‘The unholy alliance, intent on banishing the truth, had summoned up the Spanish fleet and the Lord almighty. But the Lord God prevented this and caused the fleet to scatter. By fire roundabout displayed he grounded it with might, praise loudly him who achieved this act in the year eighty-eight [1588].’

This text by church warden Cornelis Schellinger is inscribed on the choir screen in Dutch. When with the Alteration of 1578 the Oude Kerk switched to the nonconformist Protestant denomination, the church’s layout was altered substantially. Previously the congregation’s attention in the church was focused on the altar in the sanctuary, but after 1578 the chancel lost this function. Then a new, semi-enclosing wall was added, consisting of three straight walls and a wall that follows the semicircular outline of the chancel. This choir screen remains in place.