Amstelsluizen
Why is it significant?
Lean on the railing and look at the row of heavy wooden gates set into the river between stone piers. These are the Amstelsluizen, a working survivor of the 1670s, still standing guard in the middle of the river.
Key Facts
| Place | Amstelsluizen |
|---|---|
| Address | Amstel, 1017 Amsterdam, Netherlands |
| Geo Coordinates | 52.36240, 4.90280 |
| Part of Walk | Rembrandt's Amsterdam: The Night Watch, the Syndics & the Amstel |
| Generated | Generated |
Lean on the railing and look at the row of heavy wooden gates set into the river between stone piers. These are the Amstelsluizen, a working survivor of the 1670s, still standing guard in the middle of the river.
They were built in the 1670s, when Amsterdam extended its great canal ring across the Amstel. By opening and closing them, the city could control the flow of the river into its canals. For centuries they were part of the system used to flush fresh water through the canals and carry the city's dirt away towards the IJ, a constant battle in a town that dumped almost everything into its water.
Now look back at the white drawbridge you have just crossed, the Magere Brug, the Skinny Bridge. Legend says it was built by two sisters named Mager who lived on opposite banks and wanted to visit each other every day. The more prosaic explanation is that the first bridge here was simply very narrow, and mager means skinny. The bridge has been rebuilt several times, but it has kept its old form, and at night its outline is traced in little lights.
The Amstel was Rembrandt's countryside. In the 1640s and 1650s he often walked out of the city along this river with a sketchbook and drew what he saw: farmhouses, windmills, fishermen, the flat horizon and the enormous sky. His etching called The Omval, of 1645, shows a bend in the Amstel just south of the city, with a pair of lovers hiding in the shade of a tree. Long before the Impressionists, he was making art out of an ordinary walk by the river.
On the far bank you can see the grand white facade of Theatre Carré, built in 1887 by the circus director Oscar Carré. Now turn your back on the river and walk north-west to the Herengracht, where a canal house is waiting with its furniture still in place.