The Sunda Strait — Dutch Straat Soenda — is the strait that separates the southern tip of Sumatra from the western end of Java, and forms one of the two main sea passages between the Indian Ocean and the Java Sea. The strait is named in the Dutch pamphlet Beschouwingen over Atjeh en onzen oorlog met dat rijk by Een Ooggetuige (1880s) in the course of the author’s discussion of the sea approaches to Atjeh and of the wider setting of the Atjehnese theatre in relation to the shipping routes of the archipelago.
Navigation and trade
The Sunda Strait is one of the two great sea passages of the archipelago — the other being the Strait of Malacca — by which shipping passes between the Indian Ocean and the waters of the archipelago. The strait separates the Lampong districts of southern Sumatra — including the places Kroeë and Oosthaven — from the western end of Java. In the nineteenth century, the Sunda Strait was one of the principal routes by which shipping passed to and from the Netherlands Indies, and its relation to the Strait of Malacca and to the Strait of Halakka at the northern tip of Sumatra was a central element of the geography of the archipelago within which the Atjeh War was fought.
The pamphlet’s reference
The author of the Beschouwingen names the Sunda Strait — Straat Soenda — in the context of a discussion of the sea approaches to Atjeh. The reference is made in the course of the author’s argument on the strategic and commercial value of Atjeh, in which the Sunda Strait is discussed as one of the elements of the wider geography of the archipelago within which the Atjehnese coast and the Strait of Halakka held their importance. The comparison of the Sunda Strait with the Strait of Malacca and the Strait of Halakka is part of the author’s wider argument that Atjeh, properly developed, could serve as a station for world trade.
Significance
The Sunda Strait is significant within the AcehWiki corpus as a waterway named in the contemporary Dutch pamphlet literature of the Atjeh War in connection with the sea approaches to Atjeh. The strait’s mention in the Beschouwingen is a document of the wider geography within which the Dutch pamphleteers of the Atjeh War framed the Atjehnese theatre.
See Also
- Beschouwingen over Atjeh en onzen oorlog met dat rijk
- Een Ooggetuige
- Kroeë
- Oosthaven
- Strand Malaka (Strait of Malacca)
- Strait of Halakka
- Aceh War
- 1880s
Source
Beschouwingen over Atjeh en onzen oorlog met dat rijk, door Een Ooggetuige, met een Kaart van het Oorlogstooneel, de Vaarwaters en vereischte Kustlichten voor den Wereldhandel (Rotterdam: Van Meurs & Stufkens, [c. 1880s]). Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague, shelfmark 1830 C17 2611 / 1830 0947 8285.