Dutch–Aceh Treaty of 1649

Properties2
tagsdocument, treaty, diplomacy, colonial, aceh, dutch, achehnese
aliasesTreaty of 1649, Truytman treaty, Aceh-VOC agreement 1649, Truytman's treaties with the sultane, Atjeh-VOC verdrag van november 1649, Truytman treaties, Verdragen van november 1649

6 min read

The Dutch–Aceh Treaty of 1649 was an agreement concluded in November of that year between Tajul-alam, the “Sultane of Aceh,” and the Dutch East India Company (VOC) envoy Johan Truytman. It secured the Company important trade advantages across the entire West Coast of Sumatra, including the exclusion of all other European and indigenous nations (except Acehnese) and the regulation of pepper prices.

Background

After the VOC’s conquest of Malakka in 1641, the Company’s aggressive trade policies on the Malay Peninsula had strained relations with Aceh. By 1649, however, both sides sought a new accommodation. Truytman was dispatched by the High Government in Batavia and succeeded in winning Tajul-alam over with tactful diplomacy.

Provisions

The treaty:

  • Granted the VOC extensive trading privileges along the whole of Sumatra’s West Coast.
  • Excluded all other European nations, as well as all indigenous peoples except the Acehnese, from trading in these areas.
  • Fixed pepper prices, giving the VOC certainty and control over the trade.
  • Was an important step in securing the Company’s dominance in the region’s pepper and other commodities.

Significance

The treaty marked a high point in VOC-Aceh relations in the mid-17th century. It built on the 1641 treaty and paved the way for the subsequent agreement on tin trade in Perak (1650). It demonstrated the Company’s growing power and its ability to negotiate favourable terms even with strong independent states like Aceh. The treaty remained in force for several years and helped regulate VOC commerce until later conflicts.

Account from Stapel’s De Koloniën (1931)

The Treaty of Atjeh-VOC of November 1649 was the pair of treaties (een tweetal verdragen) concluded at Atjeh by the envoy of the Hooge Regeering, Johan Truytman, with the sultane of Atjeh. Recorded in Dr. F. W. Stapel’s Geschiedkundige Atlas van Nederland as the instrument by which the Compagnie broke out of the limited commercial foothold granted by the Schouten treaty of 1641 and obtained sweeping advantages on the whole West Coast of Sumatra: free trade with the exclusion of all other European and native nations (except Atjehers), together with a regulation of pepper prices.

Background

The Compagnie’s conquest of Malakka in 1641 had two contradictory effects on its Atjeh relationship. On the one hand, the Schouten treaty of February 1641 formalised the Compagnie’s presence on the Westkust in the four pepper ports Tikoe, Priaman, Padang and Indrapoera. On the other hand, the disappearance of Portuguese Malakka removed the common enemy that had kept Atjeh and the Compagnie aligned, and “the trade policy pursued by the Compagnie, after the conquest of Malakka, on the Malay Peninsula sharpened the relationship with Atjeh again and it became even very strained” (De door de Compagnie, na de verovering van Malakka, gevoerde handelspolitiek op het Maleische Schiereiland verscherpte de verhouding met Atjeh weer en ze werd zelfs zéér gespannen).

The mechanism of strain was the Compagnie’s effort to monopolise the tin trade of the Tin Quartiers (Perak, Kedah, Oedjong Salang), much of whose tin had previously been drawn off “mostly via Perak, which stood under Atjeh” (meest via Perak, dat onder Atjeh stond). On 3 July 1647 the G.G. and Councillors resolved to close the harbours of the Tin Quartiers to all foreign merchants, but this only intensified Acehnese resentment. The Compagnie’s goal, Stapel says, was achieved only when “the queen of Atjeh bound herself on 15 August 1650 to open the tin trade in Perak only to Atjehers and Hollanders” — and that 1650 success was itself the fruit of the Truytman breakthrough of 1649.

Truytman’s embassy and the terms

“In 1649 the envoy of the Hooge Regeering, Johan Truytman, in a tactful manner managed to win the sultane for the Compagnie” (In 1649 wist echter de gezant der Hooge Regeering, Johan Truytman, op tactvolle wijze de sultane voor de Compagnie te winnen). The word tactvolle — tactful — is Stapel’s editorial judgement on Truytman’s diplomacy, and it is worth noticing: in a book that frequently passes harsh judgements on the conduct of native rulers and Dutch officers alike, Truytman’s intervention is singled out as exemplary statecraft.

The two treaties concluded in November 1649 gave the Compagnie “important commercial advantages on the whole West Coast, with the exclusion of all other European and native nations — except Atjehers — and a regulation of the pepper prices” (de Compagnie belangrijke handelsvoordeelen kreeg op de geheele Westkust, met uitsluiting van alle andere Europeesche en Inlandsche naties — behalve Atjehers — en eene regeling van de peperprijzen).

The careful reservation of Atjeher rights is structurally identical to the Schouten treaty of 1641 — “behals Atjehers” — but the geographic scope has dramatically widened: from four named pepper ports in 1641 to “the whole West Coast” in 1649. The 1649 treaties thus transform the Compagnie from a tolerated trader in a handful of Acehnese ports into the privileged commercial partner along the entire Westkust.

Significance

The Truytman treaties were the political precondition for the Perak treaty of 15 August 1650, which sealed the Compagnie’s half of the peninsula’s tin trade. They are also the immediate reference point against which the 1656 blockade and the 1659 peace were measured: when Atjehsche governors on the Westkust continued to levy tolls on Menangkabau pepper sold to the Compagnie, Batavia treated that as a violation of the Truytman settlement. Stapel records the Compagnie’s frustration in characteristic terms: when oral and written protests failed, Batavia in 1656 resolved to blockade Atjeh’s coasts “in order thereby to prevent the trade with others, as in conflict with the contract of 1649” (om daardoor den handel met anderen, als in strijd met het contract van 1649, te beletten).

The “contract of 1649” is the Truytman treaties. Every subsequent Dutch claim against Atjehsche behaviour on the Westkust — including the arrest of Anthony van Voorst in 1656 and the long run-up to the Painansch Contract of 1663 — is built on the legal foundation Truytman laid.

See Also

Sources

Geschiedkundige Atlas van Nederland: De Archipel en het Maleische Schiereiland in 1619 – Idem in 1650 – De Compagnie buiten den Archipel in 1650, by Dr. F. W. Stapel (‘s-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1928), pp. 30–31.

De Koloniën, by Dr. F. W. Stapel, in Geschiedkundige Atlas van Nederland (‘s-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1931), kaart 19, blz. 27, 31 (tekst bij de bladen 2 en 3: De Archipel en het Maleische Schiereiland in 1650, Kantoren op andere plaatsen — Sumatra) en blz. 14 (tekst bij blad 4: Atjeh en de Westkust van Sumatra in 1684).

Graph View