Theatre of Peace' mounted for the entry ceremony of Paola Molino Archduke Ernest into Antwerp in 1594— engraving in Bochius, Descriptio. © Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. 45 in Leiden — engraving by Willem van Index 250 1.6 The theatrum anatomicnni Swanenburgh after Jan Cornelisz. van't Woud, 1610. © Wikimedia Commons. 46 2.1 Leaves from Neudörffer's Verzeichnis showing indices by name, and and a list of makers' marks. © By permission of the Germanisches 2.2 National Museum — GNM Merkel HS 40 533 Fols 43r and 46r. 59 2.3 Nuremberg, designed by Michael Wohlgemut and Wilhelm Pleydenwurff, View of Nuremberg, in Hartmann Schedel, Weltchronik. Nuremberg. Anton Koberger, 1493. © Creative con coons. 62 2.4 Neudhrffer's biography of Peter Flhtner. © By permission of the Germanisches National Museum — GNM Merkel HS 40 533 Fol. 17r. 71 STENCH AND THE CITY

Urban odors and technological innovation in early modern Leiden and Batavia

Marius Buning'

Introduction

This essay analyzes the importance of urban smellscapes for early modem technological innovation, proceeding from the idea that cities did not only con- sist of people, impressive buildings, and industry, but also of excrements, public toilets, and air pollution. Ever since the Middle Ages, urban authorities had made attempts to regulate this type of pollution and, as Carlo Cippola and others have shown, this led in some cases to the establishment of a form of public health care.Z Yet attempts to fight urban pollution also led to technological innovation, for instance, because new machinery had to be developed to dredge the city's canals, or because new mills had to be designed to flush polluted water outside the city limits. Early modem pollution was a problem identified primarily by scent. The aversion of specific smells was related to the idea that the air could be a source of contagion — and of all contagious diseases, the plague was possibly the most intimidating.3 Within the framework of Galenistic theory, based on keeping a balance between the four humors and the elements, the quality of the air was essential in maintaining a good health; foul air was to be kept at a distance, whereas a pleasant smell could protect someone against illness.` The so-called `miasma theory' focusing on air quality to explain the spread of disease remained dominant until the nineteenth century. Only then, did the awareness rise that the spread of disease might have something to do with niίcrobes.' Despite the existence of a general theory identifying a medical relation between contagion and stench, the interpretation of specific odors could differ. Stench, in that sense, existed in the nose of the beholder and, as Mary Douglas and others have suggested, the identification of `pollution' was thus, at least in part, a culturally determined fact that encapsulated ideas about political power, 102 Marius Buning Stench and the city 103 social distinction, and knowledge practices. This essay takes this insight as as copper smelting or tanning. Ever since the fourteenth century, the authorities a starting point to unpack the deeper meaning of the smell of water that flowed had tried to regulate the nuisance of stench.13 Yet, although one can find many through early modem urban canals. It thus attempts to draw different historio examples of earlier regulations on pollution, the urban authorities did not get graphical traditions together, and to reveal the existing kinship between the directly involved in the employment or production of new technologies to fight early modern period and later developments. pollution.14 The relationship between smell, medical knowledge, and urban development This radically changed in the course of the sixteenth century, as can be illus- has been a recurrent theme in studies that focus on the nineteenth and twentieth trated by a report tabled by Leiden's city secretary Jan van Rout, in 1591, with centuries. Often, intrinsic links are identified with the emergence of territorial the title On the Means of Taking Away the Decay of t/ie Waters Caused 6y the Fullers consciousness and the exercise of (colonial) power.a For the early modern in the City of Leiden. t5 Van Hoist's plan was essentially to move the fullers to the period, such issues have received a lot less attention. The experience of smell outskirts of the city, because of the pollution they produced. The fullers would has been dealt with primarily by philosophers and historians of medicine, often be relocated to a new industrial area north of the old town that would get its in complete independence from questions that relate to urban planning and pol- own drainage pipeline, leading polluted water out of the city. itical power.9 Vice versa, histories of early modern water management and state The relocation of polluting industries was by no means a value-free operation. regulation have had little eye for medicinal concems.10 The purpose of this essay It was equally a means for `respectable' citizens to distinguish themselves from is to change that. the poor. Accordingly, the relocation of the fullers was sustained in the project The argument that I will explore is that certain smells were typical for a city; of Van Hout as follows: that these smells led to specific reactions by city dwellers and local authorities; and that, along these lines, urban odors played a decisive role in the develop- That the afore-mentioned part of town [=Rapenburg], currently least ment of new technologies. I do so by making a comparison between two major inhabited and with few houses, will be made lively and livable, by making Dutch cities: Leiden, an industrial center for textile processing, and Batavia, the the fullers depart to make space for other persons who are highly desired Republic's colonial headquarters in the East Indies. The outline of the text is as and sought for.lc' follows. First, I deal with the Leiden experience of malodorous water by analyz- ing a series of plans for the amelioration of water flow in the canals. I embed In Van Hout's assessment, poverty and stench were intrinsically linked. Gaining the Leiden problem of water refreshment in its context, making a short com- control over the causes of environmental degradation formed the basis for his parison with the situation in a number of other towns. Then, I switch over to ideas on how to rearrange the city. Batavia, discussing the various ways in which the biggest Dutch city in the East On the issue of zoning, Van Hout was following a humanist tradition.17 Indίes struggled with the problem of putrid canals. Towards the conclusion, More specifically, Van Hout may have been influenced directly by the ideas of I return to the question of how knowledge, power, stench, and the quest for the famous architect Leon Battista Alberti (1404-1472), who had spoken exten- innovation were interlinked in various location-specific ways. sively about hygiene, disease, and zoning in his treatise De Rei Edificatoria (1443-1452, 1485).19 Alberti had linked the problem of pollution to the poor and specific trades, as well as to foreigners and strangers. One of his suggestions Sanitizing Leiden had been to divide the city into zones `according to the occupation and rank of The city of Leiden was one of the important industrial centers for textile pro- every one'. Thus, Alberti argued: cessing in the early modem period. The city attracted a large number of poor immigrants, and experienced a rapid population growth particularly after the de The charm of a city will be very much enhanced if the various workshops facto independence of the Dutch Republic in 1581. Around 1574, roughly are allocated distinct and well-chosen zones. The silver-smiths, painters, 12,000 people had lived in the city. By the 1620s their number had reached and jewelers should be on the forum, then next to them, spice shops, 11 almost 45,000. The unprecedented growth of the population led to immanent clothes shops, and, in short, all those that ndght be thought more respect- housing problems. Likewise, it intensified the necessity of specific demands, such able. Anything foul or offensive (especially the stinking tanners) should be as fire extinguishers, installations to secure sufficient drinking water, and kept well away in the outskirts to the north, as the wind rarely blows a sewerage system.l"' from that direction, and when it does, it gusts so strongly as to clear the Leiden was known as a smelly city. Like other cities throughout Europe, it smells away, rather than carry them along.19 mainly suffered from three pollutants, namely, human and animal excrements, carcasses of dead animals, and the pollution coming by specific industries, such 104 Marius Boning Stench and the city 105

The Leiden project of Jan van Hout, however, went beyond zoning per se. At based on a series of new plans that had been drawn up by the influential land the time, it was generally agreed that the dangerous stench coming from canals surveyor Jan Pietersz. Dou (1573-1635) (see Figure 4.1).24 As in the earlier case was mostly caused by stagnant waters. Van Hout's proposal therefore also of Van Merwen, Dou worked in the service of the city of Leiden and, as in the included the use of new technologies to make the waters flow. More specifιc- project of 1591, new ideas about water management coincided with political ally, he wanted to install a mill recently invented by Simon Franszoon van and economical interests. On 6 May 1611, the representatives of Leiden Merwen, the treasurer of the city, who incidentally was also responsible for lamented in the Assembly of the States of Holland: a number of maps that accompanied Van Hout's proposals.20 Van Merwen had obtained a `patent' for his invention of a new water wheel ... that the city, and especially its waters, are ever more infected with a lot in 1589, which meant that he held the exclusive rights to the commercial of stench and dirt, caused by several dirty trades that have to be carried exploitation of the technology for a limited number of years (in this case, 15 out in the center of town, and the suppliants do not know any means to years, which was not unusual).21 The text of the patent indicated that Van ameliorate the situation, except for moving [the trades] outside the city.25 Merwen played a central role in Leiden's department of Public Works (stadsfab- riekambt) and reveals a direct involvement of the authorities in the realization of The States of Holland was a provincial governmental apparatus in which the nobility civil engineering projects: and 18 cities of Holland were represented; it had to approve of the expansion of Lei- den's territory so as to balance competing local interests.'' Discussing Leiden's request, The Court of the City of Leiden has showed the aforementioned States [of Holland] a certain new invention of a water wheel, equipped with a screw on the inside by Mr. Simon Fransz van Merwen, Treasurer extra- ordinaire of the named city and commissioned to supervise the Public Works department there, which serves [i.e. the invention] to bring up water to great heights, having on the bottom and on the top its center or the disposal point, erected on his own costs in the Leprosy House in Leiden for testing in the ditch there, and operated by three men the water 22 was drained in abundance to the height of 5 or 6% feet.

After further tests with Van Merwen's mill were successfully completed, his invention was implemented as part of Van Hout's master plan. Another element of that plan was that the authorities would allocate a location outside the city for the construction of fulling mills connected to the new water system. Van Hout had anticipated that:

in case no one shall be found who is willing or able to build fulling mills, which is very well possible since fullers are mostly people of little means ... then we will need fulling mills that will be rented out on behalf of the city, as so to make a profit of it.23

In 1593, the city council indeed organized an invitation to tender for the construction of the mills. The authorities promised to provide all the stone, wood, tiles, and iron for the construction of the mills to make sure that they would be properly constructed. Yet the creation of a new industrial area did not resolve the problem of the Leiden stench. New complaints came in about pollution as early as 1594, and the city council soon decided that the city plan had to be changed even more FIGURE 4.1 Stadsplattegrond van Leiden, 1611, designed by Jan Pietenz. Dou — drastically. In 1611, time had finally come for an actual enlargement of the city colored pen drawing. © Erfgoed Leiden en Omstreken, P1332, Public Domain. 106 Marius Buning Stench and the city 107 the States' representatives quickly cane to a con-iron accord that the city should be particular the weavers, combers, and spinners, who all work with oil, piss, allowed to expand its borders in an attempt to fight the problem of putrid waters. and other stinking fat, which has infected the air to such a degree that one Behind closed doors, the Leiden city council applauded this decision also in view of can not go through the streets without inhaling the dirty and stinking air. the fact that the construction of new houses would increase the number of weavers.'` To dwell in their houses is almost entirely impossible.35 The expansion would thus further enrich the city, whereas the current housing shortage: On 28 October 1642, the city council came into action. It nominated a committee from its midst that was to decide on the quality of the projects that .., caused many beneficiaries of annuities (rentenaars), merchańts, and other had been submitted so far, as well as to hold a new design contest to find folks of quality and means, who night intend to settle in Leiden .., to a solution to the persistent problem of stench.36 Nine entries promptly came in. move elsewhere ... and many workers in the city are moving out of the They were seriously discussed before the committee decided in favor of the pro- city to the countryside, ameliorating it with [the construction of] many ject of Arent Van Gravesande (c. 1610-1662), the ofbcial surveyor of Leiden, houses, so that in time we may fear that the trade [=textile processing] who basically proposed to enlarge the city to fight overpopulation and to install will be pulled in that direction, doing damage to the city.28 a series of mills on strategic spots throughout the city to make the water circulate (see Figure 4.2). Leiden dreaded the loss of power and resolutely opposed the construction of suburbs, which inevitably had resulted in ever higher inner-city housing prices.29 The 1611 expansion did very little to address this problem, however, as the best plots were bought by a small group of speculators, among whom some of the land surveyors who were responsible for the project.30 Moreover, the expansion again did not solve the persistent problems of stench. After seeking advice from several experts, including from the famous engineer Jan Andriaansz Leeghwater (1575-1570), the city decided in 1635 to 31 address the problem by building a couple of sluices. In arguing their case iii the Assembly of the States of Holland, the authorities this time made a direct link with a recent plague epidemic:

The mayors and rulers of Leiden remonstrated that, because of garbage dumps as well as the diking in of several waters [=de Zoeterrneer, drained in 1616] ... the waters in their city have turned stinky, which according to the judgment of doctors probably contributes to the cause of the hot disease' [=the plague] in town. They would therefore like to implement the construction of three sluices.32

Medicinal expertise was invoked as a rhetorical strategy to proceed with the construction of sluices; yet, the sluices did not resolve any of the enduring problems. In 1642, the stench had apparently become unbearable again and someone in the milieu of rich cloth merchant and political theorist Pieter de la Court (1618-1685) published a pamphlet arguing strongly in favor of a new expansion of the town.33 The pamphlet addressed three main points: the massive immigra- 34 tion of poor laborers, dilapidation, and the danger of a plague epidemic: FIGURE 4.2 `Gelegenheyt van eenige sloten buyten deser Stede Leyden gaende van des stadts Cingel tot aende Oude Vliet, Room en Meerburger Wateringen als oock to If we do not enlarge our city, we have to fear for a new plague, which aende Slaaghsloot ende Zijl' (drawing of a closure outside Leiden), 1642, designed by will empty the city of many folks. [A new plague will surely come] Jods Gerstecoren — colored pen drawing. © Erfgoed Leiden en Omstreken, P19152.2, because those folks live so closely on top of one another — and in Public Domain. 108 Marius Buning Stench and the city 109

On the basis of an open tender, the city built a number of mills for rouglil dependent on local circumstances. The water flow in the canals of The Hague, 4300 guilders each.37 The project, moreover, again included the implementation for example, was mainly dependent on rainwater, as the city was not situated of patented technology. In March 1642, a certain Jacob Meyer had obtained thn next to a river or open water (and so could not make use of tides and 42 exclusive rights to exploit an invention that was described as: currents) The case of Leiden was unique in the sense that the town's industry entirely focused on the production of textile, whereas Amsterdam had its own a very curious way, which had not yet been put to work, with which he problems that could partially be ascribed to the low position of the borough could drain or raise still water without the help of wind, horses, humans, called the Jordaan or any other creature, against the ordinary course of nature ... useful for Despite these differences, there was still a general pattern regarding the prob- all cities and places, especially for the City of Leiden, which is filled and lem of water management in large towns — a pattern that directly related to the troubled by a lot of dirty and smelly water.35 threat of plague epidemics. Physicians were on this point fairly unanimous. The Dordrecht town physician Johan van Beverwijck (1594-1649), for example, In reality, Meyer had invented a new type of dog mill that was to replace identified the stench of canals in his hometown as having a bad impact on the a horse mill in Leiden's water refreshment scheme. After a series of successful spread of the plague. Referring to ancient Greek historian Diodorus Siculus, he tests with a prototype that Meyer had built in his backyard, the city decided to argued thόt `the stagnant waters ... would make stinking damps arise that cause 44 purchase one naill made after Meyer's design and to install it in a barn that was infection in the air'. Also the professor of medicine Isbraud van Diemerbroeck also suited for inhabitation. In July 1644, Meyer was appointed to operate his (1609-1674) noted the negative impact of malodorous canals in a well-known invention.39 treatise on the plague, arguing that Leiden, The Hague, Amsterdam, and other At that point, Leiden had just obtained permission from the States of Holland cities: for the new expansion of its borders. The privilege for the enlargement of Leiden again explicitly mentioned how the city and its waters were `ever more ... have canals with stagnant water amidst the wide streets. In the contaminated and filled with dirt and stench, caused by several dirty trades' that summer, these [canals] breathe out such a stench, because of the putrefac- belonged to the textile trade.40 Those trades had to be moved, yet kept under tion and decay of the water, that visitors, who are not used to the stench, urban control. Moreover, the extension of the town's jurisdiction was needed often have to close their nose, when the water is moved with the skippers' 45 because: oars and punting poles.

the most beautiful and spacious houses of the city have been split up and It was primarily (the fear for) the plague that instigated the implementation of turned into dilapidated housing, so that people of quality have been forced new projects to make the canal water circulate. Remarkable in this regard is against their will to leave us and to find more suitable housing in other how the timing of large-scale work on the canals in Dutch cities coincided. cities.41 There was equally a remarkable coherence between the implementation of regulations that related to the battle against pollution more generally. The plague As in 1611, the argument was dominated by a discourse that linked poverty, thus functioned as a catalyst for uniform action, and cities operated in that stench, and a need to expand the city. The case of Leiden thus offers a fine illus respect much less independently than the historiography on the Dutch Republic tration of how the employment of new technologies to fight pollution were has sometimes made it appear. intrinsically linked to the social reorganization of the city; the quest for techno- On the other hand, the search for a durable solution to the water problem led logical innovation also meant to identify obtrusive elements that slowed down to conflicts between the cities and other political bodies as well.46 In an argu- what was seen as improvement and progress by the people in power. ment about the drainage of the Wormenmeer, to give one example, the city councilors of Purmerend, who initiated the project, encountered strong oppos- ition from the surrounding towns, who feared that changing the project would Epistemic communities and negotiation arenas have a negative impact on their well-being. On 20 December 1623, the lords of Leiden was not the only city in the Republic suffering from smelly canals. Also Edam extensively argued their case in the Assembly of the Provincial States: in Amsterdam, The Hague, and Delft, numerous proposals were made to ameliorate the water circulation by means of new technologies, and it is worthwhile [T]he lords of Edam allege the ruin of their city because of the loss if to ask the question to what degree the case of Leiden was indeed representative flow of water, thereby withering its port and [leading to] the standstill of or unique. Undoubtedly, both the type and the degree of stench were water that would thenceforth become malodorous, have expressively made 110 Marius Buning Stench and the city 111

objection, demanding that they will not be treated differently in these canals (see Figure 4.3). The settlement that would come to serve as a major center matters than the other members of the Assembly, and therefore to deny 0f trade in the East was situated at the mouth of the Ciliwung, the `Big River' the request [to drain Lake Wormer].47 (Grote Rivie►) and protected by a moated fortress against attacks from the sea.53 The colony was protected from inland assaults by 22 bulwarks that were situated roughly It was clear that finding a solution for the water problem in the cites could not 600 meters from the city walls. Within those walls, on a terrain not bigger than be found in one city alone; continuous consultation was needed with the water 2250 x 1500 meters, a unique society developed that consisted of a local Javanese 54 boards and other cities represented in the Provincial Estates.48 Since the cities pοpulation, `free citizens' (vr~jburgers), numerous European adventurers and trade's and other political bodies ultimately abided by the decision taken m the Provin- people, a large Chinese population, slaves of various backgrounds (who constituted i cial Estates, water management issues n that way indirectly strengthened the },alf of the population), and Mardίjkers, who were the descendants of freed slaves.'5 Assembly's `institutional capital' 49 Batavia may have resembled a Dutch town from an architectural perspective; At every level, bargaining was the norm. Different theoretical solutions circu- from an organizational point of view there were many differences. One of those lated at all times and the authorities took each of them into serious consider- differences was that the Dutch citizenry of Batavia never obtained any rights to ation, as long as a practical solution to the problem of malodorous canals was representation. Decisions were made exclusively by a governor-general, who not yet found. For example, even if most physicians agreed that the movement sometimes' consulted an advisory board called the Council of the Indies. Both of water was beneficial for maintaining a healthy city,'0 the alchemist Marcus the governor-general and his advisory board were controlled from the mother- Meyboom tried to convince the Amsterdam city council in the second half of land by the East Indies Company's board of directors, the Gentlemen XVII. the seventeenth century that the circulation of water was actually a major trigger The board of directors occasionally did consider the usefulness of political repre- for the transmission of infectious diseases. Referring extensively to Hippocrates sentation, hoping to make a prolonged stay in the Indies more attractive to and other ancient authorities, Meyboom argued that rain bins were the real future settlers, yet they eventually always decided against it, fearing that the cause of a recent plague epidemic, since these bins poisoned the collected rainwater with led and chalk. Not coincidentally, Meyboom had just obtained a patent from the States of Holland for the commercial exploitation of a new method for water treatment on a chemical basis.51 He offered his method to the c ~ λΑRΤ νΑΝ Τ ASTEEL ΕΝ DE ΤΑD λ''ΑΤΑνΙΑ ΙΝΗΕΤ : AAR Amsterdam city council in 1680 for a certain amount of money' (sekere summe ΉΈ Ί geldts), insisting, however, that he would keep the details secret until he received some form of recompense.'Z Two years later, Meyboom finally managed to conclude an exclusive contract with the Amsterdam authorities. The long wait was probably somewhat of a disappointment for both parties, because when Meyboom finally revealed his method, the project was immediately shelved. The point of bringing in Meyboom's example is not to provide an overview of failed projects (of which there are many), but to show how various theoretical solutions to a problem were still up for discussion as long as a desired practical outcome was not yet achieved. Different options were reflected upon and weighed, and the final decision for the implementation of a specific project was highly dependent on local circumstances. In order to bring the particularity of this process of negotiation out even more dearly, we now shift over to the other side of the globe, where the Dutch were confronted with similar problems of foul-smelling canals in the settlement of Batavia (present-day Jakarta in the .Republic of Indonesia).

Smelling Batavia

Batavia was the Dutch Republic's most important colonial stronghold. The city was FIGURE 4.3 Map of the castle and city Batavia in the year 1667, anonymous designer — built from the ground up in 1619, following a pattern of straight streets and straight aquarel. ® Tropenmuseum/KIT, TM-496-2. 112 Marius Buning Stench and the city 113 institutionalization of citizenship would weaken their grip on power.56 In stark From what I have said, it must be plain that the rainy season, or summer, contrast to the Republic, decisions on Batavia's urban water management system is the most unhealthy, as the heat and moisture of the air are deservedly were thus ultimately taken exclusively by the governor-general. reckoned by naturalists the efficient causes of putrefaction. For unless the Batavia was situated in a marshy area, and it seerris that the Dutch initially morning and evening breezes, which prevail in that season, and the thick believed they could simply transport their knowledge on water management and cloudy constitution of the air, protected from the heat, this country across the globe. But building straight canals in the tropics was not a good would be uninhabitable.' idea, if only because the tropical climate was very different from the climate at home. The tidal range was smaller and rivers did not always flow strongly, 13ontius's comments were in line with the Hippocratic tradition. The ancient which led to continuous problems of siltation. Moreover, the flow of water Greek physician had extensively discussed the importance of warm winds in was hampered by the dirt that came from the sugar plantations in the Omme- a chapter on Airs, Waters, and Places `to show how different in all respects are landen (the lands surrounding the urban settlement) and the habit of throwing Asia and Europe, and why races are dissimilar, showing individual physical 63 rubbish and muck in the canals.' Complaints would continue for centuries characteristics'. Hippocrates had insolently ascribed a difference in character to about the stench coming from `the vile dank ditches, dignified by the name weather conditions; people living in a warn climate were foul, whereas people of canals'.'$ hardened by a έold climate had a natural tendency to bravery.Γi4 It comes as no Another factor contributing to the stench in the streets of Batavia was the surprise that these insights were happily taken up when the European Age of mudslide that grew on the city's shores. In 1635, Governor-General Hendrik Discovery got fully on its way. Brouwer had decided to build two breakwaters, which had the unforeseen con- The dangers of humid warm air were, for that matter, evident to European sequence that mud began silting up along the coast. Time and time again, the observers outside the East Indies as well. The globetrotter Jan Huygen van breakwaters had to be extended in order to keep the harbor accessible — and Linschoten, for example, described an area around the river Darien (in the after each extension the silting up increased. The result was, in a word, dra- Caribbean) as being very healthy in the mountains, but dangerous in the valley matic. When the city was built in 1619, the castle was still located next to the because of the stinking swamp-like waters.' Willem Bosman, to give another sea; when the Company imploded in 1795, the castle was situated two kilo- example, referred in his description of Ghana to the `unhealthfulness' of the meters inland. There were continuous complaints about an unbearable stench country: coming from the mudslide, where countless fish and other animals stayed dead 59 behind at every low tide. Some here distinguish betwixt one place and another; arid I am somewhat It did not last long before people started to connect the particular scent of inclined to their Opinion: If they choose those places where the wind Batavia to the unhealthy living conditions in the city.60 As a mark of social dis- blows continually and very fresh, and where the Negroes occasion the tinction, the upper classes started moving out of the city and away from the sea. least Stench, they are undoubtedly the most healthful: and as such I would A contemporary passer-by noted in 1820, that they did so in order to avoid the: prefer Bau try and Zacondee in the first place.«

... unhealthy evaporations of the stinking canals, and so the main causes Back in Batavia, stench was occasionally associated with specific groups of the of disease. The wealthy people reside in gardens outside the city, ordering population too. On 1 October 1633, for example, the authorities decided to their water from the Blue Mountains' [=Mount Salak, Mount Gede, and have the thatched houses demolished that some inhabitants had built behind

Mount Pnagrango], because it is extraordinarily good there.61 their houses. The lodgings were built without governmental consent for `families with little means' (fami.lien van geringe conditien), unwittingly increasing the The drift to the countryside only got fully underway in the 1730s, and it number of alleyways: remains uncertain if the urban water reservoirs had always been that polluted. Earlier in the seventeenth century, a physician in the service of the East Indies Such private slum dwellings and entries are nothing else than rat runs for Company had for example not considered water to be the main problem, but unruly people, hotbeds of all stench ... deforming the appearance and the humidity of hot air (singling out, in particular, the warm winds corning luster of a well situated and regulated city ... several places and yards are from the inland mountains). In a dialogue On the Preservation of Health, and on still empty and uninhabited ... people move to the slum dwellings because the Diet Most Suitable in the Indies, Jacobus Bontius (1592-1631) stated: of the bargain price ... the inhabitants in many places are living too con- fined, on top of each other, in great stench and dirt.ύ7 114 Marius Buning Stench and the city 115

As had been the case in Leiden, the authorities in Batavia made a direct link Also when it came to the smell coming from Batavia's putrid canals, the 77 between stench, poverty, and a persistent housing shortage. In that sense, the authorities insisted on regulations to limit the pollution. A well-known ideology that spread in the East did not differ much from that in the European example m this regard was the 1653 directive to empty lavatories in the motherland. canals only before four o'clock in the morning, or after nine o'clock at What did differ was the way in which the authorities dealt with the prob- night. The new rule was justified because many `unregulated and dirty' lern. Back in the European motherland, the authorities had relied on technical people: experts who had a good understanding of local circumstances and conditions. One might have expected along those lines that the Dutch would also have ... were throwing their filth and dirt not only in the canals with water, made any use of local engineering knowledge to solve the problem of putre- but also in the dry canals on top of the sludge, which not only causes fied canals in the East. After all, the Dutch traveler Johan Nieuhof had a dirty and oppressive stench on a hot afternoon, but which in time might described the city canals of Nanjing with great admiration, admiring, in the cause a pestilence disease among the population.78 footsteps of Marco polo and Giovanni Botero, Chinese methods of water management and building canals.68 There are also several records of Western As had been the case in Leiden, a direct link was made between poverty, Europeans who were treated by local healers, so there was apparently some stench, and the danger of a plague; yet in the colony, it did not result in any confidence in local knowledge when it came to medicinal knowledge.69 But capital investment. The authorities carried out the occasional repair and main- when it came to finding a solution for the stinking canals in Batavia, there is tenance work on the canals, but there is no evidence of any large-scale projects no evidence in the official sources that the Dutch ever relied on the local to ameliorate the water flow using machinery until the 1740s, when Gustaaf population as a source of technical expertise (even if the town housed Willer Van Imhoff (1705-1750) became the governor-general of the East a substantial Chinese population, and despite the extensive trade agreement Indies. By that time, it had become increasingly diflicult to attract enough quali- with other authorities in the region).70 fied personnel because of the bad reputation of the colonial city in terns of What did happen, is that the Dutch used chained prisoners and `Mud- health. One of Van Imhofl's projects was therefore to implement a series of ο Javanese' (m ddeήavanen) to dredge the canals by hand.71 The use of labor- sluices to spout the canals; the project was a disaster and the last remains of the intensive methods was, in a way, in line with `local' traditions in the sense that sluices were cleared in l797. it was common to dredge by hand in China, because of the abundant availability of cheap labor. Yet the lack of technological development clearly related to spe- Conclusion cific power structures as well. As Karel Davids pointed out recently, technological development thus `not only depended on the presence, or absence, of In the historiography on early modern health regimes, relatively little attention particular technical know-how'.72 The Dutch authorities in Batavia would never has been paid to large-scale infrastructural projects, or to the technological implement machinery on a scale as they had done back in the motherland, nor innovations they entailed, especially in comparison to the study of institutions even look for technical solutions. that somehow foreshadowed the emergence of `modern' public health care, Instead, they repeatedly issued decrees to keep the castle, their ships, and the which is in turn characterized by the professionalization of medical personnel 73 city clean and to counter `stench, and dirty unhealthy vapors'. Governor- and the involvement of political authorities in the management of the physical General Antony van Diemen (1593-1645), for example, decided in an extensive well-being of citizens.80 When infrastmctural projects involving new technology set of regulations issued on 9 July 1633, not only that protestant Reformed reli- are mentioned at all, their political significance is all too easily taken for granted. gion was the only admissible religion within city walls, but also to `forbid It is thus forgotten that it was through the materialization of infrastructural pro- anyone to make line kilns, or to burn lime, within the city walls, because of jects that a sense of the political was constituted. the dirty smoke and stench'.74 In contrast to the situation in the motherland, When unpacking the relationship between urban sensescapes and techno- however, the colonial authorities did not engage with the production of logical innovation, we see that different reactions were possible in response to machinery to fight pollution. In fact, the only project related to water manage- the same problem. Comparing Leiden with Batavia has shown that the issue of ment that included a new technology dated from 1704, when Jacob Faes pro- smell led to serious capital investments and technological innovation in one case, posed to build a rod mill that had been `invented in the motherland' to clean whereas prisoners on the chain were used to address the sane issue on the other the mudslide at Batavia's shores.7' In 1707, it was agreed that the project was side of the globe. The simple observation that `space' matters for the accommo- 76 a failure and that the mills should be sold. By that time, Jacob Faes had been dation of technology is not new, yet it still serves as an important warning promoted and obtained a seat in the Council of the Indies. against simplistic accounts of technological determinism; there was nothing 116 Marius Buning Stench and the city 117

natural about the fact that people living in cities found technical solutions for 5 For the importance of smell in Galenistic theory, see Palmer, 'In Bad Odour'. 6 Mary Douglas framed dirt as `matter out of place the problems that they encountered. '. Douglas, Purity and Danger, 36. The study of pollution and cleanliness would therefore expose specific structures in The paradigms of power worked more subtly. The case study on Leiden has the social constitution of a society. Following Douglas as well as Norbert Elias, shown how technological innovation went hand in hand with broader trans- Alain Corbin in turn adapted this view specifically to the culture of smell, arguing formations in the social organization of a city; getting the town clean was in the landmark study The Foul and Fragmrit (1986) that a major shift had taken a matter of making the water circulate as well as getting rid of stinking industries. place between 1750 and 1880, lowering the threshold of the tolerance for stench in north-western Europe. Corbin devoted, however, only very little attention to the Water management, political power, and medical knowledge were on this point pre-history of this shift and focused almost exclusively on the 'drama' played out at deeply interconnected. Technical experts, physicians, and administrators negoti- the turn of the nineteenth century. Corbin, The Foul and the Fragrant, 229. This led ated their knowledge claims, and in doing so shaped the kind of knowledge that to slight distortions in the picture that he presented. For example, as we shall see, was being produced. Moreover, the different political authorities in the Repub- stench was banned from city centers because of its association with the poor long before the period that Corbin identified as a major moment of transition. Cf. lic, such as city councils and water boards, had to find a satisfactory balance of Corbin, 144. An excellent historiographical overview of the historiography on smell power, which in turn strengthened the institutional power of a higher authority (with a focus on English literature) can be found in Jenner, 'Follow Your Nose?'. in which they were represented. See also Appuhn, 'Friend or Flood?'; Coudert, Sewers'; Skelton, Sanitation in Urban Britain; ,Wheeler, 'Stench'. On the other side of the globe, political representation was entirely absent. 7 That is to say, [ shall not deal with issues such as sexual purity, religious ideas about The absence of any 'arenas of negotiation' determined, also in this case, the type polluted foodstuffs, soap production, perfumes, and so on. of knowledge that was produced whereby the local population was entirely dis- 8 A somewhat dated but still relevant overview on the politics of water management regarded. Moreover, technological solutions imported from the motherland can be found in Swyngedouw, Kaika and Castro, `Urban Water'. Some of the other works in this field that have inspired me include: Bissell, Urban Design; Drobnick, were never adapted to local circumstances. The problem of Batavia's putrid The Smell Culture Reader, Goubert, The Conquest of Water; Ingold, 'To Historiicize or canals may have been less pressing in the eyes of the authorities, in terms of Naturalize Nature'; Swyngedouw, Social Power; Swyngedouw, Liquid Power, Taylor scale as well as in terms of budget recourses. Yet the lack of technological devel- and Trentmann, 'Liquid Politics'. For the Netherlands, see also Oosthoek, 'The opment was equally driven by a particular view of mankind supported by con- Stench of Prosperity'; Starkenburg, 'La sante et salubrite du pays'. 9 Notable exceptions include Coudert, 'Sewers'; Jenner, 'The Politics of London Air'; temporary medical theory and an unbalanced view on stewardship. Only when Rhine, The Waters of Rome; Rinne, 'Urban Ablutions'; Tullett, 'Grease and Sweat'. it became difficult to find enough qualified personnel from Europe would the 10 Limiting the examples to the Dutch Republic, no mention of health concerns is authorities come into action to make the colonial capital slightly more attractive. made in, for instance, Ciriacono, Building on Water, Greefs and 't Hart, Water Manage- Only then, would stench become an issue. ment Van Cruyningen, 'Dealing with Drainage'; Zeischka, Minerva in de Polder. 11 Noordam, 'Demografische Ontwikkelingen', 43-44. See also Daelemans, 'Leiden 1581' Notes 12 Leiden's water management systems are discussed in Van Oerle, Leiden; Van der Paauw, Verhaal; Steenmeijer, Tot cieraet, 108-118; Taverne, In 't Land, 177-237. 1 Earlier versions of this essay have been presented at the workshop 'Civic Epistemologies', Source material can be found in: SAIL 5172, Stukken betreffende de verversing van Centre Alexandre Koyre, Paris (2017); at the Seminar for Early Modern History, Georg het grachtwater A (1591-1668) en SAII 5178, Memories omtrent verbetering van de August-University of Ghttingen (2018); and at the LMU Workshop 'History of the stadswaterverversing (1641—c. 1708). Senses', Historisches Kolleg, Munich (2018). The author is particularly grateful to the 13 For an overview of these Leiden regulations, see Smit, Leiden met een luch je. For organizers and the participants of these workshops for their comments and suggestions. other Dutch cities, see also us, Van vυlliscυyl' tot huisvuilcentrale. For environmental The research was made possible by a fellowship from the Netherlands Institute for pollution in the Dutch Republic, see Faber, Diederiks and Hart, 'Urbanisering'. For Advanced Study. a historiographical introduction to the theme `Dutch cities and environment', see 2 Cipolla, Public Health. The literature on this has grown excessively large. For a first over- Van Dam, 'Frühmoderne Städte'. view, see Coomans and Geltner, 'The History of Public Health'. For the historiography 14 Cities throughout Europe did encourage the construction of drains et cetera, yet the on pre-modern European cities and their environment, see Stöger, 'Environmental responsibility ultimately fell to individuals. For example, Nuremberg 'required home- Perspectives'. owners to maintain privies; from 1533 Amsterdam began requiring sinks and drained 3 For a short but useful intellectual history of contagion, see Nutton, `The Seeds'. For pipes in the upper story rooms'. Nicholas, Urban Europe, 157. These are regulations a delicate analysis of the discrepancy between the theory and practice, see Carmichael, ordering something, not the building (i.e. financing through taxes the construction) 'Contagion Theory'. On the plague in the Dutch Republic, see Noordegraaf and Valk, of durable infrastructures for the common good. De gave Gods; Dijstelberge and Noordegraaf Plague and Print in the Netherlands. 15 Van Hout Rapport beroerende de middelen tot het wechnemen van lief bederf der u~ateren deur 4 For that reason, people carried for instance herbs on them, and later started using per- die Voller~jen in de stadt Leyden veroorsaect. As reproduced in Van der Paauw, Verhaal, fumes. Dugan, History of Pei υrne; Roodenburg, Smelling Rank and Status'. Gardens 115-126. See also Van lerle, Leiden, 328-330. were yet another locus for the rich experience of smell, see Rawcliffe, 'Delectable 16 'dat men 't loon, gedeeke v. Stadt, minst bewoont en betimmert zynde, hiermede zal Sightes'. levendich maecken, ende doen bewoonen, en 't seve doen, nits 't v trecken v. volders, 118 Marius Buning Stench and the city 119

im woonplaetse maecken voor andere p sonen, die Gode danc ten hoochsten gesucht Stadt ten dele rede veroirsaeckt, daerinne sij gaeme souden voorsien met 't leggen en begeert werden.' Van Hout, Rapport. As reproduced in Van der Paauw, Verhaal, 118. van 3 sluysen.' Stellingwerff and Schot, Particul{ere riotulen, 7: 579 (4 October 1635). 17 It is worth noting at this point that Van Hout was not only the city secretary of 33 Taverne, In 't land, 212. Leiden, but also a well-respected poet, who stood in close contact with an exclusive 34 The supposed connection between the plague and the poor was not unique to the group of humanist scholars. On Van Hout's career as a rederήker, see Koppenol, Jan Dutch Republic. Also in Italy, there was a deepening conviction from the fifteenth van Hout'. century onwards that plague and poverty were linked treats to the security of the 18 Pearson, Humanism, 92. state. Carmichael, Plague and the Poor. See also Pullen, 'Plagues and Perceptions'. 19 Alberti, On the Art of Building, 193. 35 `So wy onse stadt niet en vergrooten so hebben wy weder een nieuwe peste to vrees- 20 Van der Paauw, Verhaal, 121. Van Merwen later became the first director of the sen, die de stat seer van volck sal ontblooten, doordien dat de luyden so nau op mal- famous Dιιtch engineering school, the Nederduytsche Mathematique. ckanderen women, voomeemelick de drappiers, kammers ende spinners, die alle de 21 On the history of patents in the Dutch Republic, see lloorman, Octrooien. will met olie, pisz ende ander stinckent vet handlen, 't welck de lucht alrede so 22 'Alsoo die van den Gerechte der Stadt Leyden de Staten worn, hebben doers heeft geinfecteert, dat gy niet en kunt door hare straeten gaen sonder een vuile en verthoonen seeckere nieuwe inventie ende maniere van een Schep-Radt, van binnen stinckende lucht in to haelen ende in haer huisen to blyven stilstaen is alrede bynae slex gewys gemaeckt by Mr. Simon Fransz van Merwen, Tresorier extraordinaris der gantsch onmogelick.' Reproduced in Taverne, In 't land, 212-213. voorsz. Stede ende Gecomm, tot d'opsicht van des Stadts Getimmerte aldaer, die- 36 Steenmeijer, Tot cieraet, 109. nende im 't water met quantiteyt in de hooghte to brengen, ende under en boven 37 Ibidem, 113. The total cost of the project was c. 35,000 florins. hebbende syn centrum of het at υnt im uyt to loopen, 't welck den voom, van 38 `een bovenmatig verwonderinge manier, daermede by een stilstaende water sonder Merwen t'synen koste in het Leproos-Hays tot Leyden loom, tot een preuve hadde wirst, paert, Mensch, ofte eenich creatuyr, can doen losen orte lopen laten um hooch doen opstellen in de Sloote aldaer, ende door werckinge van drye Persoonen 't Water jegens de ordinaris Natuyr van t'water ... dat het bequaem ende seer dienstich is, in groote menichte ende overvloedigh uyt syn centre doen lossen ter hooghte van 5 niet alleer tot gestadich verversingh van water your alle steden ende plaetten ende of 6 %a biet.' Dutch National Archives, States of Holland, 3.01.04.01, inv.nr. 345, bysonder voor de voomoemde Stadt Leyden, die jaerlycx met veel vuyl ende stinck- fol. 369 [31 May 1589]. emt water is vervult ende gequelt.' Doorman, Octrooien, 208-209 (26 March 1642). 23 'indien niemant gevonden en werde van macht of wille, im ter voorsz, plaesten vol- See also Van der Paauw, Verhaal, 65-74. ryen to bouwen, 't welt mogelicken zal vallen, zo de vollers meest luyden zyn an cley- 39 Steenmeijer, Tot cieraet, 113. nen v mogen, zo zoude men, alsoo de neringe deser Stede dezelve geensins missen, 40 hoe de selve Stadt, ende besonder de wateren van dien, van tydt tot tydt meer ende mer notelicken hebben mieten ... vohyen, im die van stats weegen ter huyr to laeten meer werden besmet ende vervult met vuyligheydt ende stank, veroosaeckt door gaen, ende zulx de profyten van dien to trecken.' Van der Paauw, Verhaal, 124. verscheyden vuyle neeringhen' (17 March 1644). Van Miens, Handvesten, 5. 24 On Dou, see Verburgt, `Het levee'. Dou had been apprenticed with Van Merwen. 41 `de schoonste ende ruimste huisen van de stad to breecken im daer een hoope kleine 25 `hoe dat syluyden suppl. bemerckten, dat deselve Stadt, en bysonder de wateren van- krotteties van to maecken, also dat de luyden van qualiteit genootsaeckt zijn geweest dien van tyde tot tyde meer ende meer worden geInfecteert, met veele stanck ende ons oock met haer leetwesen to verlaeten ende gemackelickere woonplaetsen to vuylichheyt, veroorsaeckt door verscheyden vuyle neeringe die aldaer binnen ende soecken in andere steden.' Ibidem. int ridden van de selbe Stadt mosten worden gedaen, sonder dat sij suppl middel 42 de Klerk, Bouwen, 83-84. wisten om sulcx to beteren, ten waere sy dselve dede brengen buyten de Stede.' Van 43 On Amsterdam's water management, see Abrahamse, `De grote uitleg'. Miens, Handvesten, 2. 44 `dat uyt stil-staende water ... grove ende stinckcnde dampen opkomen/die infectie 26 For an overview of the various political institutions in the Dutch Republic, see in de Lucht veroorzaken.' Van Beverwijck, Bericht, 23. Fruin, Siaatsinstellingen. 45 `(vooral Leiden, 's-Gravenhage, Amsterdam en sommige andere) hebben to ridden 27 Taverne, In 't land, 208. At a time when most of the weaving was still done in in- van vele brede straten grachten met stilstaand water. In de zomer ademen die van- house workshops, the construction of houses would drive down the price. wege het bederf en de rotting van het water cen dusdanige stank uit, dat het voor 28 'maer oock daer door veroorsaeckt is dat veel oirbaere rentijers, coopluyden en voorbijgangers die niet aan de stank gewend zijn, vaak noodzakelijk is um de neus andere luyden van qualiteyt en middelen, die van sinne souden mogen geweest syn dicht to knijpen, wanneer het water met de riemen van schippern of met vaarbomen om sich binnen de Stadt Leyden neder to slaan en haere woonplaetse to nemen, door wordt bewogen.' Van Dienierbroeck, Verhandeling, Book I, 59. gebreek van bequame huysen naar haere staet en gelegentheyt, genootsaeckt zyn 46 For examples, see also Steenmeijer, Tot cieraet, 116. geweest hier vandaen to blyven ... dat ook vele andere arbeytsluyden uytte Stadt 47 `maer de heeren van Edam aligerende 't verderff van haer stadt door 't verlies van de metter woof vertraeken to platte lande de Dorpen verbeterde met menichte van thocht van water, daeromme 't verdroogen van haer haven ende stilstant van 't water dat huysen, daer nae mettertijt, soo to vreesen is, wel die Neeńnge derwaerts soude alsdan stinckende soude werden, sijn daerom expresselicken gelast 'tselve to dirncultee- mogen worden getrocken en de Stadt daer door grotelicx vercortet' 7 January 1611, ren, versoeckende dat sij hierinne niet anders werden getracteert als andere leeden van de Vroedschap door Heeren van Gerecht. As reproduced in Van Oerle, Leiden, 350. vergadringe ende mitsdien de request aff to willen slam, waermede die van Monicken- 29 Taverne, In 't land, 205. dam haer conformeerden.' Stellingwerff and Schot, Particuliere notulen, 2: 167. 30 On this development, see Van Oerle, Leiden, 359. 48 The Water Boards (waterschappen) were charged with regional water management in the 31 Steenmeijer, Tot cieraet, 109. Republic. They were powerful independent bodies entitled to levy taxes and to adminis- 32 `De burgemeester ende regierders van Leyden geremonstreert hebbende dat door de ter justice. Occasionally, they found themselves on the opposite side of the cities. For vuylniskuylen alsmede door 't bedijcken van eenige waterkens daerontrent ende a conflict between Leiden and the Water Board of Rijnland, see for example Van der ander-sints de wateren binnen haer stadt sijn stinckende geworden, daerdoor nae `t Paauw, Verhaal, 30-39. oirdel van de doctoiren memchelijckerwijse gesproocken de heete sieckte in haer -9 Cf. Fransen, Dίίk under spanning, 390.

120 Marius Buning Stench and the city 121

50 This is not to say that medicinal doctors agreed that stagnant waters were the cause Marginaha to the Daily Journals 1659-1807. Sources are available online at: https:// of diseases, such as the plague. But there was little doubt that they spread the conta- sejarah-nusantara.anri.go.id/sources (last visited 6 November 2017). gium. Cf. Van Diemerbroeck, Verhandeling, 51, 156. 71 De Haan, Oud Batavia, 1: 197. The practice came to an end in the 1770s. 51 Doorman, Octrooien, 300 (September 1679). 72 l)avids, 'Hydraulic Experts', 193. 52 Amsterdam City Archives, no. 5059, Inv. no. 183. On the project of Meyboom, see 73 Examples in Nederlandsch-Indisch Plakaatboe/e, 1602-1642, 1: 135, 259, 363. Aside also Abrahamse, 'De grote uitleg', 318. from a fish market and excrements, specific mention is made of the time kilns that 53 There has been some discussion on whether the town was built after a design by spread 'very intense fogs, stench and dirty, unhealthy air' (seer sware dampen, stank Simon Stevin, who saw his chance for implementing his ideas about the construction ende vuyle, ongesonde lucht). Nederlandsch-Indisch Plakaatboek, 1642-1677, 2: 433. of an ideal city. Compare Van Oers, 'Stadsplamiing'; van den Heuvel, `Multilayered 74 'Om den vuylen mock ende stancks wille en sal niemant eenighe calckovem mogen Grids'. See also Breuning, Het voormahge Batavia. maecken ofte branden binnen deser stede muyren, op verbeurte van selve.' Neder- 54 The Javanese were only allowed to settle within the city walls after 1629, because of an landsch-Indisch J'lakaatboek, 1602-1642, 1: 566. The 'Statutes of Batavia' were collected ongoing conflict with neighboring Banten, to be expulsed again in 1656 to adjacent by Antony van Diemen (1593-1645). kampongs. 75 'mit 't Vaderland gevordert na de nieuwe inventie.' Batavia's Kealia, file 920, fol. 75 55 On average, 3000 slaves were imported annually into Batavia for various purposes. (29 January 1704). Blusse, The Story', 19. 76 Batavia's Realia, file 925, fol. 99. 56 Ibidem, 25. 77 De Haan, Oud Batavia, 1: 191-201. 57 Niemeijer, Batavia, 113-24, 136. 78 'haren dreck. ende vuyligheyt, niet alleen mnde als noch bewaterde, maer ouck made 58 Addison, Correspondence, 356 (letter from 1813). Also Jakob Haafher, for instance, uytgewaterde, drooge gragten boven op den slick to werpen, 't welck niet alleen op made mention of the 'canals, most of which are no more than stinking pools of mud den heeten middagh een vuyle ende benauwde stank is causeerende, maer met 'er tyt in the dry season' (grnchten, doch de meeste, in het drooge jaargetijde, niet dan stinkende wel een pestilentiale sieckte under de gemeente zoude veroorsaecken.' Nederlandsch- modderpoelen 4/n). Haafner, Lotgevallen, 1: 163. Indisch Plnknatboek, 1642-1677, 2: 185. 59 Van der Brug, Malaria, 42. 70 The eventual solution to the challenges of water management in Batavia was to 60 Much has been written on the reasons for Batavia's unhealthiness but a convincing 'move the city' inland, razing the walls of Old Batavia. On this process, see Davids, explanation has never been given. A reasoned overview of the historiography can be 'Hydraulic Experts', 189. found in Van der Bng, Malaria, 181-185. 80 Cf. Geltner, 'Public Health'. 61 'ongezonde uitwasemingen der stinkende grachten, en dus eene van de voomaamste oorzaken der ziekten, to vernsijden, dat de vermogende lieden hun verblijf in tuinen , dewijl buiten de stad houden, en het dńnkwater van de Blauuwenberg laten komen References het daar buitengemeen goed is.' Haafner, Lotgevallen, 1: 138. 62 De Bondt, An Account, 114. Fourth observation. Abrahamse, Jaap Evert. 'De grote uitleg van Amsterdam: Stadsontwikkeling in de zeven- 63 Various, Hippocratic Writings, 159. tiende eeuw.' PhD, University of Amsterdam, 2010. http://dare.uva.nl/search?identi 64 Ibidem, 148-170. For the original context, see also Nutton, 'Medical Thoughts'. fιer=2b6e3e43-c68e-4d79-95d3-b2375865c55f. 65 Hence, living around the Dariende was `harmful not because of the nature of the land, Addison, George Augustus ed. Original Familiar Correspondence between Residents in India, but because of the particular place' (dat also die wooninghe tot Dariene niet van natuere des Including Sketches ofJava. Edinburgh: [Ballantyne and Hughes], 1846. is). Van Linsehoten, Itinerario, landts: mner vnnder sonderlinge plaetsen weghen schadelijcken Alberti, Leon Battista. On the Art of Building in Ten Books. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1988. 3: 95. Cf. Ruyters, Toortse, 28. Appuhn, Karl. `Friend or Flood? The Dilemmas of Water Management in Early Modem A New and Accurate Description, 108. Willem Bosman (1672-?) was 66 Bosman, Venice.' In Isenberg, A.C. ed. The Nature of Cities: Culture, Landscape, and Urban Space. a notorious slave trader and the head merchant (opperkοιρman) of the l)utch West Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2006, pp. 79-102. Indies Company. Bissell, William Cunningham 67 'Alsulcke particuliere sloptjens ende toegangen niet anders en syn als sluypplaetsen voor . 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