Description
Albertus Jacobus MEIJER (d. 1894).
Amsterdam: Lith: Faddegon & Co., 1885.
Paramaribo, the capital of Suriname, is located on the western bank of the Suriname River, near its outlet into the Atlantic. It was first established as a Dutch trading post in 1613; however, it did not start to form into a proper town until after Suriname came securely under Dutch rule in 1667, following a period of English control. The town, which developed upon a gridded street plan, became a very prosperous and busy mart of commerce, serving the colony’s vast sugar estates, which were built upon the back of enslaved African labour.
Despite Paramaribo’s importance as Suriname’s economic and administrative centre, for generations, it remained a relatively small town, as the colony was overwhelmingly rural in nature. However, that began to change after 1873, when slavery was finally phased out in Suriname. This momentous event led to the mass migration of emancipated slaves into Paramaribo, searching for employment. In the first decade after emancipation, Paramaribo’s population grew from roughly 18,000 to 24,500 (and would reach 32,000 by 1900). From another perspective, in 1873 there were 1,955 houses counted in Paramaribo, while by 1900 there were 2,800 houses.
The rapid post-emaciation growth of Paramaribo caused denser habitation in the established city, while urban expansion spilled into the neighbouring plantages (plantations), creating new suburbs. Up to that point, Paramaribo had no formal system for locating or designating properties. When the town was smaller and slow growing this was not really a problem, as the authorities, and everyone else, knew whose place was whose and who lived or worked where. However, the rapid growth of the town saw matters to become chaotic (i.e., for collecting land taxes, postal delivery, locating private residences and businesses, etc.). As such, a new property-locating system was implemented that would cover all Paramaribo and its suburbs.
From the 1850s to 1870s, a new property-locating system, apparently developed by a mathematician, had been trialled in various metropolitan Dutch cities, including Amsterdam and The Hague. These cities were divided into lettered neighbourhoods, and each property within was given a number (although this did not generally coincide with sequential street numbering). As such, every property in these cities had it own lettered-numbered code, such as ‘A-50’ (meaning Neighbourhood A, Property 50). However, while this system was wonderful for identifying properties on maps, it proved incredibly confusing for people trying to find places in real life, on the ground. As such, the system was eventually abandoned in the Netherlands, and replaced by a system of sequential street numbering, like the kind we have today.
However, as the colonies sometimes followed a bit behind the metropolitan, the described system was implemented in Paramaribo in the early 1880s, just as it was falling out fashion in the Netherlands. As it was, in 1837, the city of Paramaribo proper had been divided into 6 wijk (neighbourhoods), lettered as A, B, C, D, E and F, plus, on the outskirts there were 2 buitenwijk (suburbs), although at that time many of these zones were not yet fully urbanized.
Returning to the early 1880s, within each of these existing neighbourhoods and suburbs all the erven (estates, or properties) were given their own number. Lists defining the neighbourhood designations and the properties within each were published in the local newspapers, naming the owners of each estate.
Enter Albertus Jacobus Meijer and his Masterplan of Paramaribo
While the new property-locating system for Paramaribo was being established, Albertus Jacobus Meijer (d. 1894) was employed as a senior tax official in the city. While not much is known of his biography, we know that he was married in Suriname in 1871, and retired from the tax office in 1892, becoming a paint retailer.
Returning to 1884-5, Meijer, realized that making a cartographic masterplan of Paramaribo depicting the new neighbourhoods and all the letter-number coded properties would be of immense use in assessing and collecting property taxes. Indeed, no map of any kind that could be adapted for that purpose existed, such that he had to essentially start from scratch. Fortunately, Meijer had privileged access to all kinds of official information and manuscript surveys that facilitated the compilation of said masterplan.
In March 1885, Meijer announced in the local newspaper that his “figurative map” of Paramaribo, of 9 sheets, would shortly be published in Amsterdam, with examples to be sent back to Suriname as soon as possible.
The present work represents Meijer’s finished product, the Figuratieve Plattegrond der Stad Paramaribo (Kolonie Suriname, Zuid-Amerika) in 9 Kaarten met een plan der geheele stad op schaal. door A.J. Meyer, Ambtenaar bij de Belastingen (although the tile only appears on the publisher’s original printed wrappers, which are no present here). The work consists of 10 maps (1 double-page map and 9 single-page maps). One of these plates, Plan van Paramaribo, behoorende bij figuratieve kaarten, van 1885. van A.J. Meijer ambt[enaa].r bij de belastingen. [Map of Paramaribo, consisting of figurative maps, of the year 1885. By A.J. Meijer, tax official], is a key map, showcasing all Paramaribo, defining its divisions into the 6 neighbourhoods and 2 suburbs. The map also labels the ‘De geprojecteerde spoorweg naar Saramacca’, being the path of the projected railway entering the city from the northwest from Saramacca, although this project would never be built (instead, the Lawa Railway was built from 1905 to 1912, leaving the city from the southwest, heading towards the goldfields of the deep interior).
The 9 detailed sectional maps, drawn to the ample scale of 1:3,000, each focus upon a specific neighbourhood (wijk) or suburb (buitenwijk). All streets, laneways, canals, parks and the banks of the Suriname River are clearly defined. These include individual maps for the wijks A, B, C, D, E, and F, and three maps for the suburbs, being 1e Buitenwijk (named Combé) and 2 maps covering the geographically large 2e Buitenwijk. Upon each of these maps, hundreds of erven (meaning estates, or, in this case, properties) are numbered according to the new system, while certain large buildings and facilities are outlined and further identified by letters. Upon each map, a selection of important numbered places (ex. schools, hospitals, government offices, military facilities, places of worship, social clubs, commercial enterprises, etc.) is labelled, while all the lettered buildings are likewise listed.
Impresssively, in aggregate, Meijer’s atlas numbers 2,489 properties (1,885 in the city’s 6 neighbourhoods, and 604 in its 2 suburbs), plus outlining and numbering of dozens of key buildings and sites. As such, the atlas provides a highly valuable overview of land use in a bustling West Indian trading port. It also shows the great demographic diversity of Paramaribo, noting Christian sites of various denominations, as well as the centres of its long-standing Jewish community and its burgeoning Chinese population.
Meijer’s work represents by far and away the most detailed mapping of Paramaribo made prior the 20th century and is one of the most detailed plans of any West Indian city from the time before Charles E. Goad’s fire insurance maps of mainly British Caribbean cities, published in the 1890s. If its sectional sheets were to be trimmed and joined, they would form a map, of a highly irregular shape, over 1.5 metre wide.
Dialling down on the 9 individual sectional maps, they are as follows (with the number of properties they identify, while noting some of the most interesting labelled sites) {Please note that in the present example of the atlas the maps have not been bound in the correct order}:
[1].
Wijk A (275 Properties), featuring: 2. Freemasons’ Lodge; 13. Suriname Bank; 44. Colonial Secretariat; 46, Court House; 74. Portuguese Jewish Local Authority; 105. Firehouse; a. Government House c. Colonial Museum; e. Fort Zeelandia; f. Barracks; r. Coffee House; t. Post Office.
[2].
Wijk B (260 Properties), featuring: 2. Hospital; 219. Great Jewish Synagogue; a. location for giving vaccines.
[3].
Wijk C (207 Properties), featuring: c. covered market.
[4].
Wijk D (200 Properties).
[5].
Wijk E (398 Properties), featuring: 72. ‘Kong Ne Tong’, the Chinese Benevolent Society.
[6].
Wijk F, double-page map (545 Properties), featuring: 349. Moravian Brothers Church; 463. Repair Facilities for Steamboats.
[7].
1e Buitenwijk of Combé (253 Properties), featuring: 86. Public Works Department; 353. Coal Depot & Marine Magazine.
[8].
2e Buitenwijk (296 Properties), featuring: 20. Jewish Cemetery [Note: the 2e Buitenwijk is projected on 2 maps, this and the following, due to the suburb’s large size].
[9].
Vervolg van de 2e Buitenwijk (308 Properties, numbered 297-351).
A Note on Rarity
The atlas is exceedingly rare. It seems to have been made in only a very small print run, while the survival rate of the examples sent back to Suriname’s tropical climate would have been very low. We can trace only 2 institutional examples, held by the Leiden University Library and the University of Amsterdam Library.
References: Leiden University Library: M 2009 B 2254; University of Amsterdam Library: Kaartenzl: 108.03.21 (Kaart); OCLC: 71472885; C. KOEMAN, Bibliography of Printed Maps of Suriname 1671-1971 (Amsterdam, 1973), no. 240; F.C. BUBBERMAN, ed. C. KOEMAN, Links with the Past: The History of the Cartography of Suriname, 1500-1971 / Schakels met het verleden: de geschiedenis van de kartografie van Suriname 1500-1971 (Amsterdam, 1973), Map no. 30a; Frederick Miller & Co., Americana: livres et cartes, provenant en partie de la collection d’un ancien ministre aux États-Unis. En vente aux prix marqués (Amsterdam, 1896), no. 1050 (p. 115).
