Banquet at the Crossbowmen’s Guild in Celebration of the Treaty of Münster

On 18 June 1648 the crossbowmen of Amsterdam's civic guard sat down to a feast in their headquarters on the Singel. The Peace of Münster had been ratified in May, and the war with Spain was over. The key to the scene is a sheet of paper pinned to the big drum in the foreground. It carries a poem by the Amsterdam poet Jan Vos, saying that Bellona, goddess of war, is sick of blood, that Mars curses the roar of the guns, and that the sword now loves its sheath. So, the verse goes, brave Witsen offers noble Van Waveren the horn of peace. There they are, right of centre. Captain Cornelis Witsen, holding the company's silver drinking horn, shakes hands with his lieutenant, Johan van Waveren. Through the open windows you can see the facade of a brewery called the Lamb, and on the right a woman carries in a turkey pie.