A short explanation about the whats and whys of this site.
Archimon...
...means Architecture and Monuments. When I started this site I assumed that 'monument' in English could also mean 'historical building'. When I discovered this was not the case it was already too late. Still, I like the name, and it even seems to have another meaning as well, in some language. When the site changed from one about general old architecture into one about religious architecture I kept the name, although it had now lost most of its old meaning.
'The virtual museum'
In its original form the aim of Archimon was to describe the history of architecture in The Netherlands and to show interesting buildings all over the country. This was an enormous task, and after a few years I realized that I could never reach this goal. Church architecture had taken most of my interest and time, and at least in this field I managed to get far. I decided to use the results of my research for a 'virtual museum'. The idea of a museum allowed me to lose the struggle for completeness; no museum is ever complete, but using well-chosen examples a subject can be fully covered anyway. This is what I try here.
'Religious architecture'
Churches are the main subject here, with their history, architects and styles. It's the history of the christian religious architectural tradition in the Netherlands of the past 1000 years. I could have said 'churches' instead of 'religious architecture', but I'd like to to pay attention to monasteries and the occasional synagogue as well.
'The Netherlands'
A country in Europe. Not to be confused with Holland, which is just the old name for a part of it. In its original form Archimon tried to show what The Netherlands looked like, which meant that it needed to show as many towns and villages as possible. In its current form the site no longer attempts this. It does try to show regional variants in styles though. And there's some attention for churches outside the Netherlands, designed by Dutch architects.
The 'Places & buildings' -section
You could consider this as an extra exhibition next to the actual museum. This is the heart of the old Archimon and it contains hundreds of pages. Here you will find pages about towns and municipalities and their churches. This section is fully interlinked with the 'religious architecture' pages. This part of the site is expanded often and becomes increasingly bilingual.
Pictures
Pictures make up a large portion of the site's contents. Although pictures are kept small, this may cause pages to load slowly. It is acknowledged that some pictures are of a bad quality; these are being replaced at the first opportunity. Apart from a few exceptions the copyrights of the pictures belong to the author.
Reliability and completeness
Remember this is an amateur site. Although all information has been taken from books, magazines and all kinds of other sources, and facts are double-checked when possible, there are limits. All pages within this site should be regarded as frameworks that need to be filled in and maintained constantly. Whenever more information becomes available pages will be updated.
Navigation
Unlike in a real museum at Archimon you can choose your own route through the contents, as all sections are linked together. Remember this if you don't want to get lost. You can always return to the main page by clicking on the logo on top of each page.
For whom is Archimon meant?
For anyone interested in churches in The Netherlands in any way. People about to visit this country may find the Places & Buildings-section useful as it provides information about places often ignored by other media.
Why this site?
Like many people, after a short period on the internet, I wanted to build something myself. There had been a personal homepage, but soon I wanted to make something usefull, something of lasting value. The idea came up to do something about architecture, something I was developing an interest for at that time. After a digital camera had been bought things went very fast. In its original form Archimon tried to be a source of information about historic buildings in towns and villages in the whole country. Very little about that was available on the internet, and in some cases what was available was of dubious quality, like the website of the National Board of Tourism, which intentionally gives a very limited and cliché picture of the country. After several years I can conclude that my site has been a success.
Language
Archimon is in English in order to reach as big an audience as possible. Certain terms for which there are no satisfactory English equivalents are kept in Dutch. Names of places are kept in Dutch also. Learn a little! I am aware that my English isn't perfect, and welcome corrections.
Feedback
Questions, comments, corrections of my English etc. are welcome. Please send a messsage to archimon (at) live.nl Of course, replace (at) with @ first and delete the blank spaces.