Pieter van den Broecke

Pieter van den Broecke (1585, Antwerp - 1640, Strait of Malacca) was a Dutch cloth merchant in the service of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), and one of the first Dutchmen to taste coffee.cite web|url = http://www.vocsite.nl/geschiedenis/handelsposten/mocca.html |title = De VOCsite : handelsposten; Mocca |accessdate = 2008-07-17] He also went to Angola three times. He was one of the first Europeans to describe societies in West and Central Africa and in detail trade strategies along the African coast. [cite web|url = http://www.sochistdisc.org/2002_book_reviews/la_fleur.htm |title = La Fleur, J.D., ed. Pieter Van Den Broecke's Journal of Voyages to Cape Verde, Guinea and Angola, 1605-1612 |accessdate = 2008-07-17]

Life

His father, also named Pieter Van den Broecke, lived in Antwerp but had to flee to Alkmaar due to his Calvinist sympathies. The family lived in Hamburg for a while and left around 1597 for Amsterdam. [cite web|url = http://www.dbnl.org/tekst/bran038biog01_01/bran038biog01_01_0632.htm |title = DBNL . J.G. Frederiks en F. Jos. van den Branden, Biographisch woordenboek der Noord- en Zuidnederlandsche letterkunde |accessdate = 2008-07-17] At the time the VOC began to develop, the younger Pieter joined it as a tradesman and climbed the career ladder. He became chief-tradesman and admiral.

In 1611 he brought in a cargo of 65,000 pounds of ivory to Amsterdam, after capturing a Portuguese ship. [cite web|url = http://www.hakluyt.com/Hakluyt-Society-Publications/third_series_5.htm |title = Pieter van den Broecke's Journal of Voyages to Cape Verde, Guinea and Angola (1605-1612). Edited by JAMES D. LA FLEUR. 2000. pp. xv + 139. 1 colour plate, 1 illustration, 7 maps. ISBN 0 904180 68 9 |accessdate = 2008-07-17] In 1614 he visited Mocha and drank "something hot and black, a coffee". He was made the VOC's manager in Suratte. He described the Ethiopian slave Malik Ambar. From 1616 the establishment there blossomed, with new minor establishments being set up in the hinterland. [cite web|url = http://www.vocsite.nl/geschiedenis/handelsposten/suratte.html |title = De VOCsite : handelsposten; Suratte |accessdate = 2008-07-17] , though in 1617 the "Duyfken", under his command, was wrecked on the Surat coast. [cite web|url = http://www.home.zonnet.nl/dijoH2O/nl/india/vocbibl.html |title = VOC bibliography |accessdate = 2008-07-17]

He operated in the Malay archipelago beside Jan Pieterszoon Coen and was present at the battle of Jakarta, 1619. Pieter van den Broecke took over from Coen as head of the Banda Islands. The largest of these islands was scarcely half the size of Texel, but they were held to be important to trade due to their superior cloves and nutmeg, and so the Dutch were at that time enforcing a trade monopoly on the unwilling local population through drastic measures. [cite web|url = http://www.wereldomroep.nl/actua/dossier/koopmanendominee_2007/koopmandominee1 |title = Een blik op het verleden - RADIO NEDERLAND WERELDOMROEP - NIEUWS |accessdate = 2008-07-17 |language = nl] So many inhabitants were killed on Banda that the island had to be deliberately repopulated.

On his retirement he was honoured with a gold chain, which he wears in the portrait by his friend Frans Hals (now hanging in Kenwood House). [cite web|url = http://www.willo.com/trio/itemdetail.asp?searchdesc=&whereclause=&current_record=68 |title = The City Museum |accessdate = 2008-07-17] His son was a "perkenier" (plantation owner) on the Banda Islands. The Van der Broecke family continued to live on Banda for 13 more generations. [ [http://www.trouw.nl/deverdieping/religie_filosofie/article733237.ece/Moord_met_de_Bijbel_in_de_hand Article on him in a Dutch newspaper] ]

Notes

Works and sources

* Pieter van den Broecke: "Korte historiael ende Journaelsche aenteyckeninghe, van al’t geen merck-waerdigh voorgevallen is, in de langhdurige Reysen, soo nae Cabo Verde, Angola [etc.] als insonderheyd van Oost-Indien", Hans Passchiers van Wesbusch, Haerlem (Haarlem) 1634
* Pieter van den Broecke, Klaas Ratelband: "Reizen naar West-Afrika van Pieter van den Broecke, 1605–1614", Nijhoff, ’s-Gravenhage 1950.
* Pieter van den Broecke, Willem Philippus Coolhaas: "Pieter van den Broecke in Azië", Nijhoff, ’s-Gravenhage 1962–1963.
* Pieter van den Broecke: "Station Azoren", Boer, Bussum 1970
* Pieter van den Broecke, J. D. La Fleur: "Pieter Van Den Broecke's journal of voyages to Cape Verde, Guinea and Angola (1605–1612)", Hakluyt Society, London 2000.

External links

* [http://www.nationaalarchief.nl/amh/detail.aspx?page=dafb%E2%8C%A9=nl&id=5335 Pieter van den Broecke in Masulipatnam]