A tureen on stand

A tureen on stand

An oval-shaped silver tureen on stand in Louis XVI style. The lid of the tureen is crowned with a pomegranate, encircled by a meander border and egg-and-dart molding. The body of the tureen is decorated at the top with a band of long, pointed leaves. At the short ends appear lion or tiger heads holding laurel wreaths in their mouths, while on the long sides runs a draped garland with a central profile portrait medallion. Beneath this the body tapers down toward the foot, which is encircled by fluting. Around the base runs a laurel wreath. The accompanying stand has a smooth interior and ribbed outer edge. Engraved on the underside of the stand is the following text:

In commemoration of the renewed Psalm and Hymn versification, introduced on the 2nd of January 1780 in the Lutheran Congregation at Amsterdam, the great Assembly of Elders caused this to be made for Mr. P.W. VAN LANKEREN, one of the deputies in this matter.

The Lutheran Church in Amsterdam
The engraved inscription on the underside of the stand offers a rare glimpse into the history behind this silver table set. It tells us that the tureen and stand were made as a gift within the Amsterdam Lutheran congregation. This community was founded at the end of the sixteenth century by Lutherans who had fled Antwerp. Because of its rapid growth, the community eventually built the iconic Old Lutheran Church and the Round Lutheran Church, both located on the Singel canal. When this silver set was made at the end of the eighteenth century, as much as one-sixth of Amsterdam’s population was Lutheran—more than 33,000 inhabitants.

A New Hymnbook

Music played an important role within the Lutheran church. The community published hymnbooks in which the texts, and sometimes also the notes or melodies, of psalms and songs sung in church were recorded. For a long time, the old versifications and texts of 1579 were in use, which kept the Amsterdam Lutherans close to the origins of their church. Over a century later, in 1687, the church introduced a new hymnbook with updated texts that reflected contemporary spirit.
The tureen and stand are a beautiful, tangible document of yet another such renewal of the official hymnbooks. In the second half of the eighteenth century, it was thought that the Dutch language had become more civilised over time. The old versifications in the community’s hymnbook were therefore seen as outdated and in need of modernization. The entire process that followed is carefully recorded in the hymnbooks published from 1780 onward.
To create new versifications, the large consistory—the church’s main assembly—appointed in 1770 a small committee consisting of two experienced preachers and two so called ‘elders’. Elders were affluent men who served as cultural guardians within community life and took on supporting tasks. Initially, the deputies had great difficulty with the new versifications, and it was only after several years—when they enlisted the help of renowned poets such as Nicolaas Beets and Jan Jakob Lodewijk ten Kate—that the project gained momentum. Ultimately, the definitive version of the modernized hymnbook was approved by the large consistory in December 1778, more than eight years after the project began. Once enough books had been printed for the entire congregation, the new versifications were officially introduced and used in services from January 2, 1780. This special occasion was commemorated with the silver tureen and stand, as the inscription beneath the stand makes clear. As a token of gratitude for his dedication, the elders presented the set to their chairman, Pieter Willem van Lankeren, who from 1773 had been one of the four deputies. It is likely that the other three deputies received similar gifts.

Pieter Willem van Lankeren – Recipient of the Silver Set

Beyond his active and prominent role in the Amsterdam Lutheran congregation, Van Lankeren was also an art lover. Around 1775, he commissioned Jurriaen Andriessen, the most important Dutch decorative painter of his time, to paint wall hangings in his house at Oudezijds Voorburgwal 183. This indicates that Van Lankeren must have valued the tureen and stand not only as recognition of his service to the church but also on an artistic level. His family cherished the silver set as well. In 1880, great-great-grandson Dirk van Lankeren Mathes proudly lent the pieces for the Exhibition of Artworks of Earlier Times in Precious Metals at Arti et Amicitiae in Amsterdam. This was one of the first major and comprehensive Dutch exhibitions to focus on silver.
As the son of a Zeeland mayor, Pieter Willem van Lankeren came from an affluent background. Having lost his parents early, he moved to Amsterdam, where over the years he built a successful career as a merchant and shipowner. He launched several WIC (Dutch West India Company) ships and traded in linen, sugar, coffee, hides, and rice. The prominent Amsterdammer was also connected to many civic organizations. He served as director of the Society for the Rescue of the Drowning, among others. His loyal membership in the Patriotic Society, his directorship of the Amsterdam branch of the Economic Society, and his board role in the Amsterdam department of the National Fund show that Van Lankeren strongly embraced the ideals of patriotism.

This political vision is incompatible with his apparent sympathies for the dogmatic, conservative faction within the Amsterdam Lutheran congregation. After a long struggle for influence, this school split off in 1791 from the more progressive majority of the Lutheran church, which focused on the virtuous life of rational man rather than the traditional glorification of Christ. The splinter congregation received a great deal of support in Amsterdam from the royalist or Orangist camp, whose ideology was diametrically opposed to Van Lankeren’s patriotic vision. Nevertheless, his voting behaviour in various church meetings shows that Van Lankeren regularly chose the orthodox side.
Despite his affinity for the conservative school, it is not obvious that Van Lankeren ultimately left the old community and joined the splintered Restored
Evangelical Lutheran Church. After all, on 30 March 1806, he was buried in the Old Lutheran Church in Amsterdam, which was still used by the original community. The
fact that Van Lankeren had his own burial vault in the community’s most important church shows the great reputation he had built up over the years among the Amsterdam Lutherans. Cornelis Rudolf Stolting, the silversmith who made the tureen and stand, was likely acquainted with his Lutheran patrons, as he and his wife were also members of the Amsterdam Lutheran church.