Java, c. 1640–82

Abstract

The creation of the states of Mataram and Bantĕn is described in chapter 4 above. In the middle and later years of the seventeenth century both experienced serious internal conflicts, which the VOC at Batavia could not ignore. In terms of VOC interests, Bantĕn was in some ways similar to Maluku. It was a major source of pepper, which was becoming of even greater commercial importance than the spices of Maluku; it harboured foreign European competitors; it was accessible by sea; and resistance there could disturb Batavia just as Ambon had been threatened in the east. Mataram, however, was a very different affair. It was a far larger state than any the VOC had yet invaded and it had a vast interior where VOC naval power was meaningless. Its importance arose not because any of the VOC’s major exports came from there or because it was a centre of ‘smuggling’, but rather because it supplied rice, without which the Dutch and their allies could not live, and timber, without which they could not build their ships. It also posed a potential threat to the security of Batavia. VOC commercial interest was limited almost entirely to the north coast of Java, but events there were so inextricably involved with the interior that the Dutch were obliged in the end to march into the heart of Java.