1954 was the year of publication of both Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. by G. W. T. Dames — Maj. Inf. K.N.I.L. b.d. — in ‘s-Gravenhage (The Hague), by the Koninklijke Bibliotheek, and of P. de Roo de la Faille’s Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java, the principal modern Dutch-language source gathering the scattered Portuguese references to the Atjehnese sultan of 1539, his brother-in-law and admiral Alleredin Mahomet, and the Atjeh-Aroe war of 1539. It is thus the publication year of two quite different books — one closing the colonial military arc of the K.N.I.L., the other assembling the pre-colonial and early-modern east-coast Sumatran chronicle record.
The publication
Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. was published in ‘s-Gravenhage in 1954 by the Koninklijke Bibliotheek. The author — G. W. T. Dames, Maj. Inf. K.N.I.L. b.d. (Major of Infantry, K.N.I.L., retired) — had served at Bakongan in the dertiger jaren and at Brastagi in 1947, and wrote the book as a grateful literary memorial to the Ambonese soldiers with whom he had served.
The post-colonial context
1954 was five years after the transfer of sovereignty of 27 December 1949. The K.N.I.L. had been dissolved; the Ambonese soldiers who had served it were either in the army of the Republic of Indonesia (their former enemy) or in the Republik Maluku Selatan (the unilateral declaration of independence of the South Moluccas, which would be crushed by the Indonesian army in 1950-1952). The Netherlands itself was in the post-colonial period: the Souvereiniteitsoverdracht had ended the colonial state, and the position of the Ambonese soldiers who had served the Dutch was, in 1954, an open wound.
The book as memorial
The book — written in 1954, five years after the dissolution of the colonial army — is therefore a memorial: a grateful literary memorial to the Ambonese soldiers with whom Dames had served. The book’s prologue states the purpose: “Mogen de lezers Oom Ambon uit deze regels leren kennen en hem de genegenheid toedragen, die schrijver dezes ertoe bewoog, zijn dankbare herinnering aan hem op papier te zetten.”
Account from Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java — 1954
Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java was published by P. de Roo de la Faille in Den Haag in March 1954 — a 68-page compilation that gathers the scattered Portuguese chronicle references (chiefly Mendez Pinto’s) to the sixteenth-century Sumatran east coast, decodes their bedekte taal (veiled language), and ties them to the Sadjarah Malajoe’s chronicle geography and to the Atjeh-Aroe war of 1539. The book is dedicated to Dr. D. J. Hulshoff Pol.
People associated with the 1954 publication
- P. de Roo de la Faille — author of the Curiositeiten
- Dr. D. J. Hulshoff Pol — dedicatee
Places
Significance
1954 is significant in Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. as the year of publication — the year that closes the colonial arc the book narrates. The book’s argument is that the dissolution of the K.N.I.L. in 1949 was the end of the tangsi culture that had made Oom Ambon, and that the book itself — written in 1954, five years after the dissolution — is a memorial to that culture. The year 1954 is therefore the book’s marker of its own post-colonial position: a grateful literary memorial, written from the post-colonial Netherlands, to the Ambonese soldiers of the dissolved colonial army.
1954 is, in the same year, significant for the Curiositeiten as the terminus of P. de Roo de la Faille’s decades of research into the bedekte taal geography of the Sumatran east coast — research that would become, for later readers, the principal modern gateway to the sixteenth-century chronicle and Portuguese-travel record of Aroe and the Atjehnese sultanate.
See Also
- G. W. T. Dames
- Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L.
- Souvereiniteitsoverdracht (27 December 1949)
- Oom Ambon
- Tangsi
- K.N.I.L.
- P. de Roo de la Faille
- Dr. D. J. Hulshoff Pol
- Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java
- Alleredin Mahomet
- Atjeh-Aroe War (1539)
- 1949
- 1950
- 1952
Sources
Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L., by G. W. T. Dames, Maj. Inf. K.N.I.L. b.d. (‘s-Gravenhage: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, 1954), title page and prologue “Bij ons…”
Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java, by P. de Roo de la Faille (Den Haag: Maart 1954). 68 pp.
1954 was the year of publication of both Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. by G. W. T. Dames — Maj. Inf. K.N.I.L. b.d. — in ‘s-Gravenhage (The Hague), by the Koninklijke Bibliotheek, and of P. de Roo de la Faille’s Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java, the principal modern Dutch-language source gathering the scattered Portuguese references to the Atjehnese sultan of 1539, his brother-in-law and admiral Alleredin Mahomet, and the Atjeh-Aroe war of 1539. It is thus the publication year of two quite different books — one closing the colonial military arc of the K.N.I.L., the other assembling the pre-colonial and early-modern east-coast Sumatran chronicle record.
The publication
Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. was published in ‘s-Gravenhage in 1954 by the Koninklijke Bibliotheek. The author — G. W. T. Dames, Maj. Inf. K.N.I.L. b.d. (Major of Infantry, K.N.I.L., retired) — had served at Bakongan in the dertiger jaren and at Brastagi in 1947, and wrote the book as a grateful literary memorial to the Ambonese soldiers with whom he had served.
The post-colonial context
1954 was five years after the transfer of sovereignty of 27 December 1949. The K.N.I.L. had been dissolved; the Ambonese soldiers who had served it were either in the army of the Republic of Indonesia (their former enemy) or in the Republik Maluku Selatan (the unilateral declaration of independence of the South Moluccas, which would be crushed by the Indonesian army in 1950-1952). The Netherlands itself was in the post-colonial period: the Souvereiniteitsoverdracht had ended the colonial state, and the position of the Ambonese soldiers who had served the Dutch was, in 1954, an open wound.
The book as memorial
The book — written in 1954, five years after the dissolution of the colonial army — is therefore a memorial: a grateful literary memorial to the Ambonese soldiers with whom Dames had served. The book’s prologue states the purpose: “Mogen de lezers Oom Ambon uit deze regels leren kennen en hem de genegenheid toedragen, die schrijver dezes ertoe bewoog, zijn dankbare herinnering aan hem op papier te zetten.”
Account from Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java — 1954
Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java was published by P. de Roo de la Faille in Den Haag in March 1954 — a 68-page compilation that gathers the scattered Portuguese chronicle references (chiefly Mendez Pinto’s) to the sixteenth-century Sumatran east coast, decodes their bedekte taal (veiled language), and ties them to the Sadjarah Malajoe’s chronicle geography and to the Atjeh-Aroe war of 1539. The book is dedicated to Dr. D. J. Hulshoff Pol.
People associated with the 1954 publication
- P. de Roo de la Faille — author of the Curiositeiten
- Dr. D. J. Hulshoff Pol — dedicatee
Places
Significance
1954 is significant in Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L. as the year of publication — the year that closes the colonial arc the book narrates. The book’s argument is that the dissolution of the K.N.I.L. in 1949 was the end of the tangsi culture that had made Oom Ambon, and that the book itself — written in 1954, five years after the dissolution — is a memorial to that culture. The year 1954 is therefore the book’s marker of its own post-colonial position: a grateful literary memorial, written from the post-colonial Netherlands, to the Ambonese soldiers of the dissolved colonial army.
1954 is, in the same year, significant for the Curiositeiten as the terminus of P. de Roo de la Faille’s decades of research into the bedekte taal geography of the Sumatran east coast — research that would become, for later readers, the principal modern gateway to the sixteenth-century chronicle and Portuguese-travel record of Aroe and the Atjehnese sultanate.
See Also
- G. W. T. Dames
- Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L.
- Souvereiniteitsoverdracht (27 December 1949)
- Oom Ambon
- Tangsi
- K.N.I.L.
- P. de Roo de la Faille
- Dr. D. J. Hulshoff Pol
- Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java
- Alleredin Mahomet
- Atjeh-Aroe War (1539)
- 1949
- 1950
- 1952
Sources
Oom Ambon van het K.N.I.L., by G. W. T. Dames, Maj. Inf. K.N.I.L. b.d. (‘s-Gravenhage: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, 1954), title page and prologue “Bij ons…”
Historische Curiositeiten uit Malajoe en Java, by P. de Roo de la Faille (Den Haag: Maart 1954). 68 pp.