Johan van Valckenburgh (c. 1575 − 1624) was a Dutch military engineer who built fortresses. He is known for building the ''Bastion Henricus'' which was a fortification around

Hamburg (male), (female) en, Hamburger(s), Hamburgian(s) , timezone1 = Central (CET) , utc_offset1 = +1 , timezone1_DST = Central (CEST) , utc_offset1_DST = +2 , postal ...

. Today the Hamburg History Museum is on this site.

Biography

van Volckenburg was born in about 1575. He was working for

Maurice of Orange Maurice of Orange ( nl, Maurits van Oranje; 14 November 1567 – 23 April 1625) was ''stadtholder'' of all the provinces of the Dutch Republic except for Friesland from 1585 at the earliest until his death in 1625. Before he became Prince o ...

in 1606 under the tutelage of Johan van Rijswijck. He was working as an engineer on his own account first within the Hanseatic League in the city of

Lüneburg Lüneburg (officially the ''Hanseatic City of Lüneburg'', German: ''Hansestadt Lüneburg'', , Low German ''Lümborg'', Latin ''Luneburgum'' or ''Lunaburgum'', Old High German ''Luneburc'', Old Saxon ''Hliuni'', Polabian ''Glain''), also called ...

, but in his lifetime he is known to have worked on ten works including the waterway in Bremen. He worked on the fortifications in Hamburg from 1615 to 1625 on what became known as ''Bastion Henricus'' as well as work in Böhlau and

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 millio ...

. His work in Hamburg introduced a second layer to the fortifications to protect against the

Thirty Years War The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history, lasting from 1618 to 1648. Fought primarily in Central Europe, an estimated 4.5 to 8 million soldiers and civilians died as a result of battl ...

. He created a "New Town" (''Neustadt'') whose street names still dates from the grid system of roads he introduced. van Volckenburg died in 1625 as a Dutch soldier fighting the Spanish during the

Eighty Years War The Eighty Years' War or Dutch Revolt ( nl, Nederlandse Opstand) ( c.1566/1568–1648) was an armed conflict in the Habsburg Netherlands between disparate groups of rebels and the Spanish government. The causes of the war included the Ref ...

in 1625. He is remembered by a plaque on Hamburg's city walls. He also has the bridge illustrated named after him and the ''Valckenburgschule'' training centre in

Ulm Ulm () is a city in the German state of Baden-Württemberg, situated on the river Danube on the border with Bavaria. The city, which has an estimated population of more than 126,000 (2018), forms an urban district of its own (german: link=no, ...

.Valckenburgschule
accessed 3 November 2012

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Valckenburgh, Johan van Year of birth unknown 1570s births 1625 deaths 17th-century Dutch engineers Dutch military engineers Dutch military personnel killed in action Dutch people of the Eighty Years' War People from Voorburg