Amsterdam Royal Palace
Koninklijk Paleis
August 14

The Royal Palace in Amsterdam is described in one tourist guide as "supposedly open to the public but don't count on it". So when we heard it would be open on Sunday we expected to wait in a long line to see it. We weren't disappointed, with the line or with the building itself. No, the picture below doesn't show the line, it shows the carnival that was in Dam Square (that's part of the Dam to the right).

The palace was built from 1648 through 1662 as the city hall when Amsterdam was the richest city in the world. The halls are entirely marble floors and walls with ceiling paintings which are now too dark to see clearly.

It became the "Royal Palace" when Louis Napoleon took it as his home after he was appointed King by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1808. During WWII all of the furniture was removed and the government pretended it was being renovated and had no heat - which kept the Germans from using it as their headquarters. Interestingly some Jews were successfully hidden in the Palace during the war.

Each room of the 1st floor was devoted to one branch of government and the reliefs and statuary outside each door reflect the purpose of the room. The main hall has the Four Winds and the Four Seasons on the walls and maps of the world and the sky inlayed in the floor.

Over the door of the Commissioners for Petty Affairs (Small Claims Court)
kids and chickens squabble.

Over the Treasury fishes and horns of cornucopia.

Over the Bankruptcy office Icarus falls in flames and rats chew at a money chest.

And over the doors of the Orphans office weeping children,
military helmets, wolves, and skulls.

And a large statuary group surrounds the Court of High Justice where women hide their
faces in shame (nope, not headaches) and King Solomon delivers judgments.

The goddess Cybele was the symbol of Amsterdam.
She wears a crown of turreted protective walls.

There are also some artifacts laying around like old treasury boxes and armor.