Pasaman — the historic pepper port on the west coast of Sumatra south of Atjeh — was one of the chief pepper ports of the Sumatran west coast in the early-modern period and a port of call of the Dutch East India trade. Pasaman was visited by Paulus van Caerden in 1600 without result, together with Priaman and Tikoe, “waar overal slechts weinig peper in voorraad was”. Pasaman is one of the principal west-coast pepper ports named in Van der Woude’s chapter “Atjeh. Djohor. Malaka.” in his Van der Woude (1948).
The 1600 Van Caerden visit
Van Caerden, sent by his admiral Pieter Both to the west coast of Sumatra, “bezocht daar zonder resultaat Priaman, Tikoe en Pasaman, waar overal slechts weenig peper in voorraad was”. The visit was the first Dutch commercial call at Pasaman and showed that the west-coast pepper ports, like Atjeh itself, were subject to seasonal fluctuations in supply. Van Caerden’s failure at Priaman, Tikoe and Pasaman was the proximate cause of his decision to try Atjeh for cargo, “hoewel hij wist wat De Houtman daar was overkomen”.
The Westkust closure
Like Priaman and Tikoe, Pasaman was subject to the sultan of Atjeh’s policy of centralising the European pepper trade at Atjeh. The west-coast ports were closed to foreigners except at Atjeh — a policy that Jan Grenier encountered at Tikoe on 19 February 1602 and that shaped the early-modern commercial geography of the Sumatran pepper trade. The closure was largely effective in the early Dutch-Indies period; the Dutch and English were forced to call at Atjeh for their pepper, and the west-coast ports could be visited only when the sultan’s enforcement lapsed.
Significance
Pasaman is, in Van der Woude’s narrative, the principal west-coast pepper port of Sumatra south of Atjeh (alongside Priaman and Tikoe) and a port of call of the Dutch East India trade. The port’s seasonal fluctuations in supply and the sultan of Atjeh’s policy of centralising the European pepper trade at Atjeh together frame the early-modern commercial geography of the Sumatran pepper trade. Pasaman’s role in the early Dutch-Indies trade would grow in the seventeenth century as the Dutch shifted their pepper sourcing from Atjeh to the west coast and to Bantam and the Sunda islands.
See Also
- Acheh
- Priaman
- Tikoe
- Paulus van Caerden
- Paulus van Caerden’s Atjeh visit (1600-1601)
- Jan Grenier
- Sultan of Atjeh (1589-1604)
- Sumatra
- 1600
- 1602
Source
Coen, Koopman van Heeren Zeventien. Geschiedenis van den Hollandshen Handel in Indië (1598-1614), by Johan van der Woude (Amsterdam: C.V. Uitgeverij v/h C. De Boer Jr., 1948), Hoofdstuk V “Voorgangers, Hollanders en mededingers tot 1614. Atjeh. Djohor. Malaka.” (pp. 111, 116).