Shipwrecks, Sorrow, Shame and the Great Southland: The Use of Emotions in Seventeenth-Century Dutch East India Company Communicative Ritual

Abstract

This chapter explores the use of emotions within Dutch East India Company (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie or VOC) documentation, from instructions and ships' logs, to letters and petitions, daily registers and summative reports among personnel in VOC outposts, as well as to the central board of directors in Amsterdam, as a ritual practice that functioned to reinforce power dynamics, resolve conflict and suggest inclusion and integration. It analyses this practice in relation to documentation regarding interactions with the largely unknown lands south of the VOC’s Batavia settlement (modern-day Jakarta), primarily produced in its first 50 years of operation.

Research for this chapter was funded by the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions, 1100–1800 (project number CE110001011). I am grateful to Jacqueline Van Gent, Lesley Silvester, the editors and anonymous reviewers for their comments on earlier versions of this work.