Dutch conquest of the Banda Islands

Common card · No. 285038

The Dutch conquest of the Banda Islands, also referred to as the Banda genocide, was a process of military conquest from 1609 to 1621 by the Dutch East India Company of the Banda Islands. The Dutch, having enforced a monopoly on the highly lucrative nutmeg production from the islands, were impatient with Bandanese resistance to Dutch demands that the Bandanese sell only to them. Negotiations collapsed after Bandanese village elders deceived and murdered the Dutch representative Pieter Willemsz Verhoeff. Under the command of Jan Pieterszoon Coen, the Dutch resorted to a forcible conquest of the islands, which became severely depopulated as a result of Coen's massacres, forced deportations, and the resulting starvation and disease. The Dutch East India Company, which was founded in 1602 as an amalgamation of 12 voorcompagnies, had extensive financial interests in maritime Southeast Asia, the source of highly profitable spices, which were in high demand in Europe. A Dutch expedition had already...

Read on Wikipedia · Image Rijksmuseum, CC0