Athenaeum Illustre Amsterdam

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The gateway to the former Illustre Amsterdam high school
Agnes Chapel and Monastery (1544)

The Athenaeum Illustre Amsterdam was a pre-university educational institution in Amsterdam that existed from 1632 to 1877 and is considered the forerunner of Amsterdam University .

Founding history

Amsterdam had established itself as a trading location in the Dutch Golden Age and experienced a period of boom after the uprising of 1578 against the Spanish King Philip II . After the fall of Antwerp , the world's largest port grew in Amsterdam with its own fleet, which played an important role on the world's oceans. This in turn created a period of unprecedented prosperity in the city itself. The Amsterdam Stock Exchange and the Amsterdam Exchange Bank were founded at that time , making Amsterdam an important location for finance.

This also resulted in immense population growth, which attracted wealthy immigrants from many parts of Europe. This is how the canals characteristic of the city of Amsterdam emerged in the demographically expanding metropolis, in the context of physical urbanization . This upswing was reflected in the areas of trade, science and art. The growing need for higher education led the Amsterdam city fathers to decide in 1629 to found the Athenaeum Illustre.

The chosen location was a monastery founded in 1397 by the Poor Clare nuns , which was named after Saint Agnes of Rome as the Agnetenkapelle (Agnietenkapel). After a fire in 1452, the monastery on the Oudezijds Voorburgwal canal was rebuilt in 1470. In the 16th century the monastery lost its religious importance and after a renovation it came into the hands of the city in 1578. With the founding decision of December 11, 1630 to build the Athenaeum Illustre, the renovation of the building began again, which work was completed in 1631. From the actual monastery, only the Agnetenkapelle remained during those renovation phases.

Foundation and importance

With the founding of the Amsterdam Athenaeum Illustre on January 8, 1632, the city fathers intended to give future university students the opportunity to go to university as well prepared as possible. Because up to that point there was only one Latin school in Amsterdam , which had trained up to the seventh grade. For the city fathers, the 13-year-old graduates were too young for the strict university life. And so they gave young people the opportunity to complete their studies quickly and easily after their training, or to build a promising future for themselves by acquiring academic degrees.

One could win the Leiden professor Gerhard Johannes Vossius as professor of history, who in his opening speech De historiae utilitate spoke about the usefulness of history. One day later, on January 9th, Caspar van Baerle, professor of philosophy , spoke in his inaugural address Mercator sapiens sive oratio de conjugendis mercatuae et philosophiae studia ( loosely translated: The educated businessman. About the connection between trade and philosophy ) about the relationship between the Study of the philosophical sciences on trade. Martin Hortensius (1605–1639) joined these two scholars in 1634 as a professor of mathematics.

But other sciences were also developed here. So in 1640 Joannes Cabeljauw (1600–1652) began the professorship in law and in 1660 Gerardus Blasius (1625–1682) was able to win a representative of the medical sciences who began his lectures at St. Peter Hospital (today: Binnengasthuis). The latter branch of science in particular experienced a boom with the anatomists Nicolaes Tulp and Frederik Ruysch . Iconographically, the pictures from their anatomical lectures give a very good impression of that time.

  • Anatomy lectures with Nicolaes Tulp

  • Anatomy lecture with Frederik Ruysch

While the Latin lectures were held in the auditorium of the Agnes Chapel in the early stages of the Athenaeum, the increasing number of teachers also increased the spatial requirements of the educational institution. The professors gave their lectures in specially set up private or assigned educational institutions. In addition to the educational directions mentioned, theological lectures also established themselves, lectures on Greek and the oriental languages ​​found their way into the curriculum, but also the philosophical university subjects such as rhetoric and ethics had gained importance. An anatomical theater had also been set up, in which the medical lectures were held, and as early as 1632 an ever growing library on the upper floor of the facility.

Due to the limited space, the educational institution remained a relatively small institution with no more than eight teachers and around 250 students until the 19th century. Nevertheless, a large number of important students emerged from this educational institution, as the educational institution established itself as an elitist educational institution that is comparable to a German high school or lyceum. In the pre-university educational canon, it was just not allowed to carry out graduations. After the Athenaeum Illustre received state recognition as a higher educational institution in 1815, the Agnetenkapelle fell into disrepair in the 19th century. The library collection had grown so large that in 1860 the Amsterdam City Council decided to give the Athanaeum a new hostel in the former archery house (Handboogdoelen), where operations began on October 1, 1862. The Athenaeum Illustre underwent its last change in 1877, when it became the municipal university of Amsterdam .

Eminent teachers in the school

Eminent students

literature

  • Illustris Amstelodamensium Athenaei memorabilia, Prodita deinceps oratione Iacobi Philippi d'Orville in centesimum Athenaei natalem, et Davidis Iacobi van Lennep in altera Athenaei saecularia, accedente item Lennepii in utramque orationem annotatione. Apud J. Müllerum et socium, Amstelodami 1832, (online) .
  • Amsterdamsch Studenten-Corps: Album Academicum van het Athenaeum Illustre en van de Universiteit van Amsterdam, bevattende de names of the curators, Hoogleeraren en Leeraren van 1632 tot 1913, the Rectores Magnifici en Secretarissen van den Senaat Der Universiteit van 1877 tot 1913, der Leden van the Illustrissimus Senatus Studiosorum Amstelodamensium van 1851 dead 1913, en der Studenten van 1799 dead 1913. RWP de Vries, Amsterdam, 1913
  • N. de Roever: Album academicum van het Athenaeum Illustre en van de Universiteit van Amsterdam, bevattende de names of Hoogleeraren en Leeraren van 1632 to 1882. de Erven H. van Munster & Zoon, Amsterdam, 1882
  • EOG Haitsma Mulier et al. (Ed.): Athenaeum Illustre. Eleven studies over de Amsterdamse Doorluchtige School, 1632–1877 . Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam 1997
  • Peter Jan Knegtmans: Professors Van de Stad: Het Athenaeum Illustre en de Universiteit van Amsterdam, 1632–1960. Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam, 2007, ISBN 978-90-5356-963-4 ( online sample )
  • Dirk KW van Miert: Humanism in an Age of Science. The Amsterdam Athenaeum in de golden Age, 1632–1704. Brill, Leiden, 2009, ISBN 978-90-04-17685-0 , (online)

Web links

Coordinates: 52 ° 22 ′ 11.7 "  N , 4 ° 53 ′ 41.7"  E