One man changed it all. Jan Huygen van Linschoten’s hunger to know, passion for making elaborate notes, flair for detailed descriptions, faith in pictographic representation, and belief in a map that could say in one page what a man learns in an entire lifetime, changed this world forever. Linschoten was born in Haarlem, the Netherlands in 1563. His maps and other illustrations, published after 1592 in Dutch, English, French, German and Latin, became the first point-of-reference for European seafarers headed for Asia.
His understanding of the sea, the soil, the spices, the trade, the manufacturing factories, and the merchants, guided him in creating this and many other maps. This particular map of Spice Islands empowered the Dutch and the English to go where only Portuguese thrived – Spice Lands of Asia: India, Sri Lanka (Ceylon) and Indonesia. Spice Islands is the term used to refer to Maluku Islands, part of Indonesia. The extremely valued spices grown in this part of the world gave rise to the need to own the source of spices and control the trade. This map was the first one used by the Dutch and the English to reach and establish trading relations in Spice Islands and subsequently in India and Ceylon.
In February 1601, Captain James Lancaster of the British East India Company set out on his maiden voyage aboard his vessel Dragon. His destination, Spice Islands. Captain Lancaster carried with him this map, gold and silver worth GBP 28,472, and commercial merchandise totaling GBP 6,840. His merchandise included pistols and crockery.
On reaching Spice Islands, he found the plantation owners, referred to as Sultans, keen to do business with him. However, he soon discovered that the Dutch, armed with the same map and several times more bullion, had arrived much before him and entered into business agreements with most of the plantation owners of nutmeg, cloves and pepper. The Dutch were already controlling trade in many spices originating from Spice Islands and other areas of Indonesia. Captain Lancaster discovered thriving “Indian Ocean Trade” among Ceylon, South India and Java, Sumatra (Indonesia). He set-up a warehouse to trade in cotton and printed textiles. He went back to London armed with extensive knowledge of Asian trade, crops and cultivation. Knowledge shared by him about natural habitat of Cassia trees in south of India, the source of cinnamon, and details about cotton and printed textile producing centers in South India and Ceylon led to subsequent British voyages by other seafarers. These voyages established trade ties with South India and Ceylon, which soon grew to ownership of plantations, establishment of factories and subsequent colonization of spice-growing countries in Asia.
Linschoten died in 1611, and his maps and plates continued playing a significant role in spice trade in spice islands and other spice-growing regions in Asia.
Maps of World 