This chapter describes the daily functioning of the Desolate Boedelskamer. It examines the Amsterdam insolvency procedure through the eyes of the actors involved. How did the court evolve over time, and where is it possible to discern the influence of its staff on such changes? Social and cultural attitudes towards overindebtedness and the insolvents themselves softened during the seventeenth century. While one might expect that such developments were detrimental to the position of creditors, they actually went hand in hand with important changes to Amsterdam’s legal institutions that also sought to protect the creditors’ interests. This chapter discusses to what extent the introduction of the Desolate Boedelskamer had an impact on the management of the insolvent estates that were placed in its care. Through a careful combination of formal work instructions and archival evidence from the daily practice, it analyzes the functioning of the court as part of its broader legal and institutional context.

This chapter discusses the background and characteristics of the Desolate Boedelskamer’s staff, in order to analyze how they contributed to the professionalization of insolvency procedures in seventeenth-century Amsterdam. Through a closer examination of the ways in which the institution dealt with fraud or mistakes, it will become clear how it helped to create a more professional and trustworthy insolvency procedure. Ultimately, it was the daily labor of commissioners and subordinate officials that constituted the foundation of the systemic trust generated by the Desolate Boedelskamer as a crucial means to repair broken relations between insolvents and their creditors.

Chapter 2 offers a visual paradigm for representations of black people in the ancient Greek world. It considers fifth-century BCE janiform cups that depict black and brown faces on opposite sides. Contemporary ideas are all the more pronounced when dealing with visual constructs of skin color in Greek antiquity and therefore require continual interrogation. Disputing the uncomfortable ease with which some art historians presume a fixed connection between black people and bumbling inferiority, this chapter argues that the black face serves as part of a repertoire of sympotic performance. Similar to masks, janiform cups enable drinkers in the symposium to adopt new identities. The discourse about the chromatics on janiform cups leads to a broader examination of black skin in ancient Greek art. Close scrutiny of museum displays reveals the temporal clash that can occur when audiences encounter iconography of black people in Greek antiquity. In particular, scrupulous inspection of the British Museum unearths a troubling tendency to privilege ancient Egypt as an indication of legitimacy and legibility, contrasted with Nubia.