Traditionally, the boundaries of the Jodenbuurt, east of the city center, are the Amstel River in the southwest, the Zwanenburgwal “Swans City Wall” and Oudeschans “Old Rampart” canals in the northwest, Rapenburg, a street in the northeast and the Nieuwe Herengracht “New Patricians Canal” in the southeast. But it grew to include parts of Nieuwmarkt “New Market”, Sint Antoniesbreestraat “St. Anthony’s Broad Street”, the Plantage “Plantation”, and Weesperzijde “Weesp Side”, especially after 1882, when two canals, the Leprozengracht “Lepers Canal” and the Houtgracht “Wood Canal”, were filled in.
After the war, what was once a bustling, thriving neighborhood was largely abandoned and neglected. In 1953 the municipal government made plans for a major renovation, including a large expansion to Weesperstraat and Prins Hendrikkade and the construction of the so-called ‘oostlijn’ expansion to the Amsterdam Metro. Many houses were demolished and replaced with large apartment blocks and office buildings, including the Maupoleum, built by and named for the Jewish real estate developer Maup Caransa, who had survived the war in the neighborhood and acquired much of it.
Today, little remains of the once-thriving Jewish neighborhood that once existed in the Jodenbuurt; however there are a few surviving monuments from Amsterdam’s Jewish history. These include the Jewish Historical Museum and the Portuguese Synagogue. Saved from nearly being demolished in 1975, the Huis de Pinto is a mansion in Sint Antoniesbreestraat that once belonged to a wealthy Portuguese Sephardic family often referred to as the Rothschild family of the Dutch Golden Age.
[caption id="attachment_241787" align="aligncenter" width="455"] Caspar David Friedrich by Gerhard von Kügelgen[/caption][responsivevoice_button voice="UK English Female" buttontext="Listen to this Post"]Caspar David Friedrich was a German Romantic landscape painter, generally considered the most i...
