Amsterdam, Houtgracht

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Address
Houtgracht
City
Amsterdam
Country
Netherlands
Latitude
52.36807810
Longitude
4.90228120

Amsterdam tax registers on income from letting property (‘Verpondings-quohier van den 8sten penning’, concerning the so-called ‘eight-penny tax’), dating from the early 1650s, show that Spinoza's father Michael d'Espinosa rented a brick house from a certain Willem Kick at the edge of the Vlooienburg quarter.

That house was located in the corner of the Houtgracht and Leprozengracht (both canals were filled in in 1882) in the old tax district 11:  ‘11e wijk. achter de Bree straet, nae d’oude Stadt begint hoek Huiszittensteeg’ (District 11: behind the Breestraat, close by the old city, begins at the corner [of] ‘Huiszittensteeg’). More precisely, the house (which no longer exists) where Spinoza was raised was located in the corner of the Houtgracht and Leprozengracht, close to the Lazarussteeg, now the location of the ‘Mozes en Aäronkerk’ (Waterlooplein 207).

‘Amstelredamum emporium Hollandiae primarium totiusque Europae celeberrimum’ (Amsterdam, 1625). Detailed map by Balthasar Florisz van Berckenrode of the Amsterdam Vlooienburg quarter (an articifical rectangular embankment in the Amstel river). In 1650, the Espinosa family lived in a rental brick house ‘behind the Breestraat, close by the old city’, viz., in the corner of the Leprozengracht and Houtgracht (now the location of the Mozes en Aäronkerk). On Van Berckenrode’s map, the long Breestraat (located on the narrow peninsula-shaped strip of land below Vlooienburg) stretches towards the northeast, from the old St Anthony gate (lower left corner, under F) to the lock of St Anthony (lower right corner, under E) in the Verwersgracht. (Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, RP-P-1892-A-17491C).

Detail of Van Berckenrode’s map of the Amsterdam Vlooienburg quarter: the blocks of houses closed in between Breestraat, Lazarussteeg, Vlooienburgsteeg, and the quay of the Houtgracht canal, all belonging to the Amsterdam tax district 11. (Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, RP-P-1892-A-17491C).

Interior of the old Amsterdam Portuguese-Israelite Talmud Torah synagogue at the Houtgracht (Jan Veenhuysen, Der Jooden tempel of Sinagoge, Amsterdam, Rijksmuseum, inv. no. RP-P-AO-24-28).

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