Object data
wood and brass
ship: height 49 cm × length 163.5 cm × width 39.2 cm
ship camels: height 23.5 cm
ship in camels: width 78 cm
anonymous
Model of an East Indiaman in Camels
Amsterdam, Amsterdam, 1742
Inscriptions
- monogram, on the stern: A VOC
- mark: draught marks
Provenance
...; Kamer Amsterdam der Verenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie (Amsterdam Chamber of the Dutch East India Company);1 Departement van Koloniën (Department of the Colonies), The Hague; transferred to the Ministerie van Marine (Department of the Navy), The Hague, 1850;2 transferred to the museum, 1883
Object number: NG-MC-502
Copyright: Public domain
Entry
Wooden frame model of the hull of an East Indiaman in ship camels.
Fourty-eight gun ports are indicated in three tiers. The model has a lower deck, main deck, forecastle and beakhead deck, quarterdeck and poop, all are without planking. The model has a figurehead in the shape of a lion; the port cathead is higher than the starboard one. It has a round tuck with a gun port to port, a hollow counter with two chase ports, a two-storey taffrail with carvings of pilasters, plants and mythological figures (Neptune and Mercury) in the corners, and with the coat of arms of the City of Amsterdam and the Amsterdam chamber of the Dutch East India Company.
The two-storey quarter galleries are decorated with carvings. Below the stern a straight, square-headed rudder with after pieces are specified, and the sweep on the lower deck. The steering wheel is positioned under the poop in front of the mizzen mast. The model is fitted with a mechanical ventilator on the lower deck, double riding bitts, a pump and a galley beneath the forecastle and a capstan and two pumps beneath the quarterdeck. Scuppers are inserted between the frames. The model has two sets of channels rigged with deadeyes, the main and mizzen channels are continuous. The carvel planking is left off to starboard under the wales, revealing frames that consist of nine parts. Inside, the model is berthed up to starboard. To port there is no quick-work and the knees have been left off. The sheer rises towards both ends, the model has two wales. The hull is round. The masts have been sawn off just above the decks. The camels, of which the planking has been left off in order to reveal their interior, have eight flooding compartments divided by three transverse and one longitudinal bulkhead. Each camel has twenty-four pumps, eight cocks for flooding, twenty-seven windlasses with tackles underneath the ship joining both camels, two catheads, one capstan and a rudder.
The model was transferred to the Department of the Navy by the Department for the Colonies in 1850 together with model NG-MC-503.3 Both models were part of the collection of the Amsterdam Chamber of the Dutch East India Company.4 This model probably represents a 150 foot long East Indiaman following a new design by Charles Bentam (?-1758) from 1742, which he made at the request of Guustaaf Willem baron Van Imhoff (1705-1750) and Gerard Arnout Hasselaer (1698-1766).
Scale (estimate) 1:30.
Literature
J.M. Obreen, Catalogus der verzameling modellen van het Departement van Marine, The Hague 1858, nos. 502-503; J.B. Kist, ‘“Methodice en op egualen voet”. Ontwerp en invoering van een nieuw type retourschip van 150 voet door de Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie 1740-1750’, Tijdschrift voor Industriële Archeologie 14 (1985), pp. 9-18; J.B. Kist, ‘Design and Introduction of a New Model East Indiaman of 150 Ft by the United Dutch East India Company’, in Jaarverslag VOC-schip Amsterdam, Amsterdam 1986, pp. 91-97; Aust-Agder-Museet (ed.), Aust-Agder-Arv 1985-86. Årbok for Aust-Agder-Museet og Aust-Agder Arkivet, Arendal 1987, pp. 12-14; A.J. Hoving, ‘Ship Camels and Waterships’, Model Shipwright 76 (1991), pp. 32-36; J.B. Kist, ‘Schepen voor de VOC’, in H. Stevens (ed.), The Art of Technology: The Navy Model Collection in the Amsterdam Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam/Wormer 1995, pp. 20-23; A.A. Lemmers, Techniek op schaal. Modellen en het technologiebeleid van de Marine 1725-1885, Amsterdam 1996, pp. 24, 56, 272-74; R. Daalder and E. Spits, Schepen van de Gouden Eeuw, Zutphen 2005, pp. 83-90; G. Boven and A. Hoving, Scheepskamelen & waterschepen. ‘Eene ellendige talmerij, doch lofflijk middel’, Zutphen 2009, pp. 45-46 (erroneous inv. no. on p. 46); A.J. Hoving, Message in a Model: Stories from the Navy Model Room of the Rijksmuseum, Florence, OR 2013, pp. 50-53, 62-67
Citation
J. van der Vliet, 2016, 'anonymous, Model of an East Indiaman in Camels, Amsterdam, 1742', in J. van der Vliet and A. Lemmers (eds.), Navy Models in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.244315
(accessed 20 September 2024 13:31:21).