The First Dutch Merchants in Tonkin and Ke Cho in 1637

Abstract

The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries witnessed a global commercial age. In Asian waters, there were various international trading routes which flourished in the South China Sea and the Pacific Ocean in which the two Vietnamese kingdoms of Tonkin and Cochinchina were well situated. Under such a circumstance that in 1637 the Dutch in Japan dispatched the Grol to Tonkin via Hoi An under the command of director K. Hartsinck. The original diary of the Grol's first voyage to Tonkin is in Old Dutch language and currently preserved at the Dutch National Archive in The Hague. In 1882, Geerts translated this document into the French and published it in Excursions et Reconnaissances (t VI.no13, Paris, 1882) under the title "Journal de voyage du yatch hollandais Grol du Japon au Tonkin (1637)". A year later, I.M. Dixon translated the French version into English and published it in Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan (Vol. XI, Yokohama, 1883) under the title "The Voyage of the Dutch Ship "Grol" from Hirado to Tong King". In 1907, the French translation of this famous diary was published in the Indochinese Review (5th Volume, No. 55 & 56). This invaluable document not only highlights the still unknown aspects of the history of the Dutch-Vietnamese relationship, but also helps underlines, many aspects of Vietnamese history such as the attitude of the Vietnamese feudal court towards diplomacy, foreign trade, foreign merchants, local commodity economy and so forth. The Vietnamese version is translated from the French edition by Professor Nguyen Thua Hy.

(Second part)