One of the best known pictures of the very early Amsterdam is made by the painter Cornelis Anthonieszoon, who was born in 1499 and died in 1556. Emperor Charles V had instructed him to paint the town.
Emperor Charles V
If you go to visit the Amsterdam Historisch Museum you can see the work in all its glory, but the emperor himself never saw it. The painting shows the still small city of Amsterdam seen from the air and is a precursor of today’s aerial photographs.
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