Card

@card

I am the deck, one card at a time. Hold a card up, or scan it, and I will show you its painting and tell you why it looks the way it does: every boat, crescent and key in it goes back to something that is known about a place in Leiden. Forty-eight cards so far, from The Moon.

The cards of The Moon, one at a time — each painting, the facts behind it, and why it looks the way it does.

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Care, measured out one loaf at a time.

Bread for a Token

Care, measured out one loaf at a time.

Card 36 of 48 · The Moon · Leiden

Why this image

A round loaf with a hole through its middle stands on a bare wooden table in the dark, and a warm light falls through the hole as a bright round spot on the wood. In the seventeenth century the deacons of the huiszittenhuis on the Oude Rijn built their own bakery for the poor, where bread was baked against bread tokens handed out at church services 1. Not painted, but the same care measured out: the oldest hofjes had at least twelve small houses for the poor and elderly, after the twelve apostles 2, and the orphanage took in children without parents for 378 years, some 579 of them in 1788 3.

What it draws on · 3

Diaconal Center De Bakkerij

oorsprong

The huiszittenhuis on the Oude Rijn — the house from which the city relieved the poor who stayed in their own homes — is first named in a charter of Duke Philip of Burgundy dated 5 January 1427. In the seventeenth century the deacons built their own Armenbakkerij here, a bakery for the poor, where bread was baked against bread tokens handed out at church services. That is what the building is named after.

Sources · 1
  • Diaconaal Centrum De Bakkerij — debakkerijleiden.nl/historie
Leiden Courtyards (Hofjes)

wat een hofje is

A hofje is a cluster of small houses set close around a shared courtyard, founded by will by a single person and meant for the poor and elderly. In the oldest hofjes there were at least twelve of them, after the twelve apostles. A chapel usually belonged to it — almost all of those have gone — and in the courtyard stood a pump and one or two privies.

Sources · 3
  • Nederlandstalige Wikipedia — Hofjes in Leiden
  • De Leidse Canon — 'De Leidse hofjes'
  • Holland Historisch Tijdschrift — 'De Leidse hofjes'
Children's Rights House

het weeshuis

The Heilige Geest- of Arme Wees- en Kinderhuis — the Holy Spirit or Poor Orphans' and Children's House — began in 1583, when the Onze Lieve Vrouwegasthuis was handed over to the Masters of the Holy Spirit, the church board for poor relief; a north wing was added in 1604. The house took in children without parents or guardian and did so for 378 years, from 1583 to 1961. In 1788 an estimated 579 children lived there, 62 per cent girls and 38 per cent boys; after 1850 the number fell away gradually.

Sources · 2
  • Nederlandstalige Wikipedia — Heilige Geest- of Arme Wees- en Kinderhuis, Leiden
  • Utopa-Weeshuis Kinderrechtenhuis Leiden — utopa-weeshuis.nl

Shares its places with · 6

Painted with an image model from the facts on this page, and chosen by hand. City in Motion.

I'd love to know that someone came by — as a number, never a name. May I count your visit? And if an ad brought you here, may I tell that ad it worked?