Amsterdam · Europe

Overview

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Amsterdam has as many facets as a 40-carat diamond polished by one of the city''''s gem cutters: the capital, and spiritual "downtown," of a nation ingrained with the principles of tolerance; a veritable Babylon of old-world charm; a font for homegrown geniuses such as Rembrandt and Van Gogh; a cornucopia bursting with parrot tulips and other greener -- more potent -- blooms; and a unified social zone that takes in cozy bars, archetypal "brown" cafés, and outdoor markets. While impressive gabled houses bear witness to the Golden Age of the 17th century, their upside-down images reflected in the waters of the city''''s canals symbolize and magnify the contradictions within the broader Dutch society. With a mere 730,000 friendly souls and with almost everything a scant 10-minute bike ride away, Amsterdam is actually like a village that happens to pack the cultural wallop of a megalopolis.

Set on 160 man-made canals (stretching 75 km [50 mi]), Amsterdam also has the largest historical inner city in Europe. The French writer J-K Huysmans once called Amsterdam "a dream, an orgy of houses and water." It''''s true: when compared with other major European cities, this one is uniquely defined by houses, rather than palaces, estates, and other aristocratic folderol. Most of the 7,000 registered monuments here began as residences and warehouses of humble merchants.

Like the canals'''' waters, the city''''s historical evolution has followed a cyclical pattern of down spins and upswings. Amsterdam''''s official voyage toward global domination began in 1275, when Floris V, count of Holland, decreed that the fledgling settlement would be exempt from paying tolls. Consequently, the community, thencalled Aemstelredamme, was soon taking in tons of beer from Hamburg, along with a lot of thirsty settlers. The beer profits opened up other fields of endeavor, and by the 17th century, Amsterdam had become the richest and most powerful city in the world. It had also produced the world''''s first-ever multinational company: the East India Company (VOC), which shipped spices, among other goods, between Asia and Europe. The VOC''''s massive profits led directly to Amsterdam''''s Golden Age, when it was called, in Voltaire''''s words, "the storage depot of the world."

No doubt, this "embarrassment of riches" affected the character of the city. While the rest of Europe still felt it necessary to uphold the medieval tags of "honor" and "heroism," Amsterdam had the luxury of focusing just on money -- and the consequent liberty it created. French historian Henri Mechoulan once said, "Amsterdam must be regarded as the cradle of freedom" -- and it''''s certainly no coincidence that the city is where the noted 16th-century political thinker John Locke wrote his Epistula de Tolerantia, where 17th-century scientist Jan Swammerdam laid the foundations of entomology, where philosophers like Spinoza and Descartes could propound controversial world views, and where architects like Hendrick de Keyser, Joseph van Campen, and Daniel Stalpaert could pursue their own visions of the ideal.

Amsterdammers'''' business sense also led, in turn, to a broad tolerance for people of diverse cultures and religions. The onset of a second goldenish age in the late 19th century, through an escalation of Indonesian profits, the discovery of diamonds in South Africa, and the opening of the North Sea Channel, resulted in a doubling of the population.Then, with the post-World War II boom, another wave of immigrants, now from the former colonies of Indonesia, Suriname, and the Antilles as well as "guest workers" from Morocco and Turkey, thronged in.

Today, Amsterdam bills itself as the business "Gateway to Europe." Hundreds of foreign companies have established headquarters here to take advantage of the city''''s central location in the European Union. The city is consequently hastening to upgrade its infrastructure and to create new cityscapes to lure photographers away from the diversions of the infamous Red Light District. For example, the Eastern Docklands -- once a bastion for squatters attracted to its abandoned warehouses -- has recently been transformed into a new hub of culture focused around the boardwalk, the reinvented Hotel Lloyd, and the acoustically perfect Muziekgebouw.

Still, it will take Amsterdam time to fully erase more than eight centuries of spicy, erratic history: Anabaptists running naked in the name of religious fervor in 1535; suicides after the 1730s crash of the tulip-bulb market; riots galore, from the Eel Riot of the 1880s to the squatter riots 100 years later; jazz trumpeter Chet Baker''''s swan dive from a hotel room window in 1988. Today, the city''''s love of debauchery is still on display during the festival of Queen''''s Day, when it transforms itself into a remarkably credible depiction of the Fall of Rome. And endless debates -- about sin, students, gayness, sex and drugs, even, yes, about coffee shops -- keep the boisterous, colorful attitude of the place intact.