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Russia in Dutch cartography
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To the foremost Dutch cartographers in the 17th century belonged the family Blaeu, three generations, manufacturing maps and atlases in Amsterdam. Wladimiroff refers to the Atlantis Appendix of Willem Blaeu with maps of Moscow and the Kremlin, made around 1630. He says: “ The source of that map of Moscow was to all probability the ….inset map of tsar Boris Godounov….The plan of the Kremlin is without doubt from Russian origin and had been possibly taken along by Massa”(6). These maps were in 1665 also published in the Atlas Major by his son Joan Blaeu, with for the Kremlin extensive explanation. Very interesting is in this atlas the river chart of the Volga. This map was based on a chart, made by the German Adam Olearius, who in 1633 paid a visit to Russia as member of an embassy sent by the duke of Holstein to the tsar. A few years later he organized an expedition to the South East in the direction of Persia in order to trade with that country. Due to a bad preparation this enterprise failed(7). Wladimiroff mentions the cooperation between Olearius and a certain Cornelis Kluyting, a Dutchman. In 1636 Kluyting got permission from tsar Michaïl to act as a pilot on the ship that carried Olearius across the Volga to the Caspian Sea. Kluyting was not only a sailor, but also a technician. He assisted Olearius in mapping the Volga and its estuary into the Caspian. Later, in 1658, only after the publication of Olearius’s diary in the Republic, the cartographer Jan Jansz. Janssonius edited Nova et Accurata Wolgae fluminis, olm Rha dicti delineation Auctore Adamo Oleario (a new and accurate map of the river Volga, of old called the Rha, by the hand of Adam Olearius). The same map was published in the Atlas Major and used for corrections by Nicolaes Witsen on his journey to Moscovia.
The next person that appears in Wladimiroff ‘s description of important Dutch maps of Russia is Jan Struys. “Under the command of Butler and skipper Lambert Jacobsz. Struys (she) sailed.across the Volga and the Caspian Sea in the direction of Persia. Along the way, however, the Orel, near Astrachan, was taken by the rebel leader Stenka Razin. Struys got into captivity, but escaped later”(8). Here Wladimiroff was somewhat inaccurate: the crew of the Orel was partly inside Astrachan where she was taken prisoner by Razin during the capture of the city. Some tried to escape before the final attack of the Cossacks on the city. The Orel deprived of heir cannons laid defenceless on the quayside and got destructed – at which moment exact is not known (9).
Annex to Struys’s travel report was a Zee Kaert Verthonende de Kaspische Zee (sea chart showing the Caspian Sea) (10).
Witsen
Nicolaes Witsen made his personal acquaintance with Russia through his voyage to Moscow in 1664 and 1665. His Diary shows how greatly that country had him impressed. In Moscow he was able to make a lot of observations: about the looks and behaviour of tsar Aleksej and the common people, the appearance of the Kremlin, the housing, the religion and the administration of the law. Witsen was assisted by Andrej Winius, his second cousin, interpreter for the tsar and member of the posolskij prikaz. However, in his diary Witsen never mentions his name, but only refers to a friend who was very helpful to him. The leader of the Dutch embassy, Boreel, records several occasions where Winius acted as interpreter (11).
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After his return to Amsterdam, Witsen stayed the rest of his life interested in Russia, not only in political and economic matters, but also in the geography in that country. First, he made, following many others of his class, a grand tour through Europe: he visited Paris, Lyon, Milan, Florence and Rome. He returned via France and Cologne. After the death of his father Cornelis in 1669, Witsen was obliged to gain – in the tradition of his family - his own position in the city administration of Amsterdam. In 1672, the Dutch Year of Wonders, he was put in charge of the defence of the city during the invasion of the French and two German bishops. Somewhat later he became one of the mayors and assisted in 1688 and 1689 politically stadtholder William III in his Glorious Revolution in England (12).
Besides his work as administrator of Amsterdam. Nicolaes Witsen spent a lot of time on his investigations. The books published by him give some evidence of his exertions. The first of them, Aeloude en Hedendaegsch(z)e Scheepsbouw en Bestier (Old and Present Shipbuilding and Steering) appeared in 1671. The price of the book was 12 guilders, a considerable amount. In his foreword Witsen utters his amazement that no earlier book on ships and their equipment had been published in his maritime country. The Scheepsbouw en Bestier was a rather popular work; “from Sweden to Italy and from Moscovia to Batavia one could find copies in the libraries of wealthy scholars, notwithstanding the fact that the work was written in the Dutch language. Proof for the popularity turns up from the letters of the German savant Gottfried Leibniz and from the well-known diplomat and poet Constantijn Huygens who evoked the interest of the English king Charles II.- for us a remarkable fact; in that time a full war was going on between England and the Dutch Republic.(13 There was some criticism on several passages in the book. In his description of the battle between the Dutch and the Swedes in the Oresund (1658), Witsen stated that the Swedish admiral, count Karl Gustav Wrangel had deserted the battle because he was hit by a bullet in his jaw “however his ship was named the Victoria ”. Wrangel, in possession of the Scheepsbouw and Bestier was furious, because his ship was so damaged that he was not able to continue the fighting, In a letter, he complained to Witsen, with result. The author changed some pages: he named Wrangel manhaft (brave) and his son who was killed in that battle a hero. In reaction thereupon Wrangel called Witsen an honnête home (14)
In a short time, the book was a antiquarian rarity. In 1690 a second appeared edited by the firm Pieter and Joan Blaeu, a fact that was only discovered in the beginning of the 20th century. Wladimiroff is very restricted on Scheepsbouw en Bestier. Marion Peters, on the other hand, introduces in her The wijze koopman (see n.13) a lot of sketches of ship types – mostly made by Nicolaes Witsen himself. This goes for Dutch and foreign vessels alike. The edition of 1690 contains the Russisch-Vaar-tuigh (Russian vessel),a special and new part of chapter 16 of part 1 with 7 images of Russian ships - made by anonymous artists.(15 Witsen had collected a lot of Russian materials and illustrations for his Noord en Oost Tartarije (North and East Tartary), published in 1692, second edition in 1705 and long after his death in 1785.
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A new edition of Noord en Oost Tartarije is forthcoming, so I restrict myself to some cartography in his work. Already, during his visit to Moscow, Witsen had a conversation with Gerrit Kluyting about the geography of the Caspian Sea and the surrounding area’s. Witsen was allowed the make a copy of the map of the Caspian region made by Kluyting’s brother Cornelis. Later, he inserted this map in his Diary and became known as the Het Caspise Meer....Na de origineele Teeckningh, in Mosco afgemaeckt. Ao 1665. Nicolaus Witsen (The Caspian Lake….After the original drawing, in Moscow copied. In the year 1665. Nicola u s Witsen (16).
Wladimiroff enumerates a number of maps in both the editions of Noord en Oost Tartarije. Several of them were designed by Witsen himself, other were copies from already existing charts – sometimes mistakenly attributed to himself. In this respect is map 3 important: Het suydelykste gedeelte van de Vliet Wolga in Kaert gebragt volgens de jongste verbeteringe van den Heer E.Kempfer, uit de miswysinge van’t Compas en andersints gerigt, door N.Witsen, Cons.Amst. MDCXCVII. (The most southern part of the river Volga, mapped according to the most recent improvements of mr. E.Kaempfer, as consequence of the false indications of the compass, and (therefore) directed in another direction, by N.Witsen, mayor of Amsterdam, 1697. This means that this map was not taken down in the first edition of 1692. This Kaempfer, a German, medic and collector, was secretary to the Swedish envoy Lodewijk Fabricius, from birth a Dutchman, who travelled in 1683 through Russia to the Sjah of Persia in Isfahan. He was a friend of Witsen’s. “Under the authority Kaempfer worked as a correspondent for Witsen” (17).
Another map – not in the first edition – is Nieuwe kaert vande omtrek der Swarte Zee uyt verscheydene stucken van die gewesten toegezonden, ontworpen door N.Witsen, Cons:Amste. MDCXCVII. (A new map of the outline of the Black Sea, sent from various parts of those regions, designed by N.Witsen, mayor of Amsterdam.!697. Wladimiroff sees a similarity with older Italian maps. In 1723 made the Amsterdam publishers Ottens a copy of Witsen’s map (18).
In the first edition one can find Palus Maeotis, in kaartgebragt door N.Witsen, MDCXC. (The sea of Azov, charted by N.Witsen, 1690. The name Palus Maeotis is derived from Ptolemaeus. The exact source is not known; there are many examples for this map.(19
Winius
Cousin and one of the dearest friends of Nicolaes Witsen in Russia was Andrej Andrejevitsj Winius. He, the son of the Dutch merchant in Russia and therefore because of his knowledge of the Dutch language, was acting as interpreter for the tsar. So he came in contact with foreign diplomats. In 1665 he met Witsen. Working as an interpreter brought Winius also in contact with the Dutch shipbuilders in Dedilovo on the Oka that were constructing two vessels for sailing the Volga and the Caspian Sea. Wladimiroff speaks about a frigate, but the greatest of the two was probably a pinas. On this way, the Russians hoped to control the profitable trade with Persia. The Dutch gostj Jan van Sweeden advised the tsar to hire a Dutch crew. First, he got the commitment of the General States of the Republic, thereafter, captain David Butler – a Dutchman – was sent to Amsterdam, where he recruited 15 artisans and sailors (20).
After 1689, the year in which Peter became the actual ruler of Russia, Winius became one of the intimates of the tsar. He was nominated as postmaster-general and got in correspondence with the tsar about things like shipbuilding, the war in the Southern Netherlands against the French where Witsen was active as delegate of the States and about a big fire in the main iron foundry in Sweden – important for the production of cannon for France. Witsen was the source of this topic. The embassy of tsar Peter to West Europe was announced in the end of 1696; Winius should stay in Moscow for reason of communication with Peter. Wladimiroff mentions a letter from Peter, written in Riga, to Winius: “....keep this letter above a fire – it is written in invisible ink – and you can read it….But to avoid suspicion, I shall write on the same paper with normal ink”(21).
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Winius’s relations with Witsen were intensified by his cartographic activities. Around 1689 Andrej Winius drew a map of Siberia on base of sketches of the road from Moscow to Peking made by the envoy Nicolae Spathary-Milescu, who travelled in 1675 on behalf of tsar Fjodor to the emperor of China. In 1695 Winius became head of the Sibirskij prikaz. As such, he had to accomplish his charting of the vast space of Siberia. The goal was in the first place an economic. The opening up was meant for indicating new roads that were suitable for trade with adjacent countries and for defining the border regions. In the chart-room of the Sibirskij prikaz in Moscow were besides maps of Siberia the most famous atlases available, Ortelius, Mercator and Blaeu. Winius worked together with the cartographers Remezov, father Uljan and sons Leontij and Semjon (22). In 1701 Winius and Semjon Remezov published their Tsjertjoznaja Kniga Sibiri – two of the copies are known with the Dutch title Caertboek van Siberië. One came in the Netherlands and was named in the legacy of Nicolaes Witsen. After the auction in 1761 of the books of Witsen, during which the book was described as Een vertaling (translation) van het Groot Sibirs Caartboek; the atlas have not been heard of since. The second copy lies in the Public Library in Moscow (23). One can assume that a lot of data and peculiarities on Siberia were borrowed by Witsen from Winius for his second edition of Noord en Oosr Tartarije in 1705.
In 1703 Andrej Winius lost for what reasons the grace of tsar Peter. Relations between Witsen and Winius remained good. Proof of that fact one can find in letters that Witsen wrote to Winius. Also gifts bear witness of their mutual cordiality. A example of this concerns Reizen over Moskovië door Perzië en Indië, verrykt met 300 konstplaten.... (Travels over Muscovy through Persia and India, enriched with 300 artificial plates), Amsterdam 1711 of Cornelis de Bruyn (1652 – 1726/1727. This work was completed in cooperation with Nicolaes Witsen. Around 1712 Witsen presented this book to Winius. Notable to say that in 1722 the editor Gerard van Keulen copied the “Panorama of Astrachan” of de Bruyn as illustration to his Nieuwe Caart van de Caspische Zee.... (New map of the Caspian Sea), mainly based on the map of Jan Struys (24).
Marion Peters mentions that Winius stayed in Amsterdam from 1706 till 1708. According to Witsen’s friend Gijsbert Cuper, mayor of the city of Deventer who visited Witsen in 1711, Winius fled to Amsterdam “three or four years ago” after losing all his estates and dignities. Witsen wrote a letter to the tsar and Mensjikov and his intervention had “un tres bon effet”. Winius got mercy and received his confiscated estates (25).
Around 1709, tsar Peter gave his ambassador in the Dutch Republic, Andrej Artamonovitsj Matvejev assignment to order the newest map of Russia, made by the Frenchman Guillaume de L’Isle. In that period, the Amsterdam publishers Jean Covens and Corneille Mortier revealed his Carte de Moscovie, consisting of two parts. This was a sign of the decreasing influence of Witsen and Winius for the cartography of Russia. Another signal was Matvejev’s assignment to explore the possibility of printing a new atlas consisting of 80 maps of all empires of Russia, replacing the Atlas Major made 50 years earlier by Blaeu. The project never came to existence, probably because the Russian authorities supposed the costs too high (26).
Finally
“There is no doubt that Nicolaes Witsen and Andrei Winius have worked together”. Wladimiroff sees as the main obstruction to this observation that they kept their cooperation secret by not mentioning each other’s names in their letters till the reforms and openness of tsar Peter. Before that, Witsen was surely dependent on Winius for preparing his maps on Russia and in particular Siberia and his Noord en Oost Tartarije. The data on Siberia were kept secret – by naming Winius as his source, Witsen could ruin him (27). The friendship between the two men was solid).
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