In a previous article ("Finding Vermeer: Back to the Molenpoort", April, 2024) I have argued, in support of the opinion of earlier researchers, that the painter Johannes Vermeer and his family must, indeed, have lived in a rather big house, called Groot Serpent, on the eastern corner of Oude Langendijk and Molenpoort in Delft. This contradicts Hans Slager's recent assumption that the family lived in a much smaller house called Trapmolen at the other corner of these two streets. In his most recent article ("Vermeer’s House again and the Jesuit Church," October 2024), Slager has dismissed my conclusions.
In itself, an answer to the question of Vermeer's exact whereabouts in Delft does not seem extremely relevant. Nobody really cares about the precise location of Frans Hals' different dwellings in Haarlem during his lifetime, to name just one other outstanding contemporary painter who rented rather than possessed a house. However, in Vermeer's case "home" and "interior" play a much bigger role in his painted oeuvre than it does with Hals, and we can also be sure that some of the accessories that figure in Vermeer's scenes were taken from objects that were actually in his household. An answer to the issue of his residence may therefore help to better understand Vermeer's social status and ways of (self-)representation, which are topics of interest to art history.
In answer to Slager's remarks, I must, first of all, say that I am a bit surprised to see that he apparently deems it necessary to take refuge to all kinds of disparaging phrases about my research. I don't know whether this is customary in his original field of biology, but over the years in history and art history I have learned that this is not very helpful. From my side, I have tried to treat Slager's work with respect. The truth of the matter is that we, together, are facing all kinds of questions and issues that often have no clear-cut answers. Historic data are scarce and diverse, and not always easy to interpret. We must all work hard and with an open mind in order to find common ground and, hopefully, consensus.
In my article, I have brought into the discussion the only tax register that mentions the Vermeer family, or more precisely Vermeer's mother-in-law Maria Thins with whom the family lived, in the context of their neighbours. Slager stipulates that this register is "well-known," but, if I am not mistaken, he has not used it in his analysis of Vermeer's neighbourhood. To my knowledge, Kees van der Wiel has thus far been the only researcher to include it in his considerations on Vermeer's social position.
Like all 17th-century sources, this register, which dates from 1674 or slightly later, has specific features that make it more, or less, useful for our purposes. Its obvious downside is that it only sums up the persons who owned fl. 1,000 or more, with the implication that people who did not reach that mark—i.e. the vast majority of the population of Delft at the time—are not included. Maria Thins, however, was registered: with an estimated capital of fl. 26,000 she belonged to the 220 most wealthy inhabitants of Delft at the time. Some of her neighbours and her son-in-law Johannes Vermeer were not included, because they did not own enough to be taxed for this purpose.
The positive element of this source is that it gives the names of the actual inhabitants of the houses along the streets of Delft, including Oude Langendijk and Molenpoort, as long as they owned more than fl. 1,000, that is. This is different from many other 17th-century tax and other registers (Huizenprotocol, Haardstedengeld, Verponding, Kadegeld), which usually only give the names of house owners. This means that we can find in the 1674 register the actual residence of house owners and tenants alike who, like Maria Thins, were rich enough to be taxed.
Slager's main objection to my argument is that he doubts whether the register from 1674 that I used in order to pinpoint the residence of the Vermeer family, is really organised in a sequential way, i.e. that the sequence of the names that we find in this register reflects the spatial sequence of the houses where these persons lived. I am, however, afraid that it really does exactly that. Slager may not like it, because it contradicts his analysis, but there is no indication that the person who compiled this register followed any other order than the sequence of the houses along the canals, streets and allies of Delft, with the names of the heads of household that actually lived in these houses.
Apparently, Slager finds it most difficult to accept that I placed a woman named Jannetge Stevens tentatively in Trapmolen on the western corner of Molenpoort, the house where he thinks Vermeer lived. Slager assumes that she must have lived elsewhere on Oude Langendijk in 1674, which would imply that the order of names given in the register is less strict than I suggest and that, therefore, this source is in the end not very helpful in establishing with any certainty the location of the Vermeer household (or any other household). For this reason, it is worthwhile to look into the case of Jannetge Stevens a bit more in detail.
Jannetge Stevens (1629-1702)For a detailed picture of her years until she reached adulthood in 1654: City Archive Delft (hereafter: CAD), 72 Weeskamer (Orphan's Chamber, hereafter: WK), inv.no. 1716-1720 and 1722–1723; see also inv.no. 4514 for her other half-sister Grietge Stevens (1609/10–1647). Jannetge Stevens made two wills: CAD, 161 Old Notarial Archives (hereafter: ONA), inv.no. 1748, fol. 182–183, notary Adriaen van der Block, 15 November 1648, and inv.no. 2295, act no. 14, fol. 102–103, notary Willem van Ruijven, 21 March 1699. came into the possession of the 7th house (my count) west of Molenpoort by public auction on 28 December 1680, so we can leave that property out of this discussion altogether.For the successive owners of this property: CAD, 1 Oud-Archief stadsbestuur Delft, first section, 1246–1813 (hereafter: OA), inv.no. 2256, Huizenprotocol 1648v1811 (hereafter: Huizenprotocol 1648), fol. 325; see also: ONA, inv.no. 2229, fol. 283. Jannetge Stevens was buried from this house on 1 June 1702: CAD, 14 Baptism, Marriage and Death registers Delft, 1593-1806 (hereafter: DTB), inv.no. 46, fol. 82v.
From a certain moment in time Jannetge Stevens also owned the 5th house (my count) west of Molenpoort, but until now we did not have an exact date of her purchase. This gives room for Slager's speculation that she might have been the owner of this house and lived here already in 1674, which leads him to the conclusion that the Familiegeld register is useless for our purpose.
When we take a closer look at this property, it appears that it was bought shortly after 1648 by Simon de Knuijt, whose daughter Maria married from here in 1653 with Pieter Claesz van Ruijven, both of whom would become of such eminent importance to the painter Vermeer.For the successive owners of this property: Huizenprotocol 1648, fol. 325; for Maria de Knuijt's marriage: OA, inv.no. 2574, Marriage register 1650–1656, fol. 55, 31 August 1653; the relationship between Vermeer, Pieter Claesz van Ruijven and Maria de Knuijt was first brought to light by J.M. Montias, Vermeer and his Milieu. A Web of Social History, Princeton NJ 1989, pp. 246–262. After the death of Simon de Knuijt's widow in 1654, this house was bought by Grietge and Aechtgen Dircx, two unmarried sisters.Huizenprotocol 1648, fol. 325; the latest known mention of Grietge and Aechtgen Dircx in connection to this house is in CAD, 598 Charters, inv.no. 480, 3 March 1657. A few years later they sold it to Johannes Gerritsz van den Berch (1633–1678), who was a clerk at Delft townhall.Johannes' baptism: DTB, inv.no. 8, fol. 115v, 11 January 1633; see also: WK, inv. no. 463, fol. 252, 1 February 1636. He must have bought the house on Oude Langendijk after his marriage to Geertruijt van Overmeer (1637–1677) in 1658, at which time he lived elsewhere in town.Their banns of marriage: DTB, inv.no. 22, fol. 30v, 4 September 1658, the groom living on Papestraat. Johannes van den Berch is the first owner of this house mentioned in the Kadegeld-ledger, that was begun in 1667.OA, inv.no. 3510, Ledger of the dredging of the canals in the town of Delft, 1667-1689 (hereafter: Kadegeld 1667), fol. 131. Three of his and Geertruijt van Overmeer's children were buried, in 1668, 1672 and 1673 respectively, each and every time from Oude Langendijk. On the third of December 1677 Geertruijt van Overmeer herself was buried from here, followed by her husband on 29 September 1678, leaving behind five children, between 5 and 18 years old.DTB, inv.no. 41, fol. 29v, 21 June 1668; inv. no. 42, fol. 9v, 17 March 1672; Ibidem, fol. 27, 28 March 1673; inv.nr. 43, fol. 15v, 3 December 1677; Ibidem, fol. 25, 29 September 1678; Orphan's Chamber, inv.no. 468, fol. 380–380v and 425, 27 May 1678 and later. On 29 April 1679, a complete and detailed inventory of the estate was made up on behalf of the orphaned children. It included the house on Oude Langendijk, with Willem Cordij on one side (in my count: the 6th house west of Molenpoort) and "juffrouw van Nerven" alias Machtelt van Beest (the 4th house) on the other. Van den Berch's house, so the text of the inventory reads, "had been sold by the guardians of the orphaned children, with approbation by the city's orphan masters, to Jannetge Stevens, unmarried daughter of age, for fl. 1670." The first term of her payment was due two days later, on the 1st of May 1679, the formal date of transfer of the property. The inventory also gives us a complete description of the contents of the house, which were to be sold publicly. Before that happened, Jannetge Stevens took over some household items—a few shelves and racks, a sofa bed, a plate—from the Van den Berch family for just over fl. 15.Orphan's Chamber, inv.no. 7058, 5 May 1679, and 7059, 4 June 1683.
The conclusion is, I think, clear: Jannetge Stevens did not own the 7th house (my count) west of Molenpoort any earlier than December 1680, nor did she possess the 5th house (ditto) before May 1679. There is no indication that she lived as a tenant in one of these two houses in 1674, the year that she was formally registered as a tax payer on Oude Langendijk.In Kadegeld 1667, fol. 132, Jannetge Stevens is mentioned on Oude Langendijk in the second house west of Jacob Gerritsstraat; this property was owned since c. 1662 by her brother-in-law Claes Pietersz van der Werve; after his death in 1672 it belonged to his widow, Jannetge Stevens' half-sister Elisabeth Stevens; it remained in the Van der Werve family until at least 1711. Therefore, there is no reason whatsoever to think that Jannetge Stevens lived in 1674 on any other location than where the Familiegeld register has her.
Slager asserts that "in the Familiegeld book taxable house owners are partly jumbled, it lists non-owners that could have rented (part of) any house, it omits house owners living elsewhere and it omits recorded house owners but too poor to be taxed. This all makes sequentially placing persons at exact houses a whole series of assumptions." The opposite, however, appears to be true: the Familiegeld register gives a reliable and transparent list, in a sequential order, of all, taxable, inhabitants of houses along Oude Langendijk (and all other streets of Delft) in 1674. So, instead of rejecting it, like Slager does, we should embrace it and take its information seriously.
Like I outlined in my previous article, Jannetge Stevens is mentioned in the 1674 register after a number of entries of taxable persons whom we can verifiably place, one after another, in a sequence of properties on Oude Langendijk from west to east, until the second house (my count) west of Molenpoort. The owner of this second house, Adriaen Simonsz Sammeling, was not taxable at the time and is not registered. The next name in the register is that of Jannetge Stevens, which makes it highly likely that she lived in 1674, indeed, in Trapmolen on the western corner of Oude Langendijk and Molenpoort. After the mention of a few unmarried catholic women, of whom at least one lived demonstrably on the western side of Molenpoort, Maria Thins is registered. For this, and for various other reasons that I have tried to set out in my previous text, Maria Thins cannot have lived in Trapmolen and must have lived, together with her daughter Catharina Bolnes, her son-in-law, the painter Johannes Vermeer, and their numerous children, on the other, eastern, corner of Oude Langendijk and Molenpoort in the house called Groot Serpent. This is, in my opinion, the only conclusion that can possibly be drawn from the documentation at hand.
Slager also fights my conclusions as to the location of the hidden Jesuit church east of Molenpoort, which in my view, and in that of several authors before me, was located in the attic of the two houses immediately adjacent to Groot Serpent. Since this is not directly relevant for our study of Vermeer, I leave it to others to judge this question, but I disagree with most points that Slager has brought forward, and I maintain my position also in this respect.For the record: In my reconstruction the Jesuit church was located in the upper floors of the second and third house east of Molenpoort. The third house was owned from c. 1652 onwards by Maria and Cornelia van Swieten, two unmarried daughters of Cornelis Jansz van Swieten (–1645/7) and Neeltgen Leenders (–1652), who had lived in the third house west of Molenpoort from 1638 till 1652, after which it was sold for fl. 2400 to Machtelt van Beest, widow of Willem van Nerven. Maria van Swieten is mentioned as the owner resp. inhabitant of the third house east of Molenpoort in Kadegeld 1667, Familiegeld 1674 (together with her sister Cornelia), Personele Quotisatie 1690 (again with her sister Cornelia, and with a reference to their brother Leendert; I will not go into the peculiarities of this register), and Verponding 1733-1795. Maria was buried from Oude Langendijk on 10 February 1687, after which Cornelia moved to a house on Burgwal, from where she was buried on 24 February 1694.
Slager wants us to believe that the mention of Maria van Swieten in this third house east of Molenpoort has a bearing on someone else, rather confusingly called Maria Teresa van Swieten (c. 1620–after 1664/before 1686), the only daughter of Andries van Swieten (-1652) and Sophia van der Wiel (–1661). Maria Teresa van Swieten married in 1640 with Reijnier Carlier the younger (–in or before 1655) from Kontich (not: Kortrijk) near Antwerp, where the couple went to live. In all official documents (banns of marriage, several wills and codicils, transportation of land) her middle name Teresa is used, and she did not have a sister Cornelia nor a brother Leendert. Together with a number of other wealthy Catholics, she and her husband contributed to the payment of the costs of the fourth and fifth house east of Molenpoort, where Jesuit priests were housed. But she had nothing to do with the third house east of Molenpoort, that belonged to Maria and Cornelia van Swieten.
Apparently, Machtelt van Beest, widow Van Nerven, who owned several properties west of Molenpoort, paid the verponding for "the house of Maria and Cornelia van Swieten" (i.e.: the third house east of Molenpoort) in 1686, but this does not imply that she also owned this house, nor that Maria and Cornelia van Swieten lived west of Molenpoort in 1674, like Slager suggests. Also in this instance, the 1674 register is completely reliable.