The Ruthless Water Woolf

This 'Impolderment Plan' of Haarlemmermeer ('Lake Haarlem') from 1641 by Jacob Bartelsz Vernis was not realised. The officials were hesitant to replace the lake and wetlands with this geometrical grid of dikes and polders. The costs were enormous, the fishermen resisted the plan for obvious reasons, and the merchants of Amsterdam, Leyden and Haarlem also opposed the plan; they feared that empolderment would be a serious hindrance for the crucial water transport between their cities.
The map is embellished with a poem from Joost vanden Vondel, describing how the (Dutch) Land Lion fights and conquers the (mythological) ruthless Water Woolf.
Several other plans were made to empolder Haarlemmermeer. In the end the job was done more than two centuries later, between 1849-1852.

Looking for damages

September 6, 2010 - The next six weeks, Jean-Marieke Poot will describe in what condition the Atlas is. Inside, outside, from part 1 to part 9 - everything that is not right will be charted.
For this purpose, Jean-Marieke has designed a database to document all damage systematically. deformations, damage of front and back, old repairs, damage caused by burns, tape, rust, acidization, foxing*), and ink and copper 'eating through' the paper.

Studying the surface, you don't just need a magnifying glass; the light of the mobile phone also proves to be really handy.
If you have to look for what is wrong, can one still see the beauty of what you are looking at? Jean-Marieke: 'You tend to get fixated on what's wrong. That actually starts in the classroom. You step into a museum and you look at the damages. It does need some reminding to also enjoy the beauty of it.'

*)Foxing is a not yet exactly defined name for the reddish brown (fox colored) stains that often appear in the paper. There are multiple causes, but mostly it is caused by oxidation of metal parts in the paper, micro-organisms or mould.

Buttering Up

Some maps are too big to fit in the binder. Some of the maps are so large, they have to be folded several times - 'folded back' so to speak. If the paper is relatively thick, this may easily cause ugly, unnecessary folds or tears. A good example it this beautiful map of the town of Castricum and surrounding country from 1737, made by the largest cartography publishing house of the 18th century, Covens & Mortier. Cornelis Mortier and Johannes Covens were not only excellent map makers, the were also very good at buttering up their patrons.
This is some dedication:

"Offered to the noble most excellent Lord, The lord Mr Lieve Geelvinck, Lord of Castricum, Mynden, the Loosdrecht & Mayor and Counsel of the city of Amsterdam, Administrator of the East-Indian Company, etc, etc, etc. is this Map, the Estate of Castricum, Offered and Dedicated with Indebted Deference by Your Greatly Respectable Honour's most Obedient and Humble Servants, Johannes Covens and Cornelis Mortier, 1737."

Copper Corrosion

---------------------------------------------(this front ↑)


(with this back ↑)

18 September 2010 - Copper corrosion occurs in the presence of cupriferous inks (in blues and greens). This type of damage usually occurs in objects that have been colored in, such as maps and drawings. The slightest form of damage occurs as discolouration of the drawing. This discolouration passes from light green to black. Ink seepage to the adjacent pages can also occur - the chemicals can be transferred to the pages lying above or underneath, sometimes in the original color. That has not occurred in our Atlas yet. In a worst-case scenario, the areas affected by copper corrosion become brittle and actual holes appear in the paper. Luckily, that is also not the case here.

It is the green ink that causes the damage, for the primary cause is the cupriferous ink being used. As you can see on the back of the map, the copper ink is working its way through the paper. But many processes play a role in copper corrosion, including humidity and oxidation.
The process is irreversible, so climate control is crucial.

This map is of Nieuw Hoender Hoeck, a polder in what is now part of the municipality of Bernisse in the province of Zuidholland (near Rotterdam). I added a corresponding map from Google maps. That map has been turned 90 degrees to match the old map (So the West is top, and the town of Geervliet is in the top right hand corner in both the old and the new map). To enlarge, click on the picture.


The images of the Atlas der Neederlanden have been made by the in-house photographer of the Special Collections Department of the University Library of the University of Amsterdam.

Toolbox

17 September 2010 - Apart from expertise and an eagle's eye, what are the tools needed to assess the damage? The answer lies in this spontaneous snapshot of still life with:
- a magnifier;
- a light (in the mobile phone);
- a database in the laptop);
- a tape measure (from the sewing box).

The tape measure especially gives it the picture domestic touch, but it was chosen because it very practical: it is made of soft material (not likely to damage the maps), it is flexible and adequately accurate.

UV Damage

This blog is about the restoration of the Atlas, which makes us focus on things that are wrong with it. It is easy to forget that the state of the bound maps is actually very, very good. If the maps had not been bound into a volume and stored in the dark, but hung on a wall instead, the damage done by UV-light would have been incomparably worse to whatever dirt and small tears there are now.

I think a fantastic example of why we are so lucky to have the Atlas, is when you compare these two maps of 'T Hooghe Heymraedtschap vanden Lande van Woerden. The 'Hoogheemraadschap' is the organization responsible for the dikes and polders around the town of Woerden. Both maps are in possession of the University of Amsterdam.

The map on top is from 1739. It was printed 15 years after the map at the bottom whose 9 sheets were bound in an volume of the Atlas der Neederlanden. Apart from some coats of arms on the sides, they are identical. The top map has adorned a wall for almost 200 years. It is the kind of map that makes you say: wow, you can tell it is really really old.'

The 9 sheets of the bottom map that have been stored in the Atlas der Neederlanden still have beautiful colors. It looks like they were was printed yesterday. And as the sheets have all been digitized (not on the highest resolution, or the best quality yet, that will be done after the restoration has been completed, but still, in pretty good quality) we can join them in Photoshop and look at the map the way it was intended.

The scale of this map is approximately 1:17.000, and it was made by Johannes, Justus and Davidt Vingboons. The content dates from 1670. The printing technique is copperplate. Them map consists of 9 sheets, each 43 x 53 cm. The size of the whole map is 129 x 159 cm. It was hand-colored, and surrounded by the coats of arms of the dike reeves: Willem van der Hoeven, Jacob vander Meer, Adriaen Jacob vander Does, Cornelis Jan van Nellesteyn, Cornelis van Ewyck, Gerard Beelaerts, and Joan George Stierling.

Pimp My Atlas? I think not.

7 November 2010 - The damage assessment is being done - page by page, volume by volume. For now, Judith Geerts has taken over from Jean-Marieke Poot and is charting the damages by putting them in a database. This is necessary to get an idea of the amount of time and money needed for restoration.

Once the Atlas has been digitized in its entirety, the actual volumes will be stored under ideal conditions. In the future only someone with very good reasons for wanting to see the real thing will have access to these volumes. The maps can be studied in digital form.
Because of this, restoration will be done conservatively in both senses of the word: to conserve, but not extensively. This is not a case of Pimp my Atlas; these are old books, and they may look like old books. What needs to be done is what helps preserve the books. Not make them look like new.

One of the things that will be done, is undoing some previous restorations. In the nineteenseventies filmoplast. It was the successor of adhesive tape like sellotape - a panacea for repairing tears. Better than sellotape, that discolors, loosens and leaves traces of glue. Sellotape was replaced by the almost colorless filmoplast.

Wrong, wrong, wrong, so it seems now. Restorers now shake their heads when the see filmoplast in an old book. Because it does discolor, and it does leave traces of glue, which corrodes the original paper. So off it has to come. If a tear needs repairing, there are more reliable ways. Like grandmother's starch to glue thin Japanese paper over the tear.