The Great East ( nl, Groote Oost) was a

governorate A governorate is an administrative division of a state. It is headed by a governor. As English-speaking nations tend to call regions administered by governors either State (administrative division), states or province, provinces, the term ''govern ...

(''gouvernement'') of the

Dutch East Indies The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies ( nl, Nederlands(ch)-Indië; ), was a Dutch colony consisting of what is now Indonesia. It was formed from the nationalised trading posts of the Dutch East India Company, which ...

between 1938 and 1946. It comprised all the islands to the east of Borneo (

Celebes Sulawesi (), also known as Celebes (), is an island in Indonesia. One of the four Greater Sunda Islands, and the world's eleventh-largest island, it is situated east of Borneo, west of the Maluku Islands, and south of Mindanao and the Sul ...

, the

Moluccas The Maluku Islands (; Indonesian: ''Kepulauan Maluku'') or the Moluccas () are an archipelago in the east of Indonesia. Tectonically they are located on the Halmahera Plate within the Molucca Sea Collision Zone. Geographically they are located eas ...

, and

West New Guinea Western New Guinea, also known as Papua, Indonesian New Guinea, or Indonesian Papua, is the western half of the Melanesian island of New Guinea which is administered by Indonesia. Since the island is alternatively named as Papua, the region ...

, with their offshore islands) and of Java (

Bali Bali () is a province of Indonesia and the westernmost of the Lesser Sunda Islands. East of Java and west of Lombok, the province includes the island of Bali and a few smaller neighbouring islands, notably Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan, and Nu ...

and the Lesser Sunda Islands). Its capital was Macassar on Celebes. The Great East was created with the merger of its constituent residencies on 25 May 1938 and was ruled by a governor. The first governor was G. A. W. Ch. de Haze Winkelman. Following

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, the governorate (except for

Netherlands New Guinea Dutch New Guinea or Netherlands New Guinea ( nl, Nederlands-Nieuw-Guinea, id, Nugini Belanda) was the western half of the island of New Guinea that was a part of the Dutch East Indies until 1949, later an overseas territory of the Kingd ...

) became the State of the Great East (later the State of East Indonesia) on 24 December 1946. This state became a constituent of the federal

United States of Indonesia The United States of Indonesia ( nl, Verenigde Staten van Indonesië, id, Republik Indonesia Serikat, abbreviated as RIS), was a short-lived federal state to which the Netherlands formally transferred sovereignty of the Dutch East Indies (except ...

in 1949 and was integrated into a unitary Indonesia in 1950 (except West New Guinea, which was only integrated in 1963). As of March 2020, the area is divided into the eastern 13 of Indonesia's 34 provinces.

Administrative divisions

The Great East ''gouvernement'' consisted of the following residencies: * Bali and Lombok (

Singaradja Singaraja is a port town in northern Bali, Indonesia, which serves as the seat of Buleleng Regency. The name is Indonesian for "Lion King" (from Tamil '' singam'' and ''raja''). It is just east of Lovina, and is also the centre of Buleleng Distr ...

) *

Celebes en Onderhoorigheden Dutch Celebes refers to the period of colonial governance on the island of Sulawesi - as a commandment of the Dutch East India Company from 1699 until its demise in the early 1800s, and then as a part of the Netherlands Indies or Dutch East Indie ...

( Macassar), including southern Celebes and neighbouring islands *

Menado Manado () is the capital city of the Indonesian province of North Sulawesi. It is the second largest city in Sulawesi after Makassar, with the 2020 Census giving a population of 451,916 distributed over a land area of 162.53 km2.Badan Pu ...

(Menado), including all of northern Celebes *

(

Amboina Amboyna or amboina may refer to: * ''Amboyna'' (play), a play by John Dryden *Amboyna massacre, in 1623 in Indonesia * Amboina box turtle (''Cuora amboinensis''), of Asia * Amboina king parrot (''Alisterus amboinensis''), of Indonesia * ''Amboyn ...

), including the Moluccas, West New Guinea, and other outlying islands such as

Wetar Wetar is a tropical island which belongs to the Indonesian province of Maluku and is the largest island of the Maluku Barat Daya Islands (literally ''Southwest Islands'') of the Maluku Islands. It lies east of the Lesser Sunda Islands, which i ...

and Aru *

Timor en Onderhoorigheden The Timor and Dependencies Residency ( nl, Residentie Timor en Onderhoorigheden; id, Karesidenan Timor dan Kepulauannya) was an administrative subdivision (Residency) of the Dutch East Indies located in the Eastern half of Lesser Sunda Islands e ...

(

Kupang Kupang ( id, Kota Kupang, ), formerly known as Koepang, is the capital of the Indonesian province of East Nusa Tenggara. At the 2020 C ensus, it had a population of 442,758; the official estimate as at mid 2021 was 455,850. It is the largest ci ...

), including western

Timor Timor is an island at the southern end of Maritime Southeast Asia, in the north of the Timor Sea. The island is East Timor–Indonesia border, divided between the sovereign states of East Timor on the eastern part and Indonesia on the western p ...

and the other Lesser Sunda Islands (except for Bali and Lombok)

Notes

References

* *\* *{{cite thesis , last1=Harvey , first1=Barbara Sillars , type=PhD , year=1974, title=Tradition, Islam, and Rebellion: South Sulawesi 1950-1965 , url=https://www.oxis.org/theses/harvey-1974.pdf , publisher=Cornell University Indonesia in World War II History of New Guinea History of Timor West Timor Western New Guinea 1938 establishments in the Dutch East Indies 1946 disestablishments in the Dutch East Indies Defunct organizations based in the Dutch East Indies

Administrative divisions

See also

Notes

References