Amsterdam

Fülszöveg

AMSTERDAM
Originally 11 medieval lishinR'village, nestling beside a dam across the River Amstel. by the seventeenth century Amsterdam had !ilready become a major trading- centre for merchant ships from all over the world. It was at this time that, with the construction of three great concentric canals, pail of a network of waterways that enabled freight to be transported by barge to all parts of the city, the still externally medieval town developed into a large city. Today Amsterdam holds more than 7,'50,000 people within its eighty square miles but the old city centre has changed little in the course of three centuries. Amsterdam is now as it was then a city of tall façades overlooking rippling waterways, of narrow backstreets, bustling street markets and brightly coloured flowers.
Rembrandt would have little difficulty inrecognising theoity in which he spent the last 37 years of his life. The house in which he lived for many yeai's, 'though now a museum, still .stands... Tovább

Fülszöveg

AMSTERDAM
Originally 11 medieval lishinR'village, nestling beside a dam across the River Amstel. by the seventeenth century Amsterdam had !ilready become a major trading- centre for merchant ships from all over the world. It was at this time that, with the construction of three great concentric canals, pail of a network of waterways that enabled freight to be transported by barge to all parts of the city, the still externally medieval town developed into a large city. Today Amsterdam holds more than 7,'50,000 people within its eighty square miles but the old city centre has changed little in the course of three centuries. Amsterdam is now as it was then a city of tall façades overlooking rippling waterways, of narrow backstreets, bustling street markets and brightly coloured flowers.
Rembrandt would have little difficulty inrecognising theoity in which he spent the last 37 years of his life. The house in which he lived for many yeai's, 'though now a museum, still .stands unchanged. The rows of stately houses balanced by their reflections in the shifting waters of the canals, the formal lines of gables softened by avenues of elm and linden trees, the church towers soaring heavenwards from the low-lying city the inspiration of so many artists in Amsterdam's glory years have altered little with the passage of time.
Despite its many ancient buildings however, Amsterdam is not merely an architectural museum. Many canalside houses, former homes of rich burghers, are now occupied by the international corporations and stockbroking' fii'ms which make the city the fourth largest financial centre of the world. The famous 17th century Mint Tower, built on the ruins of a medieval keep, now presides over a congested traffic intersection, and the canals throb with the life of a mixed community of artists and artisans, bourgeois and bohemians.
The façades of the city centre hide all the trappings of a bustling twentieth century Metropolis. As the superb colour photographs of this book admirably illustrate, Amsterdam provides the best of two worlds. Vissza