Its dominance was such that between 16 its ships made nearly 5,000 voyages from the Netherlands to Asia. The VOC became a trading colossus, the world’s first multinational company. It was, in effect, a ‘state outside the state’ with the power to wage war, make treaties with Asian rulers, punish and execute criminals, create new colonies and strike its own coins. The VOC was granted a monopoly in all sea-borne trade with Asia by way of the Cape of Good Hope and the Straits of Magellan.īy the mid-1600s, the VOC boasted some 150 merchant ships and 50,000 employees, a private army of 10,000 soldiers and trading posts from the Persian Gulf to Japan. In 1602, to put an end to fierce competition between proliferating Dutch companies that were breaking into the East Indies spice trade and had forced an increase in the purchase price of spices and a glut in Europe, the companies were amalgamated by government fiat as the United Dutch East India Company or Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie (VOC). In late December 1601 a fleet of five Dutch ships drove away from Bantam, Java, a fleet of thirty Portuguese ships. A second fleet was much more successful, and at the beginning of the 17th century many small squadrons and larger fleets were equipped for voyages to the Indies by newly-formed companies. It was not very successful financially, bringing back only a small cargo of spices, but it showed what might be done in the future. In 1599 the eerste shipvaart-the first (Dutch) fleet to the Indies set sail, attempting to break the Portuguese monopoly in the spice trade, using information gained by espionage. …wherever profit leads us, to every sea and shore for love of gain the wide world’s harbours we explore …
The mariners and merchants of the region that would become the Republic of the Netherlands, and the southern provinces which remained with the Hapsburg Empire, had long been the most efficient and successful in Europe, owning more shipping than any other region. It was in some ways a commercial competition, as well as a military and naval war, against Spain and Portugal which were then combined under King Phillip II of Spain.
Their war of independence (the Eighty Years War) was not formally concluded until 1648. The Union of Utrecht can be considered the beginning of the Republic of the United Netherlands which consisted of the seven northern provinces: Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Gelderland, Overijssel, Friesland and Groningen. The 1579 Union of Utrecht and Union off Arras were both attempts to unite the patchwork of the low country provinces in their struggle for independence or autonomy from Spanish/Hapsburg rule. The creation of the Republic of the United Netherlands and the VOC The overland monopoly in the supply of spices to Europe via the eastern Mediterranean was broken in 1497 when the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape of Good Hope and sailed to India. Portugal developed and maintained a stranglehold on the spice trade during the 16th century. The merchants, perhaps Persian or Arab traders, who introduced cloves to Europe around the 2nd century, did not know the original source of the spice, and this remained true until about the 12th century. By the time the Dutch arrived in the late 1500s, the region’s spice trade already had a history dating back to ancient times. The Moluccas consist of more than 1,000 islands, only a few of which produced cloves and nutmeg, while Java and Sumatra were sources of pepper.
The Indonesian archipelago boasted two main spice centres-the Moluccas (the Maluku Islands) as well as Java and Sumatra. Spices had to be sourced from remote and distant places such as the islands of present-day eastern Indonesia. European demand for the products of Asia extended to metals, works of art, furniture, textiles and carpets. These goods made successful European traders very wealthy. Used in medicine to relieve the symptoms of rheumatism, gout and colic for example, spices helped to preserve cooked food, added flavour to meat and alcoholic drinks, and were believed to increase sexual activity. Control of the spice trade made nations rich and sparked wars. In medieval Europe and as recently as the 16th and 17th centuries, spices we take for granted today-cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, pepper and mace-were scarce and extremely valuable.
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