Cornelis Matelief de Jonge (c. 1569 – October 17, 1632) was a Dutch admiral who was active in establishing Dutch power in

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainlan ...

during the beginning of the 17th century. His fleet was officially on a trading mission, but its true intent was to destroy

Portuguese Portuguese may refer to: * anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Portugal ** Portuguese cuisine, traditional foods ** Portuguese language, a Romance language *** Portuguese dialects, variants of the Portuguese language ** Portu ...

power in the area. The fleet had 1400 men on board, including 600 soldiers. Matelieff did not succeed in this. The Dutch would ultimately gain control of Malacca more than thirty years later, again joining forces with the

Sultanate of Johor The Johor Sultanate ( ms, Kesultanan Johor or ; also called the Sultanate of Johor, Johor-Pahang, or the Johor Empire) was founded by Malaccan Sultan Mahmud Shah's son, Sultan Alauddin Riayat Shah II in 1528. Johor was part of the Malaccan ...

, and a new ally Aceh, in 1641. He was born and died in

Rotterdam Rotterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Rotte'') is the second largest city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is in the province of South Holland, part of the North Sea mouth of the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta, via the ''"Ne ...

Account

Born in

, Matelief was put in command of a fleet of eleven ships of the

Dutch East India 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 ...

with the destination of Malacca. Malacca then was an inconvenient stronghold for non-Portuguese ships heading for the

Indonesian Archipelago The islands of Indonesia, also known as the Indonesian Archipelago ( id, Kepulauan Indonesia) or Nusantara, may refer either to the islands comprising the country of Indonesia or to the geographical groups which include its islands. History ...

, China or Japan. The fleet set sail from

Zeeland , nl, Ik worstel en kom boven("I struggle and emerge") , anthem = "Zeeuws volkslied"("Zeelandic Anthem") , image_map = Zeeland in the Netherlands.svg , map_alt = , m ...

on May 12, 1605. It was the third (?) such fleet from the Dutch East Indies Company to visit Malacca. Matelieff met with

Steven van der Hagen Steven van der Hagen (Amersfoort, 1563 – 1621) was the first admiral of the Dutch East India Company (VOC). He made three visits to the East Indies, spending six years in all there. He was appointed to the Raad van Indië. Van der Hage ...

on the island of

Mauritius Mauritius ( ; french: Maurice, link=no ; mfe, label= Mauritian Creole, Moris ), officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean about off the southeast coast of the African continent, east of Madagascar. It ...

for a briefing in January 1606. As one of the first, Matelieff described the black rat, the

dodo The dodo (''Raphus cucullatus'') is an extinct flightless bird that was endemic to the island of Mauritius, which is east of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean. The dodo's closest genetic relative was the also-extinct Rodrigues solitaire. The ...

and the macaque monkey. Also his description of the vegetation of the island are most important. He reached Malacca in April 1606. In May Matelief de Jonge formed a formal pact with the ruler of

Johor Johor (; ), also spelled as Johore, is a state of Malaysia in the south of the Malay Peninsula. Johor has land borders with the Malaysian states of Pahang to the north and Malacca and Negeri Sembilan to the northwest. Johor shares maritime ...

, Sultan

Alauddin Riayat Shah III Sultan Alauddin Riayat Shah III was the Sultan of Johor who reigned from 1597 to 1615. He resided at the new capital of Johor at Batu Sawar, but later moved his administration to Pasir Raja around 1609. In 1612, at the instigation of his co-ruler ...

, to expel the Portuguese. In exchange, the Dutch would get Malacca for themselves and would be able to conduct trade with Johor. The Dutch and the Malay also agreed to tolerate each other's religion.

First battle of Malacca (August 1606)

Matelief laid siege to the Portuguese-held Malacca for several months, but was repulsed on land by Portuguese troops under

André Furtado de Mendonça André Furtado de Mendonça (1558 – 1 April 1611) was a captain and governor of Portuguese India, and a military commander during Portuguese expansion into Ceylon, India, Indonesia and Malacca. Biography He was a son of Afonso Furtado Mendo� ...

and their allies, a contingent of Japanese ''

samurai were the hereditary military nobility and officer caste of medieval and early-modern Japan from the late 12th century until their abolition in 1876. They were the well-paid retainers of the '' daimyo'' (the great feudal landholders). They h ...

'' from

Red seal ships were Japanese armed merchant sailing ships bound for Southeast Asian ports with red-sealed letters patent issued by the early Tokugawa shogunate in the first half of the 17th century. Between 1600 and 1635, more than 350 Japanese ships went ...

. A very large Portuguese fleet under Dom Martim Afonso de Castro, the Viceroy of

Goa Goa () is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is located between the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north and Karnataka to the ...

, arrived on the scene with twenty Portuguese ships on August 14, 1606. The two fleets fought from August 17. ''Nassau'' was boarded by ''Santa Cruz'' and ''Nossa Senhora da Conceição.'' Matelief, onboard ''Orange'', went to the rescue but collided with another Dutch ship, ''Middelburg''. These two ships were then attacked by ''São Salvador'' and Dom Duarte de Guerra's

galleon Galleons were large, multi-decked sailing ships first used as armed cargo carriers by European states from the 16th to 18th centuries during the age of sail and were the principal vessels drafted for use as warships until the Anglo-Dutch W ...

. ''Orange'' managed to break free, but the two Portuguese ships and the ''Middelburg'' all caught fire and sank in the action. The ''Santa Cruz'' and ''Conceição'' eventually managed to set the ''Nassau'' on fire, leading to an explosion that sank her. Matelief decided to withdraw from the action, with 150 dead on the Dutch side, and around 500 on the Portuguese side. On August 19, 1606, he obtained permission from the Sultan of Johor to anchor his fleet for repairs in the

Johor River The Johor River ( ms, Sungai Johor) is the main river in the Malaysian state of Johor. The river is 122.7 km long with a catchment of 2,636 km2 and flows in a roughly north–south direction, originating from Mount Gemuruh and then empti ...

Second battle of Malacca (Sept. 1606)

Matelief came back to the scene of the first battle about a month later. Castro had sailed away, leaving only ten Portuguese ships before Malacca. Matelief attacked the ships and managed to sink or burn every single one of them, on September 21, 1606. At the end of his trip Matelieff had lost six ships. Matelieff sailed in one ship from

Ternate Ternate is a city in the Indonesian province of North Maluku and an island in the Maluku Islands. It was the ''de facto'' provincial capital of North Maluku before Sofifi on the nearby coast of Halmahera became the capital in 2010. It is off the ...

to Canton, and on June 4, 1607 he captured a Chinese junk, loaded with spices from Banda. When six Portuguese ships under André Pessoa showed up in front of the Chinese coast, he went back, without an agreement with China or reaching Japan. Matelieff arrived unsuccessfully on Bantam on November 24, 1607, and sent

Willem Jansz Willem Janszoon (; ), sometimes abbreviated to Willem Jansz., was a Dutch navigator and colonial governor. Janszoon served in the Dutch East Indies in the periods 16031611 and 16121616, including as governor of Fort Henricus on the island of ...

with secret instructions to Banda to forestall the English ships. He left Bantam on January 28, 1608

Return to Europe with a Siamese embassy (1608)

Matelieff returned to Europe in 1608 with Cornelius Specx, a Dutchman who had established a factory in Ayutthaya in 1604. Together with them was an embassy of 16 peoples from the

Kingdom of Siam Kingdom of Siam may refer to: * Sukhothai Kingdom (1238–1351) * Ayutthaya Kingdom (1351–1767) * Thonburi Kingdom (1768–1782) * Rattanakosin Kingdom (1782–1932) * Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and official ...

sent by the Siamese ruler

Ekathotsarot Ekathotsarot ( th, เอกาทศรถ, , ) or Sanphet III ( th, สรรเพชญ์ที่ ๓); 1560 – 1610/11) was the King of Ayutthaya from 1605 to 1610/11 and overlord of Lan Na from 1605 to 1608/09, succeeding his brother Nare ...

. The embassy was brought to Holland by Matelief onboard ''Orange''. They arrived in

The Hague The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a city and municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's administrative centre and its seat of government, and while the official capital o ...

on September 10, 1608. There the embassy met with

Maurice of Nassau, Prince of Orange Maurice of Orange ( nl, Maurits van Oranje; 14 November 1567 – 23 April 1625) was ''stadtholder'' of all the provinces of the Dutch Republic except for Friesland from 1585 at the earliest until his death in 1625. Before he became Prince o ...

. Following this, a treaty was concluded between the

Dutch Republic The United Provinces of the Netherlands, also known as the (Seven) United Provinces, officially as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands (Dutch: ''Republiek der Zeven Verenigde Nederlanden''), and commonly referred to in historiography ...

and Siam in 1617.''Southeast Asia: Its Historical Development'', John Frank Cady, p.213 In 1618 Matelieff was appointed in the

vroedschap The vroedschap () was the name for the (all male) city council in the early modern Netherlands; the member of such a council was called a ''vroedman'', literally a "wise man". An honorific title of the ''vroedschap'' was the ''vroede vaderen' ...

of Rotterdam, later as a

burgemeester Burgomaster (alternatively spelled burgermeister, literally "master of the town, master of the borough, master of the fortress, master of the citizens") is the English form of various terms in or derived from Germanic languages for the chief m ...

of the city. In 1625 he lost his function as a deputy in the States-General when staying too long in

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

Account

First battle of Malacca (August 1606)

Second battle of Malacca (Sept. 1606)

Return to Europe with a Siamese embassy (1608)

Notes

Further reading