Auctions at Amsterdam of Northern European Pinewood, 1717–1808

Abstract

The demand for timber in the Netherlands, particularly for use in buildings, ships, and packing (cooperage), has long been met by imports. Domestic pinewood and oak may have retained some significance until the early middle ages, but afterwards imports predominated. Wood came from three major regions: from the Rhine, Main, and Neckar, and initially the Ruhr and around Wesel; from Norway, ‘the Lesser East’ and ‘the Greater East’ (that is, the east and south coasts of the Baltic and the south coast of Finland), the White Sea since the end of the sixteenth century, and Sweden since the nineteenth century; as well as from North America since the nineteenth century. Wood from the Rhineland was conveyed unsawn and afloat until the beginning of this century. Special techniques for floating timber were developed, employing rafts sometimes 25 meters wide and ten times as long.¹ Frequently they had crews of 500 men, many of whom during the nineteenth century emigrated overseas after passing through the Netherlands.² The rafts were dismantled at Dordrecht and Vreeswijk and the logs brought from there to their destinations. Gradually, import of sawn wood began, especially deals (vlotdelen) from the upper Rhineland. Wood from Norway, the Baltic, and the White Sea was generally unsawn; the production of the northern sawing industry, which was already in existence in the seventeenth century, when exported went mostly to England, which soon became its most important market.

This article is a translation of ‘De Amsterdamse veilingen van Noordeuropees naaldhout 1717–1808’, Economisch- en sociaal-historisch jaarboek (The Hague, 1979) 86–114. A diagram with the names and activities of 36 auctioneer broker s from 1710–1808 was included in the original article but has been omitted here. Apart from the literature quoted in this article, the author made use of ‘Grootboek van een Amsterdamse houthandelaar, 1728–9, 1729–31, 1732–3’, Gemeente Archief Amsterdam, nrs. 179, 182, 178; A.J. Alanen, Der Aussenhandel und die Schiffahrt Finnlands im 18. Jahrhundert (Helsinki, 1957); S. Hart, ‘Een bijdrage tot de geschiedenis van de houthandel’, Geschrift engetal (Dordrecht, 1976); S. Kjaerheim, ‘Norwegian timber exports in the 18th century’, The Scandinavian Economic History Review, V, i (Copenhagen, 1957) 188 ff.; L. van Nierop, ‘Uit de bakermat der Amsterdamse handelsstatistiek’, Jaarboek Amstelodamum (1915, 1916, 1917); C.A. Schillemans, ‘De houtveilingen van Zaandam in de jaren 1655–1811’, Economisch-historisch jaarboek (The Hague, 1947); A.M. van der Woude, Het Noorderkwartier (Wageningen, 1972).