Dutch Golden Age
The Dutch Golden Age was a period in the history of the Netherlands spanning the 17th century, in which Dutch trade, science and art were among the most acclaimed in the world. The first section is characterized by the Eighty Years' War, which ended in 1648; the Golden Age continued in peacetime during the Dutch Republic until the end of the century. The transition by the Netherlands to the foremost maritime and economic power in the world has been called the "Dutch Miracle" by historian K. W. Swart. In 1568, the Seven Provinces that signed the Union of Utrecht started a rebellion against Philip II of Spain that led to the Eighty Years' War. Before the Low Countries could be reconquered, a war between England and Spain, the Anglo-Spanish War of 1585-1604, broke out, forcing Spanish troops to halt their advances and leaving them in control of the important trading cities of Bruges and Ghent, but without control of Antwerp, arguably the most important port in the world. Antwerp fell on 17 August 1585, after a siege, the division between the Northern and Southern Netherlands was established.
The United Provinces fought on until the Twelve Years' Truce. The Peace of Westphalia in 1648, which ended the Eighty Years' War between the Dutch Republic and Spain and the Thirty Years' War between other European superpowers, brought the Dutch Republic formal recognition and independence from the Spanish crown. Under the terms of the surrender of Antwerp in 1585, the Protestant population were given four years to settle their affairs before leaving the city and Habsburg territory. Similar arrangements were made in other places. Protestants were well-represented among the skilled craftsmen and rich merchants of the port cities of Bruges and Antwerp. More moved to the north between 1585 and 1630 than Catholics moved in the other direction, although there were many of these. Many of those moving north settled in Amsterdam, transforming what was a small port into one of the most important ports and commercial centres in the world by 1630. In addition to the mass migration of Protestant natives from the southern Netherlands to the northern Netherlands, there were influxes of non-native refugees who had fled from religious persecution Sephardi Jews from Portugal and Spain, Protestants from France.
The Pilgrim Fathers spent time there before their voyage to the New World. Economists Ronald Findlay and Kevin H. O'Rourke attribute part of the Dutch ascendancy to its Protestant work ethic based on Calvinism, which promoted thrift and education; this contributed to "the highest literacy rates in Europe. The abundance of capital made it possible to maintain an impressive stock of wealth, embodied not only in the large fleet but in the plentiful stocks of an array of commodities that were used to stabilize prices and take advantage of profit opportunities." Several other factors contributed to the flowering of trade, the arts and the sciences in the Netherlands during this time. A necessary condition was a supply of cheap energy from windmills and from peat transported by canal to the cities; the invention of the windpowered sawmill enabled the construction of a massive fleet of ships for worldwide trading and for military defense of the republic's economic interests. In the 17th century the Dutch — traditionally able seafarers and keen mapmakers — began to trade with the Far East, as the century wore on, they gained an dominant position in world trade, a position occupied by the Portuguese and Spanish.
In 1602, the Dutch East India Company was founded. It was the first-ever multinational corporation, financed by shares that established the first modern stock exchange; the Company received a Dutch monopoly on Asian trade, which it would keep for two centuries, it became the world's largest commercial enterprise of the 17th century. Spices were imported in bulk and brought huge profits due to the efforts and risks involved and insatiable demand; this is remembered to this day in the Dutch word peperduur, meaning something is expensive, reflecting the prices of spices at the time. To finance the growing trade within the region, the Bank of Amsterdam was established in 1609, the precursor to, if not the first true central bank. Although the trade with the Far East was the more famous of the VOC's exploits, the main source of wealth for the Republic was in fact its trade with the Baltic states and Poland. Called the "Mothertrade", the Dutch imported enormous amounts of bulk resources like grain and wood, stockpiling them in Amsterdam so Holland would never lack for basic goods, as well as being able sell them on for profit.
This meant that unlike their main rivals the Republic wouldn't face the dire repercussions of a bad harvest and the starvation it accompanied, instead profiting when this happened in other states. In time the Dutch traders gained such a dominant position in Poland and the Baltic they all but turned into de facto satellite states. According to Ronald Findlay and Kevin H. O'Rourke, geography favored the Dutch Republic, contributing to its wealth, they write, "The foundations were laid by taking advantage of location, midway between the Bay of Biscay and the Baltic. Seville and Lisbon and the Baltic ports were too far apart for direct trade
The Hague
The Hague is a city on the western coast of the Netherlands and the capital of the province of South Holland. It is the seat of government of the Netherlands. With a metropolitan population of more than 1 million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam; the Rotterdam–The Hague metropolitan area, with a population of 2.7 million, is the 13th-largest in the European Union and the most populous in the country. Located in the west of the Netherlands, The Hague is in the centre of the Haaglanden conurbation and lies at the southwest corner of the larger Randstad conurbation; the Hague is the seat of the Cabinet, the States General, the Supreme Court, the Council of State of the Netherlands, but the city is not the constitutional capital of the Netherlands, Amsterdam. King Willem-Alexander lives in Huis ten Bosch and works at the Noordeinde Palace in The Hague, together with Queen Máxima; the Hague is home to the world headquarters of Royal Dutch Shell and other Dutch companies.
Most foreign embassies in the Netherlands and 200 international governmental organisations are located in the city, including the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court, which makes The Hague one of the major cities hosting a United Nations institution along with New York City, Vienna and Nairobi. Because of this, The Hague is known as the home of international law and arbitration; the Hague was first mentioned as Die Haghe in 1242. In the 15th century, the name des Graven hage came into use "The Count's Wood", with connotations like "The Count's Hedge, Private Enclosure or Hunting Grounds". "'s Gravenhage" was used for the city from the 17th century onward. Today, this name is only used in some official documents like marriage certificates; the city itself uses "Den Haag" in all its communications. Little is known about the origin of The Hague. There are no contemporary documents describing it, sources are of dubious reliability. What is certain is that The Hague was founded by the last counts of the House of Holland.
Floris IV owned two residences in the area, but purchased a third court situated by the present-day Hofvijver in 1229 owned by a woman called Meilendis. Floris IV intended to rebuild the court into a large castle, but he died in a tournament in 1234, before anything was built, his son and successor William II lived in the court, after he was elected King of the Romans in 1248, he promptly returned to The Hague, had builders turn the court into a "royal palace", which would be called the Binnenhof. He died in 1256 before this palace was completed but parts of it were finished during the reign of his son Floris V, of which the Ridderzaal, still intact, is the most prominent, it is still used for political events, such as the annual speech from the throne by the Dutch monarch. From the 13th century onward, the counts of Holland used The Hague as their administrative center and residence when in Holland; the village that originated around the Binnenhof was first mentioned as Die Haghe in a charter dating from 1242.
It became the primary residence of the Counts of Holland in 1358, thus became the seat of many government institutions. This status allowed the village to grow. In its early years, the village was located in the ambacht, or rural district, of Monster, governed by the Lord of Monster. Seeking to exercise more direct control over the village, the Count split the village off and created a separate ambacht called Haagambacht, governed directly by the Counts of Holland; the territory of Haagambacht was expanded during the reign of Floris V. When the House of Burgundy inherited the counties of Holland and Zeeland in 1432, they appointed a stadtholder to rule in their stead with the States of Holland and West Friesland as an advisory council. Although their seat was located in The Hague, the city became subordinate to more important centres of government such as Brussels and Mechelen, from where the sovereigns ruled over the centralised Burgundian Netherlands. At the beginning of the Eighty Years' War, the absence of city walls proved disastrous, as it allowed Spanish troops to occupy the town.
In 1575, the States of Holland, temporarily based in Delft considered demolishing the city but this proposal was abandoned, after mediation by William the Silent. In 1588, The Hague became the permanent seat of the States of Holland as well as the States General of the Dutch Republic. In order for the administration to maintain control over city matters, The Hague never received official city status, although it did have many of the privileges granted only to cities. In modern administrative law, "city rights" have no place anymore. Only in 1806, when the Kingdom of Holland was a puppet state of the First French Empire, was the settlement granted city rights by Louis Bonaparte. After the Napoleonic Wars, modern-day Belgium and the Netherlands were combined in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands to form a buffer against France; as a compromise and Amsterdam alternated as capital every two years, with the government remaining in The Hague. After the separation of Belgium in 1830, Amsterdam remained the capital of the Netherlands, while the government was situated in The Hague.
When the government started to play a more prominent role in Dutch society after 1850, The Hague expanded. Many streets were built for the large number of civil se
Roelant Savery
Roelant Savery was a Flanders-born Dutch Golden Age painter. Savery was born in Kortrijk. Like so many other artists, he belonged to an Anabaptist family that fled north from the Spanish-occupied Southern Netherlands when Roelant was about 4 years old and settled in Haarlem around 1585, he was taught painting by his older brother Hans Bol. After his schooling, Savery traveled to Prague around 1604, where he became court painter of the Emperors Rudolf II and Mathias, who had made their court a center of mannerist art. Between 1606 and 1608 he traveled to Tyrol to study plants. Gillis d'Hondecoeter became his pupil. Before 1616 Savery moved back to Amsterdam, lived in the Sint Antoniesbreestraat. In 1618 he settled in Utrecht, his nephew Hans would become his most important assistant. In 1621 Savery bought a large house on the Boterstraat in Utrecht; the house had a large garden with flowers and plants, where a number of fellow painters, like Adam Willaerts were frequent visitors. Savery had kept his house in Amsterdam, had one child baptized in Nieuwe Kerk.
Savery was friends with still life painters like Balthasar van der Ambrosius Bosschaert. In the 1620s he was one of the most successful painters in Utrecht, but his life got troubled because of heavy drinking. Though he would have pupils until the late 1630s, amongst which Allaert van Everdingen and Roelant Roghman, he went bankrupt in 1638 and died in Utrecht half a year later. Savery painted landscapes in the Flemish tradition of Gillis van Coninxloo embellished with many meticulously painted animals and plants with a mythological or biblical theme as background, he painted multiple flower still lifes. His unique style of painting, related to the reigning Mannerism, has been popular with collectors and can be found in many museums in Europe and North America, his preparatory drawings are valued highly. Among his best-known works are several depictions of the now-extinct dodo painted between 1611 and 1628, his nephew Hans a.k.a. Jan Savery was known for his paintings of the dodo, which he copied from his uncle's work.
Savery is famous for being the most prolific and influential illustrator of the extinct dodo, having made at least ten depictions showing it in the lower corners. A famous painting of his from 1626, now called Edwards' Dodo as it was once owned by the ornithologist George Edwards, has since become the standard image of a dodo, it is housed in London. This and his other images are the source for many other dodo illustrations. Media related to Roelant Savery at Wikimedia Commons Savery at WGA Savery at the Artcyclopedia Whale on the beach Tyrolean landscape Pieter Bruegel the Elder: Drawings and Prints, a full text exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which includes material on Roelant Savery 17 paintings by or after Roelant Savery at the Art UK site
Balthasar van der Ast
Balthasar van der Ast was a Dutch Golden Age painter who specialized in still lifes of flowers and fruit, as well as painting a number of remarkable shell still lifes. His still lifes contain insects and lizards, he was died in Delft. His lifetime of works was once summarized by an Amsterdam doctor who said, "In flowers and lizards, beautiful". Balthasar van der Ast was born in Middelburg in the Southern Dutch province of Zeeland, in the family of a prosperous wool merchant, his birth was not recorded, but years on 30 June 1618, his older brother Jacob's legal action indicated that Balthasar was around 25 years old at the time, making his birth date 1593 or 1594. His father, was a widower, when he died in 1609, Bathasar moved in with his older sister and his brother-in-law, the prominent Dutch painter Ambrosius Bosschaert the Elder, whom Maria married in 1604. Van der Ast was trained by Bosschaert as a still life painter, his early works show Bosschaert's influence. In turn, the three sons of Ambrosius Bosschaert, Ambrosius the Younger and Abraham were trained by van der Ast upon the death of their father.
Together, this group of painters is sometimes referred to as the “Bosschaert dynasty”. Van der Ast accompanied the Bosschaert family in their move in 1615 to Bergen op Zoom and in 1619 to Utrecht, where van der Ast entered the Utrecht Guild of St. Luke. Roelandt Savery entered the St. Luke's guild in Utrecht at about the same time. Savery, had considerable influence on van der Ast and his pupils in the years to come in van der Ast's interest in tonality. Besides the Bosschaerts, his pupils were Johannes Baers, it is likely that Jan Davidsz de Heem was van der Ast's pupil in Utrecht. He influenced Willem and Evert van Aelst, Bartholomeus Assteyn. Van der Ast remained in Utrecht until 1632, when he moved to Delft where he joined the guild of St Luke on 22 June 1633. In February 1633 he married Margrieta Jans van Buijeren, they had two children and Helena. In Delft, van der Ast and family lived in the house on Cellebroerstraat until 1640, in the house in Oude Delft until his death in 1657, when he was buried in the Oude Kerk.
Media related to Balthasar van der Ast at Wikimedia Commons Works and literature at PubHist Vermeer and The Delft School, a full text exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art, which contains material on Balthasar van der Ast
Antwerp
Antwerp is a city in Belgium, is the capital of Antwerp province in Flanders. With a population of 520,504, it is the most populous city proper in Belgium, with 1,200,000 the second largest metropolitan region after Brussels. Antwerp is on the River Scheldt, linked to the North Sea by the river's Westerschelde estuary, it is about 40 kilometres north of Brussels, about 15 kilometres south of the Dutch border. The Port of Antwerp is one of the biggest in the world, ranking second in Europe and within the top 20 globally; the city is known for its diamond industry and trade. Both economically and culturally, Antwerp is and has long been an important city in the Low Countries before and during the Spanish Fury and throughout and after the subsequent Dutch Revolt. Antwerp was the place of the world's oldest stock exchange building built in 1531 and re-built in 1872; the inhabitants of Antwerp are nicknamed Sinjoren, after the Spanish honorific señor or French seigneur, "lord", referring to the Spanish noblemen who ruled the city in the 17th century.
The city hosted the 1920 Summer Olympics. According to folklore, notably celebrated by a statue in front of the town hall, the city got its name from a legend about a giant called Antigoon who lived near the Scheldt river, he extracted a toll from passing boatmen, for those who refused, he severed one of their hands and threw it into the river. The giant was killed by a young hero named Silvius Brabo, who cut off the giant's own hand and flung it into the river. Hence the name Antwerpen, from Dutch hand werpen, akin to Old English hand and wearpan, which has evolved to today's warp. A longstanding theory is that the name originated in the Gallo-Roman period and comes from the Latin antverpia. Antverpia would come from Ante Verpia, indicating land that forms by deposition in the inside curve of a river. Note that the river Scheldt, before a transition period between 600 and 750, followed a different track; this must have coincided with the current ringway south of the city, situating the city within a former curve of the river.
However, many historians think it unlikely that there was a large settlement which would be named'Antverpia', but more something like an outpost with a river crossing. However, John Lothrop Motley argues, so do a lot of Dutch etymologists and historians, that Antwerp's name derives from "anda" and "werpum" to give an't werf. Aan't werp is possible; this "warp" is a man-made hill or a river deposit, high enough to remain dry at high tide, whereupon a construction could be built that would remain dry. Another word for werp is pol hence polders. Alfred Michiels has suggested that derivations based on hand werpen, Antverpia, "on the wharf", or "at the warp" lack historical backing in the form of recorded past spellings of the placename, he points instead to Dado's Life of St. Eligius from the 7th century, which records the form Andoverpis, he sees in it a Celtic origin indicating "those who live on both banks". Historical Antwerp had its origins in a Gallo-Roman vicus. Excavations carried out in the oldest section near the Scheldt, 1952–1961, produced pottery shards and fragments of glass from mid-2nd century to the end of the 3rd century.
The earliest mention of Antwerp dates from the 4th century. In the 4th century, Antwerp was first named; the Merovingian Antwerp was evangelized by Saint Amand in the 7th century. At the end of the 10th century, the Scheldt became the boundary of the Holy Roman Empire. Antwerp became a margraviate in 980, by the German emperor Otto II, a border province facing the County of Flanders. In the 11th century, the best-known leader of the First Crusade, Godfrey of Bouillon, was Margrave of Antwerp, from 1076 until his death in 1100, though he was also Duke of Lower Lorraine and Defender of the Holy Sepulchre. In the 12th century, Norbert of Xanten established a community of his Premonstratensian canons at St. Michael's Abbey at Caloes. Antwerp was the headquarters of Edward III during his early negotiations with Jacob van Artevelde, his son Lionel, the Duke of Clarence, was born there in 1338. After the silting-up of the Zwin and the consequent decline of Bruges, the city of Antwerp part of the Duchy of Brabant, grew in importance.
At the end of the 15th century the foreign trading houses were transferred from Bruges to Antwerp, the building assigned to the English nation is mentioned in 1510. Antwerp became the sugar capital of Europe, importing the raw commodity from Portuguese and Spanish plantations; the city attracted Italian and German sugar refiners by 1550, shipped their refined product to Germany Cologne. Moneylenders and financiers developed a large business lending money all over Europe including the English government in 1544–1574. London bankers were too small to operate on that scale, Antwerp had a efficient bourse that itself attracted rich bankers from around Europe. After the 1570s, the city's banking business declined: England ended its borrowing in Antwerp in 1574. Fernand Braudel states that Antwerp became "the centre of the entire international economy, something Bruges had never been at its height." Antwerp was the richest city in Europe at this time. Antwerp's golden age is l
Mauritshuis
The Mauritshuis is an art museum in The Hague, Netherlands. The museum houses the Royal Cabinet of Paintings which consists of 841 objects Dutch Golden Age paintings; the collections contains works by Johannes Vermeer, Rembrandt van Rijn, Jan Steen, Paulus Potter, Frans Hals, Jacob van Ruisdael, Hans Holbein the Younger, others. The 17th century building was the residence of count John Maurice of Nassau, it is now the property of the government of the Netherlands and is listed in the top 100 Dutch heritage sites. In 1631, John Maurice, Prince of Nassau-Siegen, a cousin of stadtholder Frederick Henry, bought a plot bordering the Binnenhof and the adjacent Hofvijver pond in The Hague, at that time the political centre of the Dutch Republic. On the plot, the Mauritshuis was built as a home between 1636 and 1641, during John Maurice's governorship of Dutch Brazil; the Dutch Classicist building was designed by the Dutch architects Jacob van Pieter Post. The two-storey building is symmetrical and contained four apartments and a great hall.
Each apartment was designed with an antechamber, a chamber, a cabinet, a cloakroom. The building had a cupola, destroyed in a fire in 1704. After the death of Prince John Maurice in 1679, the house was owned by the Maes family, who leased the house to the Dutch government. In 1704, most of the interior of the Mauritshuis was destroyed by fire; the building was restored between 1708 and 1718. In 1774, an art gallery open to the public was formed in; that collection was seized by the French in 1794 and only recovered in 1808. The small gallery space soon proved to be too small, in 1820, the Mauritshuis was bought by the Dutch state for the purpose of housing the Royal Cabinet of Paintings. In 1822, the Mauritshuis was opened to the public and housed the Royal Cabinet of Paintings and the Royal Cabinet of Rarities. In 1875, the entire museum became available for paintings; the Mauritshuis was privatised in 1995. The foundation set up at that time took charge of both the building and the collection, which it was given on long-term loan.
This building, the property of the state, is rented by the museum. In 2007, the museum announced its desire to expand. In 2010, the definitive design was presented; the museum would occupy a part of the nearby Sociëteit de Witte building. The two buildings would be connected via an underground tunnel, running underneath the Korte Vijverberg; the renovation started in 2012 and finished in 2014. During the renovation, about 100 of the museum's paintings were displayed in the Gemeentemuseum in the Highlights Mauritshuis exhibition. About 50 other paintings, including the Girl With the Pearl Earring, were on loan to exhibitions in the United States and Japan; the museum was reopened on 27 June 2014 by King Willem-Alexander. The collection of paintings of stadtholder William V, Prince of Orange was presented to the Dutch state by his son, King William I; this collection formed the basis of the Royal Cabinet of Paintings of around 200 paintings. The collection is called the Royal Picture Gallery; the current collection consists of 800 paintings and focusses on Dutch and Flemish artists, such as Pieter Brueghel, Paulus Potter, Peter Paul Rubens, Rembrandt van Rijn, Jacob van Ruisdael, Johannes Vermeer, Rogier van der Weyden.
There are works of Hans Holbein in the collection in the Mauritshuis. The Mauritshuis was a state museum until 1995; the Prince William V Gallery is managed by the organization. The museum has a staff of around 50 people. Emilie E. S. Gordenker has been the museum director since 2008, Victor Moussault has been the deputy director since 2007. In the period 2005 -- 2011, the Mauritshuis had between 262,000 visitors per year. In 2011, the museum was the 13th most visited museum in the Netherlands. In 2012, when the museum closed for renovation on 1 April, it received 45,981 visitors; the museum was closed all of 2013 and was reopened on 27 June 2014. Mauritshuis, official website
Middelburg
Middelburg is a city and municipality in the south-western Netherlands serving as the capital of the province of Zeeland. Situated on the central peninsula of the Zeeland province, Midden-Zeeland, it has a population of about 48,000. In terms of technology, Middelburg played a role in the Scientific Revolution at the early modern period; the city was a center of lens crafting in the Golden Age of Dutch science and technology. The invention of the microscope and telescope is credited to Middelburg spectacle-makers in the late 16th century and early 17th century; the city of Middelburg dates back to the late 8th century or early 9th century. The first mention of Middelburg was as one of three fortified towns erected on Walcheren to guard against Viking raids. In 844 a monastery was built on the site, which remained an active Catholic foundation until the Reformation. Foundations for Middelburg's "stately and picturesque" cathedral were first laid in the 10th century. Middelburg was granted city rights in 1217.
During the Middle Ages, it became an important trading centre in the commerce between England and the rising cities of Flanders. The town continued to gain in prestige during the 13th and 14th centuries. From 1559 to 1603, Middelburg was the episcopal. In the Eighty Years' War, Middelburg was captured from the Spanish forces during a long siege; the northern provinces of the original Low Countries won their independence from their former Spanish Habsburg rulers and formed The Netherlands, a Protestant state. In the 17th century, Middelburg became, after Holland's metropolis Amsterdam, the most important center for the East India Company of Republic of the Seven United Netherlands or Dutch East India Company. Middelburg played an important role in the 17th century slave trade. Samuel Ben Israel, son of Menasseh Ben Israel, is buried in Middelburg at the Sephardic burial site located at the'Jodengang' outside the citywall. Menasseh Ben Israel negotiated with Cromwell the opening of England, its colonies, to the Jews.
Middelburg has an Ashkenazic burial site, located at the Walensingel inside the city wall. In 1994 the synagogue was restored, as it was destroyed during the Second World War; this synagogue was the third one to be built in the Netherlands during the Golden Age. In the hall of the railway station there is a plaque of remembrance for the Jews of Zeeland who started their journey to the death camps from the Middelburg train station. About a third of the old city centre was devastated by bombs and fire in the early phases of World War II, on May 17, 1940, it is still not certain if French artillery were responsible. The town was captured and liberated by British troops during Operation Infatuate on 5 November 1944. After the War, as much of the destroyed part of the old town center was rebuilt and restored along pre-War lines as far as was possible; the city's archives, had been incinerated during the German bombardment. Modern Middelburg has regained much of its historic and picturesque character.
There are lavish 17th and 18th century merchant houses and storehouses standing along canals, of a similar style as found in cities like Amsterdam. The old city moats are still there, as are two of the city gates, the Koepoort Gate and the varkenspoort Gate. Part of the 18th century moat and defence works, were demolished in the 19th century to make way for a commercial canal that crosses Walcheren from Vlissingen to Veere; the medieval abbey is still as a museum and as the seat of the provincial government. The painter Pieter Gaal, was born and, after traveling over Europe to paint and died here. Another well-known citizen of Middelburg was the admiral and explorer Jacob Roggeveen, born in the city in 1659 and died there in 1729. Roggeveen discovered Easter Island in the South Pacific Ocean on Easter Sunday, April 6, 1722. Further discoveries on the same journey included islands of the Tuamotu group, now part of French Polynesia. On 31 January 1723, Petronella Johanna de Timmerman and poet, was born here.
In 1774 she was inducted as an honorary member of the academy Kunstliefde Spaart Geen Vlijt. She presented the academy with poems, translated from French plays, she died on 2 May 1786 in Utrecht. Aside from the city of Middelburg, the municipality includes several population centres, including: Arnemuiden, Nieuw- en Sint Joosland and Sint Laurens; when William of Orange decided to found the first university in the Netherlands in 1575, he considered locating it in Middelburg. He chose Leiden and Middelburg—as well as all of Zeeland—remained without a university until 2004 when University College Roosevelt, affiliated with Utrecht University, was established. Zeeuws Museum Vleeshal Zeeuws Archief Zeeuwse Bibliotheek Centrum Beeldende Kunst Schouwburg Concertzaal Zeeland Spiegeltheater Minitheater Filmtheater Schuttershof UCR Stand up comedy theatre The Abbey Kuiperspoort The "Lange Jan" City Hall Oostkerk Damplein Middelburg has a field hockey club, MMHC, a rugby club and four football clubs: MZVC, Zeelandia Middelburg, Jong Ambon and FC Dauwendaele.
Jong Ambon is translated Young Ambon, consists of Ambonese players. FC Dauwendaele is the main club i
