The Tempati uprising begins on a plantation

A ship’s infected laundry brought smallpox to the Cape station. The epidemic devastated Khoikhoi communities, while also killing enslaved people and settlers. As communities fled and died, settler...

On 9 October, Dutch authorities and armed colonists began mass violence against Chinese residents of Batavia. The killings followed an escalating crisis shaped by VOC labor controls, deportation...

In a letter to the Society of Suriname, Governor Jan Jacob Mauricius Crommelin argued that colonial troops could not defeat Maroon communities and that peace might save the colony. Maroon...

The treaty recognized Mangkubumi as ruler of part of the Mataram realm and formalized a political division shaped by VOC intervention. Javanese rulers pursued their own political strategies, but the...

One month after the Giyanti settlement, Sultan Hamengkubuwono I announced the name Ngayogyakarta Hadiningrat for his half of the former Mataram realm. The new court asserted Javanese political...

The agreement formalized a further division of the Mataram political order. VOC officials mediated and secured influence over Javanese succession, while local princes and courts shaped the...

A report to the Society of Suriname described the revolt and cautioned against alarming investors. The archive exposes how colonial authorities managed information about resistance to protect...

A group of former colonial officials warned the Society of Suriname about the revolt’s scale and the danger to settler property. Their private alarm contrasted with public attempts to reassure...

The Society’s representative Francois Dandiran replied to Boston Band, a leader who advocated negotiation between Ndyuka Maroons and colonial officials. Boston’s literacy, diplomacy, and political...

Crommelin wrote that only peace could prevent the colony’s ruin. His appeal followed decades of failed military campaigns and acknowledged Maroon power. The letter documents the strategic position won...