Thesis
Thesis
Thesis
Proefschrift
door
geboren te Utrecht
in 1976
Promotor: prof. dr. J.L. Blussé van Oud-Alblas
Co-promotor: dr. L.J. Wagenaar
Preface ix
Glossary xi
Maps xiii
Introduction 1
Introduction 131
Notes 219
Appendix 253
Bibliography 255
Samenvatting 265
PREFACE
They say that writing a PhD thesis is a lonely affair, but that is only part
of the story. In the last four years I have been fortunate enough to work
with a great variety of people, through the TANAP project and the
CNWS (School of Asian, African and Amerindian studies). Although I
wrote the thesis entirely by myself, some people have helped me greatly
by giving me their feedback on my writing. The comments I received
from Prof. Dr Nira Wickramasinge and Dr Hugo s’Jacob at the TANAP
conferences in Yogyakarta and Xiamen respectively were certainly useful.
The TANAP seminars in which all TANAP students participated were a
great platform to discuss new ideas and compare our findings. The same
goes for the cohort-meetings at the CNWS, where fellow PhD students,
but from very different fields, commented on each other’s chapters.
I regret that Leiden prescriptions do not allow me to thank my promotor
and co-promotor.
Although I was already well acquainted with University life as an
undergraduate, I got to know the University in a very different way as a
PhD student. The well-organized CNWS, with Ilona Beumer and Wilma
Trommelen as its backbone, provided a good working environment.
Through the CNWS I met new people from all over the world and made
new friends like Rivke Jaffe, Anna Beerens, Willemijn Waal, Daan Kok.
I would also like to thank the “South Asian Club”, led by Dr Jos
Gommans, for introducing me in the wider study of South Asia, and the
good company when I just started my research.
TANAP had its own base in the persons of Dr Henk Niemeijer and
Marijke van Wissen-van Staden, without whom the project could never
have succeeded. It was a unique experience to work together with fellow
TANAP students, who I have come to regard more as friends than mere
colleagues, Kwee Hui Kian, Liu Yong, Bhawan Ruangsilp, Ricky
Goedeman, Ota Atsushi, Ryuto Shimada, Muridan Widjojo, Sri
Margana, Hoang Anh Tuan, Chris Nierstrasz, C’hui Hsin-hui, Nirmal
Devasiri, Binu John, Ghulam Nadri. I will never forget Anjana Singh’s
energy and enterprising zeal when travelling together through China and
South India – I am sad that this era is approaching its end.
The research for this thesis was executed at various institutes in
London, The Hague, Jakarta and Colombo. I am grateful for the good
working atmosphere offered by all these institutions and the generally
very helpful staff. I have special memories of the Sri Lanka National
Archives, where the help I received was most personal thanks to the
x PREFACE
friendly staff at the reading room and the personal attention of the direc-
tor, Ms. Dr Saroja Wettasinghe. I would like to thank Nirmal, Shirani
and Hiranyada for making my life in Colombo so agreeable and Nirmal
in particular for always keeping me updated on Sri Lankan politics and
Sinhalese culture. Furthermore, I would like to thank Amice and
Mahendra Dissanayake for their friendship and Sepa and Sunitra
Ilangakoon for their hospitality while staying in their fantastic house. My
long-term research in London was made possible through the kind inter-
vention of Dr Felipe Fernadez Armesto, who arranged an exchange
between Leiden University and Queen Mary’s college, University of
London. I thank the LUF for subsidising this stay in London. For my
short-stay visits to London I could always rely on Gillian, Susannah and
Michael for a bed and a warm welcome.
Closer to home, I am grateful to my Leiden base: de Damesclub in its
broadest sense, for reminding me that beer and fun are as essential ingre-
dients to a good thesis as are books and archives. Of course I would like
to thank my family, my brother Simon and his wife Renie who worked so
hard on their own breakthroughs in the last years. And, of course, my
mother, An, for stimulating my interest for history in general and that of
the East in particular from an early age onwards. I thank my father André
for supporting me in this “soft” project, despite his absolute preference for
“real” science; Job’s parents Rina en Thijs for creating Job and finally,
I thank Job just for being there – always.
xi
GLOSSARY
INTRODUCTION
Java as inspiration
This study investigates this transitional phase and draws its inspiration
partly from recent studies that stress the importance of the eighteenth-
century foundations of the modern colonial states of Java and India. A
connection between Sri Lankan and Javanese history may seem far-
fetched now, but in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Dutch
Company servants often compared the two. From a colonial perspective
the comparison certainly makes sense: on both islands tensions with the
native kingdoms in the interior led to intrigues and alliance making, to
extensive open warfare and eventually to the expansion of Dutch territo-
rial power. In contrast to most of the other VOC strongholds in Asia,
colonial administrations were set up on these two islands to rule the
expanding territorial possessions. In addition, both built up a consider-
able population of European settlers in the port cities, maintained large
garrisons and were regarded the centre of Dutch power within their
Southeast Asian and South Asian contexts respectively.
As the historian Jurrien van Goor recently showed, the colonial paral-
lels run even further into the nineteenth century: both experienced a tran-
sition from Company-run to state-run colony during approximately the
same years. Ceylon was taken over by the British in 1796, and after a
short period of EIC rule it was placed under the responsibility of the
Crown in 1798. At about the same time the VOC went bankrupt and the
responsibility for Java was taken over by the state. In 1811 Java seemed
headed for the same colonial fate as Ceylon, when the British occupied
Java during the Napoleonic wars. But Java returned into Dutch hands
within five years, while the British continued to hold on to Ceylon. The
political unification of Ceylon and Java through the conquests of the inte-
rior kingdoms Kandy in 1815 and Mataram in 1830 respectively, is yet
another parallel that complements the story of the emergence of the colo-
nial state on these islands.10
gest that the impact of colonial policies as such was truly limited and that
Dutch and British rule on Java were interchangeable.12
It is the complex interplay between the native response to economic
and political challenges that the European presence in Asia brought along
on the one hand and the actual European colonial aims on the other that
has caught my interest. The new insights in Javanese history made me
question the traditional periodization of Sri Lanka’s colonial history, but
at the same time I wondered whether the Sri Lankan case might help us
understand the process of colonial state formation in Java and elsewhere,
especially because it was ruled by two different European colonial govern-
ments. What did the last decades of Dutch rule on the island look like,
and what picture emerges if we connect developments in Sri Lanka of the
late eighteenth century with those in early British times?
It is worth noting that in any case the British Imperial context was very
different: in contrast to the declining Dutch empire, that of the British
was on the rise. For a long time historians viewed the period as one of
uncontrolled and radical British expansion, in which colonial policymak-
ing was absent or at least not structurally implemented. Yet recently Chris
Bayly, in his all-encompassing Imperial Meridian, pictured a new image of
the British Empire in this period when he argued that besides the expan-
sion and consolidation of British power through superior methods of war-
fare, it was most certainly a period of conscious colonial state formation.
He showed how this expansion and the discussions among British officials
about the best way to exploit the new colonies, fostered the development
of a British imperial ideology that in turn reinforced the rise of national-
ism in Britain. At the same time, Bayly emphasized that the British colo-
nial governments set up in the various regions around the world in this
period were in practice as much based on native collaboration and local
institutional traditions as on British colonial principles.13
Bayly’s conclusion is written in the same vein as the research on Java
discussed above. If the eighteenth-century foundations of the Dutch
encounter in Java counted so much for the later shaping of the colonial
state, one may wonder whether this was also the case in Sri Lanka. It legit-
imizes questions about how the Dutch presence affected Sri Lanka in the
eighteenth century and how the British dealt with the Dutch legacy. Bayly
actually touches on the case of Ceylon and surmises that on the island the
British built not only on native structures but also on the Dutch legacy.
It was of course beyond the scope of his book to deal with this subject in
depth. He does not explain how the British colonial input and principles
related to those of the Dutch predecessors or what exactly were the native
responses to Dutch and British policies.14
6 INTRODUCTION
Points of analysis
overgave. However, these published sources do not cover the last decades
of Dutch rule.
British sources, government papers, private correspondences and con-
temporary publications sometimes provide an extra perspective on the
Dutch period, but I have used them primarily to examine various aspects
of British governance. Although much more has been published on the
early years of British rule in comparison to the Dutch period, it still
remains a poorly understood period because of the various shifts in poli-
cy and changes of institutions. These have been described by able his-
torians like Colvin R. de Silva, but they have not been interpreted or
placed in the context of either changes in the Dutch period or contempo-
rary developments elsewhere in the British empire. Of course the research
presented in this thesis owes a lot to the existing literature and in my con-
clusion I will point out how the research contributes to contemporary
debates.19
with the outposts give the best insight into the functioning of the local
administration and the decision-making processes involved.
In the early years, the British administration in Sri Lanka was con-
trolled by the government of the EIC headquarters in Madras (Chennai).
From 1798 onwards, the government grew apart from Madras and when
the government of Ceylon was placed directly under the Crown in 1802,
there was only a commercial relationship left between the two adminis-
trations.22 Therefore, most of the source material outside Sri Lanka for the
period after 1798 is found in the Colonial Office archives at the National
Archives in Kew – no less than seventy-five bundles with despatches from
Ceylon covering the first twenty-five years of British rule. In addition to
this “regular” set of papers, the National Archives hold thirty-two bundles
containing materials collected by the Commission of Inquiry between
1829 and 1831. This commission was installed in order to investigate cer-
tain general aspects of the government of the colony since 1795, like the
colony’s revenue, agricultural policies, the organization of the civil service
and the department of justice, and in particular the issue of slavery and
unfree labour.23
As is true of the Dutch papers, the materials in Colombo give a more
direct impression of the functioning of the local government and admin-
istration. There are also differences that are directly related to the admin-
istrative organization of the colonial governments. For example, the
British governors ruled without a political council and therefore we do
not get much insight in the decision-making process on the island. In
fact, the organization of the sources of the two colonial governments gives
some insight into their respective administrative histories. We find that
Governor Willem Jacob van de Graaff (1785-1794) installed a depart-
ment for inland affairs in 1786, which suggests that he displayed a greater
interest in the inland affairs than did his predecessors.24 The lack of regu-
lar correspondences with the outposts until 1806 in the British case sug-
gests that up until then the central government in Colombo did not have
a firm grip on the affairs in the outposts.
In addition to official administrative sources, archives in the Nether-
lands, Sri Lanka and London also possess private correspondence of
government officials. These sources provide additional information and
perspectives on current affairs, sometimes countering the official informa-
tion in the sources. One example is the private correspondence of the
advocate fiscal (later chief judge) Alexander Johnstone in the National
Archives in Sri Lanka, which consists of all sorts of letters ranging from
dinner invitations to secret reports for the government. The correspon-
dence with Governor Thomas Maitland (1805-1811) is especially inter-
esting because it shows the strong ties between the two men. Another case
in point are the letters by Pieter Sluijsken to various high officials of the
INTRODUCTION 9
VOC, which are kept in the private collections of The Hague.25 Sluijsken
left an enormous stack of papers, owing to his ongoing feud with
Governor Van de Graaff.26 These papers offer information found nowhere
else, but they need to be treated with care. Just because they were written
privately does not mean they inherently hold more significance or ‘truth’
than official papers.
The abundance of source material for the period under research is
problematic. The Dutch and British sources form a mer à boire. Selections
were made on the basis of the very useful catalogues and indexes available
in the various archival institutions.27 In the case of the British sources, the
existing literature and published sources, like the Douglas papers28 and
Bertolacci’s description of Ceylon,29 helped focus the research.
Chapter outline
The thesis is in three parts. The first gives an introduction to Sri Lanka’s
early history and briefly discusses the Portuguese political infiltration and
the Dutch arrival on the island. It deals more extensively with the emer-
gence of the Kandyan kingdom as the major indigenous political power
on the island and analyses its political organization. The purpose is to give
a long-term perspective on the European intervention on the island. At
the same time it serves as a reference point for the later chapters that deal
with the Dutch and British administrations and the Kandyan relations.
The second and largest part of the thesis discusses the colonial transi-
tion under Dutch rule at large. The three major research questions of the
thesis are considered here. Chapters Two to Four deal with the changes in
the practice of colonial rule in Dutch Ceylon over the eighteenth centu-
ry, with an emphasis on the last fifteen years. Chapter Five discusses the
Dutch colonial outlook in the last decades prior to the British take over
and Chapter Six deals with the Dutch relationship with Kandy.
In the third part of the thesis, Chapters Seven to Eleven, the British
experience is discussed and placed in the context of the findings for the
Dutch period. The three research questions are dealt with in the same
order as in Part Two: Chapters Seven to Nine discuss colonial practice
under subsequent British regimes; Chapter Ten relates the colonial ideals
expressed by the British rulers to developments and discussions on colo-
nial rule elsewhere in the British empire and Chapter Eleven discusses the
final subjugation of the Kandyan Kingdom. In the final analysis of
Chapter Twelve the research as a whole is brought together and discusses
how these findings contribute to the existing literature on Sri Lanka and
colonial regimes of the period in general.
10 INTRODUCTION
PART ONE
TEMPTATION ISLAND
13
CHAPTER ONE
Travellers have always praised Sri Lanka for its physical beauty and its
agreeable climate, but this is not what attracted the Portuguese merchants
in the beginning of the sixteenth century. They were tempted by the
island’s exclusive resources of cinnamon, one of those exotic spices that
were increasingly in demand in Europe. They settled on the shore to set
up commercial strongholds, but soon got involved in local political con-
flicts and were drawn inland. As a result, the Portuguese merchants willy
nilly acquired governmental responsibilities in the coastal regions of the
island. This introductory chapter deals with those early political develop-
ments and the political constellation at the time of the Dutch arrival
about one hundred fifty years later. Furthermore, it discusses the political
organization of the Kandyan Kingdom, the last indigenous Kingdom to
survive the Portuguese confrontation and which remained a political fac-
tor of great importance on the island until 1815.
Rubies and other precious stones are found in the mountainous part of
the island, and this has always attracted the attention of travellers and
merchants. In addition, the various pearl banks on the northwest coast,
around Manaar and Aripo, produced fine pearls of a type very popular in
Europe.32 This undoubtedly added to Sri Lanka’s reputation of being “the
finest island of its size in the world”.33 At the time the famous Venetian
thirteenth century traveller Marco Polo gave Sri Lanka this epithet, the
island was in a transitional phase, ancient civilizations were disintegrating
and large groups of people were migrating from north to the south.
The ancient civilizations (c. 500 - c. 1250 A.D.) were found in the
northern dry zone of the island, around the present-day towns of Anu-
rādhapura and Pollonaruwa. This region is often referred to as Rājarata,
or the hydraulic civilizations of the Rājarata Kingdoms, because of the
extensive irrigation systems and a corresponding social and political
organization that characterized these civilizations. Large ruins of ancient
monasteries, palaces, temples and water tanks can still be admired. This
era of Sri Lankan history was of a high cultural level: witness its beautiful
sculptures and the important Pali texts that have passed down through
the ages.34
The kingdoms were part of the large Theravada Buddhist tradition
which spread from Sri Lanka to the Southeast Asian mainland after the
third century. The Sangha, the Theravada monastic order, formed a cru-
cial element in the religious and political organization of the region. The
Pali records and Sinhalese chronicles like the Mahāvamsa all bear witness
to the vivid political, cultural and economic exchange between the Sri
Lankan and Southeast Asian kingdoms. At the same time, the proximity
of Sri Lanka to the Indian subcontinent and the frequent invasions from
there from the tenth century onwards resulted in local cultural and reli-
gious fusion with South Indian Hindu traditions.35 Agricultural produc-
tion was substantial, thanks to the massive irrigation works. The mainte-
nance of the large tanks and other waterworks called for a complex level
of social organization because it demanded intensive labour activities and
large-scale co-operation. It is therefore assumed that government was
highly centralized and that the monasteries played an important part in
its organization.36
The remains of the old civilizations seized the imagination of both
Dutch and British rulers on the island. In late eighteenth-century reports,
a picture emerges of an ancient Sri Lanka at once rich and productive, but
inexplicably degenerated prior to the Portuguese arrival. In fact, as shall
be seen in the next chapters, this image of Sri Lanka’s rich past developed
into a guiding force for the new agricultural endeavours of the Dutch and
the British rulers.37 The idea that Sri Lanka was once the granary of the
Indian Ocean was still widely supported in the 1970s, but is nowadays
LOCAL POLITICS AND FOREIGN INTRUSION 15
for trade. Waste land and jungle adjacent to the village was used for shift-
ing cultivation (chēna) of small grains and for the collection of various for-
est products like timber, honey and wax.45
In the course of time, various systems of land tenancy developed,
which varied greatly in commitments due to the lord of the land. In the
Sinhalese kingdoms this meant that some lands were held against a tax of
fifty per cent of the produce, while others were held against a tax of only
ten per cent. Moreover, most of the land was held in service tenure, mean-
ing that the occupants had to perform labour for their lord for a certain
number of days each year. In the Jaffna kingdom the tenures were a little
simpler. Produce was usually taxed at ten per cent, but poll-taxes were
added and bonded labour was just as much part of the system as in the
Sinhalese kingdoms.46
Perhaps the most general feature of the social stratification among all
societies on the island was the importance of caste hierarchy. Interestingly,
the highest in the hierarchy, namely the farmer caste – Goyigama in the
Sinhalese part and Vellale in the Tamil part – formed by far the largest
caste. With reference to this, some historians point out that Sri Lanka was
blessed with a relatively egalitarian society in comparison to India. How-
ever, it should not be overlooked that these castes were divided into vari-
ous sub-castes which were again subject to a strict hierarchy. The castes
were organized by occupation, hence there were fishermen, washermen,
barber, and silversmith castes, to give only a few examples. This did not
mean that all members of the castes actually performed this labour, as
most people on the island were involved in subsistence agriculture.
Among the Sinhalese, the highest subgroup of each caste comprised the
headmen, below which were the lascorins or guards. The lower echelons,
called naindes, usually formed the largest group and performed manual
labour. They had to undertake specialized or coolie-labour for their head-
men and the king depending on their caste. This labour was used for a
variety of projects including road repair, irrigation and general building
activities for the benefit of the community, but it was also used for private
activities of the headmen.47
The island’s relative wealth and central position in the Indian Ocean
attracted groups of settlers and traders, and between c. 1300 and 1600
there was a high level of immigration from South India. The immigration
of the Salāgamas to the southwest is probably the most important exam-
ple, but other groups like the Mukuvas in the east and the Karāva fisher-
men in the south should be mentioned too. All found new positions as a
group in the caste-based societies of either the Tamil kingdom of Jaffna or
the other Sinhalese kingdoms. A cultural division between the Tamil
north and Sinhalese south remained, despite these waves of immigration:
the immigrants adapted themselves at least in language and religion to
18 CHAPTER ONE
their respective host society. These assimilative features of the Sri Lankan
kingdoms are often noted in the current discussions on the development
of ethnic consciousness.48 Some Muslim traders from the Arabian Sea and
Hindu Chetties from Coromandel settled either temporarily or perma-
nently on the Jaffna peninsula or in the many small ports along the south-
west coast; nonetheless they kept their distinctive cultural identity. Later,
after the European arrival, many Muslims moved to the east coast.
1.4 Portuguese political infiltration and the origin of the Kandyan Kingdom
the southwest these were the mudaliyārs of the Goyigama castes who
enjoyed the same power in the former kingdoms.56 The focus of the
Portuguese continued to be on the maritime trade, with cinnamon their
most important export. Intercourse between the Portuguese rulers and
native society on the coast was stimulated by the Portuguese government
and created mixed communities on the coast, which resulted in strong
cultural influences and the adaptation of the Portuguese language. The
Portuguese names held by so many of the coastal inhabitants point at the
local intermarriages, but also at the large scale of indigenous Catholic
baptisms. Catholicism gained a strong foothold and resulted in a substan-
tial Portuguese religious and cultural influence that was to outlive Lusi-
tanian presence on the island.57
Meanwhile the Kandyan Kingdom strengthened its local power and
shook off the Hindu Saivite and Portuguese Catholic local influences and
made a definite shift to Theravada Buddhism, organizing the state accord-
ingly. As a result the island was now divided in two states, each contest-
ing the power of the other and constantly at war from the beginning of
the seventeenth century.
maritime regions under the Portuguese was not yet complete, but it is
easy to draw parallels with the Southeast Asian port polities thanks to the
maritime focus and religious and cultural binding in the form of
Catholicism brought in by the missionaries. The power relation between
the Kandyan Kingdom and the Portuguese was not yet balanced out,
when the Dutch offered their help to the Kandyans in 1638. After twen-
ty years of warfare and negotiation, the allies managed to expel the
Portuguese from the island.59 The subsequent wars with the Dutch over
the coastal region reveal the Kandyans’ persistent interest in the maritime
corridor.
The high quality of cinnamon that had first tempted the Portuguese to
involve themselves in Sri Lankan politics attracted the Dutch when they
expanded their trading network in Asia during the first decades of the
seventeenth century. When the king of Kandy asked the Dutch East India
Company for help in expelling the Portuguese, they responded positive-
ly. In 1638, the Dutch admiral Westerwolt concluded a treaty with the
Kandyans that, according to the Dutch interpretation, assured payment
by the king of Kandy, Rajasinha II (1635-1687), of all Dutch war expens-
es and at the same time stipulated a Dutch right to take over the
Portuguese strongholds on the island. After the Dutch expelled the
Portuguese from the island, Rajasinha II did not pay for all the expenses
made by the VOC. In fact, he managed to foil the Dutch plans to take
over all the Portuguese coastal possessions by effective warfare. It was only
in the 1680s that the Dutch and Rajasinha II concluded a truce and the
Dutch had to give up much of their inland territories but retained most
of the coastal forts and adjacent districts. They valued especially the
southwestern districts and the Jaffna peninsula – indeed, the regions that
had developed as centres of power in the island since the thirteenth cen-
tury.60
This development needs to be placed in the general context of seven-
teenth-century Dutch expansion in Asia. In 1602 the Dutch East India
Company was established. It grew out of several smaller trading compa-
nies that had sponsored exploratory voyages to the east in the previous
decade. An important motive of Dutch expansion in those days was the
expulsion of the Portuguese from the Asian trade. In so doing, the Dutch
hoped to gain the monopoly on the lucrative spice trade with Europe and
control the intra-Asian trade network. Obtaining a monopoly of trade in
Asian spices gave the VOC the power of price-fixing on the European
markets and therefore guaranteed a high profit. The possession of territo-
22 CHAPTER ONE
ry was not a primary objective of the Company’s activities in the east, but
was a by-product of its pursuit of monopolies. This commitment led to
various wars in Asia during the seventeenth century, between the Dutch
and the Portuguese and between the Dutch and indigenous rulers.
The protracted warfare was expensive and by the 1680s there was a
total change in mentality in the Heren Zeventien of the VOC. The costly
wars had to be put to an end and a further cut in expenses in the east was
required. At the same time, the existing monopolies of trade in spices and
other products had to be kept firmly in Dutch hands. That is why the
VOC persisted as a territorial power on Sri Lanka and why after all, the
coastal regions on the island remained under Dutch control. As a result
Ceylon developed as one of the major stations of the VOC in Asia, next
to Batavia and the Moluccas.61
It was in those early years that Dutch policy for the island was formu-
lated, and although it was not unanimously agreed upon at the time, it
was this policy that determined the further path of the Dutch on the
island. It had been the original aim of the directors of the VOC that the
cinnamon of Ceylon should be delivered to them absolutely without cost.
This turned out to be a vain desire, because competition from other
European traders had to be prevented. The preservation of coastal forts
prevented any competitors from getting a hand on the trade or any influ-
ence on the island, and the possession of the adjacent territories for the
collection of the cinnamon required additional governmental infrastruc-
ture. These contradictions in Dutch policy placed a heavy burden on the
local governors.62
The demands from the Netherlands led to the paradoxical situation in
which the High Government of Batavia had to look for other means to
pay for Ceylon’s administration. More direct local involvement inevitably
cost more. Rijckloff van Goens the Elder, governor of Ceylon between
1660-1663 and 1664-1675, had already warned the directors about this
problem in the 1670s. He proposed to either conquer the whole of
Ceylon and attract European settlers to fully develop the island’s poten-
tial, or to restrict the territorial possessions on the island solely to the cin-
namon producing areas in the southwest. His appeal fell on deaf ears, and
despite his critique, the Heren Zeventien in the Netherlands refused to
adopt a clear policy and left it to the governors on the island to meet their
targets. Van Goens was however not entirely incorrect in his predictions.
From the 1680s until 1796, the Dutch on Ceylon found themselves in
a kind of vicious circle. Their financial situation asked for increasing
exploitation of local society, but this in turn required further involvement
and responsibility, which brought about new costs. Good relationships
had to be maintained with the Kingdom of Kandy, which again triggered
extra expenses. This development, which turned the Dutch East India
LOCAL POLITICS AND FOREIGN INTRUSION 23
The Kandyan Kingdom was an economically weak polity, with a low pop-
ulation density (the total population probably never surpassed 250,000
people), a negative trade balance and a poor agricultural base due to its
mountainous topography. Only the lowland provinces bordering the
“European” maritime possessions were relatively fertile and more exten-
sively cultivated.65
The king’s power was considered absolute, though in practice it was
limited in certain ways. The Kandyan king was seen as the successor of
the great ancient kings of the Anurādhapura and Pollonaruwa kingdoms
and most information on the manner of good rule was gathered from the
examples given in the Mahāvamsa. He was to rule within the tradition
and to follow examples of the good princes; he had to observe customary
laws and written rules, governing in the interest of his subjects and fol-
24 CHAPTER ONE
lowing Buddhist precepts. Ralph Pieris points out that various rebellions
against the king were the practical outcome of these limitations. If the
king was not ruling “justly”, his subjects could revolt.66
The absence of strict hereditary rules of succession was typical for
Theravada kingdoms of the time. Though the king was considered almost
godly, this divine characteristic was not necessarily transferred through
direct bloodlines. He did have to be of chastrya origin, meaning that he
belonged to the “caste of kings”. The coronation ceremony was decisive
in the transfer of the legitimacy of power and elevated the human king to
a godly status. Over time, this divine element in Kandyan kingship
became more central to the ideology of the Kingdom. A new king, if he
was not already appointed during the lifetime of the former king, was
chosen by the highest nobles at the court.67 In practice this meant that
princesses of chastrya origin were brought to the island from South India
to marry the present king and to produce a future king. It is not difficult
to intepret this as a means to prevent competition for the crown among
the Sinhalese nobles at the court.
This was the case in 1739, when king Narendrasingha (1707-1739)
had not produced a heir to the throne and a prince was brought from
South India to be king. From then onwards, we see various attempts of
Kandyan nobles to have new kings from outside the island placed on the
throne. This important element of Kandyan kingship reminds us of the
stranger-king concept. The enthronement of a king from outside the cir-
cle of nobility functioned as a means to channel or avoid political tension
among powerful noble families. In a way it served as a compromise
between rival nobles and prevented outbreaks of violent succession-dis-
putes: instead of claiming the throne themselves they placed on the
throne an outsider with no political or family ties within the Kingdom.
The stranger-king concept is popular with scholars of Southeast Asian
history and helps to explain how, in many cases, European power expand-
ed over the Indonesian archipelago in early modern times without much
violence, but rather at the invitation of native power groups.68
The retinue of the king existed of a variety of palace officials responsi-
ble for his protection, his kitchen, his baths and so on. In total there were
about thirty-one departments. Ralph Pieris points out that the composi-
tion of the king’s retinue was not always the same and that in the late
period of the Kingdom there was an abnormal growth in these offices, the
holders of which received land in lease for their often marginal duties.69
According to him the purpose was to strengthen the position of the
monarch. The officials of the palace service stood apart from the public
or district service and even the chief ministers, the adigārs, did not have
any jurisdiction over them.70
The king’s power was delegated through his two ministers, adigārs.
LOCAL POLITICS AND FOREIGN INTRUSION 25
These men held considerable power, both in the central government and
in the provincial government. In the central government they functioned
as advisors to the king, chief justices and military chiefs. Advice was given
in cases of new appointments of chiefs, the election of the principal eccle-
siastical offices and in the transfer of land grants and service rewards. A
land grant or any other official ordinance of the king needed to be coun-
tersigned by either one of the adigārs. As an emolument each held five vil-
lages the inhabitants of which performed particular services for them and
the king.71 If the adigārs were present at the capital, all communications
with the king went through them. Consequently they had a powerful
influence on the external affairs of the Kingdom, since they could manip-
ulate the foreigners to suit their interest. This is reflected in the reports of
Dutch and British embassies to the court. The ambassadors never got to
meet the king, he remained behind the curtain in the audience hall, and
all dealings were discussed with the adigārs.72 The adigārs were also
responsible for the town of Kandy. They organized the ferry to the palace
and kept order in the city. This implied mostly that they had to secure
safety during the big festivals and kept temples and public buildings in
repair. Each adigār held jurisdiction over half the Kingdom, the first
adigār over roughly the north and east and the second over the south and
west. Appeals from these regions could be made to them.
Like all officials, the adigārs had to pay däkum, tribute, to the king for
their office: at their appointment and subsequently each year in April
before the commencement of the New Year.73 The adigārs in turn received
money from the headmen in their five villages and kept the fines result-
ing from court cases. Other income they acquired through their position
in the provincial government, since they often held the position of disāva
in one of the disāvanies simultaneously. As we shall see, some of them
managed to collect many offices at the same time. The status of the
adigārs was second to that of the king; hence many rituals to enhance their
status were performed when they moved around the Kingdom.74 The two
adigārs often came from opposing factions, which was done intentionally
to prevent them from working together against the king.
The provincial government was split in twenty-one sections. In the
mountainous area surrounding the capital there were nine small provinces
called ratas and governed by rata mahattayos. The twelve other provinces
were called disāvanies and were headed by disāvas; the four most impor-
tant were called maha disāvanies. The rata mahattayos had less power than
the disāvas, because the servants of the palace held lands in the ratas and
the authority of the palace officers penetrated their area. Also the proxim-
ity of the palace in Kandy made the rata mahattayos less independent in
the execution of their office. In comparison to the disāvas they had fewer
privileges.75
26 CHAPTER ONE
The disāva resided in the capital or left his family there when on tour.
His tasks were to administer justice, collect revenue and extract labour
service, to execute the king’s orders and to propagate good government.
The disāvas and ratas paid a däkum to the king each year, and the king
could continue or eliminate the office at will. The disāva had a deputy in
his disāvany, called the rata mohottala, and an administrative staff com-
posed of the local aristocracy. The possibility of the disāva becoming too
popular in his own province was undermined by the fact that the disāvas
usually came from the aristocratic families in the ratas of central Kandy.
These people were of most noble birth and they held no blood-ties with
the provincial aristocracy. Since the disāva often held various offices at the
same time and often had to be present in Kandy, the rata mohottala had
almost arbitrary power in the province. The disāvany was split up in kōralēs
and the kōralēs into pattus. The rata mohottala had in turn deputies in
these districts. All these offices had to be paid for and the appointments
were always temporary; the threat of removal from office served as a
means to extract more money from these officers.76
There were certain checks to the seemingly unlimited power of the
disāva and his deputy. Temple lands or viharagam and devalagam, were
given respectively to the monks and the basnāyaka nilamēs, lay caretakers
of the dēvalēs, who were appointed by the king. These lands were free from
the authority of the disāva, and they served as an independent source of
information about developments in the province. The lands held by the
officials of the royal households formed a second check on the power of
the disāva, because these lands were also beyond the disāva’s authority.
The king was free to give his gabadāgama, royal villages, to his chiefs in
which case these villages turned into a nindagama. According to Lorna
Dewaraja, “This was a necessary precaution at a time when palace
intrigues were common. A palace official, even a minor one, could be a
useful tool in the hands of an ambitious chief. For the former had access
to the person of the king. The king did not wish to see those on whose
loyalty his life depended having any dependence upon his nobles.”77
The disāva profited from the rājakāriya, or the services due to the king.
This was necessary, because it gave him status in the province and it
ensured his dignity. If the income of the disāva in cash was rather limit-
ed, his income in terms of land and labour was more considerable. He
gained cash from his appointees (usually the offices were given to the
highest bidder) and some castes paid money as a substitute for their serv-
ices. The disāva also kept the fines that were imposed in criminal cases.
Next to this hierarchical system of administration there was the badda,
which cut vertically across this system. The badda can best be translated
as a functional system of “caste groups organized as a unit for purposes of
revenue and services to the state – a mechanism by which the labour
LOCAL POLITICS AND FOREIGN INTRUSION 27
nobles, and effective power appears to have been in their hands. There are
certainly good examples of nobles who collected various offices simulta-
neously, which implies a concentration of local power with some individ-
uals. Furthermore, there were other means to undermine the system of
checks and balances. People running the vihāres were often related to the
noble families, and many of these family members in turn entered the
palace service. Dewaraja formulates the paradoxical situation as follows:
“Although in theory there was a strict division of administrative func-
tions, in the practical working of the Kandyan administration a few fam-
ilies dominated the entire structure. These families often at loggerheads
with one another, were again connected by marriage.”84
Considering the vague and unfeasible goals of the Company on the
island and the vulnerable political organization of the Kandyan Kingdom,
it is not surprising that the relationship between the two remained tense
after the intial wars between 1638 and 1678. As shall be seen, while the
Nāyakkars were brought in as stranger kings as a means to keep the
Kingdom together and at first were successful in resisting the Company’s
infiltration, they later became a bone of contention among the nobles,
who started to search for other options.
PART TWO
THE FIRST COLONIAL TRANSITION:
LOCAL GROWTH OF COLONIAL INTERESTS
33
CHAPTER TWO
This chapter discusses in greater depth the early encounters between the
Dutch merchants and the inhabitants on Sri Lanka. The aim is first of all
to understand how the Dutch government came into being and took
shape and what inland policies were implemented. Second, the chapter
focuses on the question of the actual impact of the Dutch government on
local politics and society and discusses the relation between the Kandyan
Kingdom and the Dutch. The comparison between the organization of
the Dutch and the Kandyan administration in the last part of this chap-
ter sheds light on possible Dutch deviations from local traditions, and
gives us an understanding of the functioning of the system of indirect rule
and the colonial political culture that developed in the maritime districts.
The chapter serves as the point of departure for the analysis of develop-
ments on the island after 1780 presented in the following chapters.
to do. Galle was the main port of the island for the large East-Indiamen
travelling between Europe and Batavia.88
Additional revenue was gained from the taxation on the produce of the
land, of which the paddy culture was the most important. However this
tax never yielded enough to sustain the requirements for the garrisons and
the VOC officials. Therefore, from the beginning of the Dutch presence
rice was imported from Batavia, Bengal and Coromandel.89 In general, the
type and level of the duties, in the case of both produce and labour, were
based on old customs. This gave the Company the legitimacy to levy these
taxes. For the collection of the taxes, the VOC administration depended
much on the local knowledge and co-operation of the headmen. It was
already pointed out above that the systems of land-possession and bond-
ed labour were quite complex. As a result, the Dutch decided to continue
the old practice of registration of land and people, called land- and head-
tombos.90 Even when from the mid-eighteenth century on most taxes were
farmed out to the highest bidder, the Company still needed the headmen
for advice. This relationship with native headmen is an important aspect
of the colonial administration and will be further elaborated upon in the
section on the organization of inland government.
With trading activities decreasing and expenses growing, the island did
not yield enough income. Therefore, from the 1730s Gusstaaf Willem
Baron van Imhoff started to actively stimulate agricultural production,
first in his capacity as governor of Ceylon (1736-39) and later as gover-
nor-general in Batavia (1743-1750). He reasoned that local economic
improvement would lead to better sales of the Company’s products on the
island and thereby increase the revenue. He focused both on cash crops
like coffee and pepper, and on subsistence agriculture. During his four
years in office in Ceylon he energetically endeavoured in the development
of the infrastructure and irrigation in the southwest and he made plans to
restore the ancient Giant’s tank near Mannar. Van Imhoff did his utmost
to stimulate people to grow the cashcrops in their gardens. His successors,
Van Gollenesse and Loten at first continued this line of approach.91
The coffee and pepper production took off well, but Batavia ordered a
stop to their cultivation because they were competing with Javanese cof-
fee and pepper. The historians D.A. Kotelawele and K. Goonewardena
have pointed out how this led to disappointment on the island because
many inhabitants had started to grow these crops in their gardens and set
up plantations, stimulated by the advantageous price they were to get for
it. While coffee and pepper production was hampered by the Company’s
36 CHAPTER TWO
The whole episode also reveals how much the government of Ceylon was
subordinated to the over-all interest of the VOC. Basically, the monopo-
list and mercantilist attitude of the Company drove the Ceylon govern-
ment into a corner. Batavian policymakers saw Ceylon as the periphery of
their empire and Java as the centre; therefore the island had to serve the
interests of Batavia and was not to compete with Javanese products. At
the same time, the government of Ceylon had to sell the Company’s
products on the local market, which undermined the local trading net-
works and had a negative effect on the local economy. The experiments
of the 1730s show that Colombo could not easily embark on an inde-
pendent line of policy to improve the local situation. This was a con-
tinuous problem in the eighteenth century and lay at the root of much
political tension between Colombo and Batavia.
During his struggles with the Portuguese and the later tug of war with the
Dutch the position of the king of Kandy was strong and his government
centralized and geared to the job. Yet, by the last quarter of the seven-
teenth century, when the king and the Dutch settled for a peaceful coex-
istence on the island, the king had to reconsider his position in the island.
After the wars were over diplomatic relations between the two powers had
to be retained through exchanges of official embassies. The historian
Tikiri Abeyasinghe stresses that it was only in the early eighteenth centu-
ry that these embassies became a regular feature of Dutch-Kandyan rela-
tionship. Analysing this relationship during the long peace between 1688
and 1740, he concluded that in this period the embassies became more
and more institutionalized. This was connected with a growing sense of
identity on the part of the Kandyan king on the one hand, and a relative
decline of Dutch power in the region on the other. He argues that because
these embassies were now performed regularly and the Dutch travelled to
the palace to pay honour and bestow gifts, the king perceived them as vas-
sals of his state. The Dutch envoy usually arrived in Kandy in the begin-
ning of April, just before the Buddhist New Year, when all the king’s sub-
jects paid their däkum.96 The subordination of the Dutch to the Kandyan
Kingdom was reinforced by the kneeling and bowing rituals that the
38 CHAPTER TWO
The Kandyans first managed to overthrow some of the VOC forts, but
after the arrival of reinforcements from Batavia, the Netherlands and the
Indian factories, the Dutch managed to get a grip on the situation. After
taking back the old possessions, Governor Lubbert Jan van Eck (1762-
1765) decided to march on the Kandyan capital. For some months in
1765, the Dutch troops managed to keep hold of Kandy, but lack of food
and supplies and constant guerrilla-like provocation by the Kandyans, led
them to withdraw. About half a year later, on 14 February 1766, both par-
ties signed a peace treaty. This was in all respects advantageous for the
Dutch and underlined their military superiority on the island. The Dutch
access to the coasts and ports gave them a logistical advantage and they
could readily import supplies of men, weapons and foodstuffs. This also
meant that the Dutch had access to better weapons and a relatively better
quality of troops of European, Malays and Sepoys from India.101
This war marked the last violent attempt on the part of Kandy to
extend its authority on the island and to gain access to the maritime cor-
ridor. The VOC now decided the terms of the relationship and could no
longer be seen as a vassal of the king. The new power balance was fixed in
a treaty: the Dutch would never again be forced to perform the degrad-
ing rituals before the king and the Company would not be hampered in
the collection of cinnamon in the king’s forest. Dutch possession of the
entire coast was also fixed in the treaty and ensured for ever the isolation
of the Kandyan Kingdom. The balance of power had shifted to the VOC
and heralded a new phase in Dutch policy on the island.
Falck occupied the office of governor for twenty years and he has been
portrayed as someone who wanted to prevent any disturbances in the
country whatsoever and who was therefore wary of major changes. With
the exception of the cinnamon production, which was actually decided
upon by his superiors, this seems to be an accurate picture. In these twen-
ty years, Falck took no initiative to begin new projects. He basically
sought to maintain peace and order and did not interfere much with the
inland government of his dessavas and commandeurs. However, his subor-
dinates did take some initiatives and the “cinnamon solution” implied
some relief from the strict policies towards agriculture.103
For example, two large agricultural projects were started in the districts
of Colombo and Galle in the 1770s. Initiated by the dessava of the dis-
trict De Coste, the one near Colombo involved reclamation of the marsh
land north of Colombo stretching halfway to Negombo called Mutu-
rajawela. This large enterprise was to make about 6,000 acres of land
ready for paddy cultivation by draining the salt water and ensuring the
provision of fresh water in the dry season. The Company paid for the
operation and attracted people to move to the marshes and expected to
recoup its investment easily by the tithe on the crops.104 The plan was
drawn out on a nice map showing the plots of land to be created by the
drainage.105 In the case of Diviture, an estate north of Galle, irrigation
canals were constructed to regulate drainage of the superfluous water in
the wet seasons. This was a joint venture of a group of Company officials.
While Muturajawela was to produce only paddy, Diviture was also con-
sidered suitable for garden culture and the production of cinnamon in
particular.106
Both projects failed at this stage, but they do reveal a basic change of
policy. Private investment in land was again considered profitable after
the discouraging measures of Schreuder, and the government invested
actively in the development of subsistence agriculture. It was however
under Falck’s successor Willem Jacob van de Graaff that the enterprising
inhabitants of the island were actively stimulated to develop the country
and that the officials in the outer regions were stimulated to improve and
increase the paddy production. How these increased agricultural activities
relate to the decline of the Company that took place from the 1780s, is
the subject of Chapter Three.
servants who desired a change of career when their contract ran out.
Though this was discouraged by the Company, it was not checked local-
ly. Company employees received fixed salaries following Company guide-
lines, but the highest office-holders also received the revenue from villages
that were assigned to them as long as they stayed in their posts, the so-
called dispens dorpen. It was also common for these officials to receive a
share of the revenue from the various taxes, and they had the right to
make use of the corveé system for their private affairs. Often they gained
additional income through the appointment of the native officials, who,
following local tradition, paid them a sum on appointment. This tradi-
tion was called the giving of paresses.114
The Company servants did not specialize in one sector and during
their career a servant could move from the position of fiscaal, dealing with
juridical matters, via the position of trade bookkeeper, to the function of
dessava where he had to deal with inland administration. We do know,
however, that there were regional preferences. Although there was no
general rule in this respect, people often moved from function to function
either around Jaffna and Tuticorin, or they stayed in the southwest.
Acquaintance with language and culture played a part in these choices
– Jaffna and Tuticorin were Tamil-speaking regions, while Colombo and
Galle were Sinhalese – but local connections counted probably just as
much. Of course those with high ambitions did not stay on Ceylon for
the whole period of their Company career, but moved up the ladder via
the various factories in South Asia to return to the island as commander
or governor.
In general, the Company system of administration was highly bureau-
cratic. Reports had to be sent from all sections to the governor in
Colombo. He and the political council would go through these and sum-
marize them for the High Government in Batavia. When necessary they
sent full copies of the local reports. All resolutions of the political council
were sent to Batavia and the Netherlands and were accompanied by long
letters in which each decision and happening was accounted for. A visita-
teur regularly went through the books of each place to check the
finances.115 Though it may seem so in theory, in practice it was certainly
not a watertight system. Most servants found a way to make some money
locally within the margins of this system, for example through local trade
or by lending money at high interest rates.116
The military establishment of Ceylon was much larger than the civil
department. In fact, with usually about two-thousand-five-hundred man
in garrison spread all over the island this was a very expensive department.
Consisting of Europeans, Malays and South Indian Sepoys, many of these
troops stayed on the island for long periods and married locally. Some of
the Europeans decided to pursue a civil career on the island or continued
44 CHAPTER TWO
living on the island after the end of their contract as a civilian, burgher.
By 1780, the larger part of the civil and military servants on Ceylon had
lived on the island or the nearby factories for a long time, if they were not
born there like Governor Falck himself. As a result many of the local
employees of the Company had put down roots and their private inter-
ests and local connections on the island and with the nearby Indian fac-
tories must have been extensive. From the mid-eighteenth century, pri-
vate agricultural enterprise was a new development. Casparus de Jongh
made large investments in pepper gardens during his commandorship in
Galle, and in the 1770s members of the political council like Arnoldus de
Lij and Pieter Sluijsken invested their money in the Diviture project.
They were both typical examples of the generation of rooted servants,
having arrived on the island in the 1740s and 1750s and staying on until
their death. People like them usually owned large estates on the island,
but operated from one of the three large towns of the islands.117
By the 1760s the colonial settlements of Colombo, Jaffna and Galle
had grown into real towns with military, economic and administrational
functions. This urbanization was a new phenomenon and was certainly
not to be found in Kandy. Colombo and Galle counted a population of
about eighteen hundred men, besides the garrisons, and the inhabitants
were of mixed ethnic origin. The towns were large enough to require a
separate administration. Many of the typical town institutions such as
orphanages, estate administration (boedelkamer), garbage collection, civil
militia, hospitals and so on were copied from the Netherlands.118 A survey
of the plakkaten reveals that most of the proclamations of government
dealt with the administration and legislation of the towns. At the same
time, as Lodewijk Hovy notes in his recently published compilation of the
plakkaten, there was a considerable increase in proclamations in the native
languages from the second quarter of the eighteenth century. This con-
curs with the image of increased colonial intervention, discussed earlier
on in this chapter.119 These towns also had their specific port functions
and their markets took in a central place. As we have seen, these also had
to be administered to ensure the income of duties upon the imports and
the sales. Other activities in the town included the reparation of govern-
ment buildings for which the Company had master carpenters in service.
The town populations consisted of both Europeans and natives and the
offspring of mixed marriages. It seems paradoxical, that though mixed
marriages were the order of the day, there was a very strict hierarchical
division in the grade of one’s “Europeaness”. Indeed, only the full-blood-
ed Europeans could hold the highest positions.120 Although these towns
reflected the European presence on the island, a strict division between
town and countryside did not exist. For example many inhabitants of the
towns, both European and natives possessed land under cultivation in the
COLONIAL POLITICS IN DUTCH CEYLON TILL 1780 45
1780. But as shall be seen later, from that time onwards, the Dutch grew
more and more interested in it.
to date by the landraad, many mistakes were made and after about ten
years the books became useless and a new registration campaign had to be
undertaken. Similar registrations were undertaken in the 1770s and
1780s. The tombos are perhaps the most manifest examples of the grow-
ing Dutch interference with local society in the eighteenth century.129 In
contrast to the landraden, which were welcomed as new institutions, the
land- and head-registrations were not readily accepted at the time, and the
natives even rebelled against them. Nonetheless, it should be pointed out
that they served as references in land disputes well into the twentieth cen-
tury.
Another way of limiting the Company’s dependency on the headmen
was to take away the function of tax collection from them and to farm it
out to the highest bidder. In this way the Dutch ensured an income from
the land, while competition at the auctions in August drove up the price.
The Company had the right to refuse the highest bidder if they thought
him unreliable. The person who “won” the privilege had to pay his bid at
once or in three monthly instalments. This system had become common
in all fields of taxation in the course of the eighteenth century and made
it possible for men of substance to invest their capital and increase their
income. Thus it opened up native administration to outsiders like the
Muslim traders and the Chetties, who had money to invest.130 This subject
is still rather obscure and has not been touched upon much in the litera-
ture, but will receive more attention in the following chapters. The organ-
ization of bonded labour was not farmed out in this manner, but
remained the responsibility of the headmen.
2.6 Conclusion
The commercial aims of the Dutch East India Company dictated the
shape of its government and the development of its policies. Colonial
administration really centred on the three major towns and regional
administrative centres, while inland affairs were dealt with indirectly.
However the problems in the cinnamon department and the need to
finance the government with profits from local taxes and trade drew the
Company further inland. It meant that the Company got more and more
involved locally, which in turn required the creation of new instruments
to control the native headmen.
In all, the Dutch ruled the interior of the island through a dynamic sys-
tem of indirect rule. The power relations between the native headmen and
the Company were under continuous development. In the southwest, the
Company increasingly tried to control the affairs of the headmen in order
to achieve the aims of government. In some cases it had to compete with
COLONIAL POLITICS IN DUTCH CEYLON TILL 1780 51
these headmen for local resources of agricultural products and labour. The
Dutch tried to tackle the autonomous power of the headmen by bureau-
cratic devices like the tombo registers. The new agricultural policy of
Governor Schreuder, to protect the cinnamon trees, made the relation
between the headmen and the Company even more difficult, for the pol-
icy went entirely against their interests. There were also differences in the
form of indirect rule between the core regions and the peripheral regions
like the Vanni in the north, which was really governed from a distance
and without interference from the Company.
After a long period of peaceful coexsistence, the relationship with
Kandy deteriorated in the 1750s. This went hand in hand with the social
unrest in the southwest as a result of Governor Schreuder’s restrictive agri-
cultural policies and political unrest and succession struggles in the
Kingdom. The war between the Kingdom of Kandy and the Company
between 1762 and 1766 resulted in a new balance of power to the bene-
fit of the Company thanks to its logistical and material advantages. It did
not result in the Kingdom’s collapse, but it did lead to its further isola-
tion.
The most important difference between the Kandyan and the Dutch
administration was of course that while the Kandyans ruled the interior
as a kingdom, the Dutch ruled according to the balance sheet. The gov-
ernor never held the same sacred status that the king did, even though he
tried to compensate for this by observing old rituals like the paresses.
While the king tried to maintain his power by a policy of divide and rule
among his nobles, the Dutch used an extensive bureaucracy as a means of
checks and balance. Perhaps the most successful institutional innovation
of the Dutch were the landraden, the authority of which in relation to
small civil cases and land disputes was easily accepted by the natives and
the headmen alike. However, often enough it appeared that the bureau-
cracy did not fulfil its aim entirely and that the Company had to fall back
on the practice of divide and rule. The headmen had to be bound to the
Company by gifts and rituals just as in Kandy. In fact, even among the
Europeans, personal relations with the governor played an important role
in their career track which relied for a large part on his good-will.
52
CHAPTER THREE
3.1 Introduction
During the hundred fifty years of their presence on Sri Lanka the Dutch
produced a huge amount of maps and plans of the island. Recently D.
Paranavitana and R.K. de Silva brought these together in one publica-
tion.131 The atlas provides a fine visual overview of the colonial interven-
tion that took place progressively over the years. The early maps show the
whole island, with all the Dutch forts along the coast and only the inte-
riors of the southwest and the Jaffna peninsula outlined as Dutch posses-
sions. Often, the rest of the map is filled with bushes, rocks and exotic
animals, although sometimes indigenous regional names are given. Early
drawings are also found of the various forts on the coast. It is not howev-
er until the 1750s that we get a better picture of the various provinces of
the interior. Balthus van Lier’s detailed maps of some of the districts of
Galle, Colombo and Jaffna reveal some of the increased inland activities
discussed in the last chapter.132
In 1789, long after the war with Kandy was over, a large map of the
whole island was drawn up for Governor Willem Jacob van de Graaff
(1785-1794). The boundary between the Dutch and Kandyan regions
was drawn by a clear red line, and the designer of the map gave the Dutch
a very generous share of the island. What makes it so interesting is that
the enormous map provides very detailed information on all areas under
Dutch rule including the marginal areas, like the Magampattu and Panoa
in the southeast and the Vanni in the north. The areas are split up into
administrative sections, churches are shown, villages are named, large
water tanks are indicated and even some of the outstanding ancient ruins
around Anuradhapura have been given a place on the map.133 Other maps
of the interior drawn up in the same period show us the exact location of
cinnamon gardens and plantations in the vicinity of Colombo, and there
are detailed plans for irrigation works in the Manaar region and Matara.
These maps underscore the fact that the 1780s and 1790s were a period
of yet more intense colonial encroachment on the island.134
Governor Van de Graaff, who had commissioned these maps, is a for-
gotten figure in Dutch and Sri Lankan historiography. If he is mentioned
at all, it is in relation to the cinnamon plantations or regarding his dra-
matic fate after he left Ceylon for Batavia.135 The contemporary sources
53
After years of travelling in the east, the famous Swedish botanist Thun-
berg resided in Ceylon between 4 January 1777 and 14 March 1778.
Following his return to Europe he published a two-volume account of his
experiences and he devoted several chapters to his stay on Ceylon. His
account includes lengthy descriptions of the island’s flora, and he also
gives some insight into the social life on the island. The systematic culti-
vation of cinnamon attracted his interest. In his description of the garden
54 CHAPTER THREE
After this ruse was discovered, many new trees were planted and grew up
yielding successful harvests of the cinnamon bark. More plantations were
started in Sitavake, Kalutara, and Matara. Thunberg expressed his enthu-
siasm about this project and prophesied that in the course of time the
Company would draw much more profit from the cultivated trees than
from those in the forest, the produce of which was decreasing.139
It was the dessava De Coste who was responsible for the spread of the
cinnamon plantations when it was decided to produce cinnamon on a
larger scale by involving the headmen in planting cinnamon gardens dur-
ing the 1770s. In 1774, the Dutch government started handing out
bonuses and medals to those headmen who involved themselves in the
cultivation of cinnamon trees. In 1776, it was decided to encourage
everyone in the Colombo and Galle dessavony to cultivate the tree by
promising 1 rixdollar per 30 pounds of cinnamon.140 Despite these incen-
tives and Thunberg’s enthusiasm, in 1780 the majority of the cinnamon
still came from the “wild” trees in the Dutch and Kandyan forests. In fact
it was only in 1786 that the government commenced with paying out the
promised bounty.141 Of course it took some time before the newly plant-
ed trees were ready to be peeled. Another reason for the tardiness was that,
in the initial years, mistakes had been made in the type of ground on
which the trees were planted and often the distance between the trees was
too small, as a result of which the trees stood in each other’s way and did
not grow as large as they should.
It was under Governor Van de Graaff that the plantations really took
of. With great zeal he promoted the cultivation of cinnamon. He man-
aged to excite many more of the headmen into cultivating the tree
through the rewards, and even military and civil servants of the Company
began planting trees. These operations cost the Company about 33,000
guilders a year, mainly to cover the costs of rice for the labourers who
BEYOND CINNAMON: DUTCH INTERIOR POLICY 1780-1795 55
cleared and maintained the lands and planted the trees.142 They generally
worked without further payment as part of their corvée duties. By the end
of the 1780s, Van de Graaff came to realize that there were not enough
people to labour on the plantations of the Company and the other gar-
dens, which after being planted, had to be constantly maintained to pre-
vent them from being overgrown. The demand on the cinnamon peelers
and the coolies had become too great.
Moreover, in 1789 Batavia wrote to Colombo that the expenses for the
cinnamon gardens were growing out of hand, and instructed the gover-
nor to delay the work for the time being. In 1791, Van de Graaff came up
with a new proposal, which had been suggested by his mahāmudaliyār
Nicolaas Dias Abeysinghe. The Company’s plantations were to be split up
in small plots and given away to the cinnamon peelers, who had to main-
tain these and were responsible for peeling the bark. In his memoir to
Johan Gerard van Angelbeek, written four years later, Van de Graaff
reflected enthusiastically on this measure. To further stimulate the peel-
ers, official title deeds, in Dutch and Sinhalese, were printed in September
1793 to be given away to the peelers who had received such lands. In total
fifteen hundred deeds were printed.143
During Van de Graaff ’s tenure, the Company servants and local chiefs
endeavoured in planting cinnamon trees, and once they had completed a
garden they often sold it to the Company.144 The chiefs were rewarded for
their loyal work with golden medals and other presents. Van de Graaff
also found another means to stimulate the production of the cinnamon,
one that could also be put into practice for other products like pepper,
coffee or areca nuts. This was to give the Company’s wasteland to anyone
ready to cultivate it, and to demand in return that one-third of the
ground was to be cultivated with one of these products, depending on the
type of soil. This type of land lease was called thunval.145 Many people
therefore planted cinnamon trees in their private gardens for the Com-
pany, and had these peeled by the cinnamon peelers. The dessavas and the
mudaliyārs were in charge of granting of these waste lands. Altogether,
Van de Graaff ’s measures led to the advantageous situation in the 1790s
that most of the cinnamon collected for the VOC to be sold in the Dutch
Republic, usually around 5,000 bales or 400,000 pounds, came from the
private gardens and the Company’s plantations. As the rest was still peeled
from the Company’s forests, Van de Graaff emphasized in 1794 that it
was no longer necessary to harvest the king’s forests.
Among those who opposed Van de Graaff ’s measures figured Pieter
Sluijsken. He wrote long petitions in which he explained to the govern-
ment of Ceylon and to the High Government in Batavia that Van de
Graaff ’s measures were a disaster. He argued that the trees were not plant-
ed on the right grounds and that it was unwise to let the natives grow
56 CHAPTER THREE
cinnamon because they would not know which seeds to use. According to
Burnand, Sluijsken was particularly troubled by the developments in the
cinnamon production because he had been captain of the cinnamon for
eight years in the 1770s, but had not been responsible for the planting of
the cinnamon trees. He was still working hard on his career, and the new
developments diminished the function of captain of the cinnamon, and
therefore they jeopardized his career.146 In any case, Sluijsken’s writings
against Van de Graaff had far-reaching results for Van de Graaff ’s career
and for his reputation among historians.147
The historian Kanapathypillai has been much influenced by Sluijsken’s
writings in his publication on the cinnamon production in the last
decades of the eighteenth century. In consequence, he argues that the
planting of cinnamon was unsuccessful. He used Sluijsken’s arguments
concerning the quality of the cinnamon, and corroborates these by argu-
ing that the plantations never produced more than 5,000 bales. This is a
strange argument, since the yearly requirements from the Netherlands
were 5,000 bales.148 To secure the right type of cinnamon for the Euro-
pean taste, samples were sent of different trees from different grounds to
the Netherlands, yet he forgets to mention that the Heren Zeventien were
content with the quality of the produce.149 Van de Graaff presented the
endeavours as a great success in his memorie van overgave to his successor
Van Angelbeek in July 1794. Moreover, and upon their arrival in Ceylon,
the British found an abundance of cinnamon in the Company’s stores and
managed to get enough cinnamon from the plantations and gardens for
the first two years.150 This underlines Van de Graaff ’s success.
More interesting is Kanapathypillai’s discussion of illicit private trade,
which was absolutely forbidden but daily business according to some
early British officials on the island.151 Clearly the High Government in
Batavia worried about this too and this was one of the reasons why it
planned to write to the government of Ceylon in 1797, in case the island
was to return under Dutch rule, that no further expansion of the cinna-
mon culture was required.152
Leaving the discussion on the quality and quantity aside, there were
three important elements in this new policy that need to be highlighted
because of their further consequence. First, self-sufficiency in cinnamon
cultivation relieved the government of its dependence on Kandy. As we
will see in Chapter Six, this did not imply an improvement of relations
between the two, because Van de Graaff had in the mean time readjusted
his ambitions and set his mind on the fertile lowland districts of Kandy.
Second, now that the cinnamon was being cultivated, the inhabitants of
Colombo and Galle were freed from the strict regulations regarding clear-
ances of land, and chēna and coconut cultivation. Thirdly, the native
headmen were cooperating enthusiastically in the cinnamon-enterprise
BEYOND CINNAMON: DUTCH INTERIOR POLICY 1780-1795 57
according to Van Angelbeek, the military expenses accounted for the larg-
er part of the rise in costs of the Ceylon government.157
However, Van Angelbeek continued, there were other reasons for the
rise in expenses. First of all, a lack of bullion led to a devaluation of the
copper coins and letters of credit and caused an increase in prices for basic
necessities like rice and arrack. He pointed out that while earlier on a leg-
ger of arrack from Batavia had cost about 28 rixdollars, now it costs 50
rixdollars. At the same time, the Company had issued new regulations on
the supply of arrack to the troops and thus forced the government of
Ceylon to take on the extra expenses. Products from Europe had also risen
in price since the war. The continuing tense situation with European
competitors after the war had forced the government to invest in the
repair of fortifications. In particular those of Oostenburg (Trincomalee)
and Galle had needed much repair. Another point was that while during
Falck’s governorship Ceylon had been adequately supplied with rice from
Batavia, this source of supply fell off after the war and the government of
Ceylon was forced to purchase more expensive rice from Malabar, Coro-
mandel and Bengal. Finally, the work on the cinnamon plantations and
gardens had required large investments from the Company; however, Van
Angelbeek quickly added, these investments were already paying off.
Van Angelbeek also compared the general income under Van de Graaff
with that under Falck. By doing so, he put Van de Graaff ’s expenses in
perspective and made them look less dramatic. Moreover, he pointed out
that the merits of Van de Graaff ’s government really lay in his capability
of increasing the income of the island.158 The average income under Falck
was ƒ 557,244 and this grew to an average of ƒ 845,291.125 during van
de Graaff. This was an increase of nearly fifty per cent. Basically, Van
Angelbeek reasoned that the extra expenses made by Van de Graaff were
to be explained by circumstantial factors, while his enterprising spirit
made sure that at least the damage was limited by the increasing revenue.
Therefore, Van Angelbeek argued, Van de Graaff was not to be blamed for
the bad financial situation of the island’s government, but rather to be
praised for his endeavours!159
remarks are more or less confirmed by Els Jacobs in her study on the
developments in the business of the East India Company in Asia in the
eighteenth century.160
Perhaps the most profound change that occurred over the course of the
eighteenth century was the changing pattern of trade within Asia. Jacobs
pays much attention to the growing importance of the textile trade and
the simultaneous growth of the British and French trading companies in
the region of South Asia. Not only did the British and the French man-
age to obtain good contracts with local producers and to expand their
authority on the Indian subcontinent, they also managed to obtain large
amounts of the copper that was so necessary for this branch of trade.
Instead of Japan, where the Dutch got their copper from exclusively, they
turned to Sweden and China. In doing so they undermined the strong
position of the Dutch in the intra-Asian trading network, and this situa-
tion was enhanced by the fact that the Dutch received less and less cop-
per from the Japanese in the course of the eighteenth century. Conse-
quently, by the 1780s the Company was suffering from a serious lack of
copper, not only in Batavia, but also in South Asia. In contrast, the boom-
ing business of the British brought more and more copper into the Indian
continent, and caused inflation of prices there. Indeed, as pointed out by
Van Angelbeek, Ceylon was affected negatively by this development. All
products usually derived from India, mainly rice and cloth, now increased
in price, while the amount of copper available on the island to pay for it
was falling.161
In addition, in the aftermath of the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War, the
VOC lost most of its factories on the Indian subcontinent and thereby
any advantageous access to its products. The position in Bengal had been
steadily deteriorating since the 1750s, and was sharply reduced after the
Fourth Anglo-Dutch War when the holdings on the Coromandel coast
were also abandoned. Moreover, with the growth of British power on the
subcontinent, the security situation for Ceylon changed considerably.
The war had exposed the Dutch weakness on the one hand and revealed
the maritime and military strength and capability of the British and the
French powers on the other. Hence, investments had to be made to repair
the defence works and a larger garrison of European troops was installed
on the island now. In 1789, a military commission was sent to Asia to
examine further the military establishment and to advise the Heren
Zeventien and the High Government of Batavia on the investments that
needed to be made.162 Van de Graaff took the recommendations of the
military commission seriously and began repairing the fortifications even
before the Heren Zeventien or the High Government approved, which
added to Batavia’s discontent about Van de Graaff ’s government.163 Thus,
Van Angelbeek was right to point this out as an important expense for the
60 CHAPTER THREE
slaughtered for food, supports that assumption. But safety and discipline
were equally important.174 He decided to renovate the hospital in town
and to have certain other company buildings repaired. He made proper
regulations regarding the installation of street lights at night and picking
up garbage. He limited the amount of schaggerijen (pubs) and forbade
cockfights and other gambling games. All these measures give the impres-
sion that Van de Graaff was consciously working on a civilization pro-
gramme in this Eurasian port city, but at the same time he tried to limit
the costs of the administration of the town and the country as much as
possible.
He decided to contract work on the buildings to private builders, who
had to come with an offer of the costs beforehand, instead of taking on
carpenters on regular wages. By doing so, he put the risk of extra costs
with the contractor and not with the Company. In the secretary’s office,
he took similar measures. He reached the conclusion that the Company
continuously hired too many clerks, who were neither competent nor
hardworking, and he removed some from the secretary in Galle to Mata-
ra, where they could work on the tombo registration. He decided to stim-
ulate work by giving the headwriters a certain sum above their salary, for
which they could choose to either employ other writers to perform their
assigned tasks or work harder themselves. In this way, aspiring clerks had
to work hard to prove their value before they were hired for a fixed posi-
tion.175
Van de Graaff was not merely interested in the town administration of
Galle, but also looked inland at the administration of the Matara dessa-
vony and Galle corle. His first letter to Colombo as commander of Galle,
written on 23 June 1784, mentions the absence of any maps of the Galle
corle and the Matara dessavony, and he wondered whether the copy, which
he knew to be available in Colombo, could be send to Galle to be
copied.176 This reveals on the one hand the neglect of the inland region by
his predecessor De Lij, and on the other hand Van de Graaff ’s eagerness
to gain a thorough understanding of the whole region. Moreover, Van de
Graaff made a tour through the Matara and Galle districts in July and
August, and in the following months he took some far-reaching decisions
about the inland administration.177
First, he decided to forbid in the future the pocketing of paresses, or
gifts, by the headmen from their inferiors. Second, he issued a proclama-
tion fixing the headmen’s duties to the Company, and he had all headmen
sign that they would perform the duties as ordered. They were to report
yearly on paper what they had done and achieved. A famine in Matara in
the months of October and November, due to mismanagement of the
fields, may have convinced Van de Graaff that the headmen needed
stricter job descriptions and supervision. A native sabandar was appoint-
BEYOND CINNAMON: DUTCH INTERIOR POLICY 1780-1795 63
Although during the nine years of Van de Graaff ’s governorship, the focus
was really on the inland government, the development of agriculture and
increase of revenue, his zeal to improve the order, safety and hygiene in
the coastal towns was no less apparent. For the town of Colombo, he rein-
stalled the neighbourhood councils with explicit and lenghty regula-
tions.182 To fight the rampant drunkenness among the soldiers, he cut the
number of pubs in and around Colombo from one hundred sixteen to
64 CHAPTER THREE
ture. The headmen had to make sure that the paddy was sowed properly
and on time. These proclamations also extended their authority beyond
the Company lands to include all private land. The dykes and canals had
to be kept in repair to prevent flooding of the fields. Moreover the head-
men had to stimulate the growth of products like areca nuts, teakwood
and cashcrops like cardamom, pepper and coffee and to make sure that
no arable lands remained fallow. Abandoned servicelands, called malle-
palle or nielepalle, were placed in charge of the headmen and were to be
cultivated by them.188
In the proclamation the headmen were not only deemed instrumental
for the organization of agriculture, but also for the regulation of the
labour force in their regions. They were to register all persons inhabiting
the area, and had to make sure that everyone liable for service was
employed on time. They were not allowed to take bribes from the inhab-
itants to avoid the service, nor were they allowed to use labourers for their
own purpose. The appropriation of labour had always been a source of
conflict between the headmen and the Company in the southwest. Now
that the headmen were involved in cinnamon production and other cash
crops for the Company, this problem was at least somewhat overcome:
the labourers were now supposed to work in all plantations and the work
was for the benefit of both the Company and the owner of the plantation.
A proclamation of 1787 underlines this once again. Everyone in Galle
and Colombo was urged to cultivate cinnamon, pepper, coffee, areca nuts
and other products. Anyone able to keep gardens in good order could
apply to the dessava for rice to feed the labourers, and they could even ask
for tools.189 From the resolutions of the Inlandsch Departement it is clear
that many such requests were actually made, and by all sorts of people:
Moors, Burghers, Karāvas, Chetties, Goyigama headmen, and so on.190 This
new mode of production must have put a lot of pressure on the labourers
of the southwest. Van de Graaff acknowledged this in his memoir, where
he wrote that particularly in the Colombo dessavony not too much had
been done to improve the paddy culture, because all workers were already
involved in the gardens and plantations.191 Thus, the headmen in Galle
and Colombo were now held responsible for the production of cinnamon
and other cash crops, for the paddy culture and the maintenance of the
dykes and canals and lastly for the organization of the labour force.
Just as he had done in Matara in the fall of 1784, three years later Van
de Graaff issued a proclamation fixing the juridical responsibilities of the
headmen in Colombo from the village level upwards.192 In June 1789 the
governor of Ceylon commenced with the reformation of the landraad in
which the headmen had always played an important part as members of
the board of judges. The aim was to increase the efficiency of the courts
and to prevent endless litigation, which obstructed the continuation of
66 CHAPTER THREE
work and was very expensive. At the same time, it meant that Van de
Graaff more explicitly than ever integrated the native administrative hier-
archy into that of the Company.193 Apart from their involvement in the
cinnamon plantings, these were not really new tasks, but by fixing their
responsibilities in the proclamations the headmen could now be held
responsible for it, and could be reproached and even fired if they did not
perform well.194
The proclamations can be seen as a bureaucratic curtailment of the
power of the headmen and a rationalization of the relationship between
them and the Company, but it also empowered the headmen because they
now acted under the aegis of the colonial administration. Governor Van
de Graaff clearly strove to extend the Company’s reach to the exploitation
on the district level and thereby brought the countryside nearer to the
Company. He used the existing administrative structure for this, thereby
empowering the old elite, but at the same time establishing tighter con-
trol over it. The headmen went along with the new system, and did not
protest against it. As shall be seen in the next section, one reason for their
satisfaction with the stricter administrative rules was that the Dutch gov-
ernment’s interests converged with their own. These measures correspond
with those undertaken on Java from the mid-eighteenth century and
examined in recent studies by Van Niel, Kwee and Ota on respectively
Java’s North East coast and Bantam. In that sense they are part of a larg-
er pattern, but on Ceylon it was not until Van de Graaff that such meas-
ures were introduced.195
The headmen certainly made money out of the new system. The remu-
neration for the cinnamon has been mentioned already. Moreover, the
coconut industry was flourishing and was no longer hampered by the
severe laws protecting all the cinnamon trees. In fact, the Company had
turned it to its own advantage, by taxing coconut by-products, arrack and
coir, and the transport of coconuts.196 The higher Company officials in
Colombo, Galle, and Jaffna received large shares of these taxes as emolu-
ments, which was an additional reason for them to favour the coconut
plantations. Michael Roberts sees in this boom in coconut production the
major impetus for the rise of members of the Karāva cast as capitalist
entrepreneurs.197 It will be clear by now that this boom was not an
autonomous development, but one clearly related to the new Dutch poli-
cies which coincidentally stimulated coconut production.
The headmen were stimulated to endeavour in development projects
and made use of the coolie labour and the lands for free. Kotelawele, has
BEYOND CINNAMON: DUTCH INTERIOR POLICY 1780-1795 67
suggested that their power and economic position increased much over
the eighteenth century, a view confirmed here. According to Kotelawele,
the headmen had always suffered from a lack of money to substantiate
their personal power over their inferiors.198 The introduction of money in
the rural economy could explain their enthusiasm for the plantation
enterprises in particular, because the Company paid them cash for the
cinnamon and other trade goods they produced. In that way, the growth
of their power was not an independent development or a side effect of the
Company’s policy, but a direct result of the Dutch government of
Ceylon’s efforts to monetarize the local economy. The success of the
mudaliyārs led to a new lifestyle and they spent their money on Dutch-
style houses and furniture, which gave them more prestige in the view of
their subjects. This all points to an unmatched economic and (material)
cultural convergence of the elite of the southwest and the Dutch Com-
pany hierarchy and helps explain the British surprise and mistrust of the
native headmen in the southwest when they reached Ceylon.199
In fact, the governor offered not only the native headmen but anyone
with sufficient interest and capital the opportunity to endeavour in agri-
cultural undertakings on a scale unheard of before. The mahāmudaliyār of
the governor’s gate Nicolas Dias Abeysinghe and his son Balthasar certain-
ly took the lead in this. In August 1784, the mahāmudaliyār signed a con-
tract with the Company that he would attempt to clear and develop the
fertile estate Diviture in the northwest of the Galle province. Some invest-
ment of the Company was required and he was given five years to make
the enterprise profitable and to return the Company’s investments. After
these five years the Company would decide whether it considered it fruit-
ful to keep the grounds. If not, the grounds were to be given in lease to
the mahāmudaliyār in question, who would in return cultivate part of it
for the Company. It was a large project but if successfully executed it
would provide the Company with extra paddy from the lowlands and
with cinnamon, pepper, coffee and timber from the highlands. In the first
years all went according to plan, and not much was heard of it.200
In 1788, Mattheus Petrus Raket (son of Bartholomeus Raket, com-
mander of Jaffna) and P.W. van Schuler were commissioned to investigate
the development of the estate. They concluded that progress was ham-
pered by the lack of enthusiasm for the project on the part of the com-
mander of Galle, Dyonisius Kraaijenhoff. He replied immediately with an
extensive letter to the governor in which he argued that it was not his
fault, but that of the mahāmudaliyār Nicolas Dias Abeysinghe and his son
Balthasar. He pointed out that the commissioners had been misled by the
natives, who, in fear of the mahāmudaliyār and his son, had only spoken
in ways that would show them in a good light. He pointed at Abey-
singhes’ mismanagement, their intrigues against other native headmen
68 CHAPTER THREE
while the tasks of the commanders were not particularly related to the
inland policies, the dessavas and lieutenant dessavas were actually directly
involved in the development of the interior. In the end, the governor’s
preference for direct contact with these inland administrators caused
repeated problems with the commanders who felt superceded. The
authority of the commanders was also affected in another way. Following
his experiment in Galle, Van de Graaff issued an island-wide decree in
1785 forbidding the taking of paresses.205 This time, the plakkaat was
aimed not only at the native headmen, but also at the Company officials
who traditionally received gifts from the headmen upon their appoint-
ment. This measure led to a considerable decrease in income and also neg-
atively affected the status of the dessavas and the commanders, for in a
symbolic way these gifts had functioned as a confirmation of their place
in the existing hierarchy.206
Instead of the payment of paresses the headmen were forced to cultivate
part of the grounds, in relation to their post, with such market crops as
cinnamon, coffee, areca nut, teak and sappanwood. Van de Graaff expect-
ed much from this and it was his intention to expand this policy further,
and to replace the labour services with such forced cultivation as he had
done with the cinnamon peelers.207 It was a way to get better in control
over agricultural production and make more efficient use of labour.
On the other hand, the governor tried to stimulate Company officials
to get more involved in the agricultural development of the island them-
selves. This was done through commissions and emoluments in the form
of a share in the revenue from the government’s plantations. The produce
of the coconuts also became an important revenue for the Company
administrators, and most of the coir fell into the hands of the command-
ers in this way. But Van de Graaff went even further by announcing in
1789 that the dessavas would receive fifty percent of the increase in rev-
enue of the paddy tax above the 15-year average. In this way he hoped
that the dessavas would try harder to promote the cultivation of paddy
and would put more effort into its supervision. In general, many
Company officials, civil and military, brought land under cultivation with
the intention of selling it to the Company afterwards.208
Cash-crop cultivation also demanded more intense supervision to
ensure that this carried on lands adequate for the task. This was too much
work for the dessavas and Van de Graaff requested that Batavia appoint
lieutenant dessavas as they had in earlier times. But the High Government
refused because it was deemed too costly. In the end, Van de Graaff
appointed Luitenant Mitman as overseer of the plantations against the
will of Batavia. Yet it was not uncommon to invest military commanders
with civil duties: in outposts like Trincomalee and Kalpitiya military and
civil functions were often combined. On Ceylon Van de Graaff reasoned
70 CHAPTER THREE
that the military was stationed on the island and paid for by the VOC
anyway, so why not make full use of their capabilities.209
The appropriation of military men for civil duties such as land survey-
ors also occurred in the engineering department. The Company had
always had a military engineer and mapmakers in service for the mainte-
nance of the forts on the island. However, Van de Graaff decided to use
their services for surveying gardens and plantations and for the mainte-
nance and expansion of waterworks all over the island. He had new
recruits specially trained in this work. In the 1780s and 1790s, men like
Captain engineer Pieter Samuel Foenander and the accountant Johannes
Wahlberg, and in the end the young recruit Schneider, worked hard on
the development of plans for irrigation and canals. The most famous is
Foenander’s plan for the Giant’s tank near Mannar, which brings us to yet
another part of Van de Graaff ’s inland policy, namely the agricultural
projects in the periphery; these are discussed more extensively in Chapter
Five.210
Not all Company officials were charmed by the governor’s schemes and
some did not cooperate. Therefore, Van de Graaff tried to place in crucial
posts officials who saw the advantage of agricultural development and
who were loyal to him. In Matara, Christiaan van Angelbeek, son of
Johan Gerard van Angelbeek and a cousin of Van de Graaff, was appoint-
ed dessava in 1786. In the spirit of Van de Graaff, he commenced with
new clearances and the digging of new canals in the Magampattu, the
eastern part of the Matara dessavony. Although as commander of Galle
Sluijsken was officially superior to Christiaan van Angelbeek in the ruling
hierarchy, he was passed over in the organization of this enterprise. When
in 1790 a rebellion broke out in the Matara region, this gave way to
another battle of words between the governor and Pieter Sluijsken.
On 18 April 1790, Christiaan van Angelbeek wrote Sluijsken that he
had just learned the previous day that mobs from the Matara dessavony
had started marching through the countryside en route for Matara. The
direct cause was that their headmen were forcing them to work on the
canal in the Magampattu, on orders of Van Angelbeek, while they already
had to toil on the cinnamon plantations of Governor Van de Graaff, Van
Angelbeek and some of the mudaliyārs and other headmen. They com-
plained that they “would not even have time to enjoy in peace the bless-
ings that had overcome them by the flourishing of their fields”.211
Van Angelbeek wrote to Sluijsken that the headmen had asked for a
committee consisting of members of the political council of Colombo to
investigate the complaints. Sluijsken instead decided to send a committee
directly from Galle to the mob to “discover the true origin of their dis-
satisfaction and promise them justice and protection from the govern-
ment”.212 What followed was an intense argument between Van Angel-
BEYOND CINNAMON: DUTCH INTERIOR POLICY 1780-1795 71
beek and Sluijsken about the authority of this committee: Sluijsken was
of the opinion that Matara fell under his responsibility and therefore he
was competent to authorise such a committee, while a committee sent
straight from Colombo undermined his authority. In the end, two com-
mittees investigated the matter and produced extensive reports on the
rebellion. Van Angelbeek was temporarily replaced, but rehabilitated by
the end of the year. The whole episode left an enormous amount of source
material in the form of the reports of the two committees, Sluijsken’s
accusations and Van Angelbeek’s defence.213
Nonetheless it is difficult to assess the exact reason for the rebellion,
which was likely a combination of factors. Clearly the most important
was the high pressure that the government placed on the labourers. But
this could not have been the sole cause for in previous years the labourers
had worked on the canals and gardens. In the first reports they empha-
sized that they expected a good crop which made it unnecessary for them
to work for the Company. In bad years the rations of rice and small pay-
ments they earned for the corvée work compensated for the bad crops.
Jealousies among the headmen with regards to their rivals’ successful cin-
namon plantations or their close cooperation with Van Angelbeek may
also have played a role. The rebellion did not spread beyond Matara and
was suppressed by the end of the month, but the arguments between
Sluijsken and Van Angelbeek continued. Significantly, the pattern of the
rebellion reveals some of the private patronage relations between
Company officials like Van Angelbeek and Sluijsken and the native head-
men.214 It shows that interests other than the Company’s were at stake.
This brings us to the very complex relationships between the private and
official interests of native headmen and Company officials. Such shared
interests had probably always been there, but the new policies of Van de
Graaff apparently caused new tension in these relationships.
ing these private businesses, but one instance where they do is a list with
statements of the incomes of all the Company’s officials that was sent
from Colombo to Batavia in 1789. In the statement of his income as
dessava of Colombo, Fretz complained that the High Government of
Batavia had disapproved of its personnel on Ceylon being involved in dif-
ferent plantations. A despatch of 31 July 1787, noted that “if he [the
dessava] will execute his duties as required, this should provide him with
enough work and joy, so that he does not have to occupy himself with
large enterprises in addition”.216 Fretz complained that the income of a
dessava was small, and because he could be provided with cheap labour,
he had started a plantation growing cinnamon, areca nut, pepper, coffee,
teak and sappanwood. He wrote that it was easily done and did not cost
him much time and certainly did not hinder him in his work as dessava.
How did Fretz find the cheap labour and the time to oversee the planta-
tions? It is likely that he worked together with some native headmen who
provided him with the labourers and overseers of the plantations and
shared in the profits.
We find many examples of Dutch officials who had started plantations
like Fretz. One of the bigger entrepreneurs in this respect was that of
Count von Ranzow.217 The plantations were usually made on Company
ground, but they were seen as projects that benefited the Company, and
in fact the officials were usually paid back their investments by the
Company upon departure. The cheap labour was found through the
headmen, and this means that because the Dutch were actually depend-
ent on the headmen for their profits, it was in their private interest that
the headmen kept their power over the people. Probably this is what
Maitland meant with his remark quoted at the beginning of this sec-
tion.218
Such relationships also existed in the trade sector. Anthony Bertolacci,
who worked under Governors North and Maitland, describes how the
higher echelons of the Dutch were in possession of most of the capital in
the southwest, and that they had agents who took care of their trade.
Dutch capital was further increased by lending money, which probably
also led to client-patron relationships between them and native entrepre-
neurs.219 The question of private trade remains vague: whereas we do find
remarks relating to the plantations in official Company sources, remarks
on private trade are few. At least one case that corroborates the sugges-
tions of Bertolacci is that of Pieter Sluijsken. We have already seen that he
quarrelled with Van de Graaff almost from the start of his govenorship. In
his many private writings to the authorities in Batavia, he unintentional-
ly gives us some insight into his private affairs. For example, it turns out
that his business in Galle was headed by a native of the name Simon de
Zilva with whom he had an account of not less than 40,000 rixdollars.220
BEYOND CINNAMON: DUTCH INTERIOR POLICY 1780-1795 73
registrations were liable to mistakes and frauds through bribery and eva-
sion. This counted in particular for the last head tombo drawn up in Jaffna
which showed numerous faults. Further complaints relating to the bad
management of the commander and the dessava added to this and result-
ed in a committee being sent to Jaffna to investigate the matter in 1794.231
3.13 Conclusion
its origin in the first half of the eighteenth century.241 Moreover, I find
that from the 1780s onwards this development was accelerated by two
factors. First was the cultivation of cinnamon in the plantations of the
Company and private gardens. This was an important new development,
for cinnamon had always been collected in the wild and after a period of
experimentation from about 1767, its production was now brought
under Company’s control. Second were the increased government expens-
es for rice. At the time, the VOC was in decline and supplies of basic
foodstuffs like rice for its garrisons arrived less regularly on the island than
they had before. Exacerbating this problem, the labour force on the new
cinnamon plantations required additional supplies of rice. One way to
deal with the mounting expenses was to increase the efficiency of the rev-
enue departments and Van de Graaff managed to improve the revenue of
the colony by fifty percent.
In addition, Van de Graaff also decided that Ceylon should be self suf-
ficient in its rice production. To meet this end, he shifted his attention to
the peripheral regions of the island, like the east coast, the Vanni and
Manaar regions, brought them under tight control and invested in the
irrigation and the clearance of new grounds.242 It was his plan to turn
these regions into a broodkamer or breadbasket for the rest of the island.
In the traditional centre of Dutch power, the southwest, waste land was
given out on contracts forcing the tenants to cultivate part of their lands
for the Company with cinnamon or other commercial crops. As a result,
the private interests of Dutch officials and native headmen converged in
the establishment of cinnamon plantations, the growth of other commer-
cial crops and mercantile enterprises. It seems that in these business rela-
tions the native headmen gained the upper-hand over lesser Dutch offi-
cials because of their capital accumulation and their access to the labour
force.
In this period, the government of the island became more centralized
and the relationship of the VOC with the native headmen who acted as
middlemen between colonial authorities and native society became
tighter and better defined. In the southwest, the original systems of indi-
rect rule was transformed into a more direct type of government, in which
the native headmen had well defined assignments and were held account-
able for their performance. This entailed the development of a new polit-
ical culture in which the traditional means of confirming the administra-
tive hierarchy in the form of paresses (gift-giving) were abandoned. At the
same time the native headmen were further empowered by their new tasks
and their commercial engagements. Paradoxically, while the bargaining
position of the headmen was strengthened, the colonial administration
became more hands-on because of growing Dutch interference and
control.
78 CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
INLAND EXPLOITATION:
THE DISCOVERY OF THE PERIPHERY
provided them with basic provisions of rice and a little money that
enabled them to feed their families.
What is of interest here is that in good times the inhabitants could not
see any advantage in working on the canal even though it could in the end
also be of advantage to them, because it aimed to prevent floods in the
rainy season.249 The rebellion in Matara is an example of how colonial
intervention led to a clash of mentality between the Dutch and the native
population that was not easily overcome. This was even more the case in
regions where contact between the natives and the Company had been
rare, like in the Vanni, Trincomalee, and Batticaloa. This chapter dis-
cusses these new encounters and colonial interventions in the periphery,
through an analysis of the reports and memoranda written by Jacques
Fabrice van Senden, Thomas Nagel, and Jacob Burnand on their opera-
tions in these districts.
Van Senden’s journal consists of four parts. The first part, about his jour-
ney through Kottiyar, is the most extensive. This is followed by an
account of the possible measures to be taken to improve the agriculture
there. The third and fourth part, about Tamblegam and Kattukolom, are
much shorter. In those sections, Van Senden refers often to earlier
remarks he made about Kottiyar, which was connected to Kattukolom by
the bay of Trincomalee; Tamblegam was located more inland, and bor-
dered the territories of the Kingdom of Kandy. The land on the coast is
by and large flat, but in the interior the landscape is more diverse with
plains and hilly areas. Salt production on the coast of Kattukolom formed
an important industry for the region. The salt was mainly purchased by
traders from Kandy and by the VOC in Trincomalee. The hinterland of
INLAND EXPLOITATION: THE DISCOVERY OF THE PERIPHERY 81
Van Senden travelled by boat, horse and palanquin and had himself
accompanied by the most prominent native headmen of the area. In
Kottiyar he was assisted by the vanniyār Irroemarooewentoega Ideewi-
rasinga Nallemapane, in Tamblegam by the mudaliyār Don Fransisco
Kannegerandge Kannegeritna and in Kattukolompattu by the vanniyār
Don Joan Sandere Seegere Mapane Wangenaar.252 The local population
took care of provisioning the group. The first thing Van Senden did when
arriving in the villages was to make up a register of all male inhabitants.
The villages on the coast numbered up to a hundred men, but the other
settlements were much smaller, with only seven or eight adult men. In
some places, in particular in Tamblegam and Kattukolom, it was impos-
sible to count the inhabitants, because they fled.
Van Senden’s visit to Moedoer, the first village he called at, may serve
as an example of his encounters.253 The village was relatively large, with
one hundred fourteen adult males, and was located on the coast at the
mouth of the river Kinge. The first thing Van Senden noticed was that
there was a lot of waste land. The paddy fields that were in use looked
fine, but the water tank that had to supply the land in the dry season was
not well placed. It lay too low and as a consequence the water could not
reach the fields. He therefore showed the people how they could water the
fields using dam and pipe-constructions, so they could also exploit the
waste lands. He inspected the river and wondered whether a water mill
could be placed there to saw timber. Next he checked whether the river
could be diked to prevent floods in the wet season. He explained the
inhabitant that the higher grounds, which were not used at all, were per-
fectly suited to growing fruit bearing trees. He thought of plantations of
between three thousand and twenty-two thousand coconut palms. Van
Senden did not understand why the inhabitants did not put effort into
producing more; they could barter the surplus and the population would
increase and this in turn would lead to higher production.
The unsown paddyfields, water regulation and the poor fruit tree plan-
tations are subjects that recur again and again in the text. Many times Van
Senden pointed this out to the vanniyār who travelled with him, and
encouraged him “to make better use of that which nature had given him
and his people so generously”.254 He saw everything in terms of exploita-
tion: the rivers were waterways or energy providers, the land was meant
to be used as paddyfield or plantation, and the river clay waited to be used
82 CHAPTER FOUR
for the production of bricks and tiles. Wild buffalo were suitable draught
animals for tilling the soil, wild elephants could be caught and traded
with India. Van Senden even tried to transmit his own technological
knowledge to the inhabitants, in the case of the dam-and-pipe construc-
tion in Moedoer.255
Van Senden’s utilitarian attitude towards nature emerges frequently,
and he is almost as often disappointed with the state of the agriculture
and the commitment of the inhabitants. Sometimes he was pleasantly
surprised though, for example when he visited the village Pattianoette,
with only thirteen inhabitants, on Saturday 10 June: “There is a little
pagoda here which has nothing special, except for the brahmin priest,
who loves planting and has planted part of the empty space that usually
adjoins the pagodas, with lime trees and other fruit-bearing trees.”256 Van
Senden liked this so much, that he promised the man seeds and pits of
other fruit trees to extend his orchard.
Van Senden did not pay attention only to agriculture. He was also
interested in the roads and rivers. Here he was confronted with the limi-
tations that nature forced upon people and he complained much about it.
Because of the heat, he could only travel early in the morning or late in
the afternoon, and sometimes he even travelled at night. The rivers turned
out to be unnavigable because the riverbeds had run dry, or had grown
thick with mangrove forest. Paths to specific destinations often turned out
to be impassable and “made for no one but forest people”.257 Elephants
occasionally formed an obstacle when he travelled through Tamblegam:
in large numbers they obstructed the road and terrified his retinue.258 The
elephants could only be scared away by gun shots. Above all this, van
Senden was feeling ill during his whole journey. He could sometimes
barely feel his fingers and sometimes his nerves troubled him so much
that could not continue the journey.259 In Kottiyar and Tamblegam in par-
ticular he suffered much from mosquitoes at night.
Despite everything, Van Senden often expressed his admiration for the
natural environment. On the plain close to the village of Kooijkoederipie
settlements were built on small hills and the plain was used for paddy cul-
ture:
all these islands or raisings are covered with coconut palms like feathers and
the pattern of light green of the fields that have not been reaped yet, and the
hayish-yellow of those that have already completed the reaping, and the dark
green of the trees, shows us one of those spectacles which convinces us, like
with everything, of the supremacy of nature above art.260
It is typical of Van Senden’s attitude that he uses the word nature when
he is talking not about a wild jungle, but about a landscape that has been
brought into cultivation.
INLAND EXPLOITATION: THE DISCOVERY OF THE PERIPHERY 83
The interesting thing about the travel journal is that Van Senden wrote
down not only his own observations, but also the inhabitants’s responses
to his suggestions. When Van Senden proposed in the village of Moedoer
that everyone should produce more than they needed for themselves, he
was told that “Through the outbreak of diarroeha and children’s diseases
for some years now, the country had become depopulated [...] and each
of the few remaining people do not cultivate more than what they need
in one year.”261 From the villagers’ answers to his suggestions, it becomes
clear that their existence was very insecure because of certain natural fac-
tors. Therefore they could not see the point of expanding agricultural out-
put. The region was plagued by wild animals, and hordes of wild ele-
phants in particular who damaged the fields and panters and bears who
prowled about the district. The climate often worked against them: in the
rainy season floods could ruin the crop, but long periods of drought also
had damaging effects. Finally, in the previous period many people had
died from disease. Remarkably enough, Van Senden did not recognize
this problem; apparently the people must have looked healthy at the
moment he travelled there.262
Apart from all this, Van Senden met a lot of distrust from the inhabi-
tants with regard to himself as a white representative of the Dutch gov-
ernment. Sometimes the inhabitants fled when they were informed of his
approach. They feared be taken as slaves, or being eaten by his Malay sol-
diers. Van Senden thought this nonsense and tried to convince them of
his good intentions by explaining the purpose of his trip and by offering
useful instruction, giving them extra sowing seed and promising them
postponement of taxes. Still, it did not always work, as the example of his
meeting with the men of Elendetorre shows. There, Van Senden
explained how fruit-bearing trees were best planted. He subsequently
asked the inhabitants whether they would start planting trees straight
away, if he would provide them with seeds or offshoot:
After murmuring for some time, an ancient man, who could not have much
hope of enjoying those fruits, came forward, and said with a smiling face:
“why would we go into all this trouble, our grandfathers and fathers never
did it.” This was agreed upon by all the attendants.263
According to Van Senden this inertia was the inhabitants’ most evil qual-
ity and had to change.
Van Senden portrayed the native inhabitants not only as inert, but also
as simple and angst-ridden. These characteristics came to the fore most
strongly in the folk tales he collected. Van Senden was mainly interested
in stories related to the prominent ruins he encountered. In Tamblegam
for example he passed a river with a few standing pillars in the middle.
84 CHAPTER FOUR
The local people believed that these had been placed there by a mythical
washerwoman. This woman appears again and again in the local accounts
explaining the origin of the large ruins.264 Van Senden concluded however
that the pillars would have been part of a bridge, of which the upper part
was gone.
Although Van Senden was sometimes a little scornful of the folk sto-
ries, his interest in them was sincere. Most attention was paid to the sto-
ries that related to the ancient watertank of Kantelai. The people turned
out very fearful for the water tank.
[…] in the morning at four forty I left Kooij Koederieppoe for the infamous,
and never mentioned without fright by the Mallabars, Kantelai tank. They
tried everything to prevent me from going; warnings, admonitions and the
worst: citing the many examples, which I knew were true, of curious people,
who died shortly after the visit or never recovered from lingering diseases,
but nothing helped; the usefulness of the Kantalai tank, for the agriculture
of the province Tamblegammo was too important for me not to see it with
my own eyes–for the notorious devil Poedem, who had made the facing of
the tank in six days as servant of the King Kollekooten and still guards it, I
had no fear, but I dreaded the poultice and cooked mess of the superstitious
[…].265
In deference to the strong aversion of the people, he decided to ask the
“heathen priest” for permission beforehand. He explained to the inhabi-
tants that he took their warnings seriously, but that he wished to behold
himself the structure “that I thought was made by humans, though they
attributed it to spirits”. He would however behave respectfully and hoped
that the inhabitants would join him in seeing it.266
Despite all warnings Van Senden visited the tank and was clearly much
impressed by the enormous construction. Moreover, he showed his com-
panions that the irrigation tank could be made ready for use through a
few minor operations like taking away the mud in the pipes. He ordered
the headmen who had joined him that in future the tank had to be
cleaned in the dry season by all the inhabitants together. Those who did
not cooperate would not be allowed to make use of the water for the irri-
gation of their fields.267
The section on the Kantelai tank is essential to understanding the dif-
ferences in outlook between Van Senden and the inhabitants. Van Senden
depicts himself as the all-knowing, rational European, in sharp contrast
with the primitive and superstitious indigenous population. The fact that
the inhabitants attributed a structure like the watertank of Kantelai to
devils revealed their fearful and primitive nature and their incapacity to
control nature and adapt it to their needs. The remains of temples,
bridges and, water tanks did however point at a higher civilization and
more intensive use of the land in the past, and a higher population den-
sity. This rich past appealed to Van Senden’s imagination and strength-
INLAND EXPLOITATION: THE DISCOVERY OF THE PERIPHERY 85
ened his belief that the region could turn prosperous once more. It is no
coincidence that in his scheme for improvement, he laid great emphasis
on the ancient civilization of the inhabitants.
edge and power. It also reveals an obsession with the island’s ancient and
rich past that strengthened his conviction that the region could and had
to be more intensely cultivated. Van Senden strongly contrasted himself
with the native population, who are clearly in need of European guidance
to improve their lives and that of their children. The natives’ fear of
Europeans shows how little the Dutch had intruded into this region so
far, although their fear could also be explained by their recent experience
with French and the English troops behaving ruthlessly while they occu-
pied the harbour of Trincomalee between 1782 and 1784.
Van Senden was not very sensitive to the actual problems of the inhab-
itants, in particular the diseases which afflicted them repeatedly. We now
know that it was a malaria-prone area, and the debilitating influence of
structural malaria on a population is a well known fact. Van Senden did
not notice it because he did not know about it, he could not connect the
stories about the devil poedem with the anopheles mosquito that probably
bred in the tanks. His energetic and progressive attitude is typical of the
period of Van de Graaff ’s governorship, and not surprisingly Van Senden
was strongly attached to Van de Graaff. The outcomes of Van Senden’s
schemes for improvement were limited. Residents were appointed on his
advice and the income from the paddy tithe increased fivefold, which
points at significant improvements. But although the engineer Fornbauer
made a precise plan for its repair in 1792, the Kantelai tank was never
fully repaired. Van Senden died within three years after the journey.269
In his own memoir Van de Graaff dealt in great length with the progress
of the paddy cultivation in all regions of the island. He stated that much
progress had been made in this field in the previous years, with the excep-
tion of the Colombo dessavony where most workers were involved in cin-
namon culture and could therefore not be involved in the improvement
of the paddy culture.270 However, a lot had been achieved in other regions,
notably, the outer parts of Matara, Batticaloa, the Vanni, and even a little
in Trincomalee.
The achievements are difficult to assess, but if we are to believe Van de
Graaff they were great and promising. We have seen already that Van
Senden’s plans for Trincomalee resulted in some expansion of agricultur-
al output. The most structural approach had been in Batticaloa and the
Vanni, where administrative reforms were more extensive and intensely
supervised by two enterprising officials. In Batticaloa it was Jacob
Burnand, a young man from Switzerland who had arrived on the island
in 1778, and in the Vanni it was Lieutenant Thomas Nagel. Both success-
INLAND EXPLOITATION: THE DISCOVERY OF THE PERIPHERY 87
The Vanni district covered the large area between the Jaffna peninsula and
the Kingdom of Kandy and was largely inhabited by people of Tamil ori-
gin. Before the late eighteenth century, the administration of the Vanni
had been the most obvious example of the VOC’s system of indirect
rule.271 The vanniyārs, or local chiefs, were in theory subordinated to the
Company and under the commandment of Jaffna. They had to pay a
yearly tribute of forty elephants to the Company, but the Company did
not otherwise meddle in their administration and they maintained a fair
degree of autonomy. In the course of the eighteenth century their obliga-
tions became diluted and during the 1770s the Jaffna commander was
complaining repeatedly that the vanniyārs were in arrears on the payment
of their tribute. By 1780, troubles in the district caused by a succession
struggle in one of the provinces of the Vanni allowed the colonial admin-
istration to step in.
The Company considered taking over the whole district, but due to the
scale of the operation Governor Willem Iman Falck decided that only the
province Karnawelpattu should be brought under direct Dutch rule. It
was an experiment, and the aim was to learn how much profit this
province would bring the Company. Falck had reason to have high expec-
tations, since it was common knowledge that in ancient times the district
had produced high yields. The resident, Mr Sprang, was requested to do
everything in his power to improve agriculture.272 By 1784, the vanniyārs
in the other provinces started to rebel against the Dutch, which gave
Governor Falck a reason to organize a punitive expedition. Under com-
mand of the lieutenant Thomas Nagel, the provinces were conquered one
by one. Nagel was appointed as head of the district and commisisoned to
improve the cultivation of paddy and increase the revenues of the dis-
trict.273 In 1789, Nagel requested that the colonial government lease him
the district for five years. Under his proposal he would personally make
the necessary expenses to improve the local situation, provided he would
be allowed to keep all revenue from it, except for the paddy-tithe. The
military expenses would still be paid by government. His request was
honoured.274
In 1794, Nagel requested an extension of the lease and wrote a mem-
orandum to explain the successes achieved so far and his plans for the
future. The memorandum is divided in nine paragraphs. The first four
give an introduction to the district, its nature, its people and its history.
Paragraphs five and six are concerned with the history of the Company’s
88 CHAPTER FOUR
presence in the district. Nagel describes how and why it was occupied and
what improvements were made especially in the field of agriculture. In the
following two sections Nagel elaborates on the strategic importance of the
Vanni and gives a description of his plans for further improvement of
agriculture. The final paragraph discusses his new proposal for the next
ten years. Nagel’s achievements in the district were considerable: he
improved the income of paddy, collected as the Company’s tithe, from
14,000 parrahs of paddy to 36,000 parrahs.275 In addition, the income
from taxes on gardens and trade increased. What measures did he take to
achieve this?
Thomas Nagel started with an administrative reorganization based on
the Dutch administrative system in Jaffna. In the aftermath of his expe-
ditions, he had put aside the vanniyārs, and in the new government they
were left out. The civil administration consisted of ten, later twelve,
Europeans or men of European descent and eighty natives, of whom sixty
were lascorins.276 Next to that he adopted a headmen system: eighteen
mudaliyārs were put in charge of the provincial government and thirty-six
majorals were to work under them. The new land-courts were to apply the
Jaffanese laws to the Vanni.277 Even the organization of the taxes and land
revenues were copied from the Jaffna system. He ordered a hoofdtombo
(family register, for the purpose of taxation) to be made and decided that
like in Jaffna the people would be obliged to work twelve days a year for
the Company (or to pay one rixdollar and four stivers for each day they
did not work). The land tax was fixed at a tenth of the crop, to be paid
either in kind or in money.278
The increase in agricultural output was achieved by three measures.
First, after the bad harvests of 1787 and 1788 caused by a lack of rain
Nagel lent seed to the peasants on his own account, to ensure a reason-
able crop the following year. Second, he started a land registry, identify-
ing the wasteland suitable for exploitation and reporting on the condition
of the water-tanks belonging to the occupied fields. Because many of the
tanks were in a bad state, he made a plan to repair them and figured that
in total about twenty-five thousand rixdollars were needed to fix them all.
Nagel shouldered the burden of these investments himself as part of the
contract he made with Governor Van de Graaff in 1789. In the same year
he employed four natives in the function of adigār with the specific task
of overseeing the agriculture and the repair of the tanks. By 1793, much
progress had been made, but more time was needed to meet the objec-
tives. He planned to set up sugar, coffee and cotton plantations by forc-
ing the poor inhabitants from the overcrowded Jaffna district to move to
the Vanni and work on his plantations. He also intended to make the peo-
ple of the Vanni cultivate these cash crops for the Company with one part
of their fields. These plans were inspired by Anthony Blom’s 1787 treatise
INLAND EXPLOITATION: THE DISCOVERY OF THE PERIPHERY 89
nies, overseers. Their tasks were clearly defined and they received a fixed
salary. He described in detail how these native servants should function,
how they had to make use of “annotation olas” (palm leaves) to report on
the crop and its collection, and how often they should make these reports
and send them to the secretary’s office.292 His attitude towards these civil
servants was rigid. He stressed that they only worked properly if the
authority of the chief was firmly established by punishing them heavily
from the outset for every little attempt at fraud.293 Here he deviated from
the policies of Van de Graaff for the southwest, but resembled more the
administration of Nagel in the Vanni.
By installing this twofold administration, Burnand aimed at marginal-
izing the headmen and rendering the Company independent of them.
Despite some temporary opposition from the headmen, this was achieved
in course of time and he was able to state that the “most part of them is
at present entirely unnecessary and may be dispensed with, the sole utili-
ty will be to let them act as controllers of the native servants […]”.294 The
headmen’s income was further curtailed by the prohibition against accept-
ing any presents from inferior chiefs or to taking fines in court. In fact,
these prohibitions had been brought in to practice after the proclamations
of Van de Graaff against the taking of the paresses, a step which was high-
ly praised by Burnand in this memorandum.295
Another step to limit the power of the headmen over the people was
taken in the field of justice. Burnand reorganized the rural assemblies:
instead of every six weeks, as under his predecessor, they were held only
twice a year. Moreover, they functioned not as the main courts for all sorts
of civil and criminal cases, but mainly as an agricultural board where the
expected harvests and revenues were discussed. Only cases that could
directly be decided upon could be brought to trial here. This was done to
improve the legal security of the common people, since they were often
opponents of the headmen in the court cases. In 1789 a landraad was
established. Native judges were appointed directly by the Company and
the headmen played no role here. The final responsibility of the verdicts
lay in the hands of the Dutch chief of Batticaloa, which gave him great
authority over both the people and the headmen.296
In his discussion of plans for the future, Burnand elaborated on the
importance of trade for the district. He was of the opinion that free trade
in local agricultural products and circulation of money would prove to be
an encouragement for agriculture. He stated that in previous times, the
price of grain had been kept artificially low, which kept people from pro-
ducing more than what they needed themselves. He criticized the Com-
pany’s general policy of monopolizing even local trade and he praised the
measures taken by Van de Graaff in 1786 to leave the paddy-trade in the
district free.297
92 CHAPTER FOUR
4.7 Conclusion
For the first time, not only the southwest and Jaffna peninsula were sub-
ject to the processes of colonial intervention. The peripheral regions’
experience of colonial intrusion was however very different from that in
the core regions. Here the main aim of the colonial rulers was to increase
the production of rice, and Van de Graaff explicitly designated these areas
as the storage-rooms for the rest of the island.
Although the governor increased the agricultural output, this was not
entirely a success story. In Matara the native labourers rebelled against the
continuous call for labour. In general, the increased exploitation seems to
have weighed heavily on the backs of the peasants. The new opportuni-
ties for some of the native chiefs caused jealousies among them and some
of the Dutch officials. In the peripheral districts, the Dutch heads like
Van Senden found that it was not an easy task to convince the local
inhabitants to produce more than they needed for themselves. The con-
tinuous struggle for life and the natural and mystical threats that sur-
rounded them made it useless in their eyes to expand their agricultural
production. And although the administrators of the peripheral districts
managed to increase the output of paddy, the clash of cultures and men-
talities reveals the limited reach of colonial plans and policies, something
with which the British were to deal with as well.
In the peripheral districts the native administration was dealt with very
differently than in the core districts. There, the former elites were banned
from their position and replaced by either Dutch or Portuguese burghers
in the Vanni, or by men from the Vellalle caste in Batticaloa. Clearly they
found themselves in a very different position from the powerful native
headmen in the southwest. Did this relate to a weak social-economic
organization in the region, the absence of Kandyan interests in these
regions, or the very specific historical collaboration between the Dutch
and the headmen in the southwest? This question will be taken up in the
later chapters on British policies.
93
CHAPTER FIVE
In 1809, Jacob Burnand, who remained on the island after the British
take-over, wrote a paper for the second British governor, Thomas
Maitland (1805-1811), about the Dutch mode of government. In these
“fragments on Ceylon” Burnand drew quite a positive image of the Dutch
rulers of Ceylon in the last decades. He literally referred to the governors
Van Angelbeek, Van de Graaff, and Falck as enlightened rulers and
praised Van de Graaff for his innovative policies. He argued that Van de
Graaff aspired to change society at a moderate pace and that he thought
that this was to be achieved by enlightened authoritarian rule, through a
good legal system like the landraad and systematic registration of all land
and people. With regard to the bonded services, Burnand argued that Van
de Graaff ’s long-term view was that in time the people would be freed
from their services through redemption in money or kind. In some cases
Burnand criticized the policies of Van de Graaff and referred to his own
methods in Batticaloa. How to deal with this picture of Burnand, should
it be taken seriously, or did he portray an imagined situation for the pur-
poses of illustration? Perhaps the paper was written in this way rather to
underpin Maitland’s own “enlightened” line of approach. In other words,
were Van de Graaff and his officials, Burnand included, really influenced
by contemporary, enlightened, political thought and does this help
explain their choice of policy?
Moreover, the move to the periphery, the increased colonial interven-
tion in the core-districts and the emphasis on exploitation of the territo-
ries under Dutch occupation as a means to increase the revenue for the
Company, resemble contemporary developments in Java. In particular the
experiments with systems of forced labour in the core regions and the for-
mal regulation of the tasks of the subordinated native headmen are remi-
niscent of similar actions taken on the northeast coast of Java.
Interestingly, Governor Van de Graaff had never served on Java or else-
where in the Indonesian archipelago. These similarities lead one to won-
der whether it is possible to speak of a typical Dutch-colonial approach to
new challenges in this era of change.
to ask Van Braam for help in furthering his career in the East.313 Yet, his
positive reference to the Abbé Raynal surprises, for Raynal was a severe
and influential critic of the excesses of colonialism in general and the
monopolistic rule of the VOC in particular.
Raynal’s Histoire philosophique et politique des établissements et du com-
merce des Européens dans les Deux Indes was first published in 1770.314 As
the title reveals, the books (for there are seven volumes) present a critical
overview of the situation in the European colonies in the East and West
Indies. In addition, a general perspective on the various political and eco-
nomic issues of colonialism is given. The work was of an encyclopaedic
nature written by various authors and its message is consequently a little
diffuse. Moreover, Raynal and his co-authors made substantial changes in
the various subsequent editions.315 Although the work was much criticized
for its factual mistakes, it became one of the best-sellers of the eighteenth
century, with more that forty reprints in French and translations into
Dutch, German and English. It was a much quoted work in the anti-
slavery debates of the late eighteenth century.316
The criticism on the Companies in Asia received not as much atten-
tion, but was very substantial. In the second part of the first volume, the
mercantilist system and the monopolies of the VOC were attacked.
Raynal’s portrayal of the Dutch Company was one of decline because of
greed and decadence. Raynal preferred the organization of the English
East India Company above that of the Dutch Company and repeatedly,
while comparing the two, he urged the Dutch to look at their “insular
neighbours” as an example. The major problem of the VOC was its com-
plex administrative structure, which hampered its decision-making
process and its adaptability. Moreover, the Company’s monopolistic and
jealous attitudes towards other traders were a great evil. Raynal argued
that the VOC’s policies had to be overturned, that Batavia should be
opened up for all traders. As far as he was concerned many of the super-
fluous small trading factories in Asia could be closed down. In this way,
the Company could greatly reduce its the costs and prevent the other
Europeans from turning against them.
During his textual tour along all the Dutch possessions, Raynal also
discussed the colony of Ceylon and in line with the rest of his text, he
criticized the monopolistic attitudes there. He further noted that,
although much of the land was under Dutch rule, cultivation of the soil
was not promoted. The land and its inhabitants were left in a poor state,
people had become lazy, they lived in little shacks, ate nothing but fruits
of the land and only the richest had some cloths to wrap around their
waist. Under the heading ‘hints of policy recommended to the Dutch for
improving their settlement there’, he advised the Dutch, and for that mat-
ter, all European powers in Asia:
DUTCH PERCEPTIONS OF THE COLONIAL ORDER 99
that they [should] distribute the lands to families. They will forget, and per-
haps detest their former sovereign; They will attach themselves to govern-
ment, which keeps itself busy with their happiness. They will work, they will
consume. Then, the island of Ceylon will enjoy the affluence, for which
nature has destined her. It would be a shelter for revolutions, and capable of
supporting the establishment of Malabar and Coromandel.317
regular contact through letters and were kept apprised of affairs back
home through newspapers, books and pamphlets. A rare example of a list
of books owned by Company officials at the time is found in the estate of
Selarius of Cochin, who possessed endless books, in which also Raynal
and other philosphes featured.320 Intellectually, Europe and the Nether-
lands were closer to some of the Dutchmen on Ceylon than is sometimes
assumed on the basis of their long absence from Europe. The political
developments and power politics at home interested Dutch officials, not
least because they depended on their connections at home for their
advancement in the East. For example, when the Batavian revolution
spread over the Netherlands, the Dutch in the East also chose sides of
either the stadholder or the patriots.321
The acceptance of presents by the headmen and Dutch officials was now
forbidden when someone wished to register a complaint, and officials
were no longer allowed to keep fines. This was to prevent the arbitrary
administration of justice, which had often led to long delays in trials and
appeals to higher courts. The rationale underlying these reforms was quite
practical: the sooner conflicts were solved, the sooner everyone could
return to the fields.
Van de Graaff underscored his words with deeds and within one month
after his proclamation against the taking of gifts from inferiors, in August
1784 he temporarily suspended Don Siman Wijesoendere Senewiratne
Dissanaijke, mudaliyār of the Belligam corle, for having received such
gifts. Undoubtedly this was done to set an example for the others.322 Later,
in 1793, Bartholomeus Raket was impeached for giving lucrative tax
farms to certain headmen after receiving substantial gifts from them.
Clearly, Van de Graaff believed that if this form of fair and harmonious
rule was combined with active promotion of agriculture, the colony
would become prosperous. Can we understand the new line of policy as
an answer to the predicament of despotic Company rule, and therefore as
an answer to the type of critique expressed by Raynal?
This question is difficult to answer. Even if the new measures agree
with Raynal’s advice on Ceylon and the colonial operations in the East
generally, this still does not prove any direct correlation. It is more likely
that the measures should be seen as political interventions that were based
on local officials’ lengthy experiences in the local administration. Van de
Graaff ’s predecessors like Van Goens and Van Imhoff had also expressed
their intention to contain the native headmen and to encourage agricul-
tural development of the island. Although they never succeeded in this,
their writings may have served as much as examples for the officials on
Ceylon as that of Raynal. To make things more complex: Raynal had
made much use of Van Imhoff ’s comments on the Company’s policies,
written when he was governor-general in the 1740s.323
On the other hand the initiative for the new projects lay by and large
with Van de Graaff on Ceylon. Except for the cinnamon cultivation, he
could have decided to keep things as they were, as his predecessor Falck
had done. The money he used to develop the island could have been
spent to draw rice from abroad. Instead, Van de Graaff consciously made
huge expenses on agricultural development and instigated major changes
in the inland administration. Also, he decided to invest in the peripheral
areas and turn these into the island’s breadbasket. He must have had a
positive long-term vision on the island’s destiny and must have been con-
fident of his goals to have done all this despite the Batavian government’s
opposition. It is likely that the writings of Raynal and others provided
him that long-term perspective, and that this, in combination with Van
102 CHAPTER FIVE
That as long as he [the vanniyār] as regent and father of his people did not
take care of the eductation of his children, he could never hope to have
authority over the people, they would remain merely humans in appearance
but stupid dull animals in deeds, to whom no lust for improvement of their
state and consequently of the country of their abode could ever be
inspired.324
DUTCH PERCEPTIONS OF THE COLONIAL ORDER 103
This image of the dull natural man, in contrast to the energetic civilized
man is encountered often in the text.325 The inhabitants could best be
brought to civilization through good examples, upbringing and educa-
tion, and for the best results one had to start with the children since they
were still young and innocent. They would have to learn from a young
age to lead an active life by putting them to work while they were still
young and sending them to school at the same time.326 The best students
should be rewarded with presents and upon reaching adulthood they
should be able to obtain the highest positions in the native administra-
tion. In that way, civilization was equated with status, and good examples
would follow automatically. Although he expected the headmen to coop-
erate in this, he thought it to be best if the headmen were to be supervised
by European residents. After all, the headmen had been given too much
freedom when they served under the Kandyan king, which had led them
to rule in an arbitrary way.327
Van Senden had a positive view of society because he felt that every
human, however close he once stood to nature, had the potential to devel-
op himself. The civilization process would find its expression in econom-
ic behaviour, and only once does he add hesitantly that this might lead in
the end to Christianity. But conversion was not really his aim. Van
Senden was actually much interested in the practice of Hinduism and
Buddhism which he encountered and more than once he asked for a
translation of the ancient texts that were kept in the temples that he saw.
Not surprisingly, he refers at times to contemporary travel authors like
Sonnerat who had travelled through India and paid much attention to the
origin of the Indian religion, ruins and artefacts, and who had published
a travel account in 1782.328 Van Senden gives the reader the impression of
being much concerned with and sympathetic towards the fate of the
natives. At the end of the diary, Van Senden addresses himself to the gov-
ernor, and asked him to do as much as was in his power to improve the
situation in Trincomalee. Moreover, he expressed the hope that his advice
would not only lead to the improvement of agriculture and the “morals
of the inhabitants”, but also “to the fortune of at least some blacks”.329
Two other examples of writings by Company officials who worked in
the periphery may enlighten us and help answering these questions. In
the following two sections the memoranda of Thomas Nagel and Jacob
Burnand will be discussed and compared with those of Van Senden.
We already saw that in 1789 Nagel had leased the district of the Vanni
from the colonial government on the promise that he would ensure tran-
104 CHAPTER FIVE
quility and develop it and deliver a quota of paddy to the Company. Five
years later he wrote a memorandum requesting an extension of the lease.
Although Batavia had not yet consented to his request, he was still in
charge of the district when the British arrived. The following description
of the meeting which Colonel Stuart had with him highlights Nagel’s
peculiar position as a private entrepreneur in the district:
With respect to Mr Nagel the land regent of the Wanny’s demand for sub-
sistence for himself and the servants who were employed under him at
Molletivoe [Mullaitivu], as servants of the late Dutch Company – you will
inform him I am very much surprised at this application when he must rec-
ollect, that he himself informed me at Molletivoe, that he paid not only the
civil servants, but the military, who were employed with him at that place,
and that the Dutch Company had nothing to do with them, and in conse-
quence he claimed the whole of the property found there as his own and
would not allow that any part of it belonged to the Dutch Company.330
regretted that his own efforts to bring in schoolteachers from Jaffna, had
proven to be fruitless, and that at the moment of writing this situation
had not yet improved.336
Third, he represented the people of the Vanni as people without gov-
ernment, law or institutions. He wrote sarcastically: “The laws of the
Vanni were thus very short, because there were none, neither from tradi-
tion, nor written by their lord.”337 The vanniyārs were to blame for this,
because they applied laws arbitrarily, they could always be bribed, and
they protected criminals. However, the fault was also with the people
themselves, because they were so uncivilized. Their houses were nothing
more than little huts, their ploughs were of the simplest sort, and they
were extremely lazy. Moreover, their marriages were not based on any reli-
gious or official ceremony, but on mutual consent. Adultery was a gener-
al feature of life and men and women could easily leave each other. Nagel
concludes therefore that their rules and habits were totally against natural
law and therefore the society was lawless.338 By representing the inhabi-
tants as people without history, without religion and without laws, he
underpinned his statement that they belonged to the people of “the low-
est order”.
The improvement of the “primitive people” of the Vanni was certainly
possible according to Nagel, and in fact he considered this his duty, which
gave him a moral justification for his rule over the inhabitants of the
Vanni. He praised himself for having brought them already to a “higher
step of humaneness”.339 Despite this negative description, his attitude
towards the people was positive: he described them as children in need of
a sensible father to raise them. They were lazy and indolent at first, but
after a period of good government, they would improve quickly and they
could improve even more in the future. Nagel demonstrated an optimistic
belief in the possibilities of social change.340 However, he did not elabo-
rate much on the practical aspect of this social engineering, nor did he say
exactly what he had achieved. He only stated at several points that they
had already reached a higher level of civilization because he was reform-
ing them into useful people. How he did so remains vague, and all that
can be deduced is that their situation bettered in parallel with the
improvement of agriculture and the virtue of the Company’s government.
This last element he stresses over and over again, warning his readers that
it takes a generation to pick the fruits of such labour. He therefore point-
ed out that his attention was always focused on the children, more than
on the adults, who were already “spoiled”.
It is astonishing to find the image of the inhabitants created by Nagel
fitting so neatly with the European scholarly conceptions of non-Euro-
pean societies. While Van Senden only made a distinction between civi-
lized and uncivilized people, Nagel left no doubt for his contemporaries
DUTCH PERCEPTIONS OF THE COLONIAL ORDER 107
would work harder within the system and their lives would be improved.
Christianity played a supporting, but not a central role in this notion.
The image of the colonial situation on Ceylon matched that in the West
Indies: the view of the inhabitants as children and the colonial official as
father to rule over them is strong in both documents and resembles the
Dutch contemporary attitude towards slavery. It was an ideal image and
one that both Nagel and Van Senden undoubtedly emphasized to please
their superiors, convince them of the necessity of their work and thereby
further their own careers. After all, both documents were not only sent to
the governor, but also to Batavia and the Netherlands.
Despite the tyranny of distance, Van Senden and Nagel were both
influenced by the contemporary Dutch world view, and the empathy they
expressed for the natives was part of this ideology. How sincere were these
two men? As colonial officials they undoubtedly stressed the difference in
the degree of civilization between them and and the local people, but
their reports must have sounded plausible for the intended audience.
After all, these memoranda were not written for an audience in Europe,
but first of all for the highest VOC officials in Asia, who had to decide
their policy upon such information and who had their own first-hand
experience of indigenous Asian people. Van Senden and Nagel were con-
scious that the governor and the members of the High Government in
Batavia would read their pieces. With a view on their career perspectives
it was not a bad idea to put oneself to the best advantage by revealing a
thorough-going image of themselves. Still, the image they sketched of the
inhabitants must have been acceptable for their contemporaries on
Ceylon and elsewhere in Asia.
Perhaps what binds the two most is their model of the vigorous
Company official, who ruled over his subjects in a just, paternalistic man-
ner. Both men aproached the natives in terms of character and nature that
could be improved and not in terms of social structures that should be
amended. A long-term vision of this improvement is absent. It is instruc-
tive to place the two memoranda in the perspective of that of his contem-
porary Jacob Burnand.
Burnand’s rhetoric was somewhat different from that of Nagel and Van
Senden. Most notable, Burnand did not describe his subject in the same
expressions on the stages of development. In part, this can be explained
by the nature of the document, which was written as a guideline for his
successor as head of the Batticaloa district. At the same time Burnand
based his line of reasoning on two characteristic assumptions, which are
DUTCH PERCEPTIONS OF THE COLONIAL ORDER 109
also found in Nagel’s memorandum. These are the idea of arrested devel-
opment owing to arbitrary rule by despotic headmen, and a belief in
progress of society.
The first can be illustrated by his representation of the history of the
district and its re-occupation by the Dutch in 1766. Burnand’s story-line
goes as follows: a long time ago, before the first arrival of the Portuguese,
the region was doing very well. It was populous and agriculture was flour-
ishing. It was unclear when the area came under Kandyan rule. However,
after this happened, the country was ruined, people fled, leaving only a
few vedahs behind and farmland turned into jungle again.344 It was under
the Kandyan Kingdom that the Mukuvan families, migrating from Jaffna
and allying themselves with the king, became the powerful elite of the
area. Every layer of the Kandyan administration, from the Kandyan dessa-
va of the whole district downwards to the village headmen, extorted and
vexed the poor inhabitants. Nobody’s property was secure and people ran
up great debts.345 The short period of Portuguese and Dutch occupation
of the district in the seventeenth century produced no change for the bet-
ter. Matters grew so bad that when the Dutch war against the King of
Kandy began, the Mukuvan and all the inhabitants offered their allegiance
to the Dutch. This resulted in the Deed of submission signed on 14 Octo-
ber 1766.346 Burnand’s interpretation of the history of the district leads
him to conclude that the legitimacy of Dutch rule over the district was
twofold: the land had been obtained both by conquest and also by the
invitation of the people. The latter implied a moral duty on the part of
the Company.
Here Burnand started to deviate from Nagel’s discourse. He felt that
the policy of increasing the paddy revenue for the Company could be
defined only within the opportunities offered in the deed of submission
on the one hand, and should fulfil the moral obligation to bring back the
flourishing times to the district on the other hand. These two elements of
his policy did not clash, but were in fact related to each other:
There is however [stated] in the aforementioned act of submission that with-
out transgressing those bounds or without forsaking justice and introducing
arbitrarily new taxes, the revenues of government in those districts may suc-
cessively be extended much more from time to time according to the
encrease of the population, the cultivation and the manufacture of cloth.347
Burnand strongly believed that the existing system of government
belonged to the district, and that it was not up to the Company to make
any basic alterations. This system had once brought it to a flourishing
state, and it was only through the corruption of the Kandyan court and
the Mukuvan headmen that the district had been brought to ruin. The
last argument legitimized his marginalizing policies towards the hoofd-
pedies and also explains the rationalization of the taxes and services. In his
110 CHAPTER FIVE
view, he did not change the system, but only improved it. He was of the
opinion that changes to the system, if necessary sometimes, had to be
implemented slowly and carefully at the right time.
The second characteristic assumption is exemplified by his attitude
towards the inhabitants of the district. This appears to be negative at first:
a typical picture was sketched of lazy, indifferent and indolent people.
Burnand stressed however, that this was solely the result of the fraudulent
and oppressive behaviour of the headmen. Like Nagel and Van Senden he
believed in the effectiveness of social engineering. He was certain that
their behaviour would improve dramatically once they were governed
rightly. In this way, he was sure, the “natural indifference” and the “lazi-
ness of the natives” could be “conquered”.348 They just needed to expe-
rience the fruits of the new policies and according to him many already
had: “The petty pedies / inferior headmen / and common people are in
general more attentive in performing their duties and more manageable,
which is to be ascribed [attributed] to the real amendment of their state
effected by the new changes.”349 In this argument he went further than
Nagel, because he not only provided examples of people who had already
changed their behaviour, but he also summed up the measures that led to
this change. Security of property through fair administration of justice
and free trade proved to be major catalysts for improvement. He demon-
strated, not without pride, that under his government this was all possi-
ble, and he used as an example the fact that there was no need anymore
for people to sell their children as slaves out of poverty. He found another
proof in the decreased crime rate during his administration.
He saw it as his obligation to bring “just rule” to the people, but only
within their own system and based on their own laws and customs. The
means to stimulate people to produce more were limited to economic and
political impulses: stability and security were the magic words. If man-
aged properly this would lead to a material and spiritual improvement of
the people. Nowhere does he talk about a civilizing mission as such in the
memoir.350
Although Burnand does not emphasize the contrast between primitive
native and superior Dutchman as Van Senden and Nagel do, the other
elements are still present and even more extensively discussed by him.
Burnand sincerely believed in the progress of society and the vocation of
the colonial official to pursue this. After all it would lead to a prosperous
country, with happy subjects, and an increase in income for the Com-
pany, in part because of the growth of the Ceylonese market for Company
trade goods. Since Burnand, Nagel, and Van Senden all worked closely
with the governor, there is no reason why his basic assumptions of the
colonial relations would have been fundamentally different.
DUTCH PERCEPTIONS OF THE COLONIAL ORDER 111
5.8 Conclusion
economic policies, to better exploit the interior land and to improve the
island’s agricultural situation fitted contemporary ideals about economic
policy. The language used to describe the native society also bears resem-
blemance to contemporary European publications. However, in compar-
ison to the moral-political elements of the Enlightenment, the Dutch
administrators do not make a particular “enlightened” impression.
As we saw, in the last decades of the eighteenth century, Van de Graaff,
Nagel, Burnand, and Van Senden hardly touched upon the concepts of
liberty and equality, two very important concepts in the political enlight-
enment of the eighteenth century. Burnand and Van Senden did however
show a bit more empathy than Nagel. Burnand accepted slavery and
bonded labour as part of normal life, yet he understood that people did
not prefer to be subjugated in this manner. In his view both were neces-
sary to overcome the lack of labour in Ceylon. Even though he recognized
the possibility to pay a tax instead of performing the services as a positive
development for the people and the economy, he emphasized that in
some cases the labour was just too indispensable and the payment of
redemption money was therefore not always acceptable. In fact he point-
ed out that the more people started redeeming their services, the more the
Company would have to rely on slave labour for coolie work. Slaves who
had obtained some wealth should however naturally be in the position to
buy their freedom. For the rest, control and protection from abuse by a
good ruler, were more important. It is the argument that Van de Graaff
always used when there were complaints against possible abuse by the
headmen.352
The development plans reflect in many ways a typically Dutch atti-
tude: the Dutch enlightenment had a strong traditional Christian com-
ponent and when civil society, in the form of “academic” societies,
expressed its concern for the natives of the colonies it was usually in the
context of the mission and its role in native societies. All forced labour, be
it in the form of slavery or bonded labour, was acceptable, as long as the
people were treated well. In the view of the Dutch, progress was not relat-
ed to the structural relations in society, but to virtuous behaviour: harmo-
ny and industry were its major elements. This persistent attitude towards
non-western societies reminds of that of the official policies of colonial
Java in the same period, which eventually led to the acceptance of the sys-
tem of forced cultivation (Cultuurstelsel) as major system of exploita-
tion.353 In all, what Burnand meant when he in described the Dutch as
enlightened administrators in 1809, had probably more to do with the
then-current debate over good rule than with the actual administration of
the Dutch.
113
CHAPTER SIX
Thus far, the last years of Dutch-Kandyan relations have been left aside.
Usually the war of 1762-1766 is seen as the last major upheaval in the
relationship between the Dutch colonial government on Ceylon and the
court of Kandy. Now that we know how much the policy of the Dutch
government on the island was changing, and the extent to which it was
more and more focused on the interior of the island, we may wonder
whether this relationship was as tranquil as it is usually described. More-
over, considering the fragile state of the Kingdom it is unlikely that the
political tensions within the Kingdom that were so characteristic for the
1750s and 1760s faded away entirely. Picking up where we left off in
Chapter Two, we should examine how the relationship between the two
political entities on the island fared after 1766.
A second advantage was the exclusion of the Kandyans from contacts with
foreigners, especially other Europeans. The Dutch feared that the Kan-
dyans would otherwise seek to challenge the Company’s cinnamon
monopoly by calling in other European powers to establish themselves on
the island. Contact with South Indian powers also had to be conducted
through the Company. Even when relatives of the king had to travel to
and from Madurai or if brides for the king had to be collected in South
India, the co-operation of the Company was requested.355
The treaty made it possible for the Dutch to enforce a policy of isola-
tion of the Kandyan Kingdom and of making it totally dependent on
them for their contact with the world beyond Ceylon. Isolation of the
Kingdom was what they had always aimed for, but they were now in a
much better position to impose it. The Kandyans on the other hand never
fully complied with all articles of the treaty, which they felt had been
imposed on them, yet in the years immediately after the war, fear of
Dutch aggression prevented them from disputing the treaty. For about
sixteen years after the conclusion of the treaty, Dutch-Kandyan relations
were relatively smooth apart from some disputes on the establishment of
the new borders.356
By the end of the 1770s, Kandyan courtiers tried to contact the French
through their South Indian relatives.357 These efforts came to an end in
1782 when, during the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War, Trincomalee was occu-
pied by the British, who immediately began negotiations with the
Kandyans through their ambassador, Hugh Boyd.358 The British sought to
conclude a treaty with Kandy to oust the Dutch. Remarkably enough, the
Kandyans decided not to go into further dealings with the British.359
Despite its limited results, Boyd’s mission placed the Dutch in an awk-
ward position. They had to be grateful now for the Kandyan court’s not
taking its chances with the British. Understandably, the court expected
something in return. L. Wagenaar has described how in 1782 the degrad-
ing rituals at the yearly embassies to the court were reinstated despite
Dutch opposition. The Dutch could not refuse to comply, because Hugh
Boyd had performed all the rituals at his embassy earlier that year and
they feared that if they refused the Kandyans would decide to ally with
the British after all. Wagenaar also points out the court’s increasing de-
mands for a return of the ports in the Puttalam area.360 Indeed, after 1782
it was this issue that defined the relationship between the two powers.
At their yearly embassy in the spring of 1784 the Dutch came to
understand that they were not allowed to peel cinnamon in the king’s
land because of the ports question. Governor Falck attempted to soothe
the Kandyans by stating that it was only because of the threat from other
Europeans that the shores could not be given back. He argued that this
was even to their own advantage because the Dutch were protecting them
ISOLATION AND DISINTEGRATION: THE KANDYANS AND THE DUTCH 115
elephants with the Indian continent on condition that Kandy would give
up the demand for the shores.366 At the same time Batavia stationed extra
European mercenary regiments on the island for defence against foreign
nations, thereby re-establishing the power of the Dutch after the debacle
of Trincomalee and intimidating the Kandyans. Batavia firmly adhered to
its strict policy which Governor Van de Graaff and his successor Van
Angelbeek had to uphold despite Kandyan pressures. Obviously the High
Government had placed its Ceylonese deputies in a difficult position.
With the tension between the two powers building up in the last years
of Falck’s reign, it is remarkable that Van de Graaff managed to relax the
situation as quickly as he did. After his accession to the office of governor
in 1785 he declared to his council that it was his intention to make the
Company independent of the court as soon as possible. By speeding up
the creation of cinnamon plantations in the Colombo and Galle district,
he hoped that the Company would soon be self-sufficient in the produc-
tion of this valuable spice. Up to that time, he would make use of the salt
boycott whenever necessary to put pressure on the Kandyans, and also
took serious measures against salt smuggling.367 From his reports we learn
that his policy of pacification was successful, and that he managed to con-
trol the crisis. Until 1789, the reports of embassies are positive, the Com-
pany was free to peel cinnamon in the Kandyan territory and the relation-
ship seems to have been cordial.368 Though yearly requests for access to the
shores continued, these were usually left undiscussed. Batavia appears to
have been content with this and agreed with Van de Graaff that the
negative answer of the Heren Zeventien to the Kandyan demands should
be postponed for as long as possible, certainly while the Kandyans were
well disposed towards the Company.369
From 1789 onwards, a new phase of Dutch-Kandyan relations com-
menced that is quite difficult to unravel because the two main sources
dealing with this period are contradictory and it is difficult to get a grip
on the real motives behind the plans and schemes that were proposed.
These will be discussed later. Here it is sufficient to note that relations
were strained and that Van de Graaff, encouraged by secret contact
between his own mahāmudaliyār, Nicolaas Dias Abeysinghe, the king’s
first adigār Pilime Talawe, and the basnāyaka nilamē of Sabaragamuwa
Eknelligoda, made plans for war.
If we are to go along with Van de Graaff, developments that led to the
absolute deterioration of Dutch-Kandyan relationships were as follows.
From 1789 the request for the harbours was revitalized and he could no
longer postpone conveying the message from the Heren Zeventien that
they did not want to compromise on this issue and that by no means were
any of the harbours to be given up to the Kandyans. Moreover, the cin-
namon peelers were continuously hindered in their work, especially in the
ISOLATION AND DISINTEGRATION: THE KANDYANS AND THE DUTCH 117
and was afraid that the whole affair would eventually turn out to be too
costly for the Company. Apart from this financial argument one may
wonder whether a lack of insight into South Asian continental politics
could also explain their reaction. In any case, Batavia’s firm stand left Van
de Graaff in a difficult position.
The response from the Netherlands was rather different. The Heren
Zeventien accepted the Kandyan-French connection as a casus belli and
when they wrote their response late in 1792 they expressed their surprise
but also their hope that the expeditions had been successful. In South
Asia, European power politics were much more a daily feature of interna-
tional relations than in the relatively quiet environs of Java, where peace
had been predominant for some forty years, and where threat of other
European powers was not as apparent as in South Asia.375
The relationship between the governor and the court relaxed a little in
the autumn of 1792 when the borders between the two territories were
again opened and the Kandyan people could come down to collect salt
and trade. Van de Graaff waited anxiously for the first embassy to come
down to Colombo; it was beyond his pride to send one up first. Yet as
events would prove, no embassies were exchanged between the Dutch and
Kandy from 1790 onwards.376 Correspondence between the two parties
was now cold and distant. This lasted until mid 1795, when the new
Governor Van Angelbeek, confronted with the British ascension on the
island, reopened negotiations with the court in order to prevent the
Kandyans from siding with the British.
At decisive moments the High Government of Batavia stuck to its own
line of policy, ignoring or rejecting the initiatives of the Ceylonese gover-
nor. Though the 1766 treaty was and remained the starting-point of its
policy, the High Government was not willing to sanction its violation.
Batavia feared an enormous increase of expenses if war would break out,
that could not be accounted for. Batavia’s superior authority to make
policy was re-established in 1792, but this severely strained her relation-
ship with the government of Ceylon. This is something which Van de
Graaff could not hide in his memorie van overgave to his successor and
father-in-law Johan Gerard van Angelbeek (July 1794), in which he clear-
ly stated that had it not been for Batavia, all troubles with the Kingdom
could have been settled once and for all in 1792.377 At the same time the
High Government had grown suspicious of Van de Graaff. This suspicion
was fostered by the writings of Pieter Sluijsken, who suggested treason on
the side of Van de Graaff and his mahāmudaliyār Nicolas Dias Abey-
singhe.
ISOLATION AND DISINTEGRATION: THE KANDYANS AND THE DUTCH 119
In previous chapters we have already come across the writings of the for-
mer commander of Galle, Pieter Sluijsken.378 The purpose of these writ-
ings was to show how damaging Van de Graaff ’s interior policies had been
to the Dutch establishment on Ceylon and he had some specific criticism
regarding Van de Graaff ’s Kandyan policies. His greatest mistake, accord-
ing to Sluijsken, was to place his absolute reliance in his mahāmudaliyār
Nicolaas Dias Abeysinghe, who deliberately set Van de Graaff against the
Kandyans.
Nicolaas Dias was the mahāmudaliyār of the “governor’s gate” from the
start of Van de Graaff ’s governorship, and responsible for correspondence
with the Kandyans via the disāva of the Three and Four kōralēs.379 Sluijs-
ken maintained that under Nicolaas Dias contact between the Company
and the court officials became secretive, and he maintained that even the
council members were not taken into confidence about the dealings of
the Governor and his mahāmudaliyār with the Kandyans. Sluijsken makes
clear that Nicolaas Dias Abeysinge and his Kandyan accomplices succeed-
ed for a long time in maintaining the façade that all was well between the
Dutch and the Kandyans. In exchange for expensive gifts, they assured
the safety of the cinnamon-peelers working in the Kandyan country.
According to Sluijsken, Abeysinge instigated war and unrest in the coun-
try for fear of being exposed and both sides’ realizing that he had misled
them by keeping all the expensive gifts for himself.
He began in April 1790 by instigating the revolt in the Matara disāvany,
but when this did not have the desired effect he decided to trigger war
between the two powers. It was his idea to invite a pretender to the throne
to the island. The documents are full of accusations from Sluijsken
towards the mahāmudaliyār and the governor. In a 1796 account, he
attributes the loss of the island to Van de Graaff ’s careless policy. Had
relations between the Dutch and Kandy remained cordial, the Kandyans
would have chosen the Dutch side as they had done in 1782 and would
have helped Dutch in their defence against the British.380
Now Sluijsken’s accusations are certainly sensational and very severe,
but one should be careful in using them as authoritative sources. The his-
torian V. Kanapathypillai has accepted Sluijsken’s criticism lock, stock
and barrel and and used them as the basis for condemning Van de Graaff.
He does however not explain why he chose to rely exclusively on
Sluijsken’s writings. What makes these authoritative? The fact that Sluijs-
ken contradicted the official account of Van de Graaff does not automat-
ically mean that his own version was correct.381
Any reader of Sluijsken’s writings should realize that his relationship
with Van de Graaff was a troubled one to say the least. We have seen how
120 CHAPTER SIX
from the end of the 1780s the two men were levelling accusations at each
other in official and unofficial correspondence with the Batavian author-
ities. One of the main problems appears to have been that Van de Graaff
as governor tended to extend his authority over the Galle district, which
in former times had been governed through the commandeur without
much interference from Colombo. Van de Graaff, who had many plans
for improvement of the agriculture on the island, meddled more than his
predecessors with the policies of his inferior officials. In a hierarchical
environment where social status depended to a large extent on one’s offi-
cial position, such infringements on another’s authority were taken seri-
ously. The interference of the governor with Sluijsken’s commandement
degraded his position as commandeur of Galle (which had always been the
third-highest position on the island). This in turn may have influenced
the latter’s relationship with the native elite and with the other Company
officials, and it would certainly have given him concern about his further
career.382 Considering this background the accusations of Sluijsken have
to be taken with a grain of salt.
Sluijsken’s criticism is especially thin on three accounts: first, he failed
to deliver some crucial information, to buttress his story. For example, we
do not learn from Sluijsken what exactly the mahāmudaliyār would gain
from his machinations. The mahāmudaliyār already held the highest posi-
tion on the island of any native official. He had proven his loyalty to the
Dutch during the war with Kandy in the 1760s, and had been officially
honoured with a gold medal in 1766. Why would he have risked all this
by deceiving his closest ally, the governor? Secondly, we do not learn
much about Van de Graaff ’s Kandyan complice, the adigār Pilime Talawa,
whom Sluijsken mentions only incidentally. What were his motives?
Knowing how important a role that man later played in the affairs with
Governor North, it is difficult to believe that at this point he was only a
marginal player in the mahāmudaliyār’s game. Finally, Sluijsken does not
go into Van de Graaff ’s motives for his supposed deceit, nor why he
joined the mahāmudaliyār in his war plans in the first place.
Sluijsken also appears to have been badly informed. Some of the
incriminating evidence he gives on Van de Graaff had already been dis-
patched to Batavia. With respect to the so-called secret dealings between
Van de Graaff and the pretender to the throne, Sri Sanka Sarie, Sluijsken
says he stayed in Colombo when in fact he was sent to Batavia in 1791.383
Moreover, Van de Graaff had informed the court of Kandy when he had
first come to know about this man in the first place. It was only later that
he planned to use this person as a puppet in his dealings with the court.
Van de Graaff was also quite open with Batavia about the plans he devel-
oped in early 1792 to overrun the Kingdom and to take certain provinces
in possession by keeping the local disāvas as native rulers and allies of the
ISOLATION AND DISINTEGRATION: THE KANDYANS AND THE DUTCH 121
Company. Van de Graaff also acknowledged the fact that his mahāmu-
daliyār was corresponding secretly with the first adigār, although he often
referred to him secretively as den bekenden hofsgroote, the familiar courtier.
Finally, Sluijsken states that when Colonel de Meuron and his troops
entered the Sabaragamuwa province, they were chased by the Kandians
and had to run back to the borders. Knowing that the mahāmudaliyār
joined De Meuron on his expedition, it is difficult to argue that he
intended the regiment to be attacked by the Kandyans. Why would he
have risked his own life? One starts to wonder whether Pieter Sluijsken
himself did not have some interest at stake in this whole Kandyan busi-
ness, and whether this might explain why the governor was so secretive
about his dealings with the adigār.384
Van de Graaff was also after the revenues of the lowland provinces of the
Kingdom. We saw how when confronted with financial deficits and a lack
of rice supplies for the garrisons he worked hard to achieve an increase in
the agricultural output of the maritime provinces. The acquisition of the
fertile Seven, Three and Four kōralēs would yield him more revenue while
the occupation of the Sabaragamuwa disāvany would ensure enough cin-
namon for the Company. However, while Batavia only feared extra
expenses from the acquisition of Kandyan territories, he saw in the take-
over of the fertile lowland Kandyan provinces a solution to his prob-
lems.386
As said above, the role of the adigār in the political game between Van de
Graaff and the court of Kandy needs further elaboration. To understand
the adigār’s motives and actions, we need to turn to the political relations
within the Kingdom and the role the king of Kandy. We have already seen
that in the 1750s and 1760s the presense of the relatives of the king who
accompanied him from South India caused tension at the court. Kirti Sri
Rajasinha managed to channel this by playing up his divine calling and
focusing on Buddhism. His successor was not as skillful in the game and
as we shall see, his relatives, called Nāyakkars or Malabars by the Dutch,
emerged as a strong faction at the court, thereby undermining advantage
as stranger-king in the eyes of the Sinhalese nobles.
As the younger brother of Kirti Sri, Rajadhi grew up in Kandy a devout
Buddhist. After his brother’s death in 1781, he ascended to the throne
early in 1782. He is usually referred to as the poet-king, because at least
one poem from his hand is known. He was apparently a patron of
Buddhism, like his brother, and mention is made of temple restorations
and land grants to temples under his name.387 K.M. de Silva even places
him on the same footing as his brother, noting that “The Nayakker
dynasty, especially under Kirti Sri Rajasinha and Rajadhi Rajasinha, had
identified itself with the Kandyan national interest and blended the
Nayakker personality into the Kandyan background with consummate
skill”.388 At the same time neither De Silva, nor anyone else, discusses his
policies or relationships with his nobles. Yet a very different picture of this
king’s government emerges from the Dutch sources.
As we have seen, faction and strife were endemic in the Kandyan court
and the reign of Rajadhi was no exception. Hugh Boyd, who visited
Kandy shortly after Rajadhi’s accession, described the factions at the court
as those who were inclined to the Dutch and those who were not. He
ISOLATION AND DISINTEGRATION: THE KANDYANS AND THE DUTCH 123
ascribes the failure of his mission to the fact that the Dutch-inclined fac-
tion was in the lead, and that the king himself could not violate the
strongest faction in his Kingdom at such an early stage of his reign.389
Governor Falck did not report much on Kandyan internal politics and
faction. Van de Graaff was more actively interested in Kandyan politics
and from him we learn that Rajadhi was a playful and politically disinter-
ested king who spent too much time on leisure and left the execution of
his government to his Nāyakkar relatives.390 Van de Graaff complained a
lot about these Nāyakkar relatives whom he considered a dangerous fac-
tor, because of their South Indian connection. He both feared competi-
tion in trade and their political alliances in South India. He mentioned
several times that the king was placing more and more reliance on them
and was granting them extensive lands in the several disāvanies. The his-
torian Ralph Pieris has also noted that the king’s South Indian relatives
occupied the key military positions in the palace administration.391 This is
an important observation and though several historians have contested
this, it is corroborated by information from the Dutch sources. According
to Van de Graaff, this even led to unrest in the disāvanies because the
Nāyakkars oppressed the people in the provinces.392
In the spring of 1792, while fully occupied with the development of his
war plans, Van de Graaff wrote a pamphlet to be sent into the various
disāvanies through which his army marched. The purpose was to assure
the inhabitants of his good intentions. What really stands out in the pam-
phlet is that the derogatory tone he take towards the Nāyakkars: they are
described as harmful for the Sinhalese nation, vengeful, oppressive and
absolutely unreliable. It is easy to write this off as sheer propaganda. But
Van de Graaff would not specifically mention the Nāyakkars as a negative
power in the provinces if he did not think it would strike a chord. This
would only have decreased his credibility in the eyes of the intended read-
ers. Cleary Van de Graaff was appealing to existing sentiments among the
higher echelons of Kandyan society, probably prompted by his accom-
plice Pilime Talawe.393
Van de Graaff and Pilime Talawe had a very good relationship. Until
1790, Pilime Talawe was disāva of the Three and Four kōralēs and he was
usually present at the embassies sent by the king to Colombo. Any suspi-
cious reader of the reports of these embassies would wonder whether
information was omitted. Only the official meetings were reported upon,
but from these it is clear that there were several instances each year when
the governor spoke to Pilime Talawe alone. This usually happened after
the first audience, when the governor offered the disāvas a tour around the
castle of Colombo, or invited them for a demonstration of the cannons.
Whatever was discussed during those tours was never mentioned in the
reports.394
124 CHAPTER SIX
It can be argued that Pilime Talawe’s rise to power was connected to his
good relations with Van de Graaff. This assumption is reinforced by the
following example. Some time before Pilime Talawe was appointed first
adigār, we find the governor writing to Batavia for permission to give
Pilime Talawe two thousand pagodas (c. 4,000 rixdollars). The reason for
this was that this money had to be given to the king for the journey of
some of the his Nāyakkar relatives to the coast. When one considers that
offices were usually bought in the Kandyan Kingdom and that money was
scarce, the timing makes it very likely that the money was to serve at the
same time as a gift (payment) for the office of adigār. The governor had
given Pilime Talawe the ability of offering the highest bid. Obviously, for
the Dutch governor it was advantageous to have Pilime Talawe as most
powerful man in the Kingdom because he could then direct the official
relations with the court.395
It is not unreasonable to suggest that the rival faction of Pilime Talawe,
composed of Erevvala, Leeuke, and Dumbara, was backed by the Nāyak-
kars. In the end, that was the only other source of money to pay for
offices. They attempted to restrict Pilime Talawe’s rise to power by seizing
his authority over the Sabaragamuwa districts, and Erevvala was raised to
the office of second adigār in 1792. General unrest in the Kingdom in the
1790s can be detected from the many shifts in offices within only a few
years. In this case, the system of checks and balances worked against the
interest of the king, since Eknelligoda, the basnāyake of Sabaragamuwa,
who held extensive lands, sided with Pilime Talawe thus ensuring that the
latter maintained an influential position in this province, despite the fact
that his opponent Leeuke was now in charge of it.396
Not only did the king lose his power over some of his nobles due to
Dutch intrigues, even his control over the sangha was loosened. Argu-
ments with the lowland head-priest Koratota over the control of the tem-
ple of Buddha’s footprint at Adam’s Peak, Sri Pada, led to a breach
between Koratota and the king. Koratota decided to ally himself with Van
de Graaff, who accordingly gave him a yearly stipend of 25 rixdollars.
Koratota, who sought the priesthood of Sri Pada, even encouraged Van de
Graaff in 1792 to conquer the Sabaragamuwa province.397 Later Koratota
allied with the British, and was highly esteemed by them. He had good
relations with John D’Oyly and instructed him in the Sinhalese language.
In the early nineteenth century, the Kandyan king completely lost control
over the sangha when the maha nayaka Moratota was also set against
him.398
Active Dutch intriguing in Kandyan affairs in the 1780s proved the first
step in the collapse of the Kingdom. The economic isolation of the
Kandyan Kingdom and its decentralized power inevitably brought further
ISOLATION AND DISINTEGRATION: THE KANDYANS AND THE DUTCH 125
misfortune. From Van de Graaff ’s war plans we can conclude that disin-
tegration was exactly what he and the adigār were aiming at. He wanted
to conquer the provinces one by one, and make the nobles collaborate
with him. They would be left in power, but the Company, acting as a
stranger-king amidst the Kandyan nobles, would pocket the larger share
of the revenue of these provinces.
It is attractive to understand the whole affair as a political solution of
the Sinhalese nobles to get rid of their competitors, the Nāyakkar relatives
of the king. The king had been invited as stranger, and to balance the
power between the Sinhalese nobles he had allowed his own relatives to
become far too involved in local politics and thereby turned into a local
power factor. That is why the Sinhalese nobles searched for a new outsider
to strengthen their power and found this in the person of the Dutch gov-
ernor. As we shall see, the troubles within the Kingdom were far from over
and in the end this played a large role in the final subjugation of the
Kingdom by the British.
6.6 The aftermath: Batavia’s opposition and the fate of Van de Graaff
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER SEVEN
In South Asia, the second part of the eighteenth century was character-
ized by continuous British expansion and infiltration throughout the
Indian subcontinent at the cost of both indigenous states and rival
European trading companies. The disintegration of the Moghul Empire,
the conclusion of alliances with local princes and the French competition
drew the British deep into the subcontinent. During the Mysore Wars in
the 1780s and 1790s, British attention was drawn towards the eastern
Ceylonese harbour of Trincomalee, the main attraction of which was its
strategic and sheltered location close to both the Coromandel and Mala-
bar coasts. It was possible to sail from there in both monsoons and there-
fore it could function well as a central base for activities in those regions.
That is why in 1782, midway through the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War, the
British decided to occupy Trincomalee. To their disappointment, this
occupation did not last long because the French, who were then allied
with the Dutch, captured it within the year and returned it to the Dutch
after the conclusion of the war in 1784.403
The eventual British conquest of the Dutch possessions on Ceylon in
1796 was linked to international political events in Europe and in Asia.
When early in 1795 the French conquered and occupied the Netherlands,
the British feared a French annexation of Dutch possessions in Asia,
which in turn would enhance France’s competitive position. The Dutch
stadtholder William V, who had fled his country to take refuge with king
George III in Kew, had similar concerns about French activities in Asia.
Hoping to gain British support to retain the Dutch possessions in Asia,
he asked the British to protect these against the French. These requests
were addressed to the George III and are now usually referred to as the
Kew Letters.404 The British responded instantly to his appeal and this had
repercussions for Ceylon among other Dutch possessions. Within two
days after the reception of the Kew Letters, instructions were sent to the
governors of Madras and Bengal, where they arrived in June 1795. The
situation in South India continued to be pressing, because the wars with
Mysore were far from over and the French had by then tactically allied
themselves with Mysore’s new sultan, Tipu. The British could not run the
132 CHAPTER SEVEN
risk that Ceylon with its strategic port at Trincomalee might fall in French
hands.405
Immediately after they received the information about the Kew Letters,
the commanders in Madras took action. They sent a letter to the Dutch
government in Colombo to inform them about the Kew Letters and pro-
posed to bring Ceylon under the protection of the British army. Without
waiting for a reply, they sent out a fleet under the command of General
Stuart to occupy Trincomalee. The much desired harbour was conquered
in July 1795, but it took another seven months before the remaining
Dutch territory was taken over. From the beginning there had been con-
fusion over the concept of “protection” in the negotiations with the
Governor Van Angelbeek. In the Dutch view, protection meant the tem-
porary stationing of a British garrison on the island, while in the British
view it implied a temporary occupation of the Dutch possessions.
The British annexation of Ceylon certainly does not match the concept
of reluctant or “absent-minded” imperialism often used to explain the
British expansion in this period. It was in fact a conscious strategic step
initiated in England and smoothly adopted in India. From the beginning
the British had set their mind on using the Kew Letters to conquer
Ceylon. The letters of the Scottish professor Hugh Cleghorn to the
Secretary of War Henry Dundas and the scheme he proposed to reach this
goal bear witness to this. Cleghorn suggested persuading the Count de
Meuron, the Swiss commander of the most important mercenary regi-
ment on the island of Ceylon, to switch to British service. He proposed
it as follows: “Whether Britain shall be under necessity of declaring war
against Holland, or whether she may be only induced to seize the Dutch
possessions for the stadholder, the advantages which much arise from
detaching his regiment from the service of the republick or [Dutch] East
India Company are equally obvious.”406 Dundas’ answer to Cleghorn’s
suggestion was positive, and Cleghorn was asked to execute the plan as
quickly as possible. Indeed, from Dundas’ further correspondence with
Cleghorn and with the officials in Madras, it is clear that he was con-
sciously aiming at the annexation of Ceylon. In response to a letter writ-
ten by General Stuart on the tenth of September 1795, which reported of
the conquest of Trincomalee, he wrote anxiously:
The judgement and discretion which have marked your conduct both in the
political negotiations and the military operations undertaken by you in the
island of Ceylon, and the uninterrupted success with which it has been
attended, lead me to indulge in the daily expectation of hearing that the
town and settlement of Columbo [sic] together with the remaining posses-
sions of the Dutch in that island, have been added to the valuable acquisi-
tions already made there.407
REGIME CHANGE AND TRANSITIONAL POLITICS 133
Indeed, the Dutch officials in Colombo were now put in a situation, with
their defence seriously weakened. The minutes of the political council of
those last months show how the governor and council were put into a cor-
ner. Their defences, which had not been in a good state anyway, were now
seriously hampered by the withdrawal of De Meuron’s regiment. More-
over, their reserves were running out and no supplies were coming from
abroad. They could not call in the help of the court of Kandy, because of
the diplomatic impasse with that power and in fact the Kandyans had
sought contact with the British. The final decision to capitulate was not
made by the governor alone, but by the whole council after the staff offi-
cers were consulted on their opinion. The question of capitulation was a
delicate matter, and the governor made sure he safeguarded himself
against any critique or slander by inserting the opinion of all staff officers
and members of the council. In the council minutes of 15 February 1796,
a day before the actual capitulation, the consideration of all members of
the political council and those of the staff officers were reproduced. Even
Pieter Sluijsken, then commander of Surat who was staying over on the
island, was asked for his opinion. With the British at their doorstep of
Colombo, all but one (Major Vaugine) voted for capitulation.411
Despite Van Angelbeek’s precautions, his reputation was seriously dam-
aged by the capitulation.412 In a letter to his son in law and predecessor
134 CHAPTER SEVEN
Willem Jacob van de Graaff he expressed his concerns and his hope that
Van de Graaff did not believe the allegations:
That Colombo surrendered by capitulation without any resistance must cer-
tainly surprise you, especially since I have no doubt that some persons may
have written from here to Mauritius that the place could have been defend-
ed; this is a gossip which has spread all over, both here and in Coromandel.
It will become clear that I have done from the beginning until the last day
what is, in such circumstances, to be expected from an alert governor.413
The allegations against Van Angelbeek were twofold. On the one hand, it
was said that he would have withstood the British if he had only called in
the help of the Kandyans and in return given in to some of their
demands. Second, it was said that Van Angelbeek cared more for his pri-
vate property on the island than for the Company’s interests. The ques-
tion of whether these allegations were correct must remain unanswered
here. Regardless, the British force was much larger and in other respects
in a good position to conquer Colombo, and its commanders were pre-
pared to do so even if the Dutch had chosen not to capitulate straight
away.
The articles of capitulation dealt with a wide range of matters: the dis-
mantling of the military forces; the security of private property and
finances; the continuity of clerical and charitable institutions; the right of
civil and military servants of the Company to remain on the island if they
so desired; and the continuation in office of the native headmen and ser-
vants. The Dutch officials’ attachment to the island found expression in
these articles, and they were clearly not without hope that Ceylon would
eventually return to the Dutch. This hope lasted until 1802, when at the
Peace of Amiens Ceylon was ceded permanently to Britain. Until that
time, many of the Dutchmen on Ceylon, in Batavia and in the Nether-
lands assumed that Ceylon would revert to the Netherlands after the
war.414
As early as 1797 rumours were spreading that Van de Graaff was
coming with French assistance from Mauritius (Île de France)415 and on
31 March the High Government in Batavia discussed what instruction to
send to Ceylon after its return.416 At the same time, during the peace
negotiations at Paris in 1796 and in Lille the next year, it was clear that
the British were determined to keep their new possession. The island was
considered to be of too great strategic importance to give it up, Trinco-
malee had to stay out of French hands, and plans were developed to turn
the port into a maritime base for Britain’s Asian possessions. At this point
peace was not concluded, and many still regarded Dutch Ceylon as occu-
pied territory rather than a permanent British possession.417 The new
government of coastal Ceylon had to cope with this uncertain status, as
well as with the restless hopes of the Dutch who stayed behind.
REGIME CHANGE AND TRANSITIONAL POLITICS 135
The first period of British rule on the island is a little obscure. It took six
months before all the Dutch possessions on the island were occupied by
the British. Trincomalee was taken in July 1795 and Jaffna in September
when it was placed under the military command of Major Dalrymple.
From the establishment of British civil and military authority under
General Stuart in February 1796, the connection with the government of
Madras remained very strong, and all decisions had to be sent there for
Governor Hobart’s approval.
For Stuart, the Dutch inhabitants remaining on the island were a major
point of concern. They continuously asked for financial assistence but at
the same time refused to take the oath of allegiance to the British Crown
and to work for the British.418 Serious trouble arose from the fact that the
Dutch magistrates refused to sit in the courts or hear cases, which paral-
ysed the whole judicial system and caused enormous delays. Stuart also
reported upon the correspondence with Kandy, which went less smooth-
ly than expected because the Kandyans turned out not to be the loyal
neighbours the British had expected.419 Military matters concerned the
distribution of Ceylonese booty among the troops, maintaining order in
the country and transporting of auxiliary troops back to the subcontinent
where they were needed in the war against Tipu Sultan.420
Although the British had occupied Ceylon chiefly for geostrategic rea-
sons, the government of Madras also had high expectations regarding the
wealth of the island and expected it to yield much revenue. Robert
Andrews, who had earlier been involved in secret missions to Kandy, was
appointed as permanent ambassador to Kandy in October 1795 and at
the same time put in charge of the revenue department of the conquered
territories.421 Therefore it was he who formulated the inland policies and
he, like Stuart, corresponded directly with the government in Madras.422
In practice, Andrews basically determined the inland policies on his own
and informed Stuart, his superior, only sporadically on his measures. At
first, he had two assistants at his disposal: John Jervis was put in charge of
Jaffna, and Robert Alexander was put in charge of Galle and Colombo.
Later, a third assistant, Garrow, was added for Trincomalee and Batti-
caloa.
At first the island’s revenue was enormous, just as the Madras govern-
ment had hoped. It was derived from two products: the pearl fishery and
the cinnamon. Andrews had turned to the pearl fisheries of Manaar as
soon as the region was conquered. The pearl fishery had been dormant
more than forty years but after inspection, the pearl banks were found to
be ready for fishing and these were an immediate source of revenue: with
in two years they yielded £265,000 for the East India Company (EIC).423
136 CHAPTER SEVEN
As was customary, the pearl fishery was farmed out to the highest bidder.
It was a large operation, and there were many irregularities and a lot of
fraud. The fishing grounds had suffered from over-fishing in the early
eighteenth century, but the fishery had also been affected by diplomatic
crises with the nabob of Arcot and the Rajah of Tanjore both of whom
claimed a right to part of the fishery. This conflict had kept the Dutch
from fishing for many years. By the 1790s, the crisis had been overcome
and a new contract had been made with the nabob. The pearl banks had
been inspected regularly, and the Dutch government had finally planned
a fishing campaign for 1796 – the first year of the British occupation.424
The second major sources of revenue in the first year were the stocks
of cinnamon left in the Dutch warehouses and loaded aboard ships that
had been ready to sail – almost 9,000 bales (more than 700,000 lb), a two
years’ supply for the European market. This earned a lot of money in
Europe.425 But the British wrongly assumed that the cinnamon was both
abundant and easily harvested on the plantations. Joseph Greenhill, the
EIC’s commercial resident on the island, was appointed as superintendent
of the cinnamon plantations. He did not receive any help or information
from the Dutch inhabitants about the management of the cinnamon
plantations and the private gardens, and as a result the plantations were
seriously neglected, which was to have its repercussions later on.426
Based on his experience in India, where land taxes formed the basis of
the colonial revenue, Andrews also expected a lot from the inland-
revenue. With his three assistants from Madras, he set up the inland-
revenue department and decided to reform both the system of taxation
and the function of the inland headmen. As Burnand stated in his “frag-
ments”,427 discussed at the introduction to Part Three of this book,
Andrew’s steps were drastic and disastrous for the EIC. He did away with
the import and export duties and the oeliam services, and abolished the
service tenures in the Sinhalese districts where he taxed the inhabitants for
the jak- and coconut-trees in their gardens. In the case of the coconut
trees he determined that taxes were to be paid only by those who had
more than fifty trees in their garden. He also dismissed all the native head-
men, and instead employed aumildars or dubashes from Madras.428 They
were in charge of the administration of justice and were to control the
fields and gardens; the new tax-farms were rented out to the highest
bidders.
The replacement of native headmen with aumildars was common prac-
tice when the British expanded their power in new regions, but it seems
that Andrews did not realize that he was dealing here with a very differ-
ent situation from that with which he was familiar. Before he took up his
appointment, he had not been well informed about the situation on the
island and his experiences were limited to Jaffna, which was in many
REGIME CHANGE AND TRANSITIONAL POLITICS 137
ficient influence to excite the inhabitants to revolt, while the latter remain
ignorant that their advantage will be promoted by the new system, although
the moodeliars suffer […].434
The government in Madras was not much concerned with the effects of
the changes in the headmen system. The members of government did not
really care about the new taxes imposed. However, they disagreed on the
abolishment of the service tenures, the oeliam taxes and the trade duties
and cautioned Andrews about it. Also, they were afraid that the British
government would lose control over the trade on the island and thus they
would lose revenue.435
Various petitions against the system were sent by former Governor Van
Angelbeek and other prominent Dutch inhabitants to Major General
Welbore Ellis Doyle, who succeeded Stuart on 1 January 1797, and
directly to the governments of Madras and Bengal. The Dutch were espe-
cially opposed to the coconut tree tax which they considered injudicious.
Although meant to affect only the richer inhabitants, they actually hurt
the poorer because coconut was an important source of food supply for
many. Coconuts yielded high prices around Colombo, but this was not
the case in areas further away from the roads and markets. In addition,
the tax was too high because not all trees bore the same amount of
coconuts. The Dutch also complained that Andrews had represented the
Moors as poor people as an excuse to abolish the oeliam services; but as a
rule they were not poor and the oeliam services were not a burden.436 At
first the petitions were ignored on the assumption that they were written
only to secure the interests of Dutch inhabitants.437 However, within half
a year the whole country was in a revolt and by the end of April 1797
Major General Doyle was at his wit’s end. He eventually wrote to Madras
an alarming letter stating that he no alternative but to abolish the coconut
tax, but strangely enough Madras made Doyle continue the taxes.438 In
the meantime, it was decided to establish a committee to look into the
island’s revenues and the proper management and policy that should be
followed. The committee was headed by Colonel de Meuron, assisted by
Robert Andrews and Major Agnew. When Doyle died on 11 July, Hobart
appointed De Meuron to succeed him.439
The most informative sources for De Meuron’s government are the min-
utes of his “Committee for Investigating the state of the revenue, and
other important matters on the island of Ceylon”. These give additional
insight into the rebellion and the problems that instigated it. Hobart had
given the committee some guidelines in an extensive minute dated 9 June
REGIME CHANGE AND TRANSITIONAL POLITICS 139
1797, and expected a full report from the committee.440 The coconut tree
taxation was temporary suspended in August 1797, after instructions
from Hobart in order to quell the rebellion.441 The other major problems
to be resolved were whether to return to the former headmen system and
what to do with the service lands. De Meuron took his job very seriously
and made an intensive investigation in the papers of the Dutch govern-
ment to analyse their sources of revenue and how its collection was organ-
ized.442 In the meantime, the rebellion was ongoing, now directed against
the Malabari renters, or dubashes, who not only functioned as tax collec-
tors but also held juridical authority in the districts. The three members
of the committee, De Meuron, Andrews, and Agnew, did not entirely
concur in their ideas on these matters and were still debating the matter
and sending proposals to Madras when the revolt reached its climax in
November and December 1797.443
It was at this time that the story circulated that former Governor Van
de Graaff was approaching the island with a French fleet from the island
of Mauritius.444 Many Dutch inhabitants now openly chose to side with
the native headmen and even the Kandyan prime minister started to med-
dle. This potential union of forces made the rebellion most threatening
for the British. De Meuron sent alarming letters to Hobart, informing
him that the rebellion was growing out of proportion and requesting
orders for how to deal with the situation. Hobart took these develop-
ments very seriously and decided to move to the island to oversee the sit-
uation in person. This decision was, it seems, inspired more by the news
that the Dutch and the French were working together with Kandy against
the British, than by the ongoing revolt against the new revenue system
itself. However, while he was there he realized that these issues were con-
nected and informed himself on the situation in conversations with the
committee of investigation. Subsequently, he wrote an extensive minute
in which he represented the sources of tension and proposed his solu-
tions.445
It was not to be supposed that the Moodeliars, alarmed by these measures for
their influence over the people, would be active in suppressing the dissatis-
faction which the assumption of the service lands and the introduction of
the coast system of revenue had generated–the intrigues of the Dutch, an
expected French force and an injudicious tax on the cocoanut tree, increased
the ferment, whose consequences we have seen in those insurrections.446
In this minute Hobart was careful to draw a disctinction between the sit-
uation in parts of the subcontinent and in Ceylon. His conclusion is fun-
damental to understanding the course he recommended to be taken next.
The great source of revenue upon the coast differs essentially from that upon
Ceylon–upon the coast, grain constitutes the primary source of revenue, in
Ceylon it is secondary to almost every other article of taxation. So insignifi-
140 CHAPTER SEVEN
cant indeed is the government share of that produce, that, if it were neces-
sary for the attainment of the public tranquillity, and the easy collection of
the other taxes, I should have little hesitation in advising its relinquishment
altogether under an assumption of the service lands, [otherwise] this produce
would certainly increase, but not in proportion to the expenditure which
must be then incurred for official servants and daily labourers.447
Probably this did not happen because the government in Colombo feared
another revolt if they investigated the crimes of the mudaliyārs themselves.
There were many rumours that the latter had been as much involved in
the extortion of the people as the dubashes, since many of them had actu-
ally taken up tax-farms besides the dubashes. Because of this cover up, the
whole episode has remained rather obscure.449
The British government had had a problematic start on the island and the
REGIME CHANGE AND TRANSITIONAL POLITICS 141
CHAPTER EIGHT
From the outset, the island of Ceylon’s place in the British Empire was a
peculiar one. It was described above how Ceylon was conquered by the
deputies of the East India Company in Madras, but at the initiative of
Henry Dundas in his function as the Secretary of War.450 In the first
instance this meant that the Company claimed the annexed territories on
the island and governed it from the presidency of Madras. The position
of the government in London and particularly of Henry Dundas concern-
ing this entitlement changed in 1797. Although the peace talks in Lille
were inconclusive, the British government had placed a strong claim on
its possession of Ceylon during the negotiations and the conviction that
it should be hold on to it grew firmer. The joint interests of the state and
the Company in the territories of Ceylon resulted in a dual Crown-
Company government. The government of the colony fell under the
charge of a governor appointed by the Crown and thus the formal sover-
eignty lay with the Crown, but at the same time the Company was
responsible for the actual administration and the revenues.451 In practice,
the government of Ceylon fell under the responsibility of the new gover-
nor-general, the Marquess Richard Wellesley, while the civil servants were
recruited from the Madras presidency. Therefore, in many ways Ceylon
functioned as another presidency within the East India Company’s
government of India.452
The newly appointed governor, Frederick North, has earned an inter-
esting reputation in the historiography. His immediate successors were
full of criticism regarding his government and most historians have shown
little sympathy for the man. The positive evaluation of North’s govern-
ment started in the late colonial period, when local historians wrote
enthusiastically about his attention to the educational and Christian
establishments on the island. North’s governorship is often characterized
as one of good intentions and bad luck. The war with Kandy certainly did
not reflect well on his administration, and it is often used to explain his
failures.453
In this chapter the focus will be on the interaction between North and
his superiors in Calcutta and London, and the plans that were made for
the role that Ceylon was to play in the arena of the British Empire. At the
A NEW DESTINY FOR CEYLON 1798-1805 143
same time, attention will be paid to the way Frederick North shaped his
government and dealt with the legacy of his immediate predecessors and
the Dutch rulers. This means that we shall not only focus on the institu-
tional development, but also on North’s interpretation of the system of
indirect rule. The key to successful governance, after all, lay in the rela-
tionship between government and the native establishments.
The courts had hardly functioned in the time prior to his arrival and
therefore serious action in the judicial departments was required. Al-
though he originally wished to organize the department in the same man-
ner as the Dutch had done, he soon changed his mind and made some
major changes. One of these was paying judges proper salaries, to prevent
bribery. He also curbed the powers of the native chiefs in judicial matters
and those of the fiscal, who had had too much power invested in him.458
Following the example in Bengal, North installed a supreme court of
criminal jurisdiction with full jurisdiction over the maritime provinces.
This court consisted only of European servants. Civil courts in the towns
of Colombo, Galle, and Jaffna were re-established, and the landraden
were now in charge of all civil cases in the countryside. However, courts
of appeal were installed to hear the appeals from these civil courts. The
higher and lesser courts of appeal consisted of the governor, commander-
in-chief and the chief secretary. The organization of the judicial depart-
ment did not deviate much from the former Dutch system, but the
implementation differed. Judges were now salaried and political and
juridical power were disconnected as far as possible.459
In the meantime, North worked hard to win the trust of the consider-
able numbers of Dutch inhabitants who remained in the major towns of
the island. Many of them had been agitating vehemently against the
British when North took up the office of governor and one reason the
courts had not been functioning when North arrived was because these
Dutchmen refused to take the oath of allegiance to the British Crown, a
necessary requirement for entering British service. North realized that he
needed the Dutch to get his judicial department back on its feet and he
strove actively to appease them. By the end of 1799, most of them, real-
izing that the prospect of Ceylon returning in Dutch hands was growing
less and less likely, decided to take their chance with the British. The
death of Van Angelbeek in the same year probably lowered their morale
and hastened this process.
Diederich Thomas Fretz, the former commander of Galle, was one of
the first to take the oath of allegiance and to take up a job in the civil
court of Galle.460 This started something of a chain reaction, but it was
not to the liking of all Dutch inhabitants. In September 1799, North was
confronted with a fight between Pieter Adolf Loffman against Pieter
Sluijsken. Loffman had taken the oath of allegiance not long before and
had taken up a job in the landraad. Sluijsken accused him of being a trai-
tor, and in his testimony he stated:
At the end of our conversation I among other things asked mr Loffman in a
jest whether he did not think that our Dutch nation could come again to
Ceylon, to which Loffman answered laughing, yes, I long already for them,
and if I must then hang, many others will also be hanged. Considering this
A NEW DESTINY FOR CEYLON 1798-1805 145
as a blumsy [sic] answer, I replied to it with only these words: Here are
coconut trees enough.461
North decided not to reprimand Sluijsken openly for his insults, because
of his age and character and because he did not expect his words to have
any serious effect. By this time, many of the Dutch had switched to the
British service, and Sluijsken’s “peer pressure” could not endanger that
process anymore.
In the course of his first two years in office North developed an antipa-
thy for the former Dutch government and by the end of 1799 he was
cursing its practices in his despatches home. A sense of British superiori-
ty was certainly present in these remarks. His critique concerned the
unprofessional practices in the judicial department in particular, but he
also accused the Dutch government of fraud and an inhumane attitude
towards the natives. He abhorred their intolerant religious policy, and
almost immediately did away with all restrictive rules against Catholics,
Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists.462 At the same time he acknowledged
the political advantage of the former Dutch practice of attaching the
inhabitants to the colonial government through education and religion.
Therefore he put a lot of energy into the re-establishment of the Dutch
schools and clerical institutions. The Reverend James Cordiner, who later
published a lengthy description of Ceylon, was one of the men sent out
to work on this.463
North’s ambiguous attitude towards the Dutch institutions and former
policies did not stop him from developing a fondness of the Dutch inhab-
itants. He reinstalled many of their charitable and clerical institutions and
offered those in need an adequate pension. He persuaded many of them
to continue in the juridical, clerical and educational profession. He
intended to actively educate them and prepare them for the lower eche-
lons of the British civil service, in January 1800 he wrote in a dispatch to
London:
The public officers to be provided for Ceylon are remarkably few. The
numerous colony of Burghers whom it would be unjust to banish and impo-
litical to disunite from the state, will give an easy supply to all the offices of
inferior nature; were the nomination to those of greater responsibility vest-
ed in the governor subject to the control of the governor general in Council,
little harm would possibly arise from it.464
North further hoped to encourage some of them to engage in agriculture,
which would add to the development of the country. North had found in
the Dutch the middlemen so much needed for a new government with
little knowledge about the island. Thus at this point many of the
Dutchmen started to play an important role again at the local level
because of their availability, local knowledge and experience.
146 CHAPTER EIGHT
was killed in the famous Battle of Seringpatnam. The defeat of Tipu was
of great importance for British security in India, for they had continuous-
ly worried about the alliance between Tipu and France. Wellesley
remained unconvinced, however, and under the pretext of the French
menace he continued to expand the British territories and influence on
the Indian subcontinent. In his view, Ceylon played an important part in
this effort.
He saw Ceylon as a bulwark of the Indian empire and wished to rein-
force it with extra garrisons. In his eyes the strategic function of Ceylon
compensated for its limited revenue Wellesley preferred to look at Ceylon
from an all-India perspective and argued that Ceylon’s finances could be
balanced with the income from other regions. It was after all thanks to the
possession of Ceylon that those other regions were kept secure. In the
winter of 1800, Wellesley decided to assemble an expedition for Bombay
at Trincomalee for the protection of the British possessions in India. His
brother, Colonel Arthur Wellesley (later Duke of Wellington) was ap-
pointed to head the mission and arrived at Trincomalee early in 1801.471
Dundas on the other hand, was an experienced bureaucrat with a long
record of service relative to India. In the 1780s and early 1790s he was
involved in the administrative reforms in Bengal. In general, he did not
believe in the idea of consolidation of power through aggressive expansion
in India. Dundas turned more careful after the defeat of Tipu sultan
because in his view the French were now outplayed in the Indian arena.
His opinion was reinforced after the defeat of Napoleon in Egypt two
years later, which convinced him that the French would not turn to India
again. This diminished the strategic importance of Ceylon, although
Dundas agreed with the concensus opinion that a French occupation of
Ceylon should be prevented at all costs. However, he did worry about the
bad financial situation of the colony, and concluded that Ceylon had to
become self-supportive.472
As the policies and strategies envisioned in India and London diverged,
Dundas realized that a solution had to be found for the dual government
that had been installed in 1798. Moreover, the problems with the Madras
civilians on the island had made it all too clear that the government of
Ceylon needed to be put on a better footing with stronger supervision. At
the coming peace negotiations at Amiens, Ceylon was likely to remain
British and to be internationally acknowledged as such. On Ceylon,
North hopefully expected the government to become a separate depend-
ency entirely under the authority of his befriended Governor-General
Wellesley, just as Dundas had promised in 1798. In the meantime, how-
ever, Dundas had changed his mind and decided that the island was to
fall entirely under the Crown, if it was retained at the peace negotiations
in the winter of 1801/02.473
A NEW DESTINY FOR CEYLON 1798-1805 149
At the same time, both in Ceylon and in London new strategies were
devised to improve the financial and organizational situation on Ceylon
during the years 1800 and 1801. These strategies were based on different
expectations regarding the future position of the island within the
expanding British empire and resulted in the development of two
schemes that crossed each other on the way from the metropolis to India
and vice versa. By the time the two sides received the other’s plans, both
had already started to carry out their own schemes. In the following sec-
tions, both of these will be discussed before the narrative of the actual
policies and developments on the island is continued.
voirs had to be repaired. For this purpose a civil engineer had to be send
to the island. Waterways and roads had to be established for the improve-
ment of communication and transport, for which the “personal service of
those inhabitants who hold their lands in that tenure might be very use-
ful and actively employed”.481 He expected that these measures would
eventually result in an annual surplus produce of up to 150,000 pounds.
For that reason government should not hesitate to invest some money in
the development of the colony. Moreover, he acknowledged the impor-
tance of knowledge for government and recommended the establishment
of a society “for cultivating and promoting the knowledge of Nature, his-
tory and agriculture the useful arts, manufactures and the languages, his-
tory antiquities and literature of Ceylon”.482
The spirit of Glenbervie and Dundas are reminiscent of Van de
Graaff ’s broodkamer ideology. The plans for surveying the island and
repairing all sorts of irrigation works tally with the Dutch governor’s
enterprises. Also the image of a rich past with an abundance of rice on the
island is presented here, the difference being that the English blamed the
neglect of the paddy culture on the Dutch and the Portuguese instead of
undefined natural disasters. Thus, as in the last decades of Dutch rule, the
British were drawn inland with agricultural schemes; but this time action
was ordered from above in order to safeguard the position of Ceylon with-
in the British Empire. Another crucial difference was that it had never
been Van de Graaff ’s aim to turn the whole island into a granary, but only
to promote the rice culture in the peripheral districts while reserving the
southwest for the production of all sorts of cash crops and timber.
Why were Dundas and Glenbervie so keen on rice and why did they
not opt for the cultivation of cash crops like coffee or pepper instead? The
West Indies already provided the British economy with various cash crops
and at the same time the success of Bengal must have been on their
minds. The two men reasoned that no major changes in the system of
government were necessary to turn Ceylon into a granary. All that was
needed was a proper management and supervision of affairs. That is why
Dundas instructed North to leave things the way they were in relation to
the service tenures, because in his view such changes should be brought
about only gradually, and the risks of sudden changes had been experi-
enced by Andrews. He sincerely wished that anything like that would not
happen again.483 North’s plan of engaging the Dutch in agriculture was
also rejected and in fact Dundas forbade all private Europeans from
undertaking any agricultural enterprise. He apparently feared the growth
of independent European interest groups, who could in time undermine
state authority by requesting self-government as had happened in the
American colonies and the Cape Colony.484
In many ways Dundas dealt with Ceylon as he had with India. His
152 CHAPTER EIGHT
North and Robertson were of the opinion that thanks to the new system,
the peasants would soon learn to enjoy the fruits of their labour, in con-
trast to working only for the benefit of others. As a result they would
become much more industrious in the field and be inclined to work for
wages for the government if required. In line with this plan, North also
proposed to abolish the accomodessan system, and instead to pay the
mudaliyārs and lascorins regular wages. If they wished, they could keep the
A NEW DESTINY FOR CEYLON 1798-1805 153
fields that were given them as accomodessans, but these were then taxed in
line with other properties. Within two years of the failure of Andrew’s
government and Hobart’s and Dundas’ explicit instructions to restore the
old order, North was tending once again in a more revolutionary direc-
tion.
This change of spirit was accelerated by his tour of the island between
June and November 1800. North visited all major stations on the coast
with the purpose of personally supervising his departments and in order
to remove the backlog of criminal cases.487 Prior to his tour, North had
imposed a new tax on jewelry, the joytax, against which the inhabitants
of the region north of Colombo from Negombo to Mannar soon revolt-
ed. This rebellion was quickly suppressed, and North remained convinced
of the worth of this tax. He also prided himself and his military officers
for dealing with the ringleaders justly. He compared his rule with that of
his Dutch predecessors, which he considered too severe, and that of De
Meuron, whom he regarded as too mild. He was certainly not set back by
the rebellion, but rather gained strength from it. He optimistically wrote
to Wellesley that from a new government it could hardly be expected that
everything would go well at once, but his grip was strengthening and
things were getting better and better.488
While staying in Galle in July, he corresponded a lot with the Kandyan
ministers whose propositions induced him to embark on a new diplomat-
ic course.489 Moreover, during the tour he realized that the department of
revenue and the judiciary could be further improved. He placed a lot of
emphasis on the importance of the quality of his personnel and he
expanded on his idea of appointing more Dutch servants to the lower
posts, although he reserved the higher offices like those of judges and col-
lectors for Company servants. In all, North moved further away from the
original instructions of his superiors. The letters North wrote to Wellesley
during the tour show a very positive and confident spirit, in contrast to
his letters of the year before. In October 1800 he wrote from Trincomalee:
The only thing I want is a greater latitude in the choice of my instruments
than I now have, and a greater power of rewarding and encouraging those
with whose merit I am acquainted and whose services are tried. With that
power I will engage to leave the colony in three years time / unless unfore-
seen accidents prevent it / in such a state as to add considerably not only to
the security but to the affluence of the Indian possessions.490
Thus, North imposed on himself the ambitious task of solving all the
island’s financial and political problems by the end of his term. He must
have thought that as long as this goal was attained some deviation from
the official line of policy was acceptable. If successful, he would certainly
benefit from it since the good impression he would leave behind increased
his career opportunities.
154 CHAPTER EIGHT
The new spirit was aroused by the hands-on control North established
over his inferiors through his severe approach of the Madras civilians and
his inspection tour over the island. Another factor that played a role in the
formulation of North’s new plans was that he expected the island soon to
fall entirely under the East India Company, in which case he would serve
directly under his friend, the governor-general. Wellesley’s military atti-
tude towards Ceylon and his lack of interest in financial and administra-
tional matters made North confident that he would have more freedom
to operate on the island and that this would increase his authority over his
servants. The plan to turn Trincomalee into a military rendezvous
increased the importance of the island for the British empire, and added
to the prestige of North’s governorship. Also in the case of Kandy, he
knew that if the opportunity arose, Wellesley would not be adverse to a
scheme that would lead to occupation, even if this implied a declaration
of war.491
Thus, without the approval of the home authorities, but probably with
the consent of Wellesley, North started to transform the government once
again, and moved away further and further from the original idea that the
government should resemble that of the Dutch as much as possible.
In the end both parties were presented more or less with a fait accompli:
North could do nothing to obstruct Dundas’ decision to place Ceylon
directly under the Crown or to prevent the arrival of the twenty-four new
appointees. At the same time, Dundas disagreed with North’s reforms of
the judicial and revenue departments and service tenures and even the
diplomacy with Kandy, but he could do little about them. The uncertain
solution for the dual government and the long-distance communication
caused a new dynamism in colonial policy which was now moving in two
directions.
North was of the opinion that proper rules and justice would stimulate
the inhabitants to work harder which in turn would lead to improve-
ments in the island’s economy. Dundas assumed that good supervision
and organization of the departments would be most fruitful. This con-
trast was not unique, and should be understood in the context of the
colonial policy-making for India, as shall be discussed in Chapter Ten. For
now the focus is on how North dealt with the contrast between his ideas
and those of Dundas, his superior, and what policies he pursued in his last
years as governor.
bility of career development on the island, which would stimulate the ser-
vants to do their best.495
In the judicial department North focused on the inland part of its
organization. By December 1799, the new courts were all operating suc-
cessfully and North’s measures were confirmed in the new charter of jus-
tice of 1801. Some changes regarding the organization of the supreme
court were introduced and its authority was extended over civil cases as
well. Yet after his tour over the island and before the new charter arrived
North continued to reform the judiciary. He felt particularly uncomfort-
able with the eleven landraden and the three civil courts and decided to
replace them with five provincial courts to be presided over by civil ser-
vants and assisted mainly by Dutch burghers. However, North intended
to have the courts eventually headed by professional judges. More impor-
tant was that the native headmen lost their official judicial powers in the
districts. The reforms were successful in the sense that juridical establish-
ment worked quite well until the end of North’s rule, but the establish-
ment had become very expensive and the implementation of the verdicts
did not run smoothly. Moreover, it is difficult to really assess these
changes because, due to the war with Kandy, martial law was implement-
ed in the maritime districts starting 1803.496
In all, the period between 1800 and 1802 was a vibrant one. Following
his own plans and in part those of Dundas, North turned to the agricul-
tural development of the island. According to his despatches, his abolition
of service tenures was slowly showing off its fruits. As the historian C.R.
de Silva later wrote:
There were over five thousand lascarins in the Colombo districts alone
(holding accomodessans), which meant a waste of labour in an ill-peopled
and inadequately cultivated land. A considerable increase in the land revenue
might therefore be expected.497
North not only expected a natural increase in land revenue from the abo-
lition of the service tenures and accomodessans, he also thought that the
inhabitants who had formerly worked without payment would become
much more productive if they received salary for their labour, and could
keep the produce of their land. North had commenced with the reforms
only after consultation with his mahāmudaliyār who approved of it.
Unlike in the days of Andrews, the radical switch did not cause any rebel-
lion.498
Therefore North was in a position to reply very confidently to the
doubts that the new Secretary of War, Lord Hobart, expressed in his first
letter of 1802 concerning the abolition of the service tenures. North
wrote that he had implemented these measures only after three years of
experience and due consideration, that things were going well and that
certainly he himself was in the best position to judge this. In his next
A NEW DESTINY FOR CEYLON 1798-1805 157
letter, Hobart took back his doubts and praised North for his actions. The
abolition of the service tenures was combined with the commencement of
large-scale land registration, in the manner of the Dutch tombos. North
enthusiastically reported about the progress on this as well. Following
Dundas’ instructions, North had commenced with the development of
the irrigation works. In each general letter North gave a report of their
progress. This was not the only concession to Dundas’ instructions. In the
case of the Dutch servants, he did not stimulate them to engage in agri-
culture and gave up the idea of forming them into a class of administra-
tive middlemen between indigenous society and the British. In practice,
however, many Dutchmen kept their posts as clerks in the lower order of
the administration and in the judicial department.499
North’s general letters were very passionate about the developments in
the inland government. He only expressed some disappointment about
the fact that the people of the southwestern districts did not wish to be
wage labourers for the government. He expected however that this would
change over time after they had seen some good examples to follow.
North also made more plans to improve the agriculture and general pro-
duction of the island by inviting Chinese settlers and South Indian
weavers to the island.500 These years (1800-1803) were really the heyday
of his rule; his despatches are very positive and the reader can really
believe that he had succeeded in his aim of making the island rich and
orderly. The distance between London and Colombo and the consequent
limited control from London gave him extra space to follow his own
course.
This optimistic spirit, combined by the military successes of Wellesley
in India, led North into a disastrous war with Kandy (1802-1805). We
will see in the Chapter Eleven how after some initial successes which even
led to the occupation of the capital, the British army was ambushed and
one of its detachments massacred. The troops retreated to the maritime
provinces but casualties continued along the border. The two parties
remained at war until the end of North’s governorship in 1805, although
no major campaigns were undertaken anymore after 1803. From the
moment that the Kandyan war started, North’s despatches say less and less
about the agricultural situation. Statements of the revenues are made, but
he does not write about developments in the southwest or the results of
the new modes of land possession. The war took up most of North’s time,
and in consequence at the same time he was losing control over the civil-
ian officers. It is difficult to assess the extent to which this failure was the
result of the inexperience of the new corps sent out by Dundas. In any
case, the preoccupations with the war clearly wreaked havoc on North’s
plans for the southwest.501
The last years of North’s rule, which had begun with such promise,
158 CHAPTER EIGHT
8.8 Conclusion
CHAPTER NINE
Within twenty four hours after his arrival on 19 July 1805, Maitland
wrote his first despatch to the Secretary of State in which he portrayed
governor North very positively. Indeed, the military force was in a bad
state, but North was not to be held responsible for it. He felt that North
had done a good job in his administration of the civil department, but
criticized the military and judicial establishment and he actually dis-
missed General Wemyss upon his arrival.
However, by October, Maitland’s letters begin to complain of North’s
management. He particularly disagreed with the legislation regarding all
sorts of inland affairs that North had promulgated. Maitland believed
that these laws were formulated in a very complicated language, which
made it impossible for the natives unfamiliar with British legislation to
understand it. In addition, the officials and native servants had not taken
enough pains to make sure that the regulations were complied with. In
fact, they had operated entirely outside of North’s control and had been
more occupied in filling their own pockets than in working for the gov-
ernment. The case of Jaffna was brought forward by Maitland as exem-
plary, but he assured Camden that the problem was endemic. He stated
repeatedly that North had exercised no control whatsoever over his civil-
ian corps.509
In particular, Maitland disagreed with North’s measures regarding the
service tenures.510 Nothing but chaos had come of it. In his later despatch-
es he returned to this subject and reacted vehemently against North’s poli-
cies. Maitland absolutely rejected the principle of such radical changes,
and wrote that all this should have been pursued more gradually.
We find that the Dutch uniformly did claim it [the services], we find that
their attention to keep it up was most astonishing, and we find in all their
memoirs for the last 40 years, when some, as able men as are to be met with
anywhere, administered the Government of this island, particularly Falck
and Van de Graaff, that they uniformly considered it as the object, out of
162 CHAPTER NINE
which not suddenly, but by degrees they had the prospect of increasing to an
enormous extent, stated by some no less than 2 or 300,000 pounds per year,
the revenue of this island. We find that General De Meuron in his very able
memoir on this subject entertains a similar view of it, yet in the face of all
those grave, and I must state great authorities, Mr North chooses at once to
do the whole of a system matured by the wisdom and approved of by the
experience of ages, totally away. Most fortunately however, with all his incli-
nation, it is not done away and from the modeliars having still carried it on
for their own emolument, I have been enabled in one or two instances
already to reap the benefit of the ancient system.511
In practice, apparently not much had come from North’s measures, but
contrary to his intentions they had created chaos in the interior. Not only
had the native headmen managed to gain power even while North intend-
ed to curtail their power, but gangs of landless vagrants were roaming the
countryside where they continuously harassed people, the inevitable out-
come of North’s ill-conceived land policies. The case of Jaffna was
explained as follows: the most valuable asset consisted in land and in the
right of the higher castes to demand servitude from the inferior castes. In
exchange for the services of the inferior castes, the higher castes were
bound to support and protect them. The recent interventions had thrown
the district out of balance:
These circumstances have not only tended to diminish the value of land, but
have materially checked the cultivation of the country and gradually
destroyed the whole of its police.
The property in land is shaken by its being exposed to constant and vex-
atious litigation […]. The servant from these decisions refuses to obey his
master; The master consequently refuses to support his servant; The ancient
system of subordination is done away; numbers of the lower castes without
the means of subsistence are daily turned upon the public and uniformly
commit those enormities which for the last two years have disgraced the
province of Jaffna, and which demand the immediate and salutary interfer-
ence of his Majesty’s government.512
Bands of robbers roamed the province, and gangs from the territories of
Kandy abducted women and children. In the case of Jaffna one may won-
der whether this explanation of the high crime rate was entirely correct,
for it was already a problematic and unsafe region in the Dutch period,
and Maitland may have been predisposed to blame North’s policies
regarding the service tenures.513 In any case, it led to a reversal of the
service tenures and strict regulations to decrease the crime rate.
In Matara and Galle, the government encountered a similar situation.
In the course of 1806, many robberies were reported to have taken place
over the course of several years in a row without the government being
informed of it. The headmen had not acted either because they were
bribed, feared repercussions from gangs of robbers or simply neglected
the protection of the inhabitants. In addition it was found that there were
1805-1815: TOWARDS A NEW ORDER 163
cases because their creditors would not let them go until their debts were
paid of. These stay-behinds could however no longer claim any pension
or subsidy from the British government.516
Thus, while North had treasured the burghers and their charitable
institutions, but scorned the former Dutch government, Maitland acted
the other way around. He did not consider the well-being of the Dutch a
particular concern for the British government. Those who decided to
remain on the island were now responsible for these institutions them-
selves and these were detached from the government’s responsibilities.
Therefore certain essential elements of the Dutch establishment now dis-
appeared and the community of Dutch burghers no longer had a privi-
leged position relative to the other inhabitants of the towns and coastal
areas.
The position of the Dutch officials and burghers had certainly changed
since the British take-over. Prediger wrote to Batavia how impoverished
they all were, and the difficulties they had in getting by. Upon his arrival
in Ceylon, his house had to be guarded and he had to be protected from
the desperate Dutch men and women. The poverty of the Dutch inhabi-
tants also surfaces in the few letters sent to the Netherlands and Batavia
that are now found in some of the private collections of the Nationaal
Archief in The Hague.517 People complained much about the increase in
prices and the decline of the value of their properties. Many earned an
income by letting their houses to English officials, but often this was not
enough.
Prediger writes how some men could not adapt to their new modest
position under the British government and continued to live in a luxuri-
ous manner. Only some of them kept a small shop or were engaged in
small-scale retail trade along the coast.518 It seems that within ten years,
they lost their position as the major capitalists in the country and were
unable to make new investments, but were rather bound by debts.519 In
fact, their decline created opportunities for native entrepreneurs and their
whole trade business in the southwest was taken over, most likely by the
Karāva headmen who already built up experience in this business and
managed to accumulate money while working with the Dutch capitalists
in the last decades of the eighteenth century.520 As we shall see below, the
rise of the Catholic coastal inhabitants like the Karāvas, was something
which Maitland actually encouraged.
Not only had the economic position of the Dutch burghers changed,
but so also their status. In a letter to the advocate fiscal and later chief
judge Alexander Johnston, the principal Dutch inhabitants complained
that the British did not differentiate among the various classes of Dutch,
and they instructed him about how they had been divided and employed
under the Dutch government. The hierarchy was strongly connected to
1805-1815: TOWARDS A NEW ORDER 165
the degree of racial mixture, with those descending from European par-
ents in Europe at the top and those descending from the offspring of
mixed marriages at the bottom. They complained that whereas in the past
the prominent members of the burgher community all had careers on the
island with the VOC and enjoyed certain privileges in relation to the taxes
and judicature, they were now deprived of such career opportunities.
Clearly, the more prominent members were the ones who wrote the state-
ment and were the ones who had lost most of their prestige due as a result
of the British take-over. These men wished to be regarded not simply as
Dutch burghers but as capable Europeans.521
Young men with money and connections like Christiaan van Angel-
beek and Hendrik Jan van de Graaff had already left in the course of time
after the death of Johan Gerard van Angelbeek in 1799, when they real-
ized there was no future for them on the island.522 Maitland actively
diminished the power and influence of the remaining Dutch inhabitants,
but in contrast, in the determination of his inland policies he was inspired
in many cases by the former practices of the Dutch government.
managed to cut down the enormous expenses made by the supreme court
in the circuits. These changes were only temporary though; later on he
was to look into the judicial department more critically and more precise-
ly, and advocated trial by jury instead of by one judge, and strove for a full
return of the Dutch landraden with native judges. However, the judicial
department was first set to work to clear away the arrears, for Maitland
found out that many people had had their trial but were kept in prison
without proper orders.
In all, Maitland’s new police system and his fascination with the court
system give the impression that there was a sense of increased insecurity.
Plundering gangs and robbers continued to trouble the country side and
there was a high rate of capital offences. Of course it is questionable
whether this increased insecurity was real or only perceived by the British
administrators. It has already been pointed out that in the case of Jaffna
there are reasons to believe that the crime rate was already high in the
Dutch period. More generally, Dutch proclamations in 1789 and 1790
give the impression that crime was increasing elsewhere on the island: a
striking example is the plakkaat of 1 December 1789, allowing anyone to
shoot robbers and anyone causing trouble on private properties, or on the
public roads when not responding to call from the police. Another one is
the placard issued for Kattukolom and Tamblegam urging the people who
had left their fields due to gangs of Kafirs (former African soldiers and
slaves) roaming the countryside, to return to their villages.524
Of course these are just some examples and perhaps, a more thorough
examination of the Dutch criminal records would better answer our ques-
tion. This is also what the British did themselves. Alarmed by the high
crime rate on the island, the advocate fiscal made a comparison with
Dutch times by searching the criminal records and concluded that he
“does presume to infer from these premises and from the information he
has received from others that the perpetration of crimes and of murder
more particularly, is fast increasing”.525
The executive council decided to ask the principal Dutch inhabitants
whether they were of the same feeling, which they answered positively.
Therefore, it seems it was more than perceived unsafety, and the increased
crime rate points at social unrest. It seems logical to explain this by the
continuous changes of policy and increased colonial intrusion from the
time of Van de Graaff on, which must have caused insecurity among the
inhabitants. Maitland’s obsession with justice is more extensively dis-
cussed in Chapter Ten.
In the civil departments, Maitland had a similar approach to cutting
expenses. First he discovered that there were a lot of unnecessary expens-
es made on the spot without any government control. North had certain-
ly failed to increase his personal control over the civil servants. Not long
1805-1815: TOWARDS A NEW ORDER 167
after his arrival, Maitland had made a tour over the island and came to
the conclusion that the civil departments were lacking the necessary zeal
and order. He decided to increase the control over this department and
issued regulations stating that no extra expenses could be made without
approval of the governor and the secretary.526
The agent of Jaffna was punished for his fraud, but this was an excep-
tional punishment and Maitland decided not to go into further detail in
the other cases for fear that this would cause too much unrest. He hoped
that the example of Jaffna was enough of a warning against such practices
in the future. Essential to Maitland’s system was the administrative con-
trol over his collectors in the outposts. Monthly reports had to be made,
with a statement on the financial accounts on the outposts. This was put
in to practice, as the many bundles of correspondence with the outposts
from 1805 onwards at the Sri Lanka National archives show. Indeed, the
larger part of these letters deal with financial matters and requests to
spend money.527
Maitland also abolished the board of revenue, and instead of the six
collectors with their agents as assistant, he limited the revenue depart-
ment to the appointment of eleven collectors who were required to make
yearly tours through their district to ensure that they were well informed
about what was happening and to report their findings to the govern-
ment. He raised the pay of these men, but at the same time decided that
the collectors would not be remunerated for their tours, but had to pay
for it from their own salary. Maitland expected that this would stimulate
the efficiency of his collectors and would make them more economical in
their spending patterns. Finally, he made the civil servants in England
accountable for their behaviour in Ceylon. This meant that if they wished
to pursue a further career, civil servants were forced to behave well on the
island to avoid public trial in England.528 In contrast to North, who
seemed to have only an eye for the southwest, Maitland expanded his
attention to the periphery, just as the Dutch had done.
These measures enhanced the power of the governor over the various
departments and centralized his power in Colombo, where the governor
still functioned with an executive council, which had first been appoint-
ed by Dundas to advise the governor on all sorts of matters after ties with
Madras and Calcutta were severed. North never really made use of this
council. Maitland relied a lot on the advice of the advocate fiscal
Alexander Johnstone. Part of their private correspondence can still be
consulted in Johnstone’s papers. The close cooperation between the two
was no secret, and often the executive council consisted only of the
governor, Alexander Johnstone and the chief secretary. Therefore, the
minutes of this council are very irregular. It certainly was not as impor-
tant as the political council had been in the days of Dutch rule.529
168 CHAPTER NINE
The tight control over the civil and military departments and the
increased efficiency was not enough to achieve the profit and order which
the British longed for. In line with the scheme that Dundas and
Glenbervie had worked out in 1801, Maitland aimed at turning the
island into a prosperous rice-producing region. Maitland realized that
successful government of the maritime district could only be realized if it
was based on a thorough knowledge and understanding of the island’s
natural and social constitution. Here Maitland again revealed his inclina-
tion towards the policies advocated three years earlier by Dundas, Hobart,
and Glenbervie. The last had promoted the creation of a society that
would concern itself with all sorts of knowledge on the island’s nature,
culture and history. Maitland did not found such a society, but he did
stimulate all efforts in that direction and sent his Jonhstone on various
tours around the island to look into subjects relating to traditional law,
administration of justice, education and agriculture. Maitland based his
policies by and large on the results of Johnstone’s researches.
Alexander Johnstone was a typical early nineteenth-century Oriental-
ist. He was interested in everything related to the history of the island’s
society, from indigenous religious texts and common law to Dutch prac-
tices and regulations. Copies of many of his manuscripts are found in the
collections of the colonial office in Kew and in the Sri Lanka National
Archives.530 After his return to London in the 1820s, he was involved in
the establishment of the Royal Asiatic Society in Britain, to which he
donated his papers, manuscripts and translations.531 Johnstone’s intensive
labour in the gathering information about Ceylon can be compared with
that of his contemporary Colin Mackenzie, who undertook a similar task
in South India for the government of Madras. The two had met first in
the 1770s in India, where Johnstone grew up as a boy, and Mackenzie fre-
quently visited his father’s house. According to the historian Nicolas
Dirks that is when they became “dearest friends”, and they kept in con-
tact from that time forward. In 1807, Johnstone went to India for a short
period to compare the situation there with that of Ceylon, and it is like-
ly that the two met again there.532
Johnstone did not work on his own; he was assisted by Jacob Burnand
and Captain Schneider. As we saw earlier, Burnand had been responsible
for information regarding the Dutch mode of governing in the maritime
provinces and strategies to increase the revenue. When he was still a
young recruit under Dutch rule, Captain Schneider had been educated to
become a civil engineer. Johnstone and Maitland were impressed with his
skills, and appointed him as surveyor.533 Between 1807 and 1808, he went
through all the districts, describing the state of agriculture and the possi-
1805-1815: TOWARDS A NEW ORDER 169
On the basis of the information gathered from these two men and his
own work, Johnstone drew up his advice for Maitland. This led to adjust-
ments of policy in the various districts in agricultural policy and the
native departments and a new plan for the department of justice. John-
stone had concluded that the provincial courts could best be replaced by
the former landraden, giving the native elite once again the power to
decide in native cases. The Sinhalese common law was too complicated
and because it was not written down, except in parts in a lengthy report
by Johnstone himself, could best be decided upon by the natives. That is
170 CHAPTER NINE
why the courts took too long to decide, which in turn hampered agricul-
ture. Maitland agreed and sent Johnstone home in 1809 to discuss the
matter with the Secretary of State and have a new charter of justice drawn
up. This plan was accepted by the Secretary, but withdrawn four months
later when a new Secretary of State was appointed and the provincial
courts were re-established.538
Through the work of Johnstone, Burnand, and Schneider, Maitland
was presented with a picture of the Dutch period of which the most
important element was the Dutch attitude towards the native system of
agricultural organization in general and service tenures in particular. The
Dutch were represented as conservative and thoughtful in their policies.
They based their decisions upon a thorough knowledge of society and
while they strove for change in the service obligations, they did so only
through a very gradual replacement of services for capitation taxes.
Whether or not this image of the Dutch policy on the island was correct,
it helped to justify Maitland’s own careful course.
This knowledge over the inland affairs in all districts helped Maitland
understand the power relations among the inhabitants and Johnstone
encouraged him to interfere in this. He commenced with a policy of
divide and rule in the southwest and Jaffna, where in his view the old elite
had gained too much power. The instructions he made for the collectors
of Matara and Jaffna bear witness to this policy. Maitland identified those
headmen they should engage and those whom they should try to ignore.
Both in Jaffna as in Matara, the power of the headmen was strongly relat-
ed to the religious establishments and Maitland advised his collectors to
use their authority regarding the temples and monasteries to single out
the less powerful ones.539
But I imagine independent of the benefit you will derive from a strict and
vigilant superintendence over the headmen of the cutcherry and the various
churches, that there are means in that district of Jaffna, if providently made
use of, of very materially strengthening the hands of government which is
principally the effect by forming an intimate connexion between the govern-
ment and one of the two temples at that place.
One of those temples is of late erection having been supported by
Vittilingane Chetty the great merchant at Jaffna. Vittalingane chitty whose
intrigues and influence with government enabled him render the new tem-
ple more powerful and to give it more sway in the country than the old one.
From this you will find that an inveterate jealousy exists between the bramies
[Brahmins] of the old and the new temple, which it will be your business to
keep as much alive as possible, giving however in everything you do a clear
and decided preference in point of support to the bramies of the old instead
of the new temple; and you will cultivate as much as possible the head
bramie whom you will find extremely useful if properly managed.540
Johnstone also urged Maitland to bond with the Catholic fishermen on
the coast and Catholics in the interior, by treating them as equal to the
1805-1815: TOWARDS A NEW ORDER 171
Protestants. Much was expected from this group, if they attached them-
selves well to the British government they could in time counter the
Kandyan-Buddhist influence in the interior. At the same time, Maitland
meddled in Buddhist affairs and tried to establish a Buddhist council sep-
arate from the organization in Kandy, upon which he felt they were too
dependent.541 Thus instead of replacing the mudaliyārs as Andrews had
done in 1796, Maitland tried to undermine their power by making
alliances with other power groups on the island, which would render gov-
ernment less dependent on the mudaliyārs. At the same time, he reduced
the number of offices for native headmen and replaced those headmen
who were not performing well to assert his authority over them. In any
case, it did not help Maitland much in achieving his other major goal,
namely the improvement of agriculture.
sons why Maitland instructed all collectors to make a yearly tour through
their district. Though some complied, judging from their reports, in prac-
tice not much came from these tours. According to the historian
Kannangara, this was largely related to the fact that the collectors had to
pay for their tours themselves.543 Maitland was the first British ruler who
paid structural attention to the peripheral districts of the Vanni and the
East coast.
In addition, since 1800 nine-tenths of the cattle had died from a disease
that was still virulent in the countryside. The dams of the principal water
tanks had been ruined by great storms in 1802, and in 1805 one of the
vanniyārs had rebelled and overran the Vanni resulting in substantial
damage to the fields and dams. Finally he mentions the lack of rains in
the previous two years.
These repeated and heavy losses involved the inhabitants of the district in
one general ruin, and the advances made for their support being feeble, ill-
timed and too much under the control of the moodeliars, have tended to
incur them with debts without affording them any substantial relief. The
want of the superintending and controlling principle of Mr Nagel’s system
is sufficiently apparent from the preceding statement.545
Although Turnour considered Nagel’s system of government an expensive
one, he did not think think Nagel would have made the investments if it
was not worth it. Turnour therefore decided to more or less copy Nagel’s
system by appointing adigārs to counter the power of the native headmen.
1805-1815: TOWARDS A NEW ORDER 173
This enormous encrease [sic] has taken place in those districts where the gov-
ernment reached the cultivator himself and could see its own measures car-
ried into full effect. In the Manar district a similar progression of improve-
ment is rapidly taking place; but in all the Cingalese [Sinhalese] part of the
island, where government is alone able to get at the nature through the
medium of a head man, the base is widely different; no such improvement
has or is likely to take place, and it is only yesterday that from the activity of
one of the sitting magistrates, I discovered, that for years past, the returns
made by the modeliars of the cultivated lands, in the district were just 15 per
cent under the real cultivation that existed. Should there be therefore any
doubt existing in the minds of government with regard to the policy I have
ever stated of diminishing the power of the Modeliars, I am confident this
174 CHAPTER NINE
statement will completely do it away and I beg leave further to refer on this
very important subject to Mr Johnstone.550
Maitland however did not intend to make any changes in the mode of
land ownership; the experiments of North and Andrews had shown the
impropriety of this. It was by his policy of undermining the power of the
headmen that he tried to get the people to produce more rice. This
change of view is discussed in the next chapter: first the mode of land pos-
session hampered development, later the headmen hampered develop-
ment. In fact, although he had resumed the service tenures, Maitland had
continued North’s practice of paying the headmen and lascorins in money
instead of accomodessans. On the possibility of improvement of the agri-
culture in the southwest, Schneider had advised him the following:
For improving the whole district it would be better to order the mudliars of
the corles and pattoes and the other headmen, they having very little to do
to take care that all the fields be properly and annually sown, and that all the
dams and tanks be kept in good order, and further to cause that all the
canals, thro’ which the water is led to the fields be digged and deepened.
Should any fields be found after issuing of the said order the above men-
tioned headmen shall not only be therefore responsible but also for the loss
sustained by that negligence […].551
Maitland did not take up all of Schneider’s recommendations. Instead, he
decided to increase the power of the paddy tax farmers by having them
supervise the sowing and harvesting of the crop. At the same time, he for-
bade the chēna cultivation, to protect the cinnamon, but also because the
chēnas did not deliver much taxes. In addition, Maitland fell back on
some of the Dutch methods to improve the agriculture in these districts,
Burnand being his main advisor in this. The collector of Matara was for
example instructed to implement as far as possible the regulations that
were issued by Burnand in the district of Batticaloa when he was collec-
tor of that region in Dutch times. As we saw in Chapter Five, Burnand’s
main strategy in Batticaloa had been the replacement of the native chiefs
by government agents.552
It was also in this period that Maitland developed the view that the
island needed to have European entrepreneurs investing their capital in
the land. This had been strictly forbidden by Dundas in his instructions
of 1801, but Johnstone convinced Maitland of the judiciousness of
attracting European planters after his journey to Madras where he had
travelled to compare the state of agriculture there with that in Ceylon. He
had come to the conclusion that the situation in Ceylon was much differ-
ent from that in India. On Ceylon there was a great deal of land laying
waste which could easily be brought into cultivation by European capital-
ists, which would stimulate the island’s economy. The natives could work
for them and in addition labourers could be brought over from India and
1805-1815: TOWARDS A NEW ORDER 175
southwest was tragic. At first, three years of drought and cattle plague
caused a famine and impoverishment in Matara in the years 1812-1813.
In addition, there was an outbreak of disease and people were moving
away from the district because they were not allowed to cultivate in
chēnas. Once again, gangs of robbers were making the region unsafe.556
Not surprisingly, we find from 1813 and 1817 series of collectors’ letters
discussing whether a change in the system of taxation could make the
people more keen on producing more. The answer was generally that this
would not serve as a remedy, that the key was in the superivision of the
agriculture and that this required the involvement of native headmen.
The British policymakers continued to search for solutions for the bad
state of agriculture in structural changes in the mode of land possessions,
systems of inheritance of land or taxation, topics that were not discussed
in Dutch times.557
It is also typical that the local answers to such problems were almost
always that the bad state of agriculture in the interior related to the
demise in power of the native headmen: they were not overseeing agricul-
ture as they had in the past, supervising the sowing of crops, and the
repair of dams and canals, in return for which they had received a small
part of the crop of all fields. This traditional system had fallen apart in
Maitland’s time and according to the collectors this was the cause for the
bad state of agriculture. In addition they mention the irrigation works
with which the Dutch had started, and which had been taken up by some
collectors, but were never finished.558 Edward Barnes was the first gover-
nor to undertake such activities on a scale comparable to that of the
Dutch times, to the cost of the peasants who were forced to work hard on
the public works for their service tenures.559
Whereas the institutional organization remained largely untouched
under Maitland’s successors, government policies and practice did
change. Under Brownrigg the granary ideal was abandoned and he
focused more on the facilitation of the production of cash crops like cof-
fee. Johnstone’s mission to Europe in 1809-1810 had resulted in the
approval of European private investments and landownership in
Ceylon.560 However, Ceylon’s position within the empire was still not an
attractive one. While coffee from the West Indies was imported cheaply
to sell on Britain’s markets, coffee from Ceylon still paid high import
duties. Brownrigg encountered a similar problem with the export of
arrack to India, where officials favoured and protected the Indian-made
arrack. The situation reminds of the Dutch period, when Ceylonese prod-
ucts were unable to compete with the same products from Java which
were protected by the policies of the High Government. Nonetheless
Brownrigg’s lobbying of members of Parliament proved fruitful in the
end, and the high tarrifs were rescinded.561
1805-1815: TOWARDS A NEW ORDER 177
9.9 Conclusion
North had left behind a chaotic and expensive administration and a coun-
tryside in very bad condition. The interior had become insecure due to
his new land policies. It is therefore not surprising that Maitland put most
of his energy into the reorganization of the administration, which he
totally revamped, revoking many of his predecessor’s inland policies in the
process. This was all done to establish peace and order and to cut expens-
es. It is also in that context that Maitland decided to have the remaining
Dutch inhabitants expelled from the island. Those who decided to remain
could not apply for any government assistance. Maitland was also the first
to put real effort in getting to know the island. He sent his closest
employee, Alexander Johnstone, on a tour around the island, to provide
him with all sorts of advice about the management of the colony. It was
on the basis of this information that Maitland developed his strategy of
divide and rule in order to contain the power of the native headmen.
During Maitland’s regime the granary ideal formulated by Dundas in
1801 continued to be the basis of his inland policies. Whereas Maitland
was seemingly successful in the peripheral districts, he could not get grip
on the agricultural production in the southwest, which frustrated him
much. He tried to change this by undermining the power of the native
headmen, but this only had the opposite effects. In contrast to the Dutch
development schemes, Maitland did not actively pursue the involvement
of the native headmen. This did not harm them significantly because they
had already grown into a strong, independent landowning class, thanks in
part, perhaps, to North’s chaotic administration and his new land policies.
The real growth of their power strongly related to the Dutch policies in
the second half of the eighteenth century, for it was at this time that their
power was substantially enhanced and their possessions and capital
increased. In comparison to the Dutch times, the relationship between
the mudaliyārs and the colonial government was of a different nature in
Maitland’s period. They were set further apart from the colonial officials,
because they did not jointly venture in businesses on the island. The
absence of any interest in indigenous religion and education on the part
of the British may have contributed to the cultural divide between the
headmen and the Europeans.
The Dutch burgher community probably lost the most from the
British the take-over. They never became administrative middlemen, as
North had wanted them to be. Instead, they lost their privileged position
vis-à-vis the government and thereby lost the attraction as trading part-
ners. In time, their local trading ventures were taken over by Karāva entre-
preneurs. Clearly, as migrants the Dutch inhabitants had never fully fused
with the native society, despite the intermarriages. Therefore, they had
1805-1815: TOWARDS A NEW ORDER 179
CHAPTER TEN
It has become clear that despite the similarities in the Dutch and British
approaches regarding the interior, there were some structural differences.
This counted in particular for the approaches towards the native headmen
in the southwest, the organization of the judiciary department and the
implementation of the law and the organization of the labour force and
landownership. Local responses to British policies differed, but in many
cases it was impossible to directly implement the intended policies; for
example, the southwest never turned into the rich rice-producing area
that Dundas wanted and North and Maitland strove for. Still, despite the
accommodation to many of the local practices and the foundations of
colonial power as developed under the Dutch, the British remained per-
sistent in certain instances and for example they never resorted to the
practice of forced cultivation as the Dutch did.
It has been pointed out in the previous chapters that historians tend to
portray governor North as a radical and idealistic reformer and Maitland
as a pragmatic and reactionary ruler. However, not much attention has
been paid to the actual inspiration behind both their respective policies.
In this chapter, I argue that both North and Maitland were ideologically
inspired and tried to accommodate their policies to contemporary politi-
cal trends in Britain and India. This places North’s radicalism in a differ-
ent perspective, and calls into question Maitland’s conservatism and his
proclaimed return to the Dutch system of government.
setting a bad example for his successors.572 The emphasis in the discussion
was on the moral behaviour of the British overseas and resulted in the
reorganization of the administrative structure of the Company in India in
1787.
The debates regarding British rule in India were also influenced by
contemporary publications on the history, culture and religion of India by
Alexander Dow and others. In the 1770s and 1780s, interest in the native
languages and culture had increased and men like William Jones and
Charles Wilkins zealously collected and translated information regarding
India’s ancient history. They published their findings in Asiatic Researches,
the journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, which they established in Cal-
cutta in 1783. Their portrayal of ancient Indian civilization was usually
very positive, and contemporary critics of colonialism like Raynal and
Smith contrasted their positive descriptions of India and with the Euro-
peans’ ruthless and violent behaviour in the region.573
These studies gave the debate a historic twist and fitted it in the cur-
rent concept of progress of civilization: India was considered stuck mid-
way in the stages of human development. There was a strong image of a
civilization that had once been great but that had declined thanks to cor-
rupt Oriental despots who had brought the people to a stage of indolence
and apathy and brought development to a standstill. The British attitude
in India had not changed it for the better, since the EIC servants had
copied the despotic behaviour of the native power holders, instead of rul-
ing the country by higher British standards. In the course of the 1780s, a
consensus was reached that it was the task of the British to bring “just
rule” to the subcontinent. This assumption at first helped define colonial
policies, but at a later stage it once again legitimized British expansion in
the subcontinent.574 The contemporary intellectual digressions on moral
politics, freedom of trade and individualism helped shape the arguments
and the work of intellectuals like Adam Smith much influenced the
debates.
Jennifer Pitts recently analysed liberal arguments relative to colonial
rule in the speeches of Edmund Burke and saw many comparisons
between his line of thinking and Adam Smith’s theory on moral philoso-
phy. Smith had found a way to explain variation in societies around the
world by seeing them as determined by historical developments. He
described these societies in a hierarchical manner, with “improvement” as
a key concept, and approached the various societies as impartially as pos-
sible, stressing the universality of moral principles and expressions like the
law. This implied that all societies were capable of improvement, and in
the end because of this intrinsic aspect of all societies, none could be con-
sidered absolutely superior to the other. His sympathetic attitude towards
other societies and the absence of value judgements of one society over
BRITISH CEYLON AND THE INDIAN EXPERIENCE 183
the other are a hallmark of his work. In Smith’s view, the falseness of the
popular presumption of European superiority over Asian and other soci-
eties was proven by the behaviour of Europeans in the colonial contexts.575
Burke expressed a belief in the universality of principles like justice and
humanity and like Smith he stressed the importance of sympathy for the
subjects. Neither he nor Smith was against colonialism as such, both real-
ized that opposition to colonialism was not a viable option. However, the
fact that the native society of India was in a backward stage of develop-
ment did not mean that the British subjects in India should be treated dif-
ferently from subjects in Britain itself. In fact, the British overseas had to
behave with the same moral rigor that would be expected from them in
Britain itself. The fact that they worked in India changed nothing, and if
they behaved morally this would work to the betterment of the Indian
subjects, who would improve naturally.576
The Indian question remained largely a parliamentary affair and the
initial popular interest in the impeachment of Hastings petered out in the
beginning of the 1790s. Eventually, after many years of hearings, Hastings
was cleared of the charges in 1795. Nonetheless, the affair had stirred up
a substantial discussion about the future of Britain in India, which may
have been its greatest legacy. It was the type of debate that, as we saw, was
by and large absent in the Netherlands, and it caused a substantial diver-
gence between Dutch and British colonial policy in the East.
Burke’s point that the corrupt situation in India had a bad influence on
the Company’s administrators and seduced them to indulge in a form of
despotic rule detested in Britain was generally accepted. Tighter control
over the Indian government was needed, and Parliament installed a Board
of Control to supervise the governor general in India. Secondly, it was
assumed that the low salaries which the Company paid its servants dis-
couraged better qualified people from joining the service. Because of the
low wages they received, it was difficult for employees to resist the temp-
tations that India offered in the form of private trade and private dealings
with native princes. Hence, the wages of the Company’s personnel were
increased considerably.577
Last of all, the administration in India itself had to be set on proper
footing. The first region to be worked on was Bengal, which formed the
principle territorial base of British in India. Henry Dundas as president
of the Board of Control, together with Marquess Charles Cornwallis as
governor-general, set up a new system of administration in Bengal. The
new arrangement found its origin in the enlightened criticisms of Burke
and Smith and was based on the idea that “just rule” in India should be
based on the same principles of what was considered just in Britain.
Strong emphasis was laid on the universality of the principles underlying
law and economics. If people’s rights and property were secured, they
184 CHAPTER TEN
any increase in production; on the other hand it was said that despite the
high expectations, the zamindars were not inclined to promote agricultur-
al improvement, but rather did their best to evade taxes.582 This debate
resulted in the development of an alternative revenue system in the
Madras presidency, the initiative for which originated in India and not in
Britain.583
Both the Governors North and Maitland sat in Parliament in the 1790s
and witnessed the reorganization of the EIC, the settlement for Bengal,
and the result of the impeachment of Hastings. They could not have
missed the effect of the antislavery movement on these matters and it is
likely that they took part in the discussions. When North took office as
governor, the Bengal system was still held in high regard. Dundas, who
played such an important role in the formulation of the policies for
Ceylon, had been actively involved in the administrative modernization
in Bengal. It is therefore not difficult to discern parallels between the
administrational developments in India and Ceylon. Clearly, Governor
North was inclined towards the approach carried out in Bengal, with its
emphasis on social theory and the universality of moral values. Many of
North’s regulations and ideas in Ceylon echo the changes that took place
within the Company’s organization a few years earlier. In fact, the Bengal
project helps us understand North’s drive for change in Ceylon.
For example, he complained of the lack of professionalism of the civil
servants, which he sought to improve by raising their salaries and organ-
izing their pensions. He did his utmost to make sure that a colonial career
in Ceylon became an attractive one. Dundas encouraged him in this mat-
ter: “I am clearly of the opinion that the same rule of patronage and pro-
motion should be adopted in Ceylon that I have enforced with success in
India.”584 Another direct influence of the Company reforms was found in
the judiciary. Dundas had instructed North to follow the Bengal proce-
dures of registration of government regulations and to organize the
supreme court after the example of Bengal. It is a striking coincidence
that, when from late 1799 onwards, North zealously started to reform his
administration, Governor-General Wellesley decided to export the Bengal
system of rule to Madras.585 Is this what directly inspired North, or possi-
bly reinforced his confidence?
In any case, the major judicial reforms began after personal communi-
cation with the governor-general and on the advice of the chief justice
Edmund Carrington who had come from Bengal and knew the system. It
was in this context that North separated the judiciary and the revenue
186 CHAPTER TEN
When Maitland was sent out to Ceylon, he was urged to economize and
make the colony financially healthy. Under the pretence of cutting
expenses, he overturned the whole administrative establishment by re-
forming the revenue and judicial departments. He abandoned the princi-
ple of spreading government power over the various institution, and did
away with the controlling mechanisms installed by Governor North in
the Revenue Board. All power of government was now integrated in the
functions of the collector, who acted as overseer of agriculture, revenue
collector and judge. The provincial courts were discontinued and the
landraden re-established, with the collectors as presidents and native
headmen as judges. Moreover, Maitland restored the service tenures and
caste obligations. In all, his reforms ran contrary to those of North and by
extension to the ideals underlying the Bengal administration.594
Maitland was certainly not ordered by his superiors to take this course
of action. Nobody had demanded it from him, and in fact the metropo-
lis was not all that happy with Maitland’s reforms. We already saw that
Castlereigh criticized Maitland for expressing his negative opinion of
North’s administration. In other despatches, we find that Castlereigh
opposed the re-establishments of the landraden, and that he wished to
keep judicial power in the hands of European judges instead of with the
mudaliyārs. He was often wary of the reforms that Maitland initiated, but
realized that there was not much he could do about because of the dis-
tance and lack of local knowledge and because the Napoleonic wars occu-
pied most of his time and attention.595 For example with regard to the
service tenures, the only aspect of North’s policy that London had had
reservations about, but which had been approved of anyway after enthu-
siastic reports from North, he wrote disapprovingly to Maitland: “With
respect to the land rents we cannot form here a judgement upon the sub-
ject but we hope the line you have taken is the true one and permanent-
ly true.”596
The question thus remains, why did Maitland make so many amend-
ments in the colonial administration while risking the criticism of his
superiors? The following quote, from Maitland’s despatch to Lord Castle-
reigh on 13 Janyary 1806, has been cited often as a distillation of Mait-
land’s criticism of North’s policies: it is an eloquent remark made by
Maitland in one of his first despatches in which he dealt with effects of
North’s abolition of the service tenures.597
By the explanations I have already given, your lordship will perceive that the
tenure on which land rested here, is not peculiar to the island, but exactly
the same with what exist in every country in the world in a certain state of
society; or in other words, that there being no money in the island to pay for
BRITISH CEYLON AND THE INDIAN EXPERIENCE 189
It appears however that of late years, measures have been adopted inapplica-
ble to the situation of the country, shaking in a considerable degree the tenor
on which various species of property rested, and destructive of the police and
the tranquility of the people. The most valuable property in that district con-
sist partly in land and partly in a right to servitude possessed by persons of
higher castes over those of inferior; viz the Covia Nallua and pallua castes,
approximating nearly to a state of slavery.
The proprietors’ titles to both these species of property have been ren-
dered obscure and uncertain; their rights to land by the introduction of a
new plan of registration and by the means which have taken to enforce it;
the right to servitude of persons of the lower castes, by the decisions of
provincial courts and the abolition of those regulations which under the for-
mer system secured to each proprietor the particular services that from
190 CHAPTER TEN
In the view of Maitland, North had looked too much for theoretical
inspiration to reach this goal, without taking local circumstances into
consideration, and he therefore made the mistake of commencing reforms
for which the native society was not yet ready. Maitland felt that progress
would come naturally to a society if it was ruled fairly and justly. In the
above quotations, he clearly expressed his belief that the type of govern-
ment should suit the stage of development society was in. He did not
deny the universality of moral behaviour, but he found such behaviour in
the responsible rule of the collector and the governor, rather than in prop-
erty laws and other judicial principles. Thus, Maitland was motivated by
ideological precepts and intellectual discourses at home just as North had
been. One may therefore wonder whether the merely conservative and
pragmatic reputation that historians have allotted him is correct.
His instructions for the collectors of Matara and Jaffna written up
about a year after his arrival may give the best impression of Maitland’s
ideal of the strong collector. He started his instruction for the Jaffna col-
lector by criticizing the previous practices: “It would appear that hitherto
the common duties of an agent of revenue and commerce have been con-
sidered to be limited to a residence in the chief town of his district.”600 In
contrast he instructed the collector that:
You will therefore consider it as a primary part of your duty to visit every
part of your district so as to be able to give government an opinion not
obtained from hear-say or from black-intelligence; but from personal knowl-
edge of the state of all the churches and provinces in your district and of the
characters of the headmen […], and of all other persons possessed of influ-
ence and talent in those districts.601
The collector was to make a circuit once every three months and to report
to the governor and held extensive criminal and civil jurisdiction.602
The idea was that through direct control, the power of the native head-
men could be broken and that the peasants would be protected from their
vexations. Had it not been for them, the country would have been in a
much better state, Maitland argued:
The power originally possessed by this class of persons was at all times a mat-
ter of extreme jealousy during the Dutch government, and the means they
employed to diminish it in different ways and at different periods was vari-
ous and extensive. It does not however appear they ever succeeded even to
their own wish and there is the strongest reason to believe that the present
uncivilized state of the island, possessed as it had been upwards of three cen-
turies by Europeans is much owing to the continuance of their authority
subversive of every amelioration and improvement and acting in the
strongest sense of that time distinctly as an imperium in imperior.603
BRITISH CEYLON AND THE INDIAN EXPERIENCE 191
as revenue agent and judge, and the native engagement in the administra-
tion of justice. Also, the response of Munro’s superiors was quite similar
to that of Maitland’s superiors: Governor Bentinck was quite easily con-
vinced that a ryotwari settlement could be more fruitful than a zamindari
settlement, but he was against the fusion of judge and collector in the
same person and the engagement of native agents in the judiciary. In
London most people were against the new system at first, for the same
reasons. However, within a few years the sentiment turned around, and
by 1813 the Munro system was fully put into practice, including the judi-
ciary elements. In fact it became the basic system of government for most
of the new British territories in India.
Historians still argue about the effects of both the zamindari and the
ryotwari settlements, how they functioned in practice and whether or not
they caused major changes in society. It is generally assumed that Corn-
wallis’ and Munro’s mindsets did not differ a great deal. Despite their dif-
ferent emphasis, in essence the two systems were not so different in out-
look. Both agreed on the idea of progress in society and the singularity of
India’s situation. Abstinence of direct interference with society stood cen-
tral, the role of the British was mainly to trigger the progress of Indian
society, not to enforce it. The difference lay in their respective emphases,
on institutional changes to stimulate the natural development of society
in the case of Cornwallis, or personal influence to achieve the same in that
of Munro. The universality of British legal institutions was not ques-
tioned by Munro, but local society was not ready for it yet. The concepts
of just rule and improvement stood central to Cornwallis as well as
Munro. The major difference between the two was their confidence in the
capabilities of the British officials. This confidence was lacking in the
1790s, but was gradually restored in the 1800s.609 The outlook common
to both Munro and Cornwallis was fundamentally different from the one
developed in the 1820s by the Utilitarians. At the outset confidence in
British superiority already played a major role, but not the 1830s when
Utilitarians argued that India could only succeed if it became British in a
cultural sense as well did it lead to a radical assimilation policy.610
The connection between the policies of Maitland and Munro shows
that in contrast to what is usually assumed, Maitland’s policies were
inspired by ideology and were not merely the work of a conservative and
pragmatic bureaucrat. Central to his evaluation was the idea that Ceylon
was different from Britain and had to be ruled according to its own situ-
ation and stage of development. This is the ideology that speaks out of the
quote from Maitland’s despatch to Castlereigh discussed at the beginning
of this section. This made it possible for Maitland to even accept such
“unenlightened” aspects of native society as the service tenures. It meant
the reversal of a lot of measures that North had taken and a denial of
194 CHAPTER TEN
10.6 Conclusion
It seems that the Dutch and the British on Ceylon were both affected in
some way by the new ideas on political economy that had developed in
Europe in the course of the eighteenth century. Their vision of society as
trapped in a low level of development but capable of improvement have
striking similarities. They found the situation on the island matching the
descriptions in learned books. However unlike their British successors,
the Dutch did not have an agenda about how to improve the situation on
the island and bring the natives to what they called a higher degree of
civilization.
There were clear differences between Dutch and British perceptions of
good rule and progress and development on the island. These were direct-
ly related to the intellectual climate and political developments at home.
The influence of Parliament in London and the increase of moral inter-
ference with colonial affairs, be it the rule of Bengal or the position of
slaves in the West Indies, are exceptional. As a consequence, intellectual
and political discussions on proper colonial rule were a common feature
of the British politicians and high officials. This element was virtually
absent in the Netherlands, where Parliament had no role in colonial
affairs until 1848.613
The difference between Dutch and British colonial outlook lay not just
in the absence of a clear formulation of Dutch ideals. In the field of law
and personal freedom, the Dutch and the British held very different opin-
ions. The Dutch left the rule of law to the natives, whereas the British saw
jurisdiction as the major instrument of progress and development and
kept it in their own hands. Free labour was a prerequisite to progress, and
even if only temporary use had to be made of the system of service tenure,
its abolition had to be encouraged. This opinion is totally absent among
Dutch authors with the possible exception of Burnand. It is important to
note that the same considerations played a role in Stamford Raffles’s
administration of Java, which shows how much Raffles owed to the pre-
vailing ideology in the Britain of his day, something that Dutch histori-
ans tend to underestimate.
The image that Burnand created of the last Dutch rulers as enlightened
and authoritarian, and which is captured in the writings of Anthony
Bertolacci, Thomas Maitland, and Alexander Johnstone, reflects perhaps
more the image of his own practice in Batticaloa and the ideas he had
developed since the British take-over, coincidentally he had adapted this
picture to Maitland’s ideals. This certainly suited Maitland, because as
with most regime changes, the need to achieve stability, peace and order
forced him to claim a return to the proven results of the former, in this
case, Dutch regime. By adopting the image of the former regime to his
196 CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
11.1 Defining a course: Colombo, the EIC, and the Secretary of State
In previous chapters we saw how the British lines of authority changed
several times between 1796 and 1802. First, the government of the island
198 CHAPTER ELEVEN
was placed entirely under the government of the Madras presidency of the
East India Company. By 1798, the government was headed by a governor
appointed by the Crown, but the commercial affairs were still decided by
the East India Company.614 Under Governor Frederick North the ties with
Fort St George were loosened because he did not get along very well with
the Madras officials and was more inclined to work with Governor-
General Wellesley at Fort William, Calcutta. Large bundles with corre-
spondence between North and Wellesley, preserved in the Western man-
uscripts collection of the British Library, attest to this.615 Finally, after it
was decided by the Treaty of Amiens (1802) that Sri Lanka was to remain
a British possession, all matters – administrational, economical and mili-
tary – were decided in London. In the meantime, Secretary of State
Henry Dundas had drafted new guidelines for the policies to be followed
by the governor of Ceylon. All successive governors received such a char-
ter upon accepting their office.616 As we saw, this significantly changed
how policy was made. With London nearly six months away, there was
more latitude for governors on the spot to decide urgent questions.
In general, British governors followed their superiors’ policy towards
the Kandyans more closely than the Dutch did. However, owing to the
frequent changes in personnel and shifting international circumstances in
the period under research, the policy of the superiors and their capacity
to impose it upon their governors varied quite a bit. Just as in Dutch
times, the main aim was to secure a treaty with the king to formalize the
relationship with Kandy. In fact the British were negotiating with Kan-
dyan envoys that had arrived at Madras in early 1795 even before they
had captured the Dutch possessions on the island.617
A lot has been written about the British arrival in Sri Lanka and their
preliminary contacts with the court of Kandy.618 After Boyd’s failed mis-
sion of 1782, contacts were not renewed until the 1790s. Relations
between the court and Madras intensified in July 1795, after the landing
of the British at Trincomalee earlier that month. The British wanted to
gain Kandyan support in their battle against the Dutch, and despite
Governor Van Angelbeek’s desperate appeals they did support the British.
Not aware of the contents of the Dutch treaty, or perhaps too eager to
have an official alliance with the Kandyans, the English drafted a treaty
that agreed to let the Kandyans occupy certain parts of the coast then in
Dutch hands.619 This treaty was never ratified because the British realized
soon enough that the Dutch possessed the entire coast and that if they
were to follow in their footsteps, they would also have to hold on to these
possessions. Moreover, it was feared that if the European powers arrived
at a peace settlement, they would have to return their possessions on the
island to the Dutch, and there would be significant repercussions if it was
found that they had ceded part of them to the Kandyans. So from 1796
THE COLONIAL PROJECT COMPLETED 199
From 1800 onwards, approaches by the first adigār Pilime Talawe marked
the beginning of a new episode in British-Kandyan relations. Governor
North started to push his own demands further when he decided it would
be a good idea to have a garrison stationed at Kandy. Not only was a treaty
with the same terms as the old Dutch one required, North envisioned a
British garrison in Kandy of about one thousand men whose avowed mis-
sion would be to protect the king. Stationed midway between Trinco-
malee and Colombo, these troops would also ensure quick communica-
tion between the two ports in case of a French attack, and they could be
flexibly deployed. North’s strategy to station a garrison in Kandy was
based on Wellesley’s policy of subsidiary alliances in India.622
In his negotiations with Pilime Talawe, North stressed that he wanted
permission to construct a road between Trincomalee and Kandy to facil-
itate contacts between the two places. Depending on the circumstances
the troops could descend from there to either Trincomalee or Colombo.
In those days rumors of a French attack were common and the possibili-
ty could not be ruled out. Because the troops were to protect the king, he
was to bear part of the costs. Long negotiations with the first adigār, who
seemed to prefer to dethrone the king with the help of North’s forces, led
to nothing but strained relations between North and the adigār. The main
problem was that the adigār, who agreed to North’s plans, could not prove
to North that the king himself also agreed to it. North did not want to
violate the position of king because it could make him the instigator of
war. From the correspondence between North and Wellesley, it is clear
that the latter, as North’s superior, agreed with and even encouraged this
policy. The historian Wickremeratne sees in this proof that the initiative
in the negotiations between the first adigār and North was taken by North
himself, thereby making the adigār more a victim of North’s plots than the
initiator of intrigues, as he is depicted in the British sources.623 One may
wonder whether this is not a simplification of the whole affair, given how
much Pilime Talawe stood to gain from the new plan. Moreover we have
200 CHAPTER ELEVEN
seen that intriguing with foreign powers on the island was not a new game
for him. This argument will be elaborated upon further down in this
chapter.
This new policy, revealed a shift from commercial to strategic motiva-
tions in the British dealings with the Kandyans. Certainly, the policy of
isolation which North’s predecessors had held on to was to some extent
inspired by strategic motivations as well, namely to prevent any foreign
intrusion. However, North took a more active stance in this respect and
at the same time cinnamon, which had always been a major point in
Dutch policy towards the court, became only a minor point of interest.
The emphasis on strategy in North’s policy perfectly suited the spirit of
the time, when the British Empire was still expanding at a brisk rate.624
Wellesley concurred with the whole of North’s plan, and Secretary of State
Dundas gave his final approval from London. Though at first he had been
reluctant to allow North to interfere too much in Kandyan affairs,
Dundas later argued that even if it would lead to war, not too much dam-
age could be done. It was clear that a Kandyan defeat would not confront
the British with a new frontier, and a chain reaction of expensive wars, as
had happened in India, was out of the question.625
The secret contacts with the first adigār Pilime Talawe were mainly
conducted through the governor’s mahāmudaliyār, Johannes de Saram.626
It was unclear to North whether or not the king was going to agree to his
proposals and he gradually lost faith in the adigār and started to contact
other court officials. By 1802, North was so disappointed that no treaty
had been signed that, with disaffection spreading through the Kandyan
provinces, he returned to his old accomplice Pilime Talawe. The adigār
convinced him that the time was good to invade the country since many
of the chiefs and the people in their disāvanies would readily collaborate
with the British. In January 1803, an attack on certain areca nut mer-
chants whom the Kandyans considered spies gave North his casus belli.627
Unravelling the episode that followed is complicated by official and
unofficial stories of secret contacts and treachery. North invaded the
Kandyan territory and even occupied the Kandyan capital, which had
been abandoned by the king and his retinue before their arrival. But
either through treachery of the first adigār, or through miscommunica-
tion, the British troops already weakened by lack of provisions and
injuries, were ambushed and massacred at the moment they intended to
retreat. This offensive act made it impossible for North to negotiate for
peace with the Kandyans and they remained in a state of war until he left
office, although hostilities remained limited to the border areas.
THE COLONIAL PROJECT COMPLETED 201
When Thomas Maitland was sent to the island to succeed North in 1805,
the Kandyans and the British were still at war. Before his departure from
London, Maitland had discussed the situation on the island with the new
Secretary of State, Lord Hobart. Maitland had studied the papers and had
come to the conclusion that there were no valid grounds for seeking pos-
session of the whole island. The preceding war had been costly and had
led to nothing. In Britain, willingness to pay for expensive colonial wars
was fading and a general cut in colonial expenses was required. Hence
already before Maitland departed, it was decided that he should stop the
war and attempt to appease the Kandyans. Any negotiations would use
the Dutch treaty of 1766 as the starting point, and the plan to place a gar-
rison in Kandy would be abandoned.628
During the six years of Maitland’s rule, there was no official diplomat-
ic contact between the two parties, but active warfare was over from the
moment he commenced as governor. Maitland stuck to his promise and
thereby followed the policy decided upon in London by him and his
superiors. Contact with Kandyan parties was kept up through the corre-
spondence of Maitland’s secretary and interpreter John D’Oyly. The
mahāmudaliyār lost thus his traditional position as mediator between the
Kandyan court and the government in Colombo. Instead of relying on
only one person, contact was maintained with several parties in the Kan-
dyan court. One of the main issues in this contact was the fate of Major
Davie, who was kept as a war captive by the Kandyans since 1803.
Among Maitland’s despatches to Londen are some agonizing requests for
help that Davie managed to smuggle across the borders. Maitland sought
his release but was not prepared to use force and Davie died in captivity
somewhere in the Kandyan hills in 1813.629
In a way Maitland’s policy resembled that of the Dutch who, after the
severance of diplomatic contacts in 1792 still honoured the treaty of
1766. Maitland was determined to keep the status quo, staying informed
about Kandyan affairs through contacts with monks via his interpreter
John D’Oyly. As in the 1790s, cinnamon was receding into the back-
ground as an issue in determining policy. But possession of the coastal
saltpans proved to be an effective means of putting pressure on the
Kandyans. In the last year of Maitland’s rule, there were rumours of sus-
picious moves on the Kandyan side, and after his departure in 1811, cor-
respondence more in the style of Governor North was resumed with the
Kandyan nobles.
202 CHAPTER ELEVEN
he thought the time was ripe. Assured by the Kandyan chiefs of popular
support for British military action against the king, he took his chance.
When he reported his success, he was promptly and enthusiastically con-
gratulated from the London office.632 The expedition had not cost much
and the additional Kandyan territory would bring in extra income: the
Kandyan chiefs were to remain in their position and hand over part of the
revenue from the lands under their control. Had London been closer, the
home government might have prevented the invasion, just as the High
Government in Batavia had vetoed Van de Graaff ’s plans in 1792.
About twenty years after the fall of the Kingdom, Henry Marshall, a
surgeon in the British army at the time, published a quite different
account of the fall of the Kingdom. He pictured the Kandyan nobles as
selfish, treacherous and unreliable and the British as naturally inclined to
imperialist and expansionist acts.633 Other historians lay the blame entire-
ly with the British. Following Marshall’s argument, they emphasize that
the British consciously intrigued with the Kandyan nobles and they hold
that, even if the nobles were treacherous, the British are still to blame
because they really took the initiative in the negotiations and should
therefore be considered responsible for the fall of the Kingdom.634
Before further elaborating on these issues, it should be remarked first
of all that the unification of the island under the British was not an iso-
lated development, but clearly related to new developments in maritime
Ceylon. The British governors were not as secretive about their contacts
with the Kandyan nobles as Van de Graaff had been, and coincidentally
there are not such severe accusations of treachery by the British governors.
However, Marshall’s accusations that Brownrigg covered up his real
motives when he wrote that he occupied the territories to protect and
help the Kandyan citizens are not difficult to accept nowadays. In fact,
during the expansionist years of British Empire, it was not uncommon to
describe political enemies as tyrants and to use their crimes as a pretext
for conquering their kingdoms. Such legitimization fitted the contempo-
rary ideals of progress and improvement discussed in the last chapter, and
this example shows clearly how such rhetoric carried a strong opportunis-
tic element.635
Clearly Brownrigg had the same ulterior motives for accepting the offer
of the Kandyan nobles that Van de Graaff had had a quarter century ear-
lier, for he was really after the revenue of the Kingdom.636 Just like their
Dutch predecessors, all British governors had to cope with serious
budget deficits and financial cuts by their superiors. With no funding
available for extensive warfare, both Brownrigg and Van de Graaff could
only execute their plans with the help of the Kandyan nobles. Still this
does not explain the entire context of the intrigues. After all, Brownrigg
managed to incorporate the Kingdom without much bloodshed. Did Van
204 CHAPTER ELEVEN
It has been argued that the Sinhalese nobles of the court deposed their
king in 1815 because of their aversion to his ethnic background. Indeed,
in the Kandyan Convention, the use of the word Tamil (Demala) is strik-
ingly negative.640 This issue has received much attention. Some historians
explicitly connect it with the current ethnic problems on the island, while
others passionately reject the idea. This has led to overemphasis in the
literature on the king as an outsider on the one hand, and on the assim-
ilative features of the Kingdom on the other hand. Two lines of inquiry
flow from this. The first had to do with the legitimacy of the king as a
South Indian ruler of a Sinhalese kingdom, and the second with the
degree of ethnic consciousness in the Sinhalese part of the island and the
emergence of a Sinhalese Buddhist nationalism in the same period.
For some scholars it is clear that the Nāyakkar kings were never fully
accepted and that a general aversion to their background finally led the
people to dethrone the king. According to Dewaraja’s study on the Kan-
dyan Kingdom, there were two reasons why a South Indian had been
made king in 1739, both having to do with Sinhalese (and general South
Asian) conceptions of kingship. Marriages between Sinhalese kings and
the daughters of the petty aristocracy from Madurai were already preva-
lent in the seventeenth century, before the rise of the Nāyakkar dynasty.
The selection of brides from abroad has been interpreted as a political
move consciously designed to curb the power of rival Sinhalese nobles.
Secondly and more central to Dewaraja’s argument is the fact that with
the extinction of the other kingdoms on the island it became more diffi-
cult to marry a wife of chastrya origin as was required for a king. Dewaraja
accepts this for long prevalent South Indian connection, but when she
comes to discuss the origin of the first Nāyakkar king, she strongly
emphasizes that in fact he was not of real chastrya origin. Therefore in
hindsight she questions the legitimacy of the Nāyakkar dynasty.641 By
combining this doubt of royal ancestry and the foreignness of the Nāyak-
kar kings she implicitly justifies the opposition of the nobles against their
alien kings, which ultimately led to the deposition of the king in 1815.
K.N.O. Dharmadasa takes the issue of the foreignness of the Nāyakkar
dynasty farther still and argues that it was the adoption of alien kingship
that triggered the rise of Sinhalese Buddhist nationalism in the eighteenth
century. He uses indigenous poems and songs to underline his argument
and stresses that though the first three Nāyakkar kings did relatively well,
an anti-Nāyakkar sense was present all the time. He stresses that the
Sinhalese political and religious leaders never forgot the kings’ alien ori-
gins, and in his view the rebellion against Kirti Sri in the 1750s proves
this. However, it was not until the last king, Sri Vikrama, behaved so
206 CHAPTER ELEVEN
tyrannically and went against the Buddhist ideology in his policies that
the opposition became widespread enough for a rebellion bring about the
fall of the Kingdom.642
In a recent interpretation of famous Sinhala war poems written in
praise of those who dethroned the Nāyakkar king, Michael Roberts con-
cludes that there was an absolute sense of Sinhala consciousness in this
period, and that this was restricted not only to the Kandyan area, but
encompassed all Sinhala-speaking people on the island.643 Roberts is care-
ful and precise in his use of the war poems, and while he convincingly
shows that these texts reveal a degree of Sinhala consciousness, his conclu-
sion that this consciousness was at all times widespread among all seg-
ments of society is not persuasive.644 Nor, and perhaps more importantly,
does he prove that this ethnic consciousness was a driving force in
Kandyan politics and society. The study of ethnic consciousness or iden-
tities in the pre-modern era is a slippery field and historians have to
acknowledge that identities were not as fixed as they have become in
modern times, and that they were usually applied very pragmatically. We
may wonder whether this approach really contributes to our understand-
ing of eighteenth century Kandyan politics and society.
Two historians, R. Gunawardena and John D. Rogers, leave no doubt
about their objections to such an approach. They convincingly point out
the inconsistencies in the former historical representations, emphasizing
the long-lasting ties between Kandy and the South Indian kingdoms, the
general acceptance of Tamil (Telugu) as a court language, and the fact that
after the British take-over of the Kingdom the Kandyans supported South
Indian pretenders to the throne on various occasions.645 Gunawardena
also points out that the extant versions of some of the Sinhalese poems are
actually nineteenth-century copies and that their authenticity can be
doubted. John D. Rogers has built a similar case against the European
sources to argue that the representation of the Kandyan king in British
travel writings changed over time. First represented as a Sinhalese king, he
only changed into an evil South Indian king when the British needed to
convince their audience at home of the justness of their actions.
Unfortunately, none of these historians show a way out of this bicker-
ing over sources, the ambiguity and inconsistency of which remains a
problem that has not been dealt with properly. It is striking that the avail-
able Dutch archival sources of the late-eighteenth century have been
almost entirely ignored in these studies. Moreover, the tendency to look
at the Kandyan Kingdom as an isolated case and overemphasizing its
specifically Buddhist ideological characteristics limits the view of the
political processes at stake.
THE COLONIAL PROJECT COMPLETED 207
More exciting views concerning the subject have been expressed by H.L.
Seneviratne, J.C. Holt, and J.S. Duncan. Not coincidentally, they hold a
more balanced position in the Sinhala consciousness debate and point at
competition at the court between Sinhalese and Nāyakkar noblemen.
While Holt stresses the importance of economic factors, Seneviratne and
Duncan expand upon the ideological factors in Sinhalese kingship. They
conclude that opposition to the king was not endemic among the people
in the Kandyan Kingdom and that the kings, by fitting into the ideal
shape of a Buddhist king, held their position legitimately. However, in his
analysis of the building projects of the last king, Duncan shows that he
shifted to a more worldly ideology. This estranged the clergy and certain
noble families, but he maintains that this did not negatively affect popu-
lar support for the king. Only when the building projects demanded an
unreasonable amount of labour from the peasants in 1814 did the latter
start to oppose the king. Seneviratne rightly points out that although
opposition to the king was largely absent there certainly was friction
between the nobles and the Nāyakkar kinsmen of the king owing to eco-
nomic competition. Unfortunately, neither Seneviratne nor Holt expands
further on this issue.646
Pilime Talawe’s palace revolution following the death of Rajadhi Raja-
sinha in 1798, ironically reveals the more pragmatic attitude among
exactly those Sinhalese nobles who were supposedly the great propagators
of Sinhala consciousness. Through the reports of Governor North one
learns that shortly after his arrival on the island in early 1798, there was
great unrest in the Kingdom, and that many Malabaris and certain
important Sinhalese nobles were killed and that a Malabari was placed on
the throne again. North writes how he took care of the Malabari relatives
of the former king who fled to Jaffna: not knowing yet which side he was
going to chose, he thought it best to help them to keep all options open.
Clearly there was an anti-Malabari or -Nāyakkar attitude among certain
nobles at the court, of whom Pilime Talawe was the most outstanding.
But ethnicity did not play any role in this political event: a South Indian
king was placed on the throne by the same person who was responsible
for the killing and chasing away of both South Indians and Sinhalese
nobles.647
If the political intrigues of British times are placed in the perspective of
that of the Dutch it becomes clear that the disintegration and factional-
ism of the court was an ongoing process. Earlier I have introduced the
concept of the stranger king, a concept generally accepted among histori-
ans as a political means to channel factions in Southeast Asian political
entities in early modern times, and I suggested that this could be applied
208 CHAPTER ELEVEN
Political factionalism rather than ethnic strive caused the Sinhalese nobles
to collaborate with the British and brought about the fall of the Kingdom
of Kandy. How these factions developed and the sources power of the
king’s Nāyakkar kinsmen are difficult to determine, and these questions
have certainly not received enough scholarly attention. The literature
generally refers to the reign of only two kings: the second, Kirti Sri, and
the last, Sri Vikrama. Undeniably, they were the most notable and their
policies the most radical of the four Nāyakkar kings. It is, however, impos-
sible to connect the developments in the 1750s under Kirti Sri and those
in the early nineteenth century under Sri Vikrama without taking into
account the developments in the intervening period. The third king,
Rajadhi Rajasinha, reigned for almost eighteen years and it was during his
rule that the first signs of disintegration took shape.
THE COLONIAL PROJECT COMPLETED 209
role in these developments, the story is still not complete. Many unan-
swered questions about the part of the Nāyakkars in the whole affair
remain. What exactly was their power? What lands did they hold? With
whom were they allied? What were their intentions? A careful approach is
essential though, and one issue in particular that requires attention is that
at least some if not all of them used Sinhalese names when performing
palace services.654
If nothing else, the fate of the Kandyan Kingdom shows the extent to
which developments in Kandy were related to developments in the Dutch
period and at the same time inherent to the political organization of the
Kingdom. The processes of disintegration that irreversably started in the
1780s could not be ignored by the British and called for a clear response.
This is not to say that the British had no ulterior motives: North wished
to secure Kandy as a military base, while Brownrigg saw in the occupa-
tion of the Kandyan Kingdom as a solution to the island’s financial
troubles.655
211
CHAPTER TWELVE
those in Java and elsewhere in Asia in the same period. As in Java, the first
outlines of a colonial state became visible in the last decades of VOC
occupation, and the process of colonial encroachment continued in the
British period. The colonial transition on Sri Lanka was, like elsewhere,
marked by four processes: the formal political unification of the island
under the flag of the colonial regime, the shift from trading colony to
exploitation colony, the inward focus of the colonial administration and
concomitant centralization of colonial power, and finally the formaliza-
tion and rationalization of relations with native power holders and the fis-
cal and judicial administration of the interior.
The changes did not come about suddenly but were preceded by a slow
path of increased intervention that accelerated in the 1780s under the
governorship of Willem Jacob van de Graaff, when the governor was com-
pelled to respond to shifts in global trading patterns. Both the Dutch and
British governments anxiously searched for ways to make the colony prof-
itable, to maintain it as a strategic foothold and to enrich the financial
interests in the mother country. In contrast to the policymaking of the
British regime, which was directed to a large extent from Britain and
founded on the Indian experience, the Dutch intervention built on time-
honoured local experience, and the local initiative for change lay with the
men on the spot. This is one reason why the Dutch and British systems
of government that developed on Ceylon during this period of transition
were not quite similar, even though for most of the time they aimed at
similar goals.
Why a study of this period as a whole has not been written before is hard
to say. It may have had to do with a lack of interest among present-day
historians in the history of colonial policy-making or simply be the result
of the language barrier. Most historians dealing with Sri Lanka’s history
do not master the Dutch language and therefore find it difficult to con-
sult the Dutch sources. As a Dutch native speaker I did not face these
hurdles, but I must confess that the incorporation into one study of two
bodies of source materials belonging to two very distinct administrative
traditions was not always easy. The switching back and forth between the
different organization of the material, writing style and rhetoric on the
one hand, and actual distinctions in policy, thought and colonial relations
on the other is a challenge in itself. However, a growing familiarity with
the various types of source material eventually helped to strengthen my
grip on the nuts and bolts of the colonial transition process. In the end it
led to new insights that enabled me to challenge the traditional periodiza-
CONCLUSIONS AND REFLECTIONS 213
between the Dutch colonial overlords and their subjects. Colonial inter-
vention in the peripheral regions in the east and north not only implied
interference with the agriculture, but also administrative changes. Native
headmen were replaced by government agents who worked in close coop-
eration with the colonial officials.
At the same time the government of the island became more central-
ized and the relationship of the VOC with the native headmen in the
southwest, who had played the role of middlemen between colonial
government and native society, became tighter and better defined. The
original system of indirect rule was transformed into a more direct type
of government, in which the native headmen had well-defined task
descriptions and were held accountable for their performance. Also the
judicial system of landraden was scrutinized and its procedures were
described by new protocols. The efficiency of the revenue departments
increased and Van de Graaff managed to improve the revenue of the
colony by fifty per cent. The process of centralization, reform and
exploitation was still under way when the British took over the Dutch
possessions on the island and turned the administration in new direc-
tions.
Progress in the early years of British rule was rather chaotic and vague
because of the many shifts in personnel, authority and policy, and because
of the strong and contradictory rhetoric used in the despatches sent to
London. In the course of this research it became clear that the initial over-
throw of the Dutch administrative infrastructure – both in terms of insti-
tutions and of native administrators – had features common to other
regime changes. Moreover, the various shifts in authority – from Com-
pany, to joint Company-Crown and finally to Crown rule – and the pre-
vious experiences in colonial policymaking in India appear to have much
influenced politics in Ceylon, despite the different conditions in the two
places, which helps explain the protracted chaos. Studies of general pat-
terns of regime change helped me focus on the institutional developments
and to read beyond the strong intentions of the governors. I found that
when Governor Maitland claimed to have returned to the Dutch mode of
rule, he basically meant to say that he tried to stabilize the government;
but he did this very much in his own way.
Further I investigated how policymakers at home and on the island saw
the place of the island within the British Empire as a whole. This view
changed a few times. The strategic position of the island was emphasized
until changing circumstances elsewhere nullified its strategic value, and
the British realized that the colony would have to developed in such a way
as to become self-sustaining. When eventually Henry Dundas, the Secre-
tary of State, reached the conclusion that the island should become a
granary for the rest of the Empire in 1801, he based his assessments on
CONCLUSIONS AND REFLECTIONS 215
the experience in Bengal. His concept for the island resembled the brood-
kamer of Van de Graaff, but this time rice was to be the island-wide focus.
The Indian experience had shown that rice was easy taxable and, more-
over, commercial crops like coffee and sugar were already grown in the
West Indies. This remained the axiom of the British policy until the end
of Maitland’s term of office. Maitland anxiously tried to make the inhab-
itants of the southwest increase their rice production, but did not, as the
Dutch had done, involve the native headmen in his development
schemes. On the contrary, he saw them as obstacles and did everything in
his power to diminish their influence.
When his attempts proved to be fruitless, his successors focused once
more on commercial crop production, and by the 1820s the coffee cul-
ture in the southwest and Kandyan regions really took off. In contrast to
the Dutch period, this relied less on the help of the native headmen than
on investments and enterprises from Europe. In that way the British
clearly opted for a very different system of colonial exploitation than the
Dutch.
The case of bonded labour was even more complex. The notion of free
labour as a basic right for all people was an ideal that had become very
popular among liberals in Britain. It was reinforced by the idea that
improvement of society was only possible within a system of free labour.
This had fuelled the abolitionist movement and the reform of the British
government in India, and it also influenced British policy on Ceylon. The
British governors strongly felt that bonded labour retarded economic
growth and consequently obstructed further development of society. After
failed experiments with abolition under North, Maitland compromised
and allowed bonded labour to be used, but only for public works and the
collection of cinnamon. That is why the British preferred to leave the
commercial exploitation to European investors who were to pay for the
labour they used, rather than to native headmen who appropriated the
bonded labour system for all agricultural enterprises.
After a short period of very intensive use of this form of labour by
government for infrastructural and irrigational projects, the revived abo-
litionist spirit in England led to intervention in the labour systems on the
island. In 1824, Parliament announced its intention to set up a Com-
mission of Enquiry to look into, among other things, the labour issue on
Ceylon. Thus, liberal British opinion with its strong moralist convictions
remained a strong element in policymaking on the island, an element
absent in the Dutch period, and which remained absent in the case of Java
until the Dutch Parliament was given a role in colonial affairs in 1848.
The current study also gives clues for a further comparison between the
colonial histories of Java and Sri Lanka. The considerations underlying
the choices made by North and Maitland, resemble the “modern” choic-
es made by Raffles, when representing the British Crown on Java.
Interestingly one of the members of the Commission of Enquiry, Charles
Hay Cameron, had worked with Raffles on Java and drew his inspiration
from Raffles’ reforms there, when he proposed together with Colebrooke
the reform and modernization of the government of Ceylon in 1830. The
current emphasis on the eighteenth-century indigenous foundations of
the colonial state in Java give the impression that the Dutch government
had no choice but to adapt to institutions that already existed and in
which the native elites had large interests at stake. The case of Ceylon
clearly shows that the way in which the modern colonial state adapted to
such foundations depended largely on the preferences and will of the
colonial rulers.
219
NOTES
Notes to Introduction
1
In the thesis I will use the name Ceylon only when referring to the island in its his-
toric, colonial setting. When referring to island in modern times or mainly its geograph-
ic designation, I will use the current name Sri Lanka.
2
Lieberman, ed., Beyond Binary Histories; Reid, ed., The Last Stand of Asian Autonomies.
Blussé and Gaastra, eds, On the Eighteenth Century as a Category of Asian History. For an
overview of recent publications on India on this period: Barrow and Haynes, “The Colo-
nial Transition: South Asia 1770-1840”.
3
Sophia Pieters and R.G. Anthonisz translated and published the memoirs of Rijklof
van Goens jr. (1675-1680); Thomas van Rhee (1693-1697); Cornelis Jan Simons (1703-
1707); Hendrick Becker (1707-1716); Jacob Christiaan Pielat (1732-1734); and Gustaaf
Willem Baron van Imhoff (1736-1739).
4
P.E. Pieris, Tri Sinhala: The Last Phase; Turner, Collected Papers on the History of the
Maritime Provinces of Ceylon, 1795-1802; Anthonisz, The Dutch in Ceylon; Perera, The
Douglas Papers; P.E. Pieris, Ceylon and the Hollanders.
5
Wickremasinghe, Ethnic Politics in Colonial Sri Lanka, 56-99.
6
See Chapter Eight.
7
G.C. Mendis, The Colebrooke-Cameron Papers. Arasaratnam, Dutch Power in Ceylon
1658-1687. Goonewardena, The Foundation of Dutch Power in Ceylon. Kannangara, The
History of the Ceylon Civil Service, 1802-1833. Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British
Occupation 1795-1833, Vols 1-2.
8
Kanapathypillai, Dutch rule in Maritime Ceylon 1766-1796 ( PhD thesis University of
London 1969), Wickremeratne, The Conservative Nature of British Rule of Sri Lanka.
9
The Commission of Enquiry to the eastern colonies was installed in 1823 by
Parliament to investigate in the Crown colonies (The Cape Colony, Ceylon, and Mauri-
tius) the general state of government and revenue, with particular emphasis on the ques-
tion of slavery. The commission arrived in Ceylon in 1829. G.C. Mendis, The Colebrooke-
Cameron Papers, Vol. 1, xxxi- xxxvii.
10
Van Goor, “Continuity and Change in the Dutch Position in Asia between 1750-
1850”, 185-200.
11
Kwee, The Political Economy of Java’s Northeast Coast. Van Niel, Java’s Northeast Coast
1740-1840. Ota, Changes of Regime and Social Dynamics in West Java. Carey, “Waiting for
the ‘Just’ King”. Hoadly, “Periodisation and Institutional Change in Eighteenth Century
Java”.
12
Van Goor, “Continuity and Change in the Dutch position in Asia between 1750-
1850”, 185-200. Hoadly, “Periodisation, Institutional Change and Eighteenth-Century
Java”, 96-103.
13
Bayly, Imperial Meridian: The British Empire and the World 1780-1830, 248-254.
14
Bayly, Imperial Meridian, 209-214.
15
Rasanayagam, “Tamil Documents in the Government Archives”.
16
The Cūlavamsa basically stops with the death of King Kirti Sri Raja Sinha in 1782.
Later in the nineteenth century, a few pages were added concerning the rule of the last two
kings.
17
Arasaratnam, Dutch Power in Ceylon. For a collection of his essays and articles see:
Arasaratnam, Ceylon and the Dutch, 1600-1800; Goonewardene, The Foundation of Dutch
Power; Goonewardena, “Calculating Merchant Rulers and Cultivating Colonial Subjects”;
Kotelawele, “Agrarian Policies of the Dutch in South-west Ceylon, 1743-1767”;
Wagenaar, Galle, VOC vestiging in Ceylon. See also the contributions of Arasaratnam and
Kotelawele, in K.M. de Silva, ed., University of Peradeniya History of Sri Lanka, Vol. II
(hereafter UPHS).
220 NOTES
18
Kanapathypillai, Dutch Rule in Maritime Ceylon 1766-1796.
19
In particular: Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Administration, Vol. 1-2,
praiseworthy because of its detailed descriptions.
20
The six chambers were: Amsterdam, Zeeland, Delft, Rotterdam, Hoorn and Enk-
huizen. Gaastra, De geschiedenis van de VOC, 20.
21
Meilink-Roelofsz, Raben, and Spijkerman, De archieven van de Verenigde Oostindische
Compagnie.
22
See Chapter Eight.
23
G.C. Mendis, The Colebrooke-Cameron Papers, Vol. 1, xxxiv.
24
SLNA, 1/2159-2163: resolutions of the inland department.
25
He sent his letters and reports to men of influence like Governor General Alting,
Commissioner General Sebastian Nederburgh and Admiral Van Braam.
26
This feud is dealt with in Chapters Three and Six.
27
Meilink-Roelofsz, Raben, and Spijkerman, De archieven van de Verenigde Oostindische
Compagnie. Jurriaanse, Catalogue of the archives of the Dutch central government of coastal
Ceylon 1640-1796. Gommans, Bes, and Kruijtzer, Dutch sources on South Asia c. 1600-
1825, Vol. 1. “Index to the Overgekomen Brieven en Papieren” in the reading room of
the Nationaal Archief in the Hague, now accessible on internet via www.TANAP.net. The
catalogues of the archives of the British government on Sri Lanka are unpublished but
found in typescript in the reading room of the SLNA. Also in typescript in the reading
room of the Sri Lanka National Archives: Mottau, Index to the Despatches of the Governors.
& Summary of Despatches 1798-1822. In Jakarta, I picked the fruits of TANAP-archival
labour by using the new (unpublished) catalogue of the archives of the High Government
of Batavia (see www.TANAP.net). For the National Archives in Kew and the British
Library and India Office collection: G.P.S.H. de Silva, A Survey of Archives and Manu-
scripts Relating to Sri Lanka and Located in Major London Repositories.
28
Perera, The Douglas Papers.
29
Bertolacci, A View of the Agricultural, Commercial and Financial Interests of Ceylon.
Kingdom, 34; Bandarage, Colonialism in Sri Lanka: The Political Economy of the Kandyan
Highlands, 1833-1886, 17-46.
66
R. Pieris, Sinhalese Social Organisation: The Kandyan Period, 5-13.
67
Ibid., 11.
68
Henley, “Conflict, Justice and the Stranger King: Indigenous Roots of Colonial Rule
in Indonesia and Elsewhere”, 112-128.
69
R. Pieris, Sinhalese Social Organisation, 14-18.
70
Dewaraja, The Kandyan Kingdom of Sri Lanka 1707-1782, 206-212.
71
R. Pieris, Sinhalese Social Organisation, 20-21.
72
Wagenaar, “Knielen of buigen?”, 441-466.
73
R. Pieris, Sinhalese Social Organisation, 306.
74
They had a large retinue when they travelled around. Most remarkable must have
been the whipcrackers who walked behind them to scare-off the audience. Dewaraja, The
Kandyan Kingdom, 202-205; R. Pieris, Sinhalese Social Organisation, 19-24.
75
Dewaraja, The Kandyan Kingdom, 218.
76
Ibid., 219-221.
77
Ibid., 224-226.
78
Ibid., 228-229.
79
Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society 1750-1900: A Study of Religious Revival and
Change; Gombrich and Obeyesekere, Buddhism Transformed: Religious Change in Sri
Lanka; Seneviratne, Rituals of the Kandyan State.
80
Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, 50-52.
81
Raymond, “Étude des realtions religieuses entre le Sri Lanka et l’Arakan du XIIe au
XVIII Siècle: Documentation historique et Évidences Archéologiques”, 479-487. Wage-
naar, “Looking for Monks from Arakan”, 91-111.
82
Seneviratne, Rituals of the Kandyan State, 89-115.
83
Malalgoda, Buddhism in Sinhalese Society, 82-87. Ferguson, “Mulgiri-Gala”, 197-235.
84
Dewaraja, The Kandyan Kingdom, 241-249.
Organisation of the Dutch East India Company in Ceylon”, 1-13, and Arasaratnam, “The
Dutch administration”, 341-356.
125
On the paresses of the cinnamon peelers as example of local influence on the Dutch
Colonial political culture: Wagenaar, “‘Eerst eenigen tijd versleeten met hunne dansers
zien danssen en springen.’ Ceylonese compagniesdienaren schrijven over Kaneel en
kaneelschillers in 1786”, 19-34.
126
Van Goor, Jan Kompenie as schoolmaster, 30-37. For the experience of the Catholics:
Perniola, The Catholic Church in Sri Lanka: The Dutch Period, Vols. 1-4.
127
Van Goor, Jan Kompenie as schoolmaster, 109-121.
128
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, Vol. I, civ-cx; Kotelawele, “The Administration of Jus-
tice under the VOC”, 356-374.
129
Kotelawele, “The VOC in Sri Lanka, 1658-1796: Social and Economic Change in
the Maritime Regions”, 419-422; Paranavitana, Land for Money: Dutch Landregistration in
Sri Lanka. Land registration was taken up already in 1676 in Jaffna, but stopped after the
inhabitants of Jaffna rebelled against the registrations. Van Imhoff was responsible for the
revitilization of this practice.
130
Arasaratnam, “The Indigenous Ruling Class under Colonial Rule in Dutch Mar-
itime Ceylon”, 65.
1781/82 ƒ 419,385.17.8
1782/83 ƒ 641,491.3.8
1783/84 ƒ 938,228.6.–
Income under Van de Graaff 1784/85 ƒ 642,770.1.8
1785/86 ƒ 809,302.15.–
1786/87 ƒ 793,749.17.8
1787/88 ƒ 822,283.1.–
1788/89 ƒ 861712.13.4
1789/90 ƒ 895,959.8.8
1790/91 ƒ 981,979.5.–
1791/92 ƒ 954,575.2.–
Van Angelbeek pointed out that the year 1783/84 had to be considered as an exception,
because over 300,000 guilders were earned by selling the goods of the stranded ship De
Overduin, which had been bound for Malabar.
159
Van Angelbeek must have been well aware that the government of Batavia was in pos-
session of all documents regarding the finances up to this period, and thus it is not likely
that he falsified the numbers. On the other hand, it is not entirely clear what they are
based on. This is not of real importance here though, as it is clear enough that both
expenses and income were increasing.
160
Jacobs, Koopman in Azië, 209-223.
161
On the Japanese copper trade and the British competition in India with copper from
Europe, see Shimada, Intra-Asian Trade in Japanese Copper, 65-129.
162
See for the papers of the military commission: NA (NL), VOC 10022-4; VOC 3843,
NA (NL) Collection Ver Huell 21-32; SLNA, 1/4960-5965.
163
NA (NL) Com. tot OI Handel 128, 31 July 1794 ff. 857-879, Governor and coun-
cil to Batavia, answer to despatch from the Netherlands 26 November 1792, with criti-
cism on military expenses.
164
Jacobs, Koopman in Azië, 73-122 and 218-223. Unfortunately the exchanges
between the Dutch factories in staple goods like arrack, rice and salt are missing from her
analysis. Only the sugar trade receives attention. Perhaps it was impossible to include this
in her research, but it is certainly a topic waiting to be explored.
165
SLNA, 1/2159, 1 September 1791, f. 218: Jaffna to Colombo; SLNA, 1/1795,
letter from Nagel in the Vanni about the elephant trade written 1792.; SLNA, 1/2710,
2 April 1793, memorandum commandeur of Jaffna Bartolomeus Raket for his successor,
f. 13.
166
NA (NL), VOC 3692, 3 March 1785, resolution in council regaring rice delivered
by various traders: Tranchell, the Jew Hain Gabaij, “an Armenian merchant” and “a
banker”. Blume’s proposal: NA (NL), VOC 3573, resolution 17 March 1780. On deliv-
eries by Graaf van Bijland, chief of Sadraspatnam: NA (NL), VOC 3692, resolution
24 June 1785. Conradi was a regular provider of rice: NA (NL), VOC 3842, 7 May 1790,
despatch to Batavia, ff. 2557-2558.
167
The rice prices in 1780s in Madras were also exceptionally high because of droughts,
bad harvests and warfare. Ajuha, “Labour Relations in an Early Colonial Context”, 817-
818.
168
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek; between 1766 and 1784 Falck issued 100 plakkaten,
while Van de Graaff issued the same amount in nine years.
169
Wijnanaendts van Resandt, De gezaghebbers der Oost-Indische Compagnie op haren
buiten comptoiten in Azië, 83-84.
170
SLNA, 1/2707, 12 June 1784, memorandum of the commander of Galle Arnoldus
de Lij for his successor Willem Jacob van de Graaff, ff. 1-16.
171
SLNA, 1/3425 (Buultjens), letters written by Arnoldus de Lij in 1773 and SLNA,
1/2707, 12 June 1784, ff. 1-16.
172
SLNA, 1/5083, 16 November 1784, minutes of the political council of Galle: “mise-
rabele en hulpeloose menschen, en daaronder verschijde met besmettelijke ziektens, die hier en
daar langs de publike weegens leggen te beedelen, en veel al op een beklaagelijke wijze omko-
men”.
173
SLNA, 1/2707, De Lij speaks of the Gaalse ziekte, but from his description, a swollen
TO CHAPTER THREE 227
scrotum and thick legs, venereal disease seems more likely. Another possibility is that he
was dealing with an outburst of elephantiasis, a disease that was still present in that area
the nineteenth century. Perhaps Van de Graaff ’s measures against the prostitutes were
inspired by Thunberg, who complained about the bad hygiene in the garrisons and towns
and pointed at the negative influence of the prostitutes. Thunberg, Voyages de C.P.
Thunberg, Vol. 2, 457.
174
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, Vol. 2, plakkaat 575: hygienic regulation about the
treatment and location of cattle for slaughtering.
175
SLNA, 1/5082, 20 October 1784, minute of the Galle political council.
176
SLNA, 1/1383, 23 June 1784, Van de Graaff from Galle to the political council in
Colombo.
177
SLNA, 1/5082, minutes of the Galle political council July-october 1784.
178
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, plakkaat 578; see also NA (NL), VOC 3692, 10 Fe-
bruary 1785, resolution: in this way the lack of expertise among the headmen could be
checked.
179
Ibid., plakkaat 611: this is a plakkaat for Colombo, but Hovy points out in a note
that this proclamation was based on a sannas issued in Galle on 4 August 1784.
180
See also Section 2.1 on the Dutch use of oeliam services.
181
SLNA, 1/5082, 20 October 1784, minute of the council of Galle.
182
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, plakkaat 608.
183
Ibid., plakkaat 608: extensive regulation for the police 28 December 1786; plakkaat
609: improved instructions for the quarter, or neighbourhood, masters.
184
Ibid., plakkaat 635 regarding the widows and orphans. NA (NL), Com. tot OI han-
del 129, 18 February 1795, ff. 1229-1230 despatch to Batavia. On the small pox inocu-
lation: Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, plakkaat 646, January 1791; first reference to
inoculation: SLNA, 1/193, 22 June 1786, minute political council Ceylon, also refers to
recent epidemic that killed 800.
185
NA (NL), VOC 3689, 28 January 1786, f. 302, despatch to Batavia.
186
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, plakkaat 586; the plakkaat counts 33 sections in total.
187
Ibid., plakkaat 586: sections 1 and 2.
188
Ibid., plakkaat 586.
189
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, plakkaat 615.
190
NA (NL), VOC 3799, 7 August 1788, ff. 44-62, resolution Inlandsch departement:
report of Fretz on land and gardens given out to be cultivated between 9 October 1787
and February 1788.
191
NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 442, 15 July 1794, memorandum of Governor Van
de Graaff for his successor. Ҥ53: In het geen van ouds de Kolombosche dessavonij heeft uit-
gemaakt, is de vordering daar in wel niet groote. Met de kanneel kulture is deeze dessavonij
verscheide jaaren veel te doen geweest. Daar toe heeft heel veel volk moeten worden gebruikt,
en heeft dus in dezelve ter bevordering der nelie kultuure wijnig buitengewoons kunnen wor-
den gedaan.”
192
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, Vol. 2, plakkaat 611.
193
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, Vol. 2, plakkaat 628.
194
NA (NL), VOC 3692, 10 February 1785, resolution in council regarding the native
headmen. This resolution shows that this was the explicit intention of Van de Graaff.
195
Van Niel, Java’s Northeast Coast; Kwee, Political Economy of Java’s Northeast Coast; and
Ota, Changes of Regime and Social Dynamics in West Java.
196
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, Vol. 2, plakkaat 563 on the taxation on transport of
coconuts. The commander of Galle, the dessava of Colombo and the dessava of Matara
all received considerable percentages on the arrack and coir taxes: ANRI, HR, 3855
“Statement of income of all company’s officials 1790”. See the statement of Kraijenhof for
Galle, Fretz for Colombo and Christiaan van Angelbeek for Matara. Coir or coconut fibre
was used to make ropes and sails for the Company’s Ships.
197
Roberts, Caste, Conflict and Elite Formation, 84-89.
198
Kotelawele, “Some Aspects of Social Change”, 97.
199
This continued in the nineteenth century. Burnand, “Fragments on Ceylon”, 560,
states how the headmen started building houses in the European manner, and burned wax
228 NOTES
candles in silver candlesticks in stead of the oil lamp. The headmen made a very rich
impression on Robert Andrews, the first British commissioner for the revenues: NA (UK),
CO 416/22/H10, 10/5 1796, Andrews to Madras.
200
SLNA, 1/5082, 20 October 1784, minutes of the council of Galle, decision to go
ahead with the plan; NA (NL), VOC 3689, 28 January 1786, f. 301, despatch to Batavia
§244&245: positive remarks about the progress in Diviture.
201
ANRI, HR, 3858, 23 April 1791, f. 25 extract from a despatch from Colombo to
Galle; NA (NL), VOC 3840, 12 January 1789, ff. 1983-2073; NA (NL), VOC 3799,
21 October 1788, ff. 63-147 resolution Inlandsch departement: includes report of the com-
mittee, the angry response of Kraijenhof and the comments of the political council and
decision to send out a second committee.
202
These problems of credit would be a very interesting subject of study. It lasted to well
in the twentieth century. For a literary impression on the problems of credit, see Woolf,
The Village in the Jungle.
203
NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 448, unknown author, no date (1792?) ff. 7-8:
“Maar dat de §530 voorgestelde toe eijgening van de ingenieurs, smeeden, oeliassen en 18
famillies van kolenbranders gedurende den tijd van 10 jaren buijtensporig is.”
“Dat hoe loffelijk ook het gedrag van Abbesinge, daar bij deese menschen woonplaatsen aan-
geweesen en hun door zagte behandeling §533 van een swervend leeven afgetrokken, tot goede
ingeseetenen hebbe gemaakt, ook zijn, of schijnen moogen, deese lieden egter niet aan de famil-
lie van Abbesinge overgegeven dienen te werden; maar beschout als waare ondersaten der Ed.
Comp.”
204
NA (NL), VOC 3840, 12 January 1789, f. 2045.
205
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, Vol. 2, plakkaat 595.
206
ANRI, HR, 3855, statement of the income dessava of Colombo (Fretz).
207
NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 444, 21 March 1795, Van de Graaff to the
Commissioners General. Among other things, he discusses his policy to have pepper and
coffee produced by the natives: “uit hoofde van hun verplichte landsdienst” on the basis of
their service-tenures. It goes rather slow, but is costless at the same time, the only thing
needed is the installation of some “opzienders” (supervisors).
208
NA (NL), VOC 3838, 24 April 1789, ff. 976-978.
209
NA (NL), VOC 3689, 28 January 1786, ff. 203-205, despatch to Batavia, discussing
the appointment of lieutenant Mitman as supervisor of the agriculture in the Colombo
dessavony.
210
Some references to the work of the civil engineers, Walhberg and Foenander in the
periphery: NA (NL), VOC 3878, 28 January 1793, ff. 1936-1942; NA (NL), Com. tot
OI handel 128, 31 July 1794, ff. 883-884, on Foenander and the Giant’s tank; Ibid., ff.
1122-1130, on Foenander and Walhberg, and Diviture. The projects in the periphery are
discussed in Chapter Four.
211
ANRI, HR 3852 (the description in the catalogue is incorrect, the contents of the
bundle bearing this number concurs with the description of 3851), 19 April 1790, reso-
lution in council of Galle. The first reports on the complaints of the rebels state that they
talked “over verscheide onrechtvaardigheeden die tans de ingezeetenen aangedaan worden, zeg-
gende dat zij zelvs geen tijd hebben om aan zeegen die hun door het floreeren der velden is toe-
gevallen, en het geen zij aan den goede order en bestelling van den tegenswoordigen Heer des-
save verschuldigd zijn met rust te genieten, wijl zij geduurig moeten werken in de kaneel plan-
tagies nu een svan den Wel Edelen Grootachtbaaren heer Gouverneur, dan van welgemelde heer
dessave of ook wel van de modliaars en andere hoofden. Hier op gedagte drie perzoonenen zich
stilhoudende kwam er een groot geroep als uijt eenen monde, Je verswijgt niet dat wij ook moe-
ten werken in de kanneel thuijn van de arraatjes.”
212
Ibid.
213
SLNA, 1/2159, 1791 correspondences Inlandsch departement; NA (NL), VOC
3842, 1790 ff 2514-2565, various reports and letters; NA (NL), Collectie Alting 82-83,
letters from Sluijsken, mostly relating to the rebellion; NA (NL), HR 596-597, 1790-
1791, 2 reports on the rebellion: one by Sluijsken and one by Fretz and Samlant; ANRI,
HR 3852 (confused in catalogue with 3851).
214
An example of Sluijsken’s patronage in Galle: SLNA, 1/2161, 28 March 1793, ff. 18-
TO CHAPTER THREE 229
19. Case of Andries Fernando Jajewardene vidahn arrachi, headman of the barber caste in
the Galle corle. He had been a loyal caste-headman since the commandership of de Lij.
But when Sluijsken took office he brought his own confidant, named Gabidja from
Colombo and discharged Fernando Jayawardene and appointed this Gabidja as headman.
Furthermore, Gabidja accused him of witchcraft, which he was supposed to have
employed to get rid of Gabidja.
215
NA (UK), CO 54/31, despatch Governor Maitland to London 1809, f. 141.
216
ANRI, HR 3855, no folio, statement of Fretz on the income of the dessava of
Colombo, 1790.
217
De Bruijn and Raben, eds, The World of Jan Brandes, 1743-1808, 239-241.
218
On the endeavours of Von Ranzow: SLNA, 1/2708, memorandum of chief of
Kalpetty Von Ranzow for his successor: remarks on his cotton plantations f. 34; NA (NL),
Collectie Nederburgh 442, 15 July 1794, memorandum Van de Graaff for his successor,
§133. Other examples NA (NL), VOC 3841, 27 January 1790, f. 2174 on the sale of the
plantation of dessava De Cock. NA (NL), VOC 3689, 28 January 1786, f. 304, on the
sales of the plantation of Lieutenant Rudolf.
219
Bertolacci, A View of the Agricultural, Commercial and Financial Interests of Ceylon,
32.
220
NA (NL), Collectie Alting 93, writing of Sluijsken 1796. “Op het aller onverwagts
wierden de hier voorengem. Bartolomeus de Zilva, Don Daniel Perera, Simon De Silva, Don
Gregorius, gearresteerd en beschuldigd dat eenige pasquillen tegens den Heer Gouverneur zoude
hebben gemaakt en op de weegen verstrooijt: zonder verhoord gecondemneerd verzonden te
worde NB naderhand sijn even gelijk libellen op de algemeene weegen nog verstrooijt gevonden
geworden. De Mohotiaar na Jaffenapatnam en d’drie anderen na Trinkonomale als suspecte
perzoonen: en waardoor men dus de commandeur Sluijsken de geleegenheijd meende afgesnee-
den te hebben, van eenig vertrouweling meer te hebben, ider was zeeker verschrokken over deeze
wreede handelinge en nog te meer daar men verspreijde commandeurs voorspraak: die zig egter
alleen bepaald hadde tot zijne dinaar den gem: mohandiram der wilsdschutters Simon de Zilva
welke commandeurs partikuliere zaaken behandelde en met wien hij commandeur bijna een
reekening van 40 duijzend rds hadde: geen het minste gehoor in deezen hadden gevonden.”
221
Neild-Basu, “The Dubashes of Madras”, 4-9; and Arasaratnam, “Trade and Political
Dominion in South India, 1750-1790”, 19-40.
222
Bertolacci, A View of the Agricultural, Commercial and Financial Interests of Ceylon,
32-33.
223
Roberts, Caste Conflict and Elite Formation, 83.
224
NA (NL), Collectie Alting 93, writings of Sluijsken 1796. “Bij desselfd afsterven hadde
Abesinge den Mahamodliaar de Saram, den attepattoe Modliaar te Gale [...] den vrijkoopman
Philip Simon de Waas, zijne twee nagelaatene zoon Balthazar en [...] neffens de modliaar der
vissers Renaldus de Anderado, tot executeurs sijne uijterste wille aangestelt, en benoemt, en die
dan ook immediant, tot sekerheid van alles te kunnen opneemen en nagaan, eene generaal
beseegeling van alles hebben gedaan.”
225
SLNA, 1/5082, 20 October 1784, minutes council Galle; SLNA, 1/5084, 30 De-
cember 1784, minutes council Galle; NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 442, §120-123.
226
NA (NL), VOC 3692, resolution 4 June 1785, yearly memorandum on debtors: this
lists mudaliyārs, Moors, Chetties, Dutch and Portuguese Burghers, and people bearing
Portuguese names (Karāva or other coastal inhabitants). About frauds of company offici-
als with the tax farms: Bartolomeus Raket was a major example in this period, his case is
discussed below. NA (NL), Com. tot OI handel 129, 18 February 1795, ff. 1303-1321,
despatch to Batavia.
227
SLNA, 1/5082 & 5083, 16 November 1784, minutes political council Galle.
228
Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, Vol. 2, plakkaat 622.
229
See Chapter Four.
230
On the landtombo: NA (NL), VOC 3571, 26 January 1781, f. 387, despatch to
Batavia; SLNA, 1/179, 29 July 1779, minutes of the political council Colombo.
231
This committee was composed of Nagel, Ebell, Williamsz, and Mooijaart. About the
reasons for the instalment of the committee and the consequent devepments: NA (NL),
Com. tot OI handel 129, 18 February 1795, ff. 1303-1321, despatch to Batavia. For the
230 NOTES
265
SLNA, 1/2792, Thursday 8 June, f. 20: “smorgens 10 minuten over half 5 uuren ver-
trok ik van Kooij Koedieroeppoe na het berugte en door geen Mallabaren zonder schrik
genoemd wordende Kandelaaij. Alles was aangewend om het mij te beletten; waerschouwin-
gen, vermaeningen en het geen het ergste was; aanhaalingen van een meenigte voorbeelden, die
ik wist maar al te waarachtig te zijn, van nieuwsgierigen, die kort na de bezoeking gestorven
of nimmer van kweijnende ziektens hersteld waaren, dog niets hielp; het nut van de
Kandalaaijsche tank, voor den landbouw van de provintsie Tamblegammo was te gewigtig, dan
dat ik dit beroemde werk niet met eijgen oogen zoude gaan zien.-Voor den berugten duijvel
Poedem, die als dienaar van den koning Kollekooten de beschoeijing van den tank in zes dagen
gemaakt heefd en de zelve als nog moet bewaeren, was ik niet bang, dog wel voor de papjes en
kookzeltjjes der bij geloovigen [...].”
266
SLNA, 1/2972, f. 21 “gelijk ik dagt, door menschen gemaekt, schoon zij het de geesten
toeschreeven.”
267
SLNA, 1/2972, f. 22.
268
SLNA, 1/2972, f. 24, Wednesday 14 June. Because this man had a wife and children,
he proposed that they would have the right to the fields on which his body parts were to
fall down. His fellow country men accepted his offer and the bravery of the victim. He
was crushed against the cliffs by the strong force of the water and parts of his body stran-
ded at various places and were returned to his wife and children. Though because for prac-
tical reasons they preferred to have one piece of land joined together, they chose the field
on which his right arm landed (because that hand had worked to open the tank) and as
many fields surrounding it as they had found parts of his body. “Zijn lands lieden namen
het beding aan en den braven Tamblegammer wierd, zijn vaderland gered hebbende, het slag-
toffer zijner grootmoedigheijd; hij wierd doord en sterken drang van water tusschen de klippen
vermorseld en de deelen van zijn lichaam kwamen op verscheijde plaatsen aandrijven, die ook
werkelijk aan zijn vrouw en kinderen toegeweesen wierden, dog deze om het gemak wille, lie-
ver alles bij een willende hebben, verzogt en verkreegen het veld, waar op / zeeker, wijl die het
werktuig der openening van de tang gevoerd had/ den regter arm aangedreeven was en zoo veel
velden rondom dit, als er stukken van zijn lighaam gevonden wierden.” Van Senden empha-
sized that he was not sure whether the story was true, but it seemed that some of the elder-
ly had been acquainted with the washerman’s children, though in Van Senden’s time of his
descendants was still alive. Quote in text: “Om de eer van het menschdom wenschte ik het
geval als waaragtig te kunnen boekstaven, het op een steen te laaten uijtsnijden in verschillen-
de taalen en er onder aan te schrijven met Gulde letteren Welk een man! Welk een vader! doch
voor al welk een meede burger!”
269
NA (NL), Com. tot OI handel 128, 31 July 1794, despatch to Batavia, f. 1132.
270
NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 442, §52 and 53.
271
This point is made by Arasaratnam in his article “The Vanniar of North Ceylon”.
272
NA (NL), VOC 3571, despatch to Batavia, 26 January 26, ff. 390-393; NA (NL),
3573, resolution 7 March 1780. More extensively about this operation SLNA, 1/1296,
minutes of the policital council of Jaffna, March-August 1780.
273
NA (NL), VOC 3692, resolution 26 April 1785 and NA (NL) VOC 3693, resolu-
tion 2 August 1785.
274
NA (NL), HR 585, “Memorie over den staat der Wannijsche landen [...]”, 23/5 1793.
275
One parrah of paddy equals twenty-eight pounds. Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, Vol.
2, appendix 1.
276
NA (UK), 55/1, 2 August 1796, f. 137: “List of Company servants in the Vanni in
need of subsistence”. Next to their names and functions their background is mentioned.
Most are called “of Portuguese native descent”, but bear typical Dutch names like Jan
Anthony Twekkerts or Johan Carel de Hoed.
277
The Jaffanese laws and customs, called Thesalavamai, were codified by Governor
Simons in 1706. Nadaraja, The Legal System of Ceylon in its Historical Setting , 13.
278
NA (NL), HR 585, “Memorie over den staat der Wannijsche landen [...]”, 23/5 1793.
16-17. (No folio-numbers are given in the document. In my transcription I numbered the
pages myself, these are the page-numbers referred to.)
279
NA (NL), HR 585, 31. Blom, Verhandelingen van den Landbouw in de colonie
Suriname, a popular title in the Netherlands at the time. See Sens, “Mensaap, heiden,
TO CHAPTER FIVE 233
slaaf ”, 28, 100, 122.
280
Slaves would have been expensive and there was great risk that they would flee to the
Kandyan Kingdom. That is why he had to use salaried labourers from the area. NA (NL),
HR 585, 31-33.
281
Arasaratnam, “The Vanniar of North Ceylon”. He uses the term feudal to define the
relationship of the vanniyārs with their subjects.
282
NA (UK), CO 54/42, 26 February - 29 March 1812, f. 74 no date. The circum-
stances were: war with England, no ships to Holland, disastrous events in Switzerland,
bankruptcy of his agent Ritmeyer in Amsterdam, and finally, the French occupation of the
Netherlands rendered his investments in public funds worthless. See also the introduction
to Burnand’s “Fragments on Ceylon”, 440. He was looked at with “utmost respect by the
Europeans and native inhabitants”.
283
NA (UK), CO 54/125, f. 655. Unlike Nagel’s memorandum, Burnand’s memoran-
dum was not supposed to be sent to Colombo, Batavia or elsewhere, nor was it written to
sell a plan or to secure a career. It was meant only to inform his successor. In comparison
with Nagel, Burnand gives more detailed descriptions of his policies and goes into the
practical aspects of ruling the district in depth. It is a long and extensive document cover-
ing of about three hundred pages.
284
NA (UK) CO 416/24, f. 131. Although the memorandum is divided in five para-
graphs, the composition of the document is not that different from the one written by
Nagel: Burnand starts with an introduction on the ancient history of the island and the
state of the district under the Kandyan government until 1766. Next he discusses the
changes which the government undertook during Francke’s term of office. He then goes
on to explain the measures he took during his own administration, followed by an
overview of the civil service in the district. Finally he discusses the plans he made for
improvement of the district in the future.
285
Burnand speaks even of 2,000 lasten in his fragments (= 150,000 parras).
286
NA (UK) CO 416/24, f. 168.
287
Ibidem, ff. 139-140.
288
Ibidem, f. 147.
289
Idem and Ibidem, f. 203. James Cordiner, A Description of Ceylon, 350: one of the
descriptions of a journey made by Thomas Christie from Batticaloa to Matara gives evi-
dence of Burnand’s irrigation works.
290
Such categorization of people is a subject of research in itself, for which this memoir
could serve well as a practical example.
291
NA (UK), CO 416/24, f. 177.
292
Ibid., ff. 155-157 and 189.
293
Ibid., f. 175. In fact, he states that the native servants wish to be treated that way and
that they are “being respectfull and obedient pro rato the severity with which they are
treated when found guilty of an offence for they are regardless to a more gentle and indul-
gent treatment”.
294
Ibid., f. 177.
295
Ibid., ff. 167, 217 and 218 (praise); Hovy, Ceylonees plakkaatboek, Vol. 2, plakkaat
595 and 596, and NA (NL), VOC 3692, resolutions 27 February 1785 and 26 April
1785.
296
NA (UK), CO 416/24, ff. 184-186.
297
Ibid., ff. 197-199.
301
Pitts, A Turn to Empire, 25-58, on Adam Smith on development; Pagden, Lords of All
the World, 113; on Quesnay and his ideal of the agrarian nation.
302
Sens, “Mensaap, heiden, slaaf ”. See also her recent article, “Dutch Debates on Over-
seas Man and his World, 1770-1820”. Marshall and Williams, The Great Map of
Mankind, 214-221. Schutte, “De Nederlandse Patriotten en de koloniën”, 1-6.
303
Sens, “Mensaap, heiden, slaaf ”, 129-135, and Marshall and Williams, Great Map of
Mankind, 128-155, 299-305.
304
Schutte, “De Nederlandse Patriotten en de koloniën”, 103. For a discussion of the
plans for the organizational and financial improvement see: Steur, Herstel of ondergang.
305
Oostindie, “Same Old Song?”, 179-193.
306
Van Zonneveld, “Een échte antikoloniaal”, 19-29. This may be explained by the fact
that Haafner published these accounts between 1806 and 1810, when the Batavian
Republic was at war with the British. The work of Haafner is curious, in particular his sto-
ries of Ceylon; they read more like adventure novels than as real travel accounts. Van
Zonneveld also emphasizes the influence of early Romanticism on his work. Between
1992 and 1997 the Linschoten Vereniging published all Haafner’s writings in De Moor
and Van der Velde, De werken van Jacob Haafner.
307
Drescher, “The Long Goodbye”, 25-67, and Oostindie, “Introduction”, 1-25.
308
Sens, “Dutch Antislavery Attitudes in a Decline-Ridden Society, 1750-1815”, 89-
105.
309
Bataviaasch Genootschap voor Kunsten en Wetenschap, a detailed study of which is
in Groot, Van de Grote Rivier naar het Koningsplein.
310
Schutte, “De Nederlandse Patriotten en de koloniën”, 214-216.
311
Ibid. Studies on early nineteenth-century ideology: Schutte, “Winds of Change”,
154-163; Van Goor, “Continuity and Change”; Schrieke, “The Native Rulers”, 185-186.
About the plans and policies of Dirk van Hogendorp: Van Niel, “Dutch Views and Uses
of British Policy in India around 1800”, and Paasman, “Het onvolmaakte paradijs”, 30-
51.
312
NA (NL), Collectie Van Braam 115, 30 December 1785: “Den grooten Venalon, in
zijne Telemachus, den cardinaal Alberonie, in zijn testament politique en d’abt Reijnaal, in
zijne histoire politique en Philospique bewijsen ons alle, dat het de pligt is van alle regenten,
om hunne ondergeschikte aan te moedigen, tot de commercie en den landbouw zij pretendee-
ren, dat deese twee takken, de bron des overvloeds in een land zijn zij zeggen al verder, door
deese in vleur (bloei) te brengen, ’t eenigste middel is, om een land magtig en bloeijend te
maken, en wijsen al verder aan hoe noodsakelijk ’t is, het volk door beloning daar toe te ani-
meeren. Men pretendeert dat alle regerende vorsten in Europa dit politique systeme reeds heb-
ben aangenomen. Het eijland Ceijlon, is algemeen bekend, seer vrugtbaar te weesen, ’t legdon-
der een seer gelukkiglijk climaat, d’inwoonders zoude niet soo als tegenwoordig aan alles gebrek
hebben indien men d’handen aan ’t werk wilden slaan, om van dit eiland haar vrugtbaarheid
gebruik te maaken.”
313
Among the rest of the letters in this bundle we find his curriculum vitae and direct
demand for promotion, descriptions of the islands government and ideas for improve-
ment.
314
The book was not only of his hand, but in fact a compilation of texts by various
authors, of whom Diderot was the most important contributor; see Wolpe, Raynal et sa
machine de guerre, and Pagden, Lords of All the World, 163-177. For an analysis of Diderot’s
contributions see Muthu, Enlightenment against Empire, 72-122.
315
On the various editions and additions by other authors: Wolpe, Raynal et sa machine
de guerre, and Feugère, Bibliography critique de l’abbé Raynal.
316
Irvine, “The Abbe Raynal and British Humanitarianism”, 564-577.
317
Raynal, Histoire philosophique et politique des établissemens & du commerce des
Européens dans les Deux Indes. 7 vols. (The Hague, 1774), Vol. 1, Book 2, 257: “A Ceylon,
beaucoup plus encore que dans le reste de l’Inde, les terres appartiennent en propriété au souve-
rain. Ce systême destructeur a eu, dans cette isle, les suites funestes qui en sont inséperables. Les
peoples y vivent dans l’inaction la plus entière. Ils sont logés dans les cabanes; ils n’ont point des
meubles; et ils vivent des fruits; et les plus aisés n’ont pout vêtement, qu’une piece de grosse toile,
qui leur ceint le milieu du corps. Que les Hollandois fassent ce qu’on peut reprocher à toutes les
TO CHAPTER FIVE 235
nations, qui ont établi les colonies en Asie, de n’avoir jamais tenté: qu’ils distribuent des
terreins proper aux familles. Elles oublieront, détesteront peut être leur ancien souverain; elles
s’attacheront au gouvernement, qui s’occupera de leur bonheur; elle travailleront, elles consom-
meront. Alors, l’isle de Ceylon jouira de l’opulence, à laquelle la nature l’a destinée. Elle sera à
l’abri des revolutions, et en état de soutenir les établissemens de Malabar et de Coromandel,
qu’elle est chargée de protéger.”
318
Muthu, Enlightenment against Empire. 102, 108-109, and Pagden, Lords of all the
World, 163-165. Raynal is often described as relatively moderate, in particular regarding
the anti-slavery debate. The more radical contributions came from Diderot. This explains
some of the ambiguities in the text. For example, Raynal did not directly support the abo-
lition of slavery on San Domingo. In his piece about Ceylon in the 1776 edition of his
Histoire he even suggested fetching slaves from the Moluccas to cultivate waste land in
Ceylon and to serve as good example for the inhabitants of Ceylon.
319
Raynal, Histoire (English edition 1798 / reprint New York 1969), Vol. 1, Book 2,
276.
320
The inventory of the estate of warehousemaster Cellarius, gives us an overview of an
extremely rich collection of books, old and contemporary, including a copy of Raynal’s
Histoire. TSA/DR/1557: “Papieren betreffende de boedel en nalaatenschap van de heer Johan
Adam Cellarius tot den 31 december 1803.” (With the courtesy of Ms. Anjana Singh.)
Cellarius had good connections with Van Angelbeek, who wrote about him to Neder-
burgh: “Hij is twintig jaar onderkoopman, een bekwaam dienaar, een geleerd en beleezen, en
het geen meer bij mij geacht word, een eerlijk deugdzaam man, weshalven ik hem mijn favo-
rabel getuignis niet durve weigeren.” NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 141, no date
(c. 1791).
321
Schutte, “De Nederlandse Patriotten en de koloniën”, 150-175.
322
SLNA, 1/5083, defense of the mudaliyār: “De s. heeft nooit iemand van zijne onder-
hoorige niets met geweld afgenoomen doch hij heeft en wil dit niet verbergen eenige paressen
van hen ontvangen, die ze naar ’slandsgewoonte aan hem gebracht hebben. Dit is in de
Matureesche dessavonij voor geen verboode zaak gehouden en van alle de inlandsche hoofden
in dezelve dessavonij zal er vermoedelijk geen een gevonden worden die wanneer daar na
behoorlijk onderzoek gedaan wierd, niet zal blijken het zelfde te hebben gedaan ten aanzien
van hunne ondergeschikten, tot dat het neemen van geschenken door UwelEdele gestrenge
grootagtbare onlangs strengelijk verbooden is. De suppliant zoo wel als de andere hoofden in de
Matureesche dessavonij hebben dit te minder voor een misdaad gehouden, wijl ook zij alle
wanneer ze een dienst verkrijgen de gebruijken ten hunne opzigte in agt neemen.” It was deci-
ded that he had to pay a fine and would be reinstated in office, for the proclamation had
been implemented only very recently. The case would however be used as an example to
others.
323
Raynal often refers to Van Imhoff and to Mossel in his piece about the VOC esta-
blishments in Asia.
324
SLNA, 1/2792, Tuesday 25 May, f. 9: “Dat zoo lang hij [de vanniyār] als regent en
vader van zijn volk niet voor de opvoeding der kinderen zorge, hij nimmer hoopen konden
gezag over de menschen te voeren, dog dat het slegts menschen in gedaente en domme botte
gediertens in der daed zouden blijven, aan wien nimmer enige lust tot het verbeeteren hunner
staat en gevolgelijk die van het land hunner inwooning zoude kunnen inboezemen.”
325
He repeatedly made remarks like “De aard der ingezeetenen is die, welke het naast aan
dien der woestheijd komt” (the character of the inhabitant resembles most closely that of
savageness): SLNA, 1/2792, f.14; or he talks about inhabitants who “buijten de gedaente
en spraek niets menschelijks vertoonden” (apart from looks and speach do not appear
human), SLNA, 1/2792, f. 23.
326
SLNA, 1/2792, f. 15.
327
SLNA, 1/2792, f. 15. “Den inlander eens bij ondervinding hebbende, hoe een grootere
werkzaamheijd hem niet alleen aanzien maar ook een aangename overvloed bezorgde zoude
zich van alle moogelijke middelen bedienen om beijde te vermeerderen en dus zijn zoonen niet
meer tot hun vijftiende of sestiende jaar te laaten loopen, zonder ander werk te verrigten dan
’savonds de geesten van den vader vast te binden en ’smorgens weder los te maken.”
328
SLNA, 1/2792, Van Senden refers to Sonnerat when he discusses the resemblance
236 NOTES
between the tripod of Shiva and that of Neputunus. About Sonnerat and his interest in
Indian religions and iconography, see Mitter, Much Maligned Monsters, 82.
329
SLNA, 1/2792, 21 June, f. 31.
330
NA (UK), CO 55/1, 10 July 1796 General Stuart to Barbut, officer commanding at
Jaffenapatnam.
331
Oostindie, “Same Old Song?”, 153.
332
NA (NL), HR 585, for example: 4, 12, 13, 16, 19.
333
NA (NL), HR 585, 12, 13.
334
Ibid., 5: about migration to the district: “Dog deese ingeseetenen weten er niets bij over-
levering van, nog in geschrift nog bij monde, zij weeten dus van hunne afkomst niets te bren-
gen.”
335
Not surprisingly, this is the “Parable of the Tenants”, which is concerned with the
behaviour of husbandmen towards their landowner.
336
NA (NL), HR 585, 7-9; quotation: 6.
337
Ibid., 10: “De wanniasse wetten waaren dus zeer kort, want zij hadden gene, nog van
ouds, nog van den landsheer in geschrift.”
338
Ibid., 10-12. He writes literally that they ruled: “dispolisch en strijdig met de wetten
der natuur”.
339
Ibid., 19. Literally: “[...] om hun tot meerder trap van menschelijkheid te brengen [...]”;
other examples of similar expression are “inspire the nation with human feelings” (de natie
menschelijke gevoelens inboesemen) and “the reform of a wild nation” (hervorming eener
woeste natie).
340
Ibid., 4: “hunne begrippen, hun caracter, hunne neijgingen kunnen ongetwijfeld verbee-
terd worden onder den invloed eens geschikten mentors.” Nagel draws the father-child paral-
lel literally, further on in the memorandum, at page 27.
341
I have checked the following works whose authors wrote about the Vanni either
because of their administrative connection with the district, or because they travelled
there: Wolf, Reyze naar Ceylon benevens een berigt van de Hollandse regeering te
Jafanapatnam (Den Haag, 1783); Pieters, Memoir of Hendrick Zwaardecroon; Pieters,
“Memoir left by Anthony Paviljoen”; Cordiner, A Description of Ceylon (London 1807);
and Lewis, A Manual of the Vanni districts, Ceylon (1895).
342
Colonel Stuart mentioned his great wealth NA (UK), CO 55/1, Stuart to Barbut,
10 July 1796. How he gathered this wealth remains unclear. In an anonymous document,
written around 1793, Nagel’s administration is called obscure. Moreover, this person
claimed that it was common knowledge that Nagel made large profits from the trade in
timber from the region. NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 448. Perhaps he also made some
profits on his plantations: he mentions one large coconut tree plantation in his memoran-
dum. According to Wolf, Reyze naar Ceylon, 186, his place of residence on the east coast,
Mullaitivu, was a well-known smuggling port.
343
See Section 4.5.
344
Vedahs were people living a nomadic live in the woods. They were said to have been
the first inhabitants of the island.
345
NA (UK), CO 54/125, ff. 659-663.
346
Idem.
347
Ibid., f. 161.
348
NA (UK), CO 54/125, f. 687.
349
NA (UK), CO 416/24, f. 164.
350
He makes this point in his “Fragments on Ceylon” (1809).
351
Van Goor, Kooplieden, predikanten en bestuurders overzee. Beeldvorming en plaatsbepa-
ling in een andere wereld, 135-195.
352
NA (UK), CO 416/24, ff. 145 and 182.
353
Emmer, “The Ideology of Free Labour and Dutch Colonial Policy, 1830-1870”, 207-
223. According to Emmer, Dutch colonial policy-making was characterized by the limit-
ed impact of the free-labour ideology in comparison to that of the British. In fact the suc-
cesses of the cultuurstelsel in Java reinforced the Dutch reliance on unfree (slave) labour
in the West.
TO CHAPTER SIX 237
Notes to Chapter Six
354
Arasaratnam, “Dutch Sovereignty in Ceylon”, 105-121.
355
NA (NL), VOC 3571, 16 August 1780, ff. 94, 96, 119-200: references to princess-
es for the king of Kandy. NA (NL) VOC 3842, 7 May 1790: references to contact with
the Nabob of Karnataka.
356
This had to do with a disagreement on the measurement of the distances between the
shore and the border. The Kandyan measurements did not concur with the Dutch: obvi-
ously the Dutch measured a wider strip of land than the Kandyans.
357
Rasanayagam, “Tamil Documents”, 18-22; he refers on these pages to Tamil letters
in the Sri Lanka National archives nos. K45, K24, K38, K43 and K 64. The French, at
that point allied with the Dutch, kindly declined the king’s offer.
358
Tammita-Delgoda, “The English East India Company and Sri Lanka, 1760-1796”,
531-552. V.L.B. Mendis, The Advent of the British to Ceylon, 52-79.
359
See also Section 11.1 on this issue.
360
Wagenaar, “Knielen of buigen?”, 441-446.
361
NA (NL), VOC 3664, 20 March 1784, Governor Falck to the Kandyan dessava of
the Three and Four korales.
362
NA (NL), VOC 3665, January 1785, ff. 1032-1034 notes of the dealings with the
Kandyan envoys.
363
NA (NL), VOC 3692, resolution 6 February 1785.
364
Gaastra, De geschiedenis van de VOC, 66.
365
Kanapathypillai, Dutch Rule in Maritime Ceylon, 156-164.
366
Perhaps the strict attitude towards possession of the coast had to do with the fact that
following the peace negotiations of the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War, the Dutch had been
obliged to admit foreign traders
367
NA (NL), VOC 3692, resolution in council, 10 February 1785.
368
NA (NL), VOC 3841, 27 January 1790.
369
Kanapathypillai, Dutch Rule in Maritime Ceylon, 156-170.
370
SLNA, 1/3317, 24 March 1790, report of the embassy to Kandy by Van Vollenhove.
371
NA (NL), HR 532, secret resolutions, 7 May - 17 June 1791.
372
Colonel de Meuron from Switzerland was in charge of the Regiment de Meuron,
which was placed on Ceylon in 1788 for its defense. NA (NL), HR 532, ff. 98-99. The
colonel was instructed to judge for himself the feasibility of Eknelligoda’s plans. Ibid.,
f. 43.
373
NA (NL), VOC 3975, 18 March 1792, correspondence between Colombo and
Pondicherry; Ibid., 8 January 1793, Colombo to Batavia with a recapitulation of the
whole affair. Some of the letters are to be found among the Tamil letters in the Sri Lanka
National archives Rasanayagam, “Tamil Documents in Government Archives”, 23-28.
374
NA (NL), VOC 3975, despatches to Batavia 24 May 1792 and 31 December 1792.
The king in question was Narendra Singha (1707-1739).
375
NA (NL), Com. tot de O/I handel 128, 31 July 1794: generale beschrijvingen with
extracts of the Patriasche missive, ff. 880-881.
376
SLNA, 1/3350, letters relating to Kandy 1791-1795. Many letters between 1793 and
1795 concern the question of the embassies. From September 1795 the letters of Van
Angelbeek concern the English. NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 442, memorie van
Overgave Governor Van de Graaff to his successor Johan Gerard van Angelbeek, 15 July
1794, §260-261. NA (NL), VOC 3975, 11 January 1793, Colombo to Batavia, ff. 644-
645.
377
NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 442, paragraphs 4 and 8.
378
Pieter Sluijsken was commander of Galle 1788-1792 and commander of Suratte
from 1792 until 1796. The documents in question are the following: NA (NL), Collectie
Alting 93, NA (NL) Collectie Nederburgh 440. The first is dated 17 February 1796, just
after the British take over of the Dutch possessions on the island. The second was written
in the autumn of 1792, just after the borders with the Kingdom were reopened.
379
“Governor’s gate” is a translation of the Portuguese porta, referring to the palace and
therefore the importance of this function, as the first advisor of the governor.
238 NOTES
380
NA (NL), Collectie Alting 93. NA (NL) Collectie Nederburgh 440.
381
Kanapathypillai, Dutch Rule in Maritime Ceylon, 156-216.
382
NA (UK), CO 416/24, 5 February 1809. Jacob Burnand refers here to the argument
between Sluijsken and the governor, concerning the production of cinnamon in planta-
tions, but it shows how important the status of a position was to Sluijsken: “cette question
dans laquelle le premier ne peut être pas trop de bonne fois parceque la culture dimminnoit
l’importance de son employ.”
383
First mention of Sri Sanka Sarie and decision to inform the court about him: NA
(NL), VOC 3837, 10 November 1789, ff. 745-749, despatch to Batavia. NA (NL), VOC
3975, 24 May 1792, despatch to Batavia, ff. 295-300. Van de Graaff suggest here that it
would be a good idea if Sri Sanka Sarie was sent back from Batavia to Colombo.
384
In fact there were rumours going around in 1792 that Sluijsken corresponded with
the dessava of Sabaragamuwa, Leeuke, who was an enemy of Pilime Talawe: NA (NL),
VOC 3975, 31 December 1792, despatch to Batavia, ff. 302 and 304. In his own writ-
ings Sluijsken stresses that he was highly appreciated by the Kandyan courtiers, NA (NL)
Collectie Alting 93.
385
NA (NL), VOC 3975, f. 309 about a letter received from Pilime Talawe, in which
he asks the Dutch to help him depose the king: “Dat de waare meening daarvan ons scheen
te zijn, om aan te duijden dat men het hof door active middelen moest doen buijgen, daarmee-
de kan een man van gematigde gevoelens, niet wel geagt worden iets anders te hebben bedoeld,
dan zijn land en landgenooten van de overheersching der Naijkers te bevrijden, en de goede
harmonie tusschen hof en komp. Als de eerste grondslag van de welvaart en zelfs het voortdu-
ren van het Kandiasche rijk te herstellen, en we denken daarom zeer needrig, dat hij, zoo wel
als wij, overtuijgd zijnde dat dit door zagte middelen nimmer op eene toerijkende wijze zoud
bereijkt worden, door het geeven van dien raad, zoo min verdiend ene landverraader genoemd
te worden, als een heelmeester, die geen kans ziet een wonde te geneezen als met het snijmes,
daarom verdiend een moordenaar genoemd te worden.”
386
NA (NL), VOC 3975, 31 December 1792, despatch to Batavia, f. 281.
387
Gunawardana, “Colonialism, Ethnicity and the Construction of the Past”, 199. The
poem in question is called Asadisadâ Kava. On temple restorations and land grants see
Coomaraswamy, Mediaeval Sinhalese Art, 13, 56, 131, 188, 206, and 277.
388
K.M. de Silva, A History of Sri Lanka, 222.
389
OIOC G/11/1, ff. 469-470.
390
NA (NL), VOC 3842, 7 May 1790, seperate despatch to Batavia, ff. 2620-2622: “een
tijd lang geleeden deed mij den eersten hofsgrooten die ik reeden heb te gelooven dat de komp.
Zeer is toegedaan in vrij onbewimpelde termen weeten, dat de koning anders een goed man,
zig wat veel begon over te geeven aan zijne plaisieren, en om zoo te spreeken daar van zijne
voornaamste bezigheijd maakte.”
391
R. Pieris, Sinhalese Social Organisation, 207.
392
NA (NL), VOC 3842, 7 May 1790, seperate despatch to Batavia, ff. 2620-2622 “[...]
Dat deeze Naikers zig hier door [presenten van de kust aan de koning] diep begonnen door te
dringen in ‘skonings gunst zoo dat hij hun tegens de gewoonte nu en dan begon te gebruiken
tot bestellingen in het land, het geen niet alleen strekte tot merkelijk ongenoegen van de hofs-
grooten, maar ook doorgaans uitliep op verschijde knevelarijen op den gemeenen man.”
393
NA (NL), VOC 3975, 31 December 1792, appendix to despatch to Batavia, ff. 350-
356: “[...] Ten eenenmaal in genoomen met de verderflijke projekten der Naikers, die hem
omringen, ziet de koning gerust zijnen onderdaanen lijden, zonder de middelen te zoeken om
de dingen te herstellen volgens den inhoud van het vredens en alliantie traktaat, het welk tus-
schen de Ed. Komp. en de Singaleesche natie subsisteerd. Eindelijk is het hatelijk projekt, waar-
toe de koning zig heeft laaten overhaalen, en waer bij hij volstandig schijnt te blijven, ten dui-
delijksten voor den dag gekomen. God die ’t eiland Ceilon en de Singaleesche natie beschermt,
heeft in handen van den heer Gouverneur doen vallen den brief van de koning, welke aan-
toond dat hij de zwakheid gehad heeft, gehoor te geeven aan de schaadelijke raadgeevingen van
de ontrouwe Naikers die bij hem zijn, en dat hij niet alleen heeft toegestaan, maar zelfs ver-
zogt om troupes van eene vreemde mogentheid op dit eiland te doen koomen. Deeze ontrouwe
Naikers, die bij den koning zijn, afgunstig dat ze niet ook over de Singaleesche natie kunnen
oeffenen, die verdrukkingen die de Mallabaaren gewoon zijn te oefenen tegens een elk die ze
TO CHAPTER SEVEN 239
kunnen vertrappen, hadden zig niets minder voorgesteld dan dat ze door vreemde troupen op
dit eiland te doen koomen, gemakkelijk de grote des rijks en alle verdere aanzienlijke
Singaleeschen zouden kunnen vernielen. ‘Door den een na den anderen op te offeren aan hunne
wraakzugt en misdadige uitzigten, zouden ze spoedig de eenigste raadsluiden van de koning
geworden zijn, en niets zouden ze ontzien hebben om den totalen on dergang der Grooten te
berokkenen, en het volk onder zwaare juk te brengen [….]”
394
See for example NA (NL), VOC 3691, 26 and 30 November 1785, ff. 637-640.
395
NA (NL), VOC 3837, 9 February 1789, despatch to Batavia.
396
Vimaladharma, Directory of the Office Holders of the Kandyan Kingdom.
397
NA (NL), VOC 3975, 31 December 1792, f. 262: “[…] en aan hem uit naam van
den opperpriester Karetotte Oenanse is koomen verzoeken, om aan de Maha Modliaar bekent
te maaken, dat wijl er tans over en weer boodschappen gingen, er midsdien door het geheele
land faam was, dat de vreede zoude getroffen worden, dit een zeer goede zaak was, dog dat
schoon het ook tot een oorlog mogte komen de ingezetenen van de Saffregam de comp. Niet
zouden tegenvallen.”
398
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 1, 149-150.
1796, Sluijsken argues that if Van Angelbeek had managed to appease the Kandyans he
could have stood a chance against the British. For further discussion of the allegations
against Van Angelbeek see Nypels, Hoe Nederland Ceylon verloor, 59-95; Fyres, “A Collec-
tion of Notes on the Attack and Defence of Colombo”; Thomé, “Governor van Angelbeek
and the Capitulation of the Dutch Settlements in Ceylon”.
413
UB Leiden, LTK 732, 16 September 1796, Van Angelbeek to Van de Graaff: “Dat
Colombo zig, zonder slag of stoot, bij capitulatie heeft overgegeeven, zal Uw: zeeker bevreem-
den, vooral wijl ik niet twijffele, of eenige menschen van hier zullen na Mauritius geschreeven
hebben, dat de plaats zig had kunnen defendeeren, een uitstrooizel, het welk zig overal, zoo hier
als te Coromandel, verspreid heeft, zal blijken, dat ik van den beginne af aan tot den laatsten
dag toe, tot behoud van Colombo gedaan hebbe, wat in zulke omstandigheeden, van een
wakker Gouverneur verwacht kan worden, dog dat alle mijne poogingen en te werk gestelde
middelen, door een zaamenloop van weederwaardigheeden veriedeld zijn, en dat ik door de
capitulatie, die ons aangebooden werd, af te wijzen, en de defensie van de vesting op mij te nee-
men, de colonie ongelukkig en mij verantwoordelijk gemaakt zoude hebben.”
414
See in NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh: various letters sent privately by men like
Sluijsken (no. 757) and Fretz (no. 727: Fretz applying for the function of governor after
the Death of Van Angelbeek 1799) to Nederburgh. NA (NL), Com. tot OI handel 130,
preparations are made for 1797; NA (HR), 586: comments of the Hoge Regering in the
margins of the memorandum of Van de Graaff, dated 31 March 1797. NA (NL), Collectie
Brugmans 118, letter of Louis Monneron on the importance of Ceylon and the need to
hold on to it in the Paris and Lille peace negotiations.
415
OIOC p/245/13, 2 January 1797, Col. de Meuron to Fort St George. He feared that
Van de Graaff and Pierre Monneron could count on the support of over least 2,000 men,
if they proceed to Ceylon, “for the inhabitants of every class will fly to him”.
416
NA (NL), HR 586, “marginale dispositien op de memorie over Ceylon van Willem
Jacob van de Graaff genomen in Rade van Indien March 31, 1797.”
417
Nypels, Hoe Nederland Ceylon verloor, 96-112.
418
Of course there were exceptions. Captain F.T. von Meybrink, who bred horses on the
island of Delft, offered his services to the British government on 3 November 1795.
Brohier, “Chronological Catalogue of Letters and Reports on Ceylon Affairs”, 29. In most
cases the Dutch who expected the island to return to the Company refused to work for
the British government: NA (UK), CO 55/1, fall 1796, ff. 151-164, various letters and
proclamations on the oath of allegiance to be taken when entering the British service and
the the Dutch refusal to take the oath.
419
On the early relations of the British with Kandy, see Chapter Eleven.
420
NA (UK), CO 55/1, copies of all Stuart’s correspondences with Hobart in Madras
are collected in this bundle. A copy is found in SLNA, 7/47.
421
See Chapter Eleven.
422
OIOC, p/275/8, Proceedings of the Madras Revenue Board, 12 February 1796,
f. 343: decision to appoint Andrews as ambassador to Kandy and head of the revenue
department.
423
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 2, 502. However it did
not yield as much in the following years due to problems with the organization of the fish-
ery, frauds and finally the exhaustion of the pearl banks. Ibid., 502-510.
424
NA (NL), Com. tot OI handel, 128, 31 July 1794, despatch to Batavia, ff. 931-933.
425
This cinnamon had laid waste for three years, since 1793 no ship was sent to the
Netherlands anymore. Presumably this was the cinnamon load for 1793 and 1794. It is
likely that no cinnamon was collected in 1795; there are rumours that Van Angelbeek neg-
lected the plantations, but perhaps he consciously did not have the cinnamon peeled in
the last year, since there was still so much in stock. See NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh
446, 20 February 1797, evidence of Franken, f. 12. Amsterdam warehouses still had cin-
namon in stock, and they brought it on the market at the same time as the cinnamon that
the British had found on the ships; it was enough to considerably devaluate the price.
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 2, 414.
426
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 2, 417. The British gov-
ernment had three good investments from the plantations between 1796 and 1799, but
TO CHAPTER SEVEN 241
this was followed by a steady decrease because the plantations were not well maintained.
See also BL, add 13866, North to Wellesley, 27 October 1798, in which he explains to
the governor-general in Calcutta that 5,000 bales of cinnamon is enough for the yearly
world consumption and that “their quantity is nearly supplied from the government gar-
dens planted by Governor van der Grave, by the trees found in our woods and by those
in the gardens of individuals”.
427
See introduction to Part Three.
428
Neild-Basu, “The Dubashes of Madras”, 1-31.
429
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 1, 201: Andrews was
appointed superintendent of revenues on October 15, right after the conquest of Jaffna.
After his return from Kandy on 7 November he rushed to Jaffna to take up his office. The
position was later extended to all possessions on the island, OIOC p/275/8, proceedings
of the Revenue Board, 2 February 1796.
430
See Section 3.12.
431
Brohier, “Chronological Catalogue of Letters and Reports on Ceylon Affairs”, 41-43.
References are made here to contact with Thomas Nagel and Raket. A nice view of the
early private contacts between the Dutch and the British is found in the diary of
Macquarie, a military commander who, when stationed in Galle was quartered in the
house of Diererich Thomas Fretz the Dutch commander, and they appear to have been on
a good footing. See the publications on Lachlan Macquarie & the 73rd regiment on Sri
Lanka 1796-1821 by Macquarie University Library in New South Wales, Australia:
www.lib.mq.edu.au/digital/under/index.html.
432
NA (UK), CO 416 22/H10, Andrews to Josiah Webbe (secr. Fort St George), 10
May 1796, ff. 233-234; Ibid., 4 April 1797, ff. 257-262, Andrews to Major General
Doyle explaining once more his motivation for the imposition of the new taxes.
433
NA (UK), CO 416 22/H10, Andrews to Josiah Webbe (secr. Fort St George),
10 May 1796, f. 233
434
NA (UK), CO 55/1, June 1796, f. 71, Stuart to Hobart.
435
Brohier, “Chronological Catalogue of Letters and Reports on Ceylon Affairs”, 51:
extract of a letter from the Madras Revenue Board to Robert Andrews 30 July 1796.
436
See letters of Van Angelbeek and the principal Dutch inhabitants in NA (UK),
416/22 H10, February 1797 and 22 June 1797.
437
NA (UK), CO 416 22/H10, among others, Hobart to Andrews, 28 May 1796,
f. 235. July/August 1796 Hobart to Andrews, ff. 241-243: Hobart forbids Andrews to
lower the taxes on the coconut trees. Ibid., 22 June 1797 petition from Dutch inhabitants
responding to Hobart’s letter. Ibid., 4 April 1797, Andrews explained once more in a let-
ter to Doyle that he instituted the taxes on purpose because he felt that the richest inhab-
itants, the Dutch, native headmen and merchants, paid the least in taxes.
438
NA (UK), CO 416 22/H10, 4 April 1797, Andrews to Doyle, ff. 257-262. See also
Brohier, “Chronological Catalogue of Letters and Reports on Ceylon Affairs”, 65.
439
Ibid., 65-66, extract of the letter ordering the inauguration of the committee of
investigation, and 67, extract of the letters regarding the death of Major General Doyle
and the appointment of Brigadier General de Meuron to assume the command of the
Island of Ceylon.
440
NA (UK) Co 416 22/H10, Hobart’s minute 9 June 1797, ff. 269-281.
441
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 1, 214.
442
Collins, “Extracts from the Proceedings of the Committee of Investigation”, 1-15.
443
Andrews was replaced by Robert Alexander in May 1797 when he went for a visit to
Madras “to the benefit of his health”. Brohier, “Chronological Catalogue of Letters and
Reports on Ceylon Affairs”, 82. Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation,
Vol. 1, 223.
444
OIOC, p/254/12 Madras military and political proceedings. 2 January 1798, ff. 11-
12, Brigadier general De Meuron to the board: “In the present state of things it is to be
supposed that messieurs Monneron and Van de Graaf are acting in concert against us and
I think the only place they can have in view is Ceylon, the influence Mr van de Graaf has
here would be worth than to 2000 men to them for the inhabitants of every class and con-
dition will fly to him, mr. Monneron made the fortunes of several people when he was
242 NOTES
French agent here in the war of 1780. – Together they will unite all voices whilst we have
exasperated. All the good I have been able to do is not yet consolidated sufficiently to
think that we have any for us, but our own forces, you know the state of them, and I have
had the honour to write to you on the subject.”
445
Brohier, “Chronological Catalogue of Letters and Reports on Ceylon Affairs”, 77;
OIOC, p/254/13, Madras military and political proceedings 16/2 1798, “Lord Hobart’s
minute communicating information deriving from his journey to Ceylon”, ff. 1086-1088:
“I submitted to the board, previous to my journey to Ceylon the intelligence I had
received from that island; and added my reasons for supposing that my presence there,
even for a short period, might be attended with beneficial effects. The first object of my
attention was the disposition of the king of Candia to our government, which, as had been
represented to me previous to my leaving Madras, I found far from satisfactory. That con-
fidence and cooperation which he had manifested on our first landing upon the island had
been changed into disinterest and disaffection: but I could trace no substantial ground for
this alteration of sentiment. He certainly had been disappointed in the concessions he had
looked for upon taking possession of the Dutch settlements, but, as those concessions
were expressly stated, and were to be made so soon as the treaty executed at Madras should
be ratified by them, he can in fact have no real cause of complaint-It appears however that
Dutch and French emissaries, availing themselves of the temper of the court of Candia,
have taken infinite pains to misrepresent our national character, and to render that court
discontented with it’s alliance with our government having produced that impression they
had persuaded the king of Candia to expect the disembarkation of a body of French and
Dutch troops, and there was no reason to apprehend that he had been induced to prepare
for cooperating with them in hostile measures against us. Under a supposition of a descent
on Ceylon, the alliance or hostility of the King of Candia become subject of serious
importance for such is the nature of the country that an European force, if unassisted by
the natives would find it difficult, if not altogether impracticable, to procure supplies.”
446
OIOC, p/254/13, 16 February 1798. f. 1096. Lord Hobart’s minute communicat-
ing information deriving from his journey to Ceylon.
447
Ibid., ff. 1097-1099.
448
OIOC, G/11/54, Factory records Ceylon 1799-1800, f. 186: Memorandum of Davy
Robertson sent by Governor North to England to report on the situation on the island,
3 December 1799 (ff. 143-231).
449
NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 446, 20 February 1797, report of Carel Franken on
the British take over addressed to Governor-General Van Overstraaten, f. 12: Franken
mentions that districts were farmed out to Sinhalese headmen against the will of the pea-
sants: “Wat de ingezeetenen betreft, dezelve hebben zij in haare bezittingen gelaten, dog even
voor mijn vertrek van Ceilon waaren zij bezig om de meeste pattoes en districten bij wijze van
admodiatie aan de Singaleesen die maar het hoogste bood af te staan, waar door de gemene
man, so als men vernam, gantsch niet te vreede scheen, en alzo daar uijt seer ligt opschuddin-
gen konden resulteeren, voor al zo zij daar meede bleeven continueeren, wijl den inlander nim-
mer aan diergelijke dingen is onderworpen geweest, maar daar en tegens van onheugelijke tij-
den af, in de geruste beheering is gebleeven van het zijne.”
Cleghorn. He argued that since none of the ancient authors point out that there was a
shortage of rice, this shortage could only have become a problem at a later time, as the
result of Dutch neglect of rice cultivation. They had started importing rice during the war
with the Portuguese and continued the practice afterwards. He further argued that all the
authors point out that the soil is so fertile and the rivers flow abundantly in many areas.
According to Barros the eastern part, Batticaloa, was particularly fertile, and was also com-
monly referred to as “the kingdom of rice”.
481
NA (UK), CO 416. 4/a17, 13 March 1801 (Glenbervie’s treatise on the improve-
ment of agriculture).
482
Idem.
483
NA (UK), CO 55/61, Dundas to North, 13 March 1801, §93.
484
NA (UK), CO 55/61, Dundas to North, 13 March 1801, §29-33.
485
BL, Add 16867, 30 July 1800, North to Mornington, f. 297.
486
OIOC, G/11/54, 3 December 1799, f. 180, memorandum written by Davy
Robertson based on his own experiences and memory on the island and on his conversa-
tions with North (ff. 143-231).
487
BL, add, 13867 North to Mornington, 20 June 1800, f. 255: “I am going to set out
on my tour of the island tomorrow, which is fortunate, as my physician declares that
repose and amusement are absolutely necessary for me. Indeed I have for this last fortnight
been labouring under a most horrible nervous disorder, which has almost deprived me at
times of the power of seeing, and hearing and I have had a quantity of business on my
hands, which was quite insupportable.”
488
BL add 13867, North to Mornington, 1 July 1800, ff. 258-261.
489
For Kandyan affairs, see Chapter Eleven.
490
BL add 13867, North to Mornington, 19 March 1800.
491
See Sections 11.1 and 11.2.
492
D.G.B. de Silva “Hugh Neville’s ‘Notes on Military History of Trincomalie’”, 73-74:
“Memorandum by Col. Wellesley on Trincomalie”.
493
BL add 13867, North to Mornington, 7 September 1801, f. 501.
494
Ibid., f. 503. On patronage system: R. Pieris, “Some Neglected Aspects of British
Colonial Administration”, 73-77. Kannangara, The History of the Ceylon Civil Service,
125-157.
495
Kannangara, The History of the Ceylon Civil Service, 56-57.
496
Ibid., 69.
497
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 2, 341.
498
Ibid., 340-344.
499
Mottau, Summary of Despatches to the S/S, Vol. 1, 19-40.
500
BL add 13865, Mornington to North 8 December 1801; SLNA, 10/38, 3 April
1805, letter of F. Rossi from Prince of Wales Island to Governor North.
501
Mottau, Summary of Despatches, 40-60.
502
Mottau, Summary of Despatches. References to the hurricanes: 8 February 1805.
Reference to the cattle plague 16 March 1802.
503
Ibid., 1 January 1804, 5 October 1804, 8 February 1805.
ing letters, unbound. SLNA Lot 2 contains the records executive council.
530
NA (UK), CO 54/123-126, papers of Alexander Johnstone donated to Secretary of
State Lord Londonderry.
531
NA (UK), CO 416 4/A31, 3 October 1831, letter by Alexander Johnstone accom-
panying the papers he offered to the Commissioners of Enquiry, including a list of the
papers donated to the Royal Asiatic Society.
532
Dirks, Castes of Mind, 84; NA (UK), CO 416 4/A31, for some remarks on his jour-
ney to Madras. “Sir Alexander Johnston’s proposals for improvements in Ceylon”, in G.C.
Mendis, The Colebrooke-Cameron Papers, Vol. 2, 221-227.
533
Instructions for Schneider’s surveys in Mannaar and Jaffna, SLNA, 2/2, 13 February
1807, ff. 145-147.
534
These reports are now in the collection of the Commissioners of Enquiry NA (UK),
CO 416 and among the papers donated by Alexander Johnstone to the Colonial Office
NA (CO) 54/124.
535
NA (UK), CO 54/126, 10 June 1807, report of Schneider on the state of the Vanni,
ff. 13-23.
536
NA (UK), CO 416 28/J28, Schneider’s report on Tangalle and Matara, f. 399.
537
NA (UK), CO 416/22/H8; CO 416/4/A21; CO 416/28 /J28 (200 pages of reports
and recommendations made by Schneider for Maitland) and NA (UK), CO 54/126
(Johnstone’s papers).
538
His remarks for Lord Londondery are published as: “Sir Alexander Johnstone’s
Proposals for Improvement”, in G.C. Mendis, The Colebrooke-Cameron Papers, Vol. 2,
221-227. See also SLNA, 2/3, December 1808, ff. 90-101, for the discussion in the exec-
utive council about the judiciary, and the mission of Alexander Johnstone. About the brief
implementation and revocation of the judicial reforms proposed by Johnstone, see Colvin
R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 1, 327-329.
539
SLNA, 2/2, instructions for the collector of Jaffna, 22 December 1806, ff. 81-103
and ibid., instructions for the collector of Matara, 10 February 1807, ff. 115-127.
540
SLNA, 2/2, 22 December 1806. Instructions for the collector of Jaffna, f. 100. This
is undoubtedly the chetty Waitelinge who made his fortunes in tax farming and the Jaffna
trade in Dutch times.
541
SLNA, 2/2, 27 August 1806, ff. 41-43 petitions of twelve Buddhist priests from
Matara to set up a Buddhist council falling directly under the British government. This
was part of the strategy to draw the lowland Buddhist priests closer to government. See
also: SLNA, 25.1/34, 2 May 1806, statement of Alexander Johnstone on the policy
towards the Catholics and Buddhist.
542
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, 414-445.
543
Kannangara, The History of the Ceylon Civil Service, 65.
544
SLNA, 6/143, letters from the collector of the Wanny, 14 July 1807, §25, report of
George Turnour.
545
SLNA, 6/143, letters from the collector of the Wanny, 14 July 1807, §28, report of
George Turnour.
546
SLNA, 6/101, 9 September 1806, letter of MacNab, the collector of Batticaloa
inquiring after the memorandum of Burnand.
547
NA (UK), CO 416/27/J12, 23 May 1815, f. 120-128.
548
Bertolacci, A View of the Agricultural, Commercial and Financial Interests of Ceylon,
180.
549
Ibid., 181-182.
550
NA (UK), CO 54/31, Maitland to Castlereigh, 25 January 1809, f. 6.
551
NA (UK), CO 416/28/J28, f. 418, reports of Schneider on the state of agriculture in
Galle and Matara 1807.
552
SLNA, 2/2, 10 February 1807, f. 117, instructions for the collector of Matara, §4.
553
NA (UK), CO 416/4/A31, 3 October 1831, letter of Alexander Johnstone, accom-
panying the papers he gave to the commissioners of enquiry.
554
NA (UK), CO 416/26/5, reports from collectors’ circuits in Galle: “they did not only
give the necessary information, but also informed me by a Cingalese ola that in the said
quality they had upon them the cultivation of this country in the Dutch government and
TO CHAPTER NINE 247
well at the time of his excellency the Governor Van de Graaff, the extent of one hundred
and ten amm. [ammonam] and seventy burnies low ground was caused to be cultivated
and the produce thereof given, and that by the assistance of three rivulets called De Kande,
Elle Kandan Elle and Kirybattawille Elle which were made to discharge the superfluous
water of Diviturreh.”
555
Kannangara, The History of the Ceylon Civil Service, 109-124.
556
SLNA, 6/84, letters from the collector of Matara to Colombo 1812; NA (UK), CO
54/44, despatch from Brownrigg to London, 28 August 1812, reporting on the famine:
over 4,000 people have died and many have migrated to Kandy. It was reported to
Colombo only at a very late instance, which is why government was late with help.
557
NA (UK), 416 2/A1: “Mr Orr’s proposal for a land tax or fixed quit rent to be per-
manently established on all landed property in Ceylon” (1813-1815). Based on the sys-
tem in Bengal, Orr was of the opinion that the backward development of the agriculture
was the result of the system of small landholdings and different sort of titles. His col-
leagues responded negatively to his proposal. In 1817, Brownrigg suggested such a change
in modes of taxation and possession of land once more. The extensive and informative
replies to his questions by all the collectors, almost all negative, are kept in the following
bundle: SLNA, 10/201-202.
558
SLNA, 10/201-202, reports sent to Brownrigg by the collectors and magistrates in
1817 in answer to his question about improving agriculture through modes of taxation
and laws of inheritance. For example, the collector of Galle writes the following interest-
ing remarks: “1st to take a general view of the present state of cultivation; It will be found
that lands of all description are much neglected; That it was in a more flourishing state
under the Dutch government is an observation which comes from the natives themselves.”
Another such example is found in the description of Matara by Granville, 1813: NA
(UK), 416/26/J10, f. 382: “It however appears to me highly necessary that headmen
should be appointed whose particular duty would be to superintend the cultivation of the
country. To be able by a proper authority vested in him, to call upon the people at pleas-
ure to work the lands, to order the cutting of crops and inspect the due division of the dif-
ferent share. This might be done by appointing weebadde mohandirams, a title which has
been extinct since the Dutch time, but nevertheless in itself highly necessary. Another title
and situation existed under the Dutch government called saaymeesters or sowing masters
[…].”
559
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation. Vol. 2, 385-413.
560
Ibid., 371.
561
Correspondence with the commercial agent for Ceylon Huskisson BL, Add 38739,
Huskisson papers, Huskisson to Henry Goulburn 11 July 1814, ff. 233. Letter discussing
the bad financial state of Ceylon and suggestions for improvement by increasing the access
to the Indian market (arrack) and the English market (coffee).
562
On the labour on the public roads, see Munasinghe, The Colonial Economy on Track,
11-14, 30-42; Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 1, 279-282.
NA (UK), 59/27, ff. 13-55, reports on the duties of the various castes and classes of
natives liable to government service. In 1818, Brownrigg sent around a letter to all collec-
tors to ask for lists of the type of labour, coolie labour in particular, to which the inhabi-
tants of the specific districts were liable.
563
NA (UK), CO 54/93, despatches to London, 1826, f. 69: Barnes speaks of an
increase in coffee exports from 209,568 in 1816 to over one million pounds in 1822.
However he, like Brownrigg, still had to convince his superiors in London of the desir-
ability of growing coffee in Ceylon. In 1826, the import duty for coffee from Ceylon was
still higher than that for coffee from the West Indies.
564
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 2, 437-444. Moreover
in 1826, 3,000 sprigs of the cinnamon tree were stolen by a Dutchman and brought to
Sumatra. NA (UK), CO 54/93, despatch Barnes to London, 22 September 1826, ff. 182-
188.
565
Peebles, Social Change in Nineteenth Century Ceylon, 89-90.
566
G.C. Mendis, The Colebrooke-Cameron Papers, Vol. 1, ix-lxiv (introduction).
248 NOTES
619
Lewis, “Andrew’s Embassies to Kandy in 1795 and 1796”.
620
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 1, 54-62.
621
For source publications of these embassies see Lewis, “Andrew’s Embassies”, and
“Macdowall’s Embassy to Kandy”.
622
Wickremeratne, “Lord North and the Kandyan Kingdom”, 30-42.
623
Ibid.
624
Bayly, The Imperial Meridian, 100-209.
625
Perera, “The Douglas Papers”, 65-78.
626
He succeeded Nicolaas Dias in 1794 and retained this position after the British
takeover.
627
Colvin R. de Silva, Ceylon under the British Occupation, Vol. 1, 95-97.
628
NA (UK), CO 55/62, 21 February 1805, Hobart to North, f. 111; ibid., Hobart’s
Instructions to Maitland, ff. 114-128 (reference is made to a paper on the subject of
Kandy which Maitland wrote after consulting North’s dispatches).
629
NA (UK), CO 54/43, Brownrigg to Secretary of State, 29 March 1812, f. 3. Last
received letter from Davie: “[…] For heavens sake please send Laudanum and opium, my
torture is indurable […].” Davie died in early 1813: NA (UK), CO 54/47, despatch
Brownrigg to London, 13 March 1813.
630
P.E. Pieris, Tri Sinhala, 158-161; Granville, “Deportation of Sri Vrikama Rajasinha”.
631
NA (UK), CO 55/63, 10 May 1815, ff. 71-73: “he [His Royal Highness] has […]
commanded me to inculcate upon you the necessity of abstaining from hostilities with
Kandy / not only under the present circumstances of provocation, but under any short of
an actual invasion and attack upon his majesty’s territory. It is impossible for his Royal
Highness to forget that the immediate consequence of a war would be the loss of a very
large proportion of the European force employed in a climate which has proved particu-
larly obnoxious to European constitutions and an immense increase of expenditure
beyond what the colony could ever have a chance of defraying.” BL add 38739, Huskisson
to Brownrigg, 12 December 1814, f. 306: “On the subject of expenditure, and particular-
ly of military expenditure, I cannot help stating to you, in the confidence of old friend-
ship, that there exist an impression at home, that it is carried on much beyond what is
absolutely necessary. This is supposed to be the effect not of any eagerness for patronage,
nor of any want of zeal of checking any abuses; but rather from your military habits, and
from you being supposed to look at matters rather too much with a soldier’s eye.”
632
NA (UK), CO 55/63, Bathurst to Brownrigg, 28 August 1815, f. 83: “[…] The suc-
ces of your enterprize has been so complete and immediate that you must have yourself
anticipated the lively satisfaction with which his royal highness received the intelligence.
Had it been confined to the mere liberation of a people from a foreign despotism / as san-
guinary and cruel as that under which the inhabitants of Kandy so long groaned / it could
not but have been grateful to the feelings of His Royal Highness: but as the overthrow of
that tyranny has given encreased security to His Majesty’s possessions, and has been fol-
lowed by an annexation of territory voluntarily and animously made by its inhabitants,
the satisfaction which His Royal Highness would in any case have felt derives considerable
accession from these circumstances, and from the proofs which they afford on the part of
a whole people of confidence in the British name and character.”
633
Marshall, Ceylon, 110-111 and 127-128.
634
Wickremeratne, “Lord North and the Kandyan Kingdom”; K.M. de Silva, A History
of Sri Lanka, 220-239.
635
Teltscher, India Inscribed, 229-59. Teltscher uses British descriptions of Tipu Sultan
of Mysore, who was increasingly depicted as an oriental tyrant, to legitimize British mili-
tary action against Mysore.
636
NA (UK), CO 54/55, 15 February 1815, f. 103, Brownrigg to Bathhurst: “I shall
[…] conclude the present [despatch], with soliciting your lordship to me the honor of pre-
senting to his Royal Highness the Prince Regent the expression of my humble congratu-
lations, in being enabled by the speedy and happy issue of a campaign ending with the
unparalelled good fortune of not loosing a single life, to tender for his Royal highness’s
acceptance, the duties of a new and industrious hardy race of people, and the possession of a
territory bountifully endowed with natural gifts, and requiring only the blessing of a just
TO CHAPTER ELEVEN 251
government […].” (My italics.)
637
Certainly the strategic argument, the constant fear that the Kandyans would ally
themselves with a foreign enemy, was another motive for a more aggressive policy towards
Kandy. However, one could say that in Brownrigg’s time, this fear was less realistic than
in the days of Van de Graaff. Other factors such as personality and background could have
played a role. Both men did have a military background and would therefore have been
more eager to make use of their experiences. In the case of Van de Graaff, one may won-
der whether he was reinforced in his decisions by the arrival of the military commission
in 1789, and whether the presence of the professional regiments made him more eager for
war.
638
For an elaboration on this subject, see Section 11.6.
639
NA (NL), VOC 3975, despatch to Batavia, 31 December 1792, f. 274: “Dat het
daarentegen zeer bekend is, dat den tweeden adigaar is een zeer listig en kwaadaardig man,
van geheel tegengestelde principes, welke met de hofsgrooten van zijn partij, onder anderen
Doembere en Leuwke, zedert lang heeft gewoeld om het hof, met de komp over hoop te helpen,
en dat het bovendien uit de geintercepteerde Korrespondentie met de Franschen gebleeken is,
dat hij is een der voornaamse hoofd belijderen daar van.”
640
P.E. Pieris, Sinhale and the Patriots, Appendix B, 591: The treaty of March 1815 “art.
1: By inflicting bodily torture and the pains of death unrestrainedly arbitrarily and mer-
cilessly without making inquiry, in some instances without even a complaint, and also in
matters where there was not even the opportunity for performing any wrongful act, and
by infringing the law with great contempt, the cruelties and violent acts of the Demala
[Tamil] Raja have become so extremely great and widespread as to be beyond endurance
[...] art. 3: It is hereby announced that all males bearing kinship to the late Raja Sri
Vikrama Raja Simha whether by marriage or otherwise, or of that family in any other
manner whatsoever, or claiming kinship by deceitful stratagem, are not only enemies of
the Government of the Simhala Rata, but they may not enter the said Rata for any pur-
pose whatever without the warrant of the English government […]. All Demala males
now expelled from this rata are prohibited from coming back thereto […].”
641
Dewaraja, The Kandyan Kingdom, 29-45.
642
Dharmadasa, “The Sinhala Buddhist Identity and the Nayakker Dynasty”, 79-105.
643
Roberts, Sinhala Consciousness in the Kandyan Period 1590s to 1815, 109-131.
644
Roberts bases his argument on the idea that people in the villages would have sung
the war poems and thereby passed on the anti-Tamil message to all levels of society. He
underlines this by a lengthy discussion of oral poetry in Sri Lanka, but he does not sub-
stantiate his central point, that the war poems were enthusiastically received and wide-
spread in this manner.
645
Gunawardana, “Colonialism, Ethnicity and the Construction of the Past”, 198-221;
Goonewardene, “Sri Vijaya Rajasimha (1739-1747)”, 441-496; Rogers, “Historical
Images in the British Period”, 87-106.
646
Holt, The Religious World of Kirti Sri, 100; Duncan, The City as Text, 182-183;
Seneviratne, “The Alien King”, 55-61.
647
SLNA, 7/39, Governor’s secret diary, November 26, 1798.
648
This “last stand of Kandyan autonomy” has been dealt with extensively by P.E. Pieris
in his Sinhale and the Patriots 1815-1818. 195-246, include references to the new king-
to-be, Dore Swami. The rebellion inspired Sinhalese nationalists in their resistance to
colonial regimes in the twentieth century.
649
NA (NL), VOC 3975, despatch 31 December 1792.
650
NA (NL), Collectie Nederburgh 442, §10: “[…] dat den eersten Rijks Adigaar van
wien ik meen te moogen vertrouwen, dat hij bij voortduuring wel gezind tegens de kompenie
is [...]”
651
Rasanayagam, “Tamil Documents”, 25-28.
652
OIOC, G/11/1, f. 478. Boyd refers here to the dessāva of Matala, this office was at
that point occupied by Erevvala.
653
Rasanayagam, “Tamil Documents”, 35-36; Lewis, “Andrew’s Embassies”, 70-76.
654
Rasanayagam, “Tamil Documents”, 4. Reference is made here of a letter written by
Meduma Vederala, who also carried the Sinhalese name Rajakaruna Rajapaksa Gopala
252 NOTES
Mudaliyar.
655
It is understandable that in these times of ethnic troubles in Sri Lanka, historians
search for early manifestations of ethnic consciousness. However, I do not think that this
can serve as an explanation for the fall of the Kingdom. More generally, I have not come
across forms of communal strive among the various ethnic groups on the island.
Competition between the castes was a more urgent problem, but even that was limited.
In any case, a better explanation for the Kingdom’s fall is its fragile political power struc-
ture. That is not to say that there cannot have been any relationship at all between the rise
of Sinhalese ethnic consciousness and the fall of the Kingdom: but Kandy’s demise seems
to have triggered the rise of Sinhalese ethnic consciousness, rather than the other way
around.
APPENDIX
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Collectie Van Braam
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Collectie Brugmans
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265
SAMENVATTING
delen staat achtereenvolgens een aantal clusters van vragen centraal, zodat
het Nederlandse beleid systematisch kan worden vergeleken met dat van
de Engelsen. Ten eerste, hoe verliep de vorming van politieke en bestuur-
lijke eenheden in de kustregio? Op welke manier organiseerde men de
koloniale administratie en welke methoden ontwikkelden de Neder-
landers en de Engelsen om meer landinwaarts gelegen gebieden te exploi-
teren? Cruciaal daarbij is de functie die lokale inheemse machthebbers
vervulden als bemiddelaars tussen de koloniale regering en de lokale
bevolking. Wat voor rol zagen de Nederlanders en de Engelsen weggelegd
voor deze “middle-men”, en andersom, hoe positioneerden de inheemse
machthebbers zich tegenover de beide koloniale mogendheden?
Ten tweede neem ik het beeld onder de loep dat de Nederlanders en
Engelsen zich vormden van hun eigen aanwezigheid op het eiland. Hoe
dachten zij over de verdeling en uitoefening van de territoriale macht op
het eiland en op welke manier heeft dit gedachtegoed de houding en poli-
tieke planning van de machthebbers mede vormgegeven? Het derde
cluster vragen gaat over de relatie van de koning van Kandy met respec-
tievelijk de Nederlanders en de Engelsen. De onderwerping van het
koninkrijk en de daaropvolgende politieke eenwording van het eiland in
1815 probeer ik zo te plaatsen in de politieke ontwikkelingen van Ceylon
op de langere termijn. Tevens breng ik ze in verband met de binnenland-
se politiek van beide Europese machten op het eiland.
netwerk, dwongen de gouverneur tot een radicaler beleid dan dat van zijn
voorgangers.
In de daaropvolgende jaren zochten eerst de Nederlandse en vervolgens
de Engelse regering naar manieren om de kolonie weer winstgevend te
maken, het eiland tegelijkertijd te behouden als strategisch steunpunt en
om de financiële belangen van het moederland te behartigen. Daarbij tra-
den wel verschillen op tussen het optreden van de Nederlanders en de
Engelsen, die vooral het gevolg waren van de verschillen in de wijze waar-
op het beleid totstandkwam. De Nederlandse bemoeienis op Ceylon was
gebaseerd op langdurige ervaring met de lokale samenleving en het initia-
tief voor beleidsveranderingen lag bij de hoge VOC-dienaren op het
eiland zelf. Het Britse regime was daarentegen het product van een veel
gecentraliseerder koloniaal beleid: de Engelse bestuurders op Ceylon wer-
den sterk vanuit Londen gedirigeerd, en het in Engeland geformuleerde
beleid stoelde vooral op de Britse ervaringen in India. Dit is een van de
redenen waarom de Nederlandse en het Britse regeringssystemen, zoals
die zich in deze overgangsperiode ontwikkelden, niet identiek waren, ook
al stonden beide regimes min of meer dezelfde doelen voor ogen.
De analyse van de relatie tussen het koninkrijk Kandy en de twee kolo-
niale regeringen op het eiland onderstreept nogmaals de belangrijke rol
die inheemse politieke elites speelden in de ontwikkeling van de kolonia-
le staat. De wisselwerking tussen Europese koloniale doelstellingen en de
inheemse antwoorden daarop is moeilijk te interpreteren. Op het Engelse
Ceylon uit de negentiende eeuw herkennen we sommige achttiende-
eeuwse fundamenten van de koloniale staat – het resultaat van de inter-
actie tussen de Nederlanders en de inheemse hoofdmannen – maar in
andere gevallen wijken de door de Britse heersers geïntroduceerde instel-
lingen werkelijk af de eerdere koloniale en inheemse instituties, zoals bij
de vorming van het juridisch apparaat.
Door het analyseren van de verschillen en overeenkomsten tussen de
Nederlandse en Engelse periode wordt duidelijk hoe de machts- en
bestuursstructuren op Ceylon zijn gevormd door het ingewikkelde
samenspel tussen genoemde groepen en personen, binnen de specifieke
politiek-culturele context die Ceylon eigen was. Zo is het, ondanks expli-
ciete pogingen daartoe, de Britten niet gelukt om in het zuidwesten ande-
re machtige inheemse groepen te vinden om mee samen te werken dan de
mudaliyars, de hoofdmannen die al een dergelijke positie hadden onder
de Nederlanders. Echter, het karakter van de relatie die de Engelsen met
deze groep opbouwde, was heel anders. Terwijl de Nederlanders en de
hoofdmannen samenwerkten op basis van overeenkomstige belangen in
het nieuw ontwikkelde exploitatiesysteem, groeiden de belangen van de
Engelse regering en de hoofdmannen juist uit elkaar. Dit was een direct
gevolg van het Britse wantrouwen en pogingen om de macht van de
SAMENVATTING 269
CURRICULUM VITAE