can still be found, especially on the Babar islands, where they fulfil important economic and ceremonial functions.
Photograph 2.5. Detail of an India-motif basta, found on Sermata.
Not only new products, but also new ideas made their entry via trade. Thus Islam spread across the mid-and northern Moluccas from the 15th century onwards in the wake of the Javanese and Malayan seafarers. The inhabitants of Maluku Tenggara were also brought into contact with Islam during this period.8
The Arrival of the Europeans
The lucrative spice trade had also drawn the attention of the seafaring European nations. The Portuguese were the first to succeed in tracking the route to the "Spice Islands." In 1512 they arrived on the Banda islands, and began to trade textiles from India and other Asian countries for spices, thus reducing Javanese and Malayan commerce.9 They monopolised the spice trade during most of the 16th century.
Portuguese influence on Maluku Tenggara was fairly superficial. On the western island of Kisar and the eastern Aru islands they built fortifications, but other evidences of a lengthy stay, such as the Roman Catholic churches found elsewhere, can not be found on Maluku Tenggara. However, traces of their language have continued to exist in Moluccan Malay, which is also the lingua franca of the southeastern Moluccas.
The United East India Company
Apart from the Portuguese, the French, the English and the Dutch tried to acquire the monopoly for spices. In order to coordinate the trade in the East, the Dutch founded the United East India Company. Profiting from the declining power of the Portuguese in the Moluccas, the Dutch succeeded in beating the competition after years of harsh battle. In 1605 they captured the Portuguese stronghold on Ambon and in the course of the 17th century all the Moluccas were brought under Dutch authority.
The United East India Company, and notably the ruthless governor-general Jan Pietersz. Coen, put a violent stamp on the monopolisation of the spice trade. By regulating the production of spices at the source, the supply was kept low and the price high. Contracts were concluded—forced or unforced—with local chieftains, who had to guarantee exclusive delivery to the Dutch. Breach of contract meant severe punishments. Thus in 1621 almost the entire population of the nutmeg and mace producing Banda islands, as many as 15,000 people, were murdered or chased away.
The measure to concentrate the cultivation of spice on only a few of the islands had far-reaching consequences too. At other locations the nutmeg and clove trees were destroyed as much as possible. Military expeditions had the assignment of destroying illegally planted trees. For the local population hunger and misery were the result.
Disruption of the Local Economy
The Dutch appeared in Maluku Teriggara at the beginning of the 17th century. In 1605-06 they reached the eastern islands of Kei and Aru, and not much later the islands more to the west. Contracts were concluded with the inhabitants, in which the sovereignty and monopoly of the United East India Company were acknowledged. The islanders were only allowed to trade with the Bandanese—in slaves who could be employed on the nutmeg plantations of Banda, among other things. On several islands an occupational force was stationed, usually consisting of "a corporal and two private soldiers."10 Furthermore, schools and churches were erected and Protestant Christianity was preached on the islands. 11
In 1668, Fort Vollenhove was built on Kisar to protect against attacks by the Portuguese who were quartered on Timor. A small European garrison supervised the observance of the trade monopoly. When the military occupation was abolished almost 150 years later, the garrison's Dutch soldiers and their families remained on the island. Mestizos, the descendants of Dutch soldiers and Kisarese women, have Dutch names and physical features such as blond hair and blue eyes.12
Strongholds were also built on the important trade centre of Aru and on Damer to protect the spice monopoly. In order to concentrate the nutmeg trade on Banda permanently, nutmeg cultivation was terminated on the whole of Maluku Tenggara from 1648 onwards. On Kei, Damer, Moa, Teun, Nila and Serua tens of thousands of nutmeg trees were destroyed, despite heavy protests by the population. Nutmeg had always been an important means of barter in local trade. Kisarese for example had a flourishing barter trade in slaves, mostly originating from Timor, with the inhabitants of these nutmeg producing islands.
Counter measures by the affected islanders soon made themselves felt From 1666 onwards, for example, the population of Damer repeatedly stormed the Dutch fortification. Yet to no avail. In the first decade of the 18th century the Damerese—presented by the Dutch as the prototype of "those stubbornheaded island peoples"13 —were permanently defeated. After the extirpations, the islanders, especially those of the small islands of Teun, Nila and Serua, led a miserable existence. They had been deprived of their main source of barter and they dared not plant any trees out of fear of a new confrontation with the Dutch. 14
Around the end of the 17th century the Dutch took more measures to monopolise trade. From 1692 the inhabitants of Maluku Tenggara were prohibited from trading with the Bandanese and other "strangers." This meant the end of the age-old, intensive trading in the region. As a result of this the southeastern Moluccans were also devoid of many import goods that were of great importance in mutual barter trading. The population resisted once more, notably on Aru, but again unsuccessfully.
However, Dutch measures did not prove water-tight and there was illicit trade via the old channels. Moreover the Dutch themselves became aware of the disadvantages of their merciless politics. On Banda there was a shortage of foodstuffs after the supply of sago by the Keiese and Aruese had been prohibited and food from elsewhere was considered too expensive.
Therefore the United East India Company encouraged Christianity on the islands of Kei and Aru at the end of the 17th century, after the termination of the extirpation politics, hoping to create peace and quiet and to "civilise" the population. Under such conditions, it was hoped, they could be persuaded to start trading again with the Bandanese. In 1705 the 1692 trading ban was lifted.15
Nevertheless the trade between the southeastern Moluccans and the Bandanese ceased once more around the middle of the 18th century. Macassars and Buginese from South Sulawesi came to trade, especially in the eastern part of Maluku Tenggara. An attempt of the United East India Company to prevent this trade led to new revolts. Resistance was especially heavy on Aru. In 1787 the Dutch stronghold was attacked and the occupational force murdered, and in 1794 even the Keeper of the Post, the local Dutch representative, was killed. In that same year the Aru archipelago was abandoned by the Dutch "because it was a real nuisance": it was becoming too expensive.16
During this period the entire Dutch position on the Moluccas weakened. Wars, corruption and mismanagement sapped the United East India Company. Furthermore, the clove monopoly of the Company was affected due to the fact that cloves were now also cultivated elsewhere in the world. By the end of the 18th century the English succeeded in driving out the Dutch from the Moluccas. In 1795 they occupied Ambon and a year later they were in possession of Aru.
From Merchants to Colonists
After two periods of intermediary rule by the English, the Dutch returned to the Moluccas in 1817. In 1789 the bankrupt United East India Company had been taken over by the Batavian Republic, so that it was now the Dutch State which ruled over the islands. The Dutch freed trade within the Moluccas and formally opened the region for Macassar and Buginese traders in 1827. In 1853-54 Banda and Ambon, among others, were declared free ports. During the second half of the 19th century the economy of the Banda islands flourished once again, enabling trade with the southeast Moluccas to start up again and Macassar ships to call at these islands.17
