Celebrate 400 years of Dutch history in America at the New Netherland Seminar

“1614” will commemorate the 400th anniversary of the construction of Fort Nassau on Castle Island in the port of Albany. It will feature five speakers: Jeremy Bangs, Director of the Leiden American Pilgrim Museum Foundation, Leiden NL; Leslie Choquette, Professor of History Assumption College, Worcester, MA; Willem Frijhoff, consultant on research in history, chair Cultural Dynamics (NWO), visiting professor at Erasmus University Rotterdam, NL; William A. Starna, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at the State University of New York College at Oneonta; and Len Tantillo, historical and marine artist, Nassau, NY. These speakers will place the Dutch trading post in its historical context as well as offer arguments for its probable location on the island.

A special presentation by Dutch archaeologists Oscar Hefting, Project Coordinator of the Atlas of Dutch Brazil for the New Holland Foundation, and Hans van Westing, Project Manager for Foundation Archaeology & Monuments for the New Holland Foundation, will feature recent archaeological investigations into 17th-century Dutch earthen defense works at the site of New Holland in tropical Brazil and the insights they may provide into similar structures in North America.

Celebrate 400 years of Dutch history in America and find out who really settled America at the Annual New Netherland Seminar in Albany, New York on Saturday 20, 2014. Scholars from the Netherlands and the United States will discuss historical and archeological evidence of the 17th century Dutch settlement of North America. Topics include Dutch affairs and Native Americans, relations between the Dutch and their French and English neighbors in the New World, and historical evidence of the location and appearance of the Dutch trading post of Fort Nassau.

This is the 37th New Netherland Seminar. The first Rensselaerswijck Seminar was held by the New Netherland Project in 1979. The Project was five years old. Without secure funding, it was imperiled by sporadic support and low visibility. It needed to go public. The Seminar was one step to spread the word about its work and about New Netherland in general.

For more information please visit the New Netherland Insitute website.