Slaves and tyrants: Dutch tribulations in seventeenth-century Mrauk-U

Journal of Early Modern History

Volumn 1, Issue 3, 1997, Pages 201-253

  Subrahmanyam, Sanjay ^a  

^a ÉCOLE DES HAUTES ÉTUDES EN SCIENCES SOCIALES   (France)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0011048880     PISSN: 13853783     EISSN: 15700658     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1163/157006597X00028     Document Type: Review

References (103)

1. For a similar observation, Jacques Leider, "La route de Am (Arakan): Contribution à l'étude d'une route terrestre entre la Birmanie et le Golfe du Bengale," Journal Asiatique 282/2 (1994): 335-70.
2. For a summing up, see M. S. Collis and San Shwe Bu, "Arakan's Place in the Civilization of the Bay: A Study of Coinage and Foreign Relations," Journal of the Burma Research Society (henceforth JBRS) 14/4 (1924): 34-52.
3. Richard C. Temple, "Buddermokan," JBRS 14/4 (1924): 1-33;
4. and for a reconsideration, M. Siddiq Khan, "Badr Maqams or the Shrines of Badr-al-Din-Auliya," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Pakistan 8/1 (1962): 17-46.
5. Victor B. Lieberman, Burmese Administrative Cycles: Anarchy and Conquest, c. 1580-1760 (Princeton, 1984).
6. Sanjay Subrahmanyam, "Quisling or Cross-Cultural Broker? Notes on the Life and Worlds of Dom Martinho de Alemão, Prince of Arakan," Mare Liberum 5 (Lisbon, 1993): 77-91;
7. M. Ana Marques Guedes, "D. Martim, um príncipe arracanês ao serviço do Estado da Índia e das pretensões portuguesas de submissão da Birmânia," Mare Liberum 6 (1993): 67-82.
8. M. S. Collis, "Fra Manrique: A Glimpse of Arakan in 1630 A.D.," JBRS 13 (1923): 199-219;
9. also Collis, "The City of Golden Mrauk-U," JBRS 13 (1923): 244-56.
10. For the text, see Itinerário de Sebastião Manrique, ed. Luís Silveira, 2 vols. (Lisbon, 1946),
11. and the English translation by C. E. Luard and H. Hosten, Travels of Fray Sebastien Manrique, 1628-1641, 2 vols. (London, 1927).
12. The most comprehensive survey and listing of the Portuguese sources on Burma for the years from 1580 to 1640 (or so) may be found in Maria Ana Marques Guedes, Interferência e Integração dos Portugueses na Birmânia, c. 1580-1630 (Lisbon, 1994).
13. D. João de Lima to D. Manuel, Cochin, 22 December 1518, Arquivos Nacionais/Torre do Tombo (henceforth AN/TT), Lisbon, Corpo Cronológico, in Geneviève Bouchon and Luís Filipe F. R. Thomaz, Voyage dans les Deltas du Gange et de l'Irraouaddy: Relation Portugaise Anonyme (1521) (Paris, 1988), 359-61;
14. also the discussion by Thomaz, 59-63.
15. Cartas dos Vice-Reis da Índia, No. 108, AN/TT, in Bouchon and Thomaz, Voyage, 362-63.
16. Armando Cortesão, ed., A Suma Oriental de Tomé Pires e o Livro de Francisco Rodrigues (Coimbra, 1978), 227-28.
17. In my earlier essay, "Quisling or Cross-cultural Broker," 79, I have inexplicably translated prata (obviously silver), as gold.
18. Neves Águas, ed., O Livro de Duarte Barbosa (Lisbon, 1992), 157-58.
19. Cf. The diplomatic correspondence between Min Ba and the Portuguese governor, D. João de Castro, from March 1546, in D. Fernando de Castro, Crónica do Vice-Rei D. João de Castro, eds. Luis de Albuquerque and Teresa da Cunha Matos (Tomar, 1995), 67-68.
20. Cf. M. A. Rahim, "Chittagong under the Pathan Rule in Bengal," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, 3rd Series, 18/1 (1952): 21-30;
21. and S. B. Qanungo, "Chittagong under the Afghan Rule, 1538-1580," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bangladesh 21/2 (1976): 54-75.
22. Other historians claim an earlier date (c. 1550) for Arakan control over Chittagong; cf. S. M. Ali, "Arakan rule in Chittagong (1550-1666 A.D.)," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Pakistan 12/3 (1967): 333-52.
23. Abu'l Fazl Allami, Á'în-i Akbarî, trans. H. S. Jarrett, rev. Jadunath Sarkar, 2nd ed., 3 vols. (Calcutta: Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1948; New Delhi: reprint, 1989), vol. 2, 132-36.
24. Also see Gavin Hambly, "A Note on the Trade in Eunuchs in Mughal Bengal," Journal of the American Oriental Society 94/1 (1974): 125-29.
25. 'Abd al-Hamid Lahauri, Pâdshâh Nâma, eds. Maulavi Kabir al-Din Ahmad, Maulavi 'Abd al-Rahim and W. N. Lees, 2 vols. (Calcutta, 1866-72), vol. 1, 434-35.
26. For a translation, see H. M. Elliott and J. Dowson, The History of India as told by its own historians, 8 vols. (London, 1867-77), vol. 7, 31-32.
27. In fact, Shahjahan, as prince Khurram, had been in Bengal in the 1620s; cf. Sanjay Subrahmanyam, "'Through the looking glass': Some comments on Asian views of the Portuguese in Asia, 1500-1700," in Artur Teodoro de Matos and Luís Filipe F. Reis Thomaz, eds., As Relações entre a Índia Portuguesa, a Ásia do Sueste e o Extremo Oriente: Actas do VI Seminário International de História Indo-Portuguesa (Macau/Lisbon, 1993), 377-403.
28. H. Hosten, "Jesuit Letters from Bengal, Arakan and Burma (1599-1600)," Bengal Past and Present 30/59-60 (1925): 52-76.
29. H. Hosten, "The Twelve Bhuiyas, or Landlords of Bengal," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal 9/10 (1913): 437-49.
30. For a discussion, see Richard M. Eaton, The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 1204-1760 (Delhi, 1994), 146-48.
31. Presumably, it is to this expedition that Hall refers when he mentions how "Tibâo (sic) made a great attack on Mrohaung in 1615;" cf. D. G. E. Hall, "Studies in Dutch Relations with Arakan," JBRS 26/1 (1936): 1-31 (in 3 parts): 2.
32. H. T. Colenbrander, ed., Dagh-Register gehouden int Casteel Batavia, Anno 1631-1634 (The Hague, 1898), 367, 389.
33. Colenbrander, ed., Dagh-Register gehouden int Casteel Batavia, Anno 1637 (The Hague, 1899), 71-72.
34. Islam Khan to Thirithudhamma, c. 1637. Ghulam Sharafuddin Qadiri Rashidi, compiler, Ashraf al-Musauwadat, in Syed Hasan Askari, "The Mughal-Magh Relations down to the time of Islam Khan Mashhadi," Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, 29th Session, (Gauhati, 1959) (Bombay, 1960), 201-213, esp. 209-10 and 211-13.
35. François Bernier, Travels in the Mogul Empire, A.D. 1656-1668, trans. Irving Brock, ed. Archibald Constable (Delhi, 1968);
36. rev. and ed. Vincent A. Smith (Delhi, 1989), 175; the whole discussion occupies 174-82. The editor also notes a marking on a section of James Rennell's 1780 map of the Sunderbans, "Country depopulated by the Muggs."
37. For a discussion, also see Eaton, Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 220-21, 234-36.
38. For the French text, see François Bernier, Voyage dans les Etats du Grand Mogol, ed. France Bhattacharya (Paris, 1981), 131.
39. Niccolao Manucci, Mogul India, or Storia do Mogor, trans. William Irvine, 4 vols., (reprint, Delhi, 1990), vol. 2, 109-110.
40. Manucci, Storia do Mogor, vol. 1, 350-55.
41. Caixas da Índia, No. 16 [340], Doc. 67, dated March 1644, Arquivo Histórico Ultramarino, Lisbon; text published in Marques Guedes, "D. Martim, um príncipe arracanês," 74-79.
42. J. W. Schoorl, "Power, ideology and change in the early state of Buton," in G. J. Schutte, ed., State and Trade in the Indonesian Archipelago (Leiden, 1994), 40-42, 46-49.
43. Also see, for a far more wide-ranging set of Southeast Asian examples, Anthony Reid, ed., Slavery, bondage and dependence in Southeast Asia (St. Lucia, 1983).
44. Letter from De Carpentier, Specx, Vlack and Van Diemen, dated 27 January 1625, in W. Ph. Coolhaas, ed., Generale Missiven van Gouverneurs-Generaal en Raden aan Heren XVII der VOC, 2 vols. (The Hague, 1960-64), vol. 1, 156.
45. For a Dutch overview from the period of the prospects, see Jan van den Burch, Pulicat, to the governor-general and council at Batavia, 5 December 1625;
46. Algemeen Rijksarchief, The Hague (ARA), Overgekomen Brieven en Papieren (OBP), Archieven van de VOC, VOC. 1087, f. 170-172v.
47. ARA, OBP, VOC. 1143, f. 636-37 (another copy on f. 619-20), "Translaedt ofte coppije van verscheijden formans...."
48. The titles "Lord of the White and Red Elephant" and "Lord of the Golden Palace" are to be found on the coinage of the Arakan rulers: see Arthur P. Phayre, "The Coins of Arakan," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal 15/171 (1846): 232-37.
49. Both titles also occur in the Bengali texts of their court, where the king is titled "śveta rakta mâtanga îśvara" (e.g. in Alaol, Padmâvatî), and his court as "hâ tcombining dot belowaka vescombining dot belowtcombining dot belowita gadcombining dot belowa" (Alaol, Sapta payakara); cf. Satyendranath Ghoshal, "Beginning of Secular Romance in Bengali Literature," Visva-Bharati Annals, vol. 9 (1959): 68, 200.
50. Letters from Van Diemen, Lucasz. etc., 26 December and 9 December 1637, in Coolhaas, ed., Generale Missiven, vol. 1, 658, 626-29.
51. Also see p. 526 for an earlier letter from January 1636.
52. For the Dutch perception of the entire system of control on the river, an invaluable aid is the late seventeenth-century map entitled "Kaart van de rivier van Arakan, van de mond tot de stad van dien naam," ARA, Studiezaal Kaarten, VEL. 261.
53. Copie missive Adam van der Mandere uit Arracan, 10 January 1637, ARA, OBP, VOC. 1125, f. 477-85.
54. In the 1630s and 40s, one Arakan tanga was worth approximately 1.1 to 1.2 Dutch florins.
55. Bill-of-lading of the Oostcappel, 11 January 1637; bill-of-lading of the Ruttem, 31 January 1637; and bill-of-lading of the yacht Wessanen, 24 December 1636; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1125, f. 487-87v, f. 486-86v, and f. 488.
56. In 1642, there was already another notable with the title of Majlis, described as a "new merchant" (nieuw negosjant), whose first ship was destroyed at Aceh. Van den Helm to Batavia, 31 October 1642, ARA, OBP, VOC. 1143, f. 632v.
57. This post seems to have been inherited in Arakan from the Gaur Sultanate; cf. Bouchon and Thomaz, Voyage dans les Deltas, 86, 133, passim. It is equally referred to by Alaol, Dârâ Sekandara Nâma, as that of Majlis Navaraj.
58. Daulat Qazi, Satî Mayanâ (Hamidi Press edition), 5, as cited in Ghoshal, "Beginning of Secular Romance," 23.
59. Daulat Qazi, Satî Mayanâ, 5-6,
60. cited in Goshal, "Beginning of Secular Romance," 14.
61. It is unclear whether Ashraf Khan was the same as the all-powerful "Mahomedan Hajji" described by Collis, on the basis of Manrique's acount; cf. Collis, "The City of Golden Mrauk-U," 248-49.
62. Adam van der Mandere to Van Diemen in Batavia, (n.d.) November 1638, ARA, OBP, VOC. 1126, f. 291-97v.
63. Colenbrander, ed., Dagh-Register gehouden int Casteel Batavia, Anno 1631-1634, 66, passim, entries for March 1632.
64. In 1641, Van den Helm claimed great intimacy and friendship with Narapatigyi, whom he supplied with wine and Dutch spirits; cf. Hall, "Studies in Dutch Relations," 17-18.
65. First farmân of 1642; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1143, f. 636v. These artisans are likely to have been both weavers and wood-workers, since the palace at Mrauk-U featured elaborate wood-carving, largely made by slave-artisans (information from Dr. Catherine Raymond).
66. Van den Helm to Van Diemen in Batavia, 31 October 1642; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1143, f. 629-34 (another copy of the same f. 649-54).
67. Later, in October 1643, Mir Muhammad Sa'id Ardistani, sar-i khail at Golconda, sent a present to the ruler of Arakan with his ship, to try and arrange the release of Isma'il Beg; cf. Van den Helm and Van de Water to Van Diemen, 30 October 1643; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1151, f. 629.
68. Bill-of-lading, 30 October 1643; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1151, f. 611-12v, 618.
69. Van den Helm to Jeremias van Vliet in Melaka, 22 February 1643; VOC. 1143, f. 611-12v.
70. Arent van den Helm to Van Diemen in Batavia, 22 February 1643; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1143, f. 613-17.
71. Van den Helm had organised the release of this English pilot by October 1643. Cf. Van den Helm and Van de Water to Van Diemen, 30 October 1643; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1151, f. 629v.
72. Arent van den Helm to Van Diemen in Batavia, 22 February 1643, f. 616v-17; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1143.
73. Van den Helm to Van Vliet in Melaka dated 18 March 1643; Van den Helm to Van Diemen in Batavia, 10 March 1643; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1143, f. 642-42v (for the reference to the toppassen); f. 645-46. The second letter adds that Narapatigyi is still not to be seen in public.
74. Van den Helm and Van de Water to Van Diemen, 30 October 1643; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1151, f. 629v.
75. Despite his heavy irony here, Van den Helm was careful to maintain good relations with men like Diogo de Sá, the Portuguese who maintained a correspondence widi even Governor-General Antonio van Diemen in Batavia. But on still another occasion, in 1645, he refers to the "left-over mestizo descendants of the Portuguese" in Arakan with contempt. Van den Helm at Arakan to Batavia, 31 October 1645; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1159, fl. 371v.
76. "Translaet vant firman door Sijn Maijt. int Coninckrijck van Arracan, aen den oppercoopm. Arent van den Helm...." ARA, OBP, VOC. 1151, f. 617.
77. Arend Jansz. van den Helm at Arakan to Cornelis van der Lijn and council at Batavia, 31 October 1645; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1159, f. 369-83.
78. Cf. The letter from Cornelis van der Lijn and Council at Batavia to the Heren XVII, 9 July 1645, in Coolhaas, ed., Generale Missiven, vol. 2, 270.
79. "Copia missive aen de E: Hrn. Raeden van India pr. t'fluijt schip Uitgeest, in dato ultmo Octob. 1646 geschr: Arracan," by Arent van den Helm etc.; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1163, f. 178-91.
80. "Extract uit het daghregister onser arracanse voyagie met t'jacht d'Leeuwercq den 22en october anno 1649 aengevangen synde t'notabelste soo ons uit selve rycq is wedervaren," ARA, OBP, VOC. 1177 f. 124-155; another copy on f. 156-95.
81. There is a vast literature of varying quality - ranging from editions of texts to sophisticated commentaries thereon - on Dutch embassies to various seventeenth-century Asian courts. For useful comparative elements, see for example, John E. Wills (Jr.), Embassies and Illusions: Dutch and Portuguese Envoys to K'ang-hsi, 1666-1687 (Cambridge, MA, 1984).
82. For a colonial ethnographer's view of these hill peoples, see Lieut. T. Latter, "A Note on Some Hill Tribes on the Kuladyne River - Arracan," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal 15 (1846): 60-78.
83. Compare the description of Thado's court, and his hunting expeditions in Alaol, Padmâvatí, ed. Muhammad Shahidullah (Dhaka, 1950), 13-18;
84. The interpreter, a certain Nicolau Rebelo ought not to be confounded with a "cousin" of one of the Arakan rulers, baptised by the Augustinians and given that name; cf. Marques Guedes, "D. Martim, um príncipe arracanês," 79, n. 3.
85. The letter is in fact largely an attack on Van den Helm and his comportment; for its text, see "Translaet missive door de Mayt: van Arraccan omtrent den 27en Februarij anno 1650 geschreven in de moochse tale aen d'Ede. heer gouverneur generael ende d'heeren Raden van India;" ARA, OBP, VOC. 1177, f. 154-55.
86. Gossens, Gerrit van Voorburgh, Gillis Cox and Michiel Willemsen, at Arakan, to Joan Verpoorten, Dutch commissioner in Bengal, 6 March 1653; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1200, f. 220-22v.
87. Joan Gossens, Melaka, "Raport aen d'Ede Heer Carel Reniersen, Gouverneur-Generael ende d'E: Heeren Raaden van India ...," 12 June 1653, f. 235-52 (citation on f. 236v), ARA, OBP, VOC. 1200.
88. David Verdonck at Arakan to Governor-General Johan Maetsuycker, 25 January and 1 March 1654; ARA, OBP, VOC. 1202, fls. 397-407, 408-14v.
89. W. Fruin-Mees, ed., Dagh-Register gehouden int Casteel Batavia, Anno 1682 (Batavia, 1931), 1113, 1127-29 (text of the letter).
90. Cf. in this respect, the late seventeenth-century overview of Dutch activities by the Company's legal adviser: Pieter van Dam, Beschrijvinge van de Oost-Indische Compagnie, book 2, pt. 2, ed. F. W. Stapel (The Hague, 1932), 97-99.
91. For a contemporary Persian account of the Mughal expeditions of the late 1650s and 1660s, see Shihab al-Din Talish, Fathîyah-i 'Ibrîyah, translated extracts in Jadunath Sarkar, Studies in Aurangzeb's reign (Calcutta, 1933), 163-213.
92. Tapan Raychaudhuri, Jan Company in Coromandel, 1605-1690: A study in the inter-relationship of European commerce and indigenous economies (The Hague, 1962).
93. Hall, "Studies in Dutch Relations with Arakan."
94. Also see, more recently, the brief discussion in a paper by S. Arasaratnam, "Slave Trade in the Indian Ocean in the Seventeenth Century," in K. S. Mathew, ed., Mariners, Merchants and Oceans: Studies in Maritime History (New Delhi, 1995), 195-208.
95. Silveira, ed., Itinerário de Sebastião Manrique; for a discussion, see Sanjay Subrahmanyam, "Quisling or Cross-Cultural Broker," 77-92.
96. For a detailed discussion, see M. Siddiq Khan, "The Tragedy of Mrauk-U ( 1660-1661)," Journal of the Asiatic Society of Pakistan 11/2 (1966): 195-254.
97. For a discussion of sources for Burmese history (but largely focusing on the Irrawaddy and Salween valleys), see Lieberman, Burmese Administrative Cycles, Appendix.
98. Also see Pe Maung Tin, "The Burma Manuscripts in the British Museum," JBRS 14/3 (1924): 221-46. The main chronicles used by San Shwe Bu (from palm-leaf manuscripts in his possession) appear to be Doewa's Rakhaing Razawingyi, the Diññyawaddi Aredawpon, and the Nga Lat Rone Razawin (the last for the mid-seventeenth century).
99. e siècle: documentation historique et évidences archéologiques," Journal Asiatique 283/2 (1995): 469-501. Raymond cites among other references the five-volume collective work, published in Sittwe (Myanmar) in 1988, and titled Rakhaing-prene Phritsaing Thamaing Hmâ.
100. e siècles, ed. Denys Lombard and Jean Aubin (Paris, 1988), 117-24.
101. Cf. Anthony Reid, "Trade and State Power in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century Southeast Asia," in Proceedings of the Seventh IAHA Conference, Bangkok, August 1977 (Bangkok, 1979), 391-419.
102. It does not quite conform, however, to the well-known models of upstream-down-stream (ulu-ilir) opposition, as developed in Barbara W. Andaya, To Live as Brothers: Southeast Sumatra in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (Honolulu, 1993);
103. and Jane Drakard, A Malay Frontier: Unity and Duality in a Sumatran Kingdom (New York, 1990).