Both Moluccan cloves and Bandanese nutmeg and mace played an important, even crucial, part in the elaborate network of exchanges of commodities which for many centuries before the intervention of the Europeans had been the characteristic feature of inter-island trade in the Indonesian archipelago. From the early sixteenth century the Portuguese, and to a lesser extent the Spanish, added a new strand to this network, but even in the spice islands, the commercial domination of which was their chief goal, they did not seriously disrupt its traditional pattern. This was particularly so in the Banda Islands, which they soon discovered were markedly different from the Moluccas, not only by virtue of the different spices which they produced and in which they traded, but in the economic and political organization of their societies, in the manner in which they reacted to the European intervention and in the effect which that intervention had upon their commercial activities. Both acted as magnets to the Portuguese and Spanish, and later on the Dutch and English, drawn by the lure of great profits, as they had to Asian traders for many centuries before the arrival of the Europeans. But both presented rather different problems to those traders, Asian and European alike, once commercial relations had been established

¹ SeeThomaz,L. F. F. R., ‘Les Portugais dans les mers de l'Archipel au XVIe siècle’,Archipel,18 (1979), pp.105–25;CrossRefGoogle Scholar andThomaz,L. F. F. R., ‘Malucoe Malaca’, inA viagem de Fernão de Magalhães e a questão das Molucas, Actas do II Colóquio Luso-Espanhol de Historia Ultramarina (Lisbon,1975), pp.29–48.Google Scholar See alsovan Leur,J. C.,Indonesian Trade and Society (The Hague,1955),passim;Google Scholar andMeilink-Roelofsz,M. A. P.,Asian Trade and European Influence in the Indonesian Archipelago between 1500 and about 1630 (The Hague,1962),passim.Google Scholar

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³⁰ The islanders of Waigeo paid an annual tribute of birds of paradise, tortoiseshell or sago to the Sultan of Tidore as late as the mid-nineteenth century.Wallace,A. R.,The Malay Archipelago,7th edn (London,1880), pp.529–30.Google Scholar

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³³Jourdain,John,The Journal of John Jourdain 1608–1617, ed.SirWilliam,Foster,Hakluyt Society, 2nd series,XVI (1905), pp.328–9. Richard Hunt had accompanied David Middleton's expedition and presumably gone with him to Banda, where he remained as factor. My italics.Google Scholar

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³⁵ Perhaps the Javanese whom Barros says was the wife of the first Moslem ruler of Ternate (Barros,,Da Asia,III, I, p.580).Google Scholar

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³⁸ Hence the Dutch hongitochten, the naval patrols sent round the islands to destroy and burn unlicensed trees after the Treaty of Batavia in 1652.

³⁹ Up to 100, according toPires,,Suma Oriental,I, p.214.Google Scholar See alsoCastanheda,,Historia do descobrimento…, 6, XI, p. 168.Google Scholar

⁴⁰Rebello,Gabriel,Informação das cousas de Maluco, 1559,III, pp.381–6.Google Scholar See alsoHorridge,G. Adrian,The Design of Planked Boats of the Moluccas, Maritime Monographs and Reports,National Maritime Museum,Greenwich,38 (1978).Google Scholar

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⁵⁴ In English these coins were known as class or cash. The word derives from Tamil Kasu (Sanskrit:karsha) and was used especially to denote the Chinese coinsle andZien, made of an alloy of copper and lead with a square hole in the centre. 1000 of these coins made 120 reis or 1 tael and 140 weighed 1 arratel of 160z. SeeJohn,Saris,The voyage of Captain John Saris to Japan 1613, ed.SirSatow,Ernest M.,Hakluyt,Society, 2nd series,V (1900), p.213.Google Scholar

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⁵⁷ Afonso Lopes da Costa to the King, Malacca, 20 08 1518, inSá,,Documentação,I, pp.103–4.Google Scholar

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⁵⁹ From ‘Kalinga’. The MalayKeling was used to designate Indian merchants from the Coromandel coast settled in Malacca (Portuguese: Quelim).

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⁷⁰Pires,,Suma Oriental,I, p.206. The weight of the bahar in Banda was 550 lbs, in the Moluccas 600 lbs and in Malacca 530–540 lbs. The Portuguese generally reckoned 32 new arratels or pounds of 16 ounces to the arroba, 4 arrobas to the quintal and 4 quintals to the bahar.Google Scholar

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⁷²Descriçāo sumaria…,Google Scholar inibid., IV, p. 16. The same figures are given inInformação a El-Rei sobre o comercio da pimenta e do cravo, s.d., inibid., I, pp. 338–9.

⁷³Barbosa,,An Account of the Countries…,II, 118, pp.196–8.Google Scholar

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⁷⁶Thomaz,, ‘Maluco e Malaca’, p.44Google Scholar See alsoPigafetta,,Magellan's Voyage, p. 121. Pigafetta describes how he and his companions traded with the King of Ternate and obtained a bahar of cloves each for two cubits of fairly good red cloth, 35 glasses, 15 axes, 25 pieces of linen, 150 knives, 50 pairs of scissors, 40 caps, ten ells of Gujerat cloth etc.Google Scholar

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⁸⁵ I.e.manuko dewata (divine bird). The modern Indonesian isburung dewata orcenderawasih.

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¹⁰⁰ Irmao Fernao do Souro to his brethren of the Colegio de Santo Antao, Lisbon, Moluccas, 15 02 1563,ibid., III, pp. 24–5. Some scholars have asserted that the Portuguese set upfeitorias in the Banda Islands comparable to those established on Ambon (see, for example,Diffie,B. W. andWinius,G. D.,Foundations of the Portuguese Empire 1415–1580 (University of Minnesota Press andOxford University Press,1977), p.370). Winius describes the Portuguese settlements on Lontor and Neira asfeitorias. But there is insufficient evidence from Portuguese sources to sustain this view. The establishment of a right to trade by agreement with local rulers and the erection of apadrao did not invariably lead to the setting up of afeitoria or the appointment of afeitor. This of course is not to deny that some Portuguese settled in the islands and traded there.Google ScholarAbdurachman,R. Paramita in her excellent essay ‘Moluccan Responses to the First Intrusions of the West’ (inHaryati,Soebadio andCarine,A. du Marchie Sarvaas (eds.),Dynamics of Indonesian history (Amsterdam,1978), p.173)Google Scholar cites the donation (doacao) of D.Joao III in 1531 to Kaichili Daroes, a Ternatan agent orRimelaha, of tenure of all the land in Banda as an indication that the Portuguese Crown exercised some kind of suzerainty over the Banda Islands which made it possible to bestow them in this way on a faithful ally as a reward for his services. But there is no evidence that the orang kaya ever recognized any authority of the Portuguese Crown over them or their land and it seems unlikely therefore that thedoacao was ever more than a symbolic offering by the King of Portugal of something which was not in any real sense his to donate.

¹⁰¹Relação dos feitos eroicos…, ch.91,Google Scholar inSá,,Documentação,IV, pp.435–6 and 451.Google Scholar

¹⁰² Padre Baltasar Dias to his brethren in Portugal,Malacca,, 19 11 1556,Google Scholaribid., II, p. 270. A decree of the First Provincial Council of Goa in 1567 ordains that no priest should be received in Bengal, Peru, China, Moluccas, Banda, Sunda or other places where there is no Portuguese fortress, even if he has dismissory letters from the bishop of that place, unless they expressly mention how he is to govern it. (Da reformação das cousas da Igreja (Goa, 1567),Google Scholaribid., III, p. 190.)

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