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Tulipomania - Mike Dash [108]

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basic details given here are summarized from Krelage’s books and from the works of contemporary gardeners such as Abraham Munting, Waare Oeffening der Planten (Amsterdam: Hendrik Rintjes, 1671), from W. S. Murray, “The Introduction of the Tulip, and the Tulipomania,” Journal of the Royal Horticultural Society (March 1909), and Sam Segal, Tulips Portrayed: The Tulip Trade in Holland in the Seventeenth Century (Lisse: Museum voor de Bloembollenstreek, 1992); the latter also includes a useful discussion of what is known about seventeenth-century tulip books.

Monstereul’s eulogy Cited by Segal, Tulips Portrayed, p. 4.

Lobelius The Latinized name of Mathias de l’Obel, whose work on tulips was published in a French herbal of 1581. See Segal, Tulips Portrayed, p. 3.

Varieties of tulip Ibid., p. 4; Murray, “Introduction of the Tulip,” p. 21. These totals exclude Turkish species, which by the eighteenth century numbered more than thirteen hundred by themselves. Early tulip lovers Krelage, Bloemenspeculatie in Nederland, pp. 23–24; Krelage, Drie Eeuwen Bloembollenexport, pp. 6, 17.

The tulip in France Krelage, Bloemenspeculatie in Nederland, p. 29; Munting, Naauwkeurige Beschryving der Aardgewassen, pp. 907–11; Garber, “Tulip-mania,” p. 543. Although dealt with by contemporary garden writers, the history of this early French tulip mania is still obscure and would probably repay some original research.

The rose as empress of the garden Zumthor, Daily Life in Rembrandt’s Holland, p. 49.

The tulip connoisseurs Stadsbibliotheek, Haarlem, Passe, Een Cort Verhael van den Tulipanen, p. 4; Krelage, Drie Eeuwen Bloembollenexport, p. 6.

Paulus van Beresteyn Beresteyn and Hartman, Genealogie van het Geslacht, p. 134.

Jacques de Gheyn Regteren Altena, Jacques de Gheyn, vol. 1, pp. 2–3, 14, 38, 40, 59, 66, 69–70, 131–32, 153.

Guillelmo van de Heuvel Leonhardt, Het Huis Bartolotti, pp. 14–15, 39–40; Israel, Dutch Republic, p. 348.

The Golden Age Price, Culture and Society in the Dutch Republic; Israel, Dutch Republic, pp. 547–91.

Dutch country houses Schama, Embarrassment of Riches, pp. 292–95; Krelage, Bloemenspeculatie, pp. 7, 27–28. Jokes in church Cotterell, Amsterdam, p. 119. The usual fine was six stuivers per joke.

Jacob Cats Schama, Embarrassment of Riches, pp. 211, 293, 437.

Lord Offerbeake’s garden Brereton, Travels in Holland, pp. 44–45.

“All these fools want …” English translation from Segal, Tulips Portrayed, p. 16.

Of de Moufe-schans Hondius, Dapes Inemptae. On the true ownership of the Moufe-schans, which is sometimes incorrectly said to have been Hondius’s own home, see Nieuw Nederlandsch Biographisch Woordenboek, vol. 8, pp. 812–13.

The prince of Orange’s garden Brereton, Travels in Holland, pp. 34–35.


Chapter 8. The Tulip in the Mirror

My discussion of Semper Augustus is based, as all such discussions must be, on the chronicle of Nicolaes Jansz. van Wassenaer. Van Wassenaer, the son of an Amsterdam physician, taught at the Latin School in Haarlem and then in Amsterdam before becoming a professional writer (and part-time physician) after 1612. His chronicle, Historisch Verhael aller Gedencwaerdiger Gheschiedenissen, 5–9 (Amsterdam: Iudocus Hondius and Jan Jansen, 1624–25), which is in general one of the most reliable available, is the principal source of information on the flower.

The passages on the progress of the tulip craze are based as before on the works of Krelage, supplemented by those of Nicolaas Posthumus, “Die speculatie in Tulpen in de Jaren 1636 en 1637,” parts 1–3, Economisch-Historisch Jaarboek 12 (1926), pp. 3–9; 13 (1927), pp. 1–85; 18 (1934), pp. 229–40; and “The Tulip Mania in Holland in the Years 1636 and 1637,” in W. C. Scoville and J. C. LaForce, eds., The Economic Development of Western Europe, vol. 2 (Lexington, Mass., 1969), and Peter Garber, “Tulipmania,” Journal of Political Economy 97 (June 1989), pp. 535–60. Information on Dutch gardens of the period is drawn from Paul Zumthor, Daily Life in Rembrandt’s Holland (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1962), and Simon Schama’s The Embarrassment

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