Andre -NY400: The story of New Amsterdam- Goed

Introduction

The NHF is working on a unique project. Together with a team of historians, architects, students and heritage organisations, we are building a full scale model of New Amsterdam between 1660 en 1664.

How can a scale model tell the stories of New Amsterdam? What makes this representation unique, is its focus on historical human activity. The buildings and landscape of New Amsterdam set the stage for the real stories of the people of New Amsterdam and gives a 3D dimension to the archives, maps, and books about this period and place in time.

Browse through the many stories of New Amsterdam represented in the scale model:

Negotiations between the Dutch and the Native American sachems were important to maintain good relations and also allowed the colonists to expand beyond New Amsterdam. The Mahicans’ land spanned a section of the upper Hudson River, and they frequently engaged in treaty-making, land negotiations and conflict with the settlers of New Netherland. The Mahicans called the Hudson River Mahicannituck and referred to themselves as Muh-he-con-neok, which means the “People of the Waters That are Never Still.” Skiwias, a Mahican sachem, participated in multiple treaties with the Dutch on behalf of his people, yet the exact nature of his role is unclear. It has been suggested that he was acting as an entrepreneur, rather than sharing his payments fairly with the Mahican people.

Skiwias

Etow Oh Koam, Smithsonian

Nevertheless, Skiwias’ role in negotiating with the Dutch was very beneficial for the fledgling colony, as he appeared to have maintained peaceful relations with them. He even signed the 1645 treaty which ended Kieft’s War, after two years of devastating warfare. He signed this document on the Wappingers’ behalf, an Eastern Algonquian Native American group who occupied the east bank of the Hudson River and were close allies to the Mahicans.

Skiwias became a very well-known figure among the Dutch, with records showing that he was regularly available to testify in court, participated in contract ceremonies, and was even treated by the local Dutch doctor. On July 9^th, 1661, Skiwias signed over the land which is now the Town of Bethlehem, New York. In exchange, Jeremias van Rensselaer recorded that Skiwias and his wife were paid six pieces of cloth, 30 fathoms of wampum, four kettles, six hatchets, six chipaxes, six pairs of socks and 12 knives.

Learn about Skiwias and the Stadhuis

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Teunis Cray was one of the many Europeans who immigrated to New Amsterdam in the 17^th century. He was born in Venlo, in northern Limburg in 1602 and later, in 1642, moved to New Amsterdam. There, Cray built himself and his family a small house on a plot of land at the corner of Brewer Street and the Broad Street canal. While he worked as a tavernkeeper for almost thirty years, his career was unremarkable, aside from his 1667 appointment as the public measurer of apples, onions, and turnips.

Teunis Cray

View of the Heere Gracht

However, perhaps the most notable thing about his life is a 1658 incident relating to his daughter Janneke Cray and her groom Philip Schooff. The two got married in August of that year and when leaving the church, Anneken Sibouts shouted “they slept together and therefore did not deserve to have palm strewed” at the newlyweds. Here, Sibouts referred to the tradition of decorating a marital bed with flowers and palms, and so implied that as Philip and Janneke had premarital sex, the two were not worthy of marriage. The groom obviously found this remark offensive, and he took Sibouts to court, just as he did two weeks before with a certain Breghtlande van de Graaf whom he accused of slandering his wife.

Interestingly, about a month prior in July, Teunis Cray and Philip Schoof had a minor legal dispute. As a result, Schoof was not allowed to leave New Amsterdam for a certain amount of time about which he complained to the court. While we do not know with certainty what exactly van de Graaf said about Janneke Cray or the cause of the dispute between Teunis Cray and Philip Schoof, we can speculate that these incidents were possibly connected to the couple’s premarital sex.