Martinus or Maarten Sonck (also Marten; Soncq; Sonk) (ca. 1590, Amsterdam? – August 1625, Anping) was the first

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

governor of Formosa from 1624 to 1625. Sonck, who in 1612 lived in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population of 907,976 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban ar ...

, studied law at Leiden University from October 1612 to March 1616. In 1618 Sonck was sent by the

Dutch East Indies Company The United East India Company ( nl, Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, the VOC) was a chartered company established on the 20th March 1602 by the States General of the Netherlands amalgamating existing companies into the first joint-stock co ...

as “advocaat-fiscaal” (a district attorney) to

Batavia Batavia may refer to: Historical places * Batavia (region), a land inhabited by the Batavian people during the Roman Empire, today part of the Netherlands * Batavia, Dutch East Indies, present-day Jakarta, the former capital of the Dutch East In ...

, where he arrived in 1619. He subsequently became governor of the

Banda Islands The Banda Islands ( id, Kepulauan Banda) are a volcanic group of ten small volcanic islands in the Banda Sea, about south of Seram Island and about east of Java, and constitute an administrative district (''kecamatan'') within the Central ...

. In 1623 he was recalled to Batavia to account for the use of excessive amounts of ammunition at gun salutes (he was to pay for it out of his own pocket). (in Dutch, with a picture of Martinus Sonck's signature) On 4 May 1624 the governing body in Batavia decided to send him to replace Cornelis Reijersen as commander of the Dutch fort and trading base on Peng-hu, the main island of the

Pescadores The Penghu (, Hokkien POJ: ''Phîⁿ-ô͘'' or ''Phêⁿ-ô͘'' ) or Pescadores Islands are an archipelago of 90 islands and islets in the Taiwan Strait, located approximately west from the main island of Taiwan, covering an area ...

west of Formosa. The Pescadores were Chinese territory, and after a failed accord, Nan Juyi, the governor of

Fujian Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its cap ...

, sent an army to attack Peng-hu in July 1624. Sonck arrived at the Pescadores on 1 August on board the ship ''Zeelandia''. On 25 August, after negotiations via Li Dan, head of the illegal traders on Taiwan, Sonck succumbed under the pressure and withdrew his contingent to Formosa, where he founded Fort Zeelandia near the town Anping. The Dutch monopolized the harbour, while

Zheng Zhilong Zheng Zhilong, Marquis of Tong'an and Nan'an (; April 16, 1604 – November 24, 1661), baptismal name Nicholas Iquan Gaspard, was a Chinese admiral, merchant, military general, pirate, and politician of the late Ming dynasty who later defec ...

, or Nicolas Iquan, became a

privateer A privateer is a private person or ship that engages in maritime warfare under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign or deleg ...

for the Dutch, attacking trade between China and

Manila Manila ( , ; fil, Maynila, ), officially the City of Manila ( fil, Lungsod ng Maynila, ), is the capital of the Philippines, and its second-most populous city. It is highly urbanized and, as of 2019, was the world's most densely populate ...

. This constituted the beginning of the colonial presence of the Dutch on Formosa. Sonck was governor of Dutch Formosa for only one year, as he drowned in Anping harbour in August 1625. According to another author, he died in December 1626. He was buried at Fort Zeelandia. He was succeeded by Gerard Frederikszoon de With.

References

Bibliography

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Sonck, Martinus Year of birth missing 1625 deaths Dutch East India Company people from Amsterdam Colonial governors of Dutch Formosa Leiden University alumni