String Of Butterflies: Maastricht, Netherlands!

Saturday 3/30/13

I'm being spoiled this weekend, yesterday was the Roman ruins, tomorrow will be rock climbing, and today is Maastricht, Netherlands (http://www.vvvmaastricht.nl/home.html). This is the 4th blog post of today, so if you're visiting the blog infrequently, read on below this one, as I'm writing each day separately. Again I'm traveling with Katia, as we make great partners in crime. Beware of photo overload on this post.

Maastricht is a shoppers paradise, they have outlets and every other store you can imagine. So goals for the day- visit the city, shop, and take a walking tour. "The guide will lead you to the most beautiful spots in the historic centre, including the Stokstraat district, the Onze Lieve Vrouweplein square and basilica, the town ramparts, the parks, the Jeker district, and the Vrijthof with the monumental St. Janskerk (Church of St. John) and the St. Servaas Basiliek (Basilica of St. Servatius)."

So the few shopping trips I will regale you with before I get to the really good stories from the tour are as follows: Crossing the main bridge in Maastricht is the district where most of the locals shop, and you can't go to the Netherlands without at least trying/buying some cheese. I got this herb gouda cheese that is so fantastic, I wish I could find it everywhere. What's a little cheese without some chocolate? Maastricht has been ruled by the Germans, Belgians, and lastly the Netherlands. The city mostly aligns itself in mentality with the Belgians, even though they are part of the Netherlands. Therefore, I was able to get some Belgian chocolate....mmmmmmm.....

Now for the tour. Our tour guide was Dorry, he said his name probably came from Theodore, which was his grandfather's name- a random tidbit, I know. The city walls used to be in the shape of a star, there were canons on the inward and outward tips of the star for defense. This city is a strategic point for many countries as it's on the river and those who control it, also can control the Netherlands and shipping traffic. The current main bridge of Maastricht is built over the one from the Middle Ages, which was the 4th installment of the bridge, so the bridge itself dates back to ~1300. The Romans had their bridge several meters down from the current bridge, and it's commemorated with a statue at that point. The exact point was determined only in the 90's when they were dredging the sediment from the river and found it. The city has many underground passageways, mostly from Roman times, that were subsequently used during the various wars to evade various factions.

businesses by the river

Katia

The main bridge in Maastrict

The city was unique, to quote Wikipedia: "Shortly after 1200 the city received dual authority, with the prince-bishops of Liège and the dukes of Brabant holding joint sovereignty over the city." This meant that depending on what part of the city you were in, and who you owed your loyalty to, determined who ruled you/ issued punishments to you. In the courthouse basement, everyone was deemed guilty, if you plead innocent, they would torture you until you switched to guilty, proving the rulers that they were right in believing you to be guilty in the first place. Some of the new architecture such as the new 'city hall' plays homage to this duality in rulers, with twin spirals.


City hall/court- now it's the current visitors center

For a long time the streets were not named, but known for who was on the street/ what business was on the street. They would also steal facades from other buildings when the current ones would begin to crumble. The homes also had the date that they were built etched cleverly in them, and often times the etcher was illiterate and additions to the original words were added. If you look closely below, a 'R' was added to the date. Any capital letter was a Roman numeral for the date the building was made.

Cow symbol for a butcher shop


Street name w/ the butcher's shop was "Koestass"=cow street

We also found a bakery that Katia had been looking for called Bisschopsmolen, (http://www.bisschopsmolen.nl/), we later came back for vlaaien (Dutch for pies), and enjoyed apple nut pie with coffee. So delicious. The Dutch are not known for their baking (in fact most consider it inedible at times, and not up to par with their neighboring countries). So this one is a delightful outlier to the norm. This bakery's history is that the original owner long ago owed a debt to the Bishop, and he used the mill as collateral, he died before the debt was paid, and so it became the Bishop's property, so now the name of the bakery and mill is Bisschopsmolen in memory of its history.

We also passed the Ave Maria church, which was the peoples church, and when there was war or any other chaos occurring, everyone would flock/hide there for protection. The windows in the church are made of thin marble.

We also passed a former brothel (back several centuries), and the story goes if a customer tried to escape without paying, the women would throw flower pots at him. The windows hold the same number of pots, so you could imagine how many women lived there and how one of them would get the escapee.

The walls of the city were built in two separate times, and they are actually lower in the ground than what you can see from the surface, because one was built in Roman times, and layers of filth and grime made the street level rise over the centuries. The second expansion wall was built because the city was getting overcrowded and is of a slightly different style. Unfortunately, shorty after the construction was completed, the expansion wasn't needed as the plague rolled through the city.

Where the old wall (right) meets the new wall (left)

One of the architects payed homage to the wall and Roman times with an interesting window into an office building. During the week you can go into the inner gardens and look at the lower half of the wall beneath the ground.

One of the University's new libraries has an amazing entrance to it. Nearby is a cool outdoor cafe that would be lovely in springtime.

Other treasures include St. Janskerk (Church of St. John) and the St. Servaas Basiliek (Basilica of St. Servatius). The Catholic church was built first for the local cannons who owned it. Later the Protestant church was built next door for the common people, and there is a small road between them, which is named 'purgatory.' The Protestant church is painted red to protect the limestone walls, and the red paint used to be ox blood.

Now, the tour is complete, but my story isn't. What things do I love the most (Ok almost the most)? Bookstores! The churches in the Netherlands have fallen on hard times. One such church was converted into a bookstore, which paid homage to the church, but the place had an amazing atmosphere. At the nave of the church is a cafe. I could probably wander through the place all day! More information can be found here: (http://inhabitat.com/gorgeous-church-renovated-into-modern-bookstore/selexyz-domincan-church-maastricht/)