Pub Date : 2024-09-11DOI: 10.1177/08438714241271805
Matteo Barbano
This article explores collective resistance actions among Austrian seafarers between the late nineteenth century and First World War, shedding light on the seaborne dimension of their struggles and investigating possible connections between the developmental stages of the seafarers’ labour movement in Trieste and their engagement in collective action at sea. In doing so, the research focuses particularly on the crews of Austrian Lloyd, the most powerful shipping company in the Habsburg merchant marine, which played a leading role in shaping labour relations between Austrian seafarers and shipowners. By analysing data extracted from the Black Book, the company’s tool for blacklisting seafarers, this article identifies seaborne collective resistance as a distinctive mode of struggle found in specific phases of the industrial relations between Lloyd and its seagoing personnel, underscoring the relevance of the ship as a significant stage in maritime labour conflicts in the age of industrial shipping.
{"title":"Beyond docks, below decks: Austrian seafarers’ shipboard collective protests in the age of industrial shipping","authors":"Matteo Barbano","doi":"10.1177/08438714241271805","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241271805","url":null,"abstract":"This article explores collective resistance actions among Austrian seafarers between the late nineteenth century and First World War, shedding light on the seaborne dimension of their struggles and investigating possible connections between the developmental stages of the seafarers’ labour movement in Trieste and their engagement in collective action at sea. In doing so, the research focuses particularly on the crews of Austrian Lloyd, the most powerful shipping company in the Habsburg merchant marine, which played a leading role in shaping labour relations between Austrian seafarers and shipowners. By analysing data extracted from the Black Book, the company’s tool for blacklisting seafarers, this article identifies seaborne collective resistance as a distinctive mode of struggle found in specific phases of the industrial relations between Lloyd and its seagoing personnel, underscoring the relevance of the ship as a significant stage in maritime labour conflicts in the age of industrial shipping.","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"59 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191696","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-09-11DOI: 10.1177/08438714241275569
Noelle Nadiah Richardson
This article analyses the emergence of the Amfioen Societëit (1745–1794) and its impact on the market for opium in eighteenth-century Java. It engages with a limited body of historiography to challenge assumptions that the Societëit was a wholly colonial institution designed to serve an elite – namely, European – set of interests. In reassessing how the Societëit worked in theory and in practice, it is argued that this institution was born from the necessary collaborative engagement of a European and a local commercial class with different but vested interests in the opium trade. Moreover, the article situates the Societëit among other finance institutions that existed in eighteenth-century Java to serve the credit needs of the local commercial milieu. In doing so, it lays the foundations for a deeper and more nuanced history of the opium trade and the local economy of early modern Java in a period about which very little is known.
{"title":"The Amfioen Societëit (1745–1794): Opium, intra-Asian trade and the commercial world of Batavia in the eighteenth century","authors":"Noelle Nadiah Richardson","doi":"10.1177/08438714241275569","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241275569","url":null,"abstract":"This article analyses the emergence of the Amfioen Societëit (1745–1794) and its impact on the market for opium in eighteenth-century Java. It engages with a limited body of historiography to challenge assumptions that the Societëit was a wholly colonial institution designed to serve an elite – namely, European – set of interests. In reassessing how the Societëit worked in theory and in practice, it is argued that this institution was born from the necessary collaborative engagement of a European and a local commercial class with different but vested interests in the opium trade. Moreover, the article situates the Societëit among other finance institutions that existed in eighteenth-century Java to serve the credit needs of the local commercial milieu. In doing so, it lays the foundations for a deeper and more nuanced history of the opium trade and the local economy of early modern Java in a period about which very little is known.","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"64 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191695","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-09-11DOI: 10.1177/08438714241272520
Amélia Polónia, Rosa Capelão
Interactions between Europeans and the societies and cultures of contact during the early modern process of empire-building depended on the agency of women. This seems particularly apparent in the Portuguese case. Even if many of these interactions were imposed, women were crucial elements in the dynamics and outcomes of European colonization. This affected Portuguese and autochthone women alike, even if on different scales and levels. This article focuses on the latter. Between resistance, conflict, cheating, defection, intermingling and assimilation, those women performed as intermediaries between different worlds. Their presence and agency were vital to economic flows, as they were essential in negotiation processes. They were influential in social organization, through their role in the family, and in the reconfiguration of colonial settings. The concept of intersectionality underlines this analysis by describing the ways by which systems of inequality based on gender, race, ethnicity and other forms of discrimination intersected to create unique historical dynamics.
{"title":"Practices and representations of gender: Autochthone women in the Portuguese State of India, 1500s–1600s","authors":"Amélia Polónia, Rosa Capelão","doi":"10.1177/08438714241272520","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241272520","url":null,"abstract":"Interactions between Europeans and the societies and cultures of contact during the early modern process of empire-building depended on the agency of women. This seems particularly apparent in the Portuguese case. Even if many of these interactions were imposed, women were crucial elements in the dynamics and outcomes of European colonization. This affected Portuguese and autochthone women alike, even if on different scales and levels. This article focuses on the latter. Between resistance, conflict, cheating, defection, intermingling and assimilation, those women performed as intermediaries between different worlds. Their presence and agency were vital to economic flows, as they were essential in negotiation processes. They were influential in social organization, through their role in the family, and in the reconfiguration of colonial settings. The concept of intersectionality underlines this analysis by describing the ways by which systems of inequality based on gender, race, ethnicity and other forms of discrimination intersected to create unique historical dynamics.","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"34 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-09-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191699","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-09-05DOI: 10.1177/08438714241272663
Niki J. P. Alsford
{"title":"Book Review: Japan’s Ocean Borderlands: Nature and Sovereignty by Paul Kreitman","authors":"Niki J. P. Alsford","doi":"10.1177/08438714241272663","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241272663","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"73 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-09-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191697","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-09-04DOI: 10.1177/08438714241272548
Richard W. Unger
When Portuguese sailors confirmed that there was an all-sea route to South Asia from Europe, they introduced new ship designs and building methods to the Indian Ocean World. They found sophisticated maritime skills and a long history of trade over water, both local and long distance. The meeting of the two successful technologies led to some borrowing of different methods and materials, and European use of vessels of Asian design. There were cases of borrowing specific design features, mostly by Asian shipbuilders, but there was surprisingly little melding of aspects of construction. There was some specialization, with Europeans concentrating on building and using larger seagoing cargo carriers. The arrival of steam propulsion for ships after 1800 changed all maritime technologies beyond recognition.
{"title":"Melding technologies? Shipbuilding around the Indian Ocean after the arrival of European ships","authors":"Richard W. Unger","doi":"10.1177/08438714241272548","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241272548","url":null,"abstract":"When Portuguese sailors confirmed that there was an all-sea route to South Asia from Europe, they introduced new ship designs and building methods to the Indian Ocean World. They found sophisticated maritime skills and a long history of trade over water, both local and long distance. The meeting of the two successful technologies led to some borrowing of different methods and materials, and European use of vessels of Asian design. There were cases of borrowing specific design features, mostly by Asian shipbuilders, but there was surprisingly little melding of aspects of construction. There was some specialization, with Europeans concentrating on building and using larger seagoing cargo carriers. The arrival of steam propulsion for ships after 1800 changed all maritime technologies beyond recognition.","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"43 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191698","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-09-04DOI: 10.1177/08438714241272583
Margaret E. Schotte
Over the course of the eighteenth century, French East India Company ships carried numerous sailors, soldiers, passengers and unfree labourers to and from various ports of trade in the Indian Ocean. Although European merchant companies developed extensive documenting systems, certain elements received little attention in the records. When it came to tracking unfree labourers, Company employees used terminology with ambiguous meanings and categories that were codified in the Atlantic context and therefore not initially applicable in the Indian Ocean. In order for historians to interpret these records more accurately, this article reviews specific terminology and pertinent French legislation about racialized labourers. This contextual information helps to uncover previously overlooked groups of unfree labourers working for – and, at times, trying to escape from – the French East India Company in the Indian Ocean and beyond.
{"title":"‘Belonging to the Company’: Transporting and documenting unfree labour in the Indian Ocean, 1719–1790","authors":"Margaret E. Schotte","doi":"10.1177/08438714241272583","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241272583","url":null,"abstract":"Over the course of the eighteenth century, French East India Company ships carried numerous sailors, soldiers, passengers and unfree labourers to and from various ports of trade in the Indian Ocean. Although European merchant companies developed extensive documenting systems, certain elements received little attention in the records. When it came to tracking unfree labourers, Company employees used terminology with ambiguous meanings and categories that were codified in the Atlantic context and therefore not initially applicable in the Indian Ocean. In order for historians to interpret these records more accurately, this article reviews specific terminology and pertinent French legislation about racialized labourers. This contextual information helps to uncover previously overlooked groups of unfree labourers working for – and, at times, trying to escape from – the French East India Company in the Indian Ocean and beyond.","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"46 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-09-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191701","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-08-28DOI: 10.1177/08438714241262258
Julie van den Hout
While Atlantic skippers were vital to seventeenth-century Dutch imperial expansion, few histories address the roles of skippers in colonial ventures. Drawing on archival records in Amsterdam and New York, this study examines the activities of skippers along roughly 200 voyages between Amsterdam and New Netherland from 1639 to 1664. In Amsterdam, skippers in relationships with voyage outfitters functioned as trusted partners who offered continuity for operations. As principals at sea, skippers navigated hazards and managed contingencies during inherently risky transatlantic passages. In the colony, skippers collaborated with local merchants to facilitate trade, and with colonial authorities to provide maritime support. With an impact on every stage of the endeavour, skippers were key players in the colonial complex, which depended on them for its functioning. Beyond New Netherland, these findings have applications for evaluating other European colonial undertakings, and for understanding the wider mechanisms of imperial expansion into the Atlantic.
{"title":"The roles of Dutch skippers as partners and principals in colonial endeavours: Lessons from Amsterdam to New Netherland (1639–1664)","authors":"Julie van den Hout","doi":"10.1177/08438714241262258","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241262258","url":null,"abstract":"While Atlantic skippers were vital to seventeenth-century Dutch imperial expansion, few histories address the roles of skippers in colonial ventures. Drawing on archival records in Amsterdam and New York, this study examines the activities of skippers along roughly 200 voyages between Amsterdam and New Netherland from 1639 to 1664. In Amsterdam, skippers in relationships with voyage outfitters functioned as trusted partners who offered continuity for operations. As principals at sea, skippers navigated hazards and managed contingencies during inherently risky transatlantic passages. In the colony, skippers collaborated with local merchants to facilitate trade, and with colonial authorities to provide maritime support. With an impact on every stage of the endeavour, skippers were key players in the colonial complex, which depended on them for its functioning. Beyond New Netherland, these findings have applications for evaluating other European colonial undertakings, and for understanding the wider mechanisms of imperial expansion into the Atlantic.","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"5 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-08-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191703","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-08-28DOI: 10.1177/08438714241269611
Izidor Janžekovič
The balance of power is among the foundational principles in international relations. This principle, however, has been analysed mostly in relation to land powers on the European continent, while the historiography has failed to appropriately recognize its naval aspect so far. This article compares the English and Dutch sea powers or fleets during the three Anglo-Dutch Wars (1652–1674). Warships or ships of the line were the main instruments of naval warfare, and hence key to any measurements of sea power. Detailed tables of the fleets with the number of warships and guns for the major engagements show the balance of sea power at the time. Attaining and maintaining the balance of (sea) power in the early modern era was not just an abstract idea, but also an interactive process, based on numerical analysis. The author argues that there was a real or naval balance of sea power between the fleets or alliances of fleets; that the balance of sea power was acknowledged in the international alliance treaties; and that the balance of sea power became an element of early modern political discourse.
{"title":"The balance of sea power in the early modern era: The Anglo-Dutch Wars (1652–1674)","authors":"Izidor Janžekovič","doi":"10.1177/08438714241269611","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241269611","url":null,"abstract":"The balance of power is among the foundational principles in international relations. This principle, however, has been analysed mostly in relation to land powers on the European continent, while the historiography has failed to appropriately recognize its naval aspect so far. This article compares the English and Dutch sea powers or fleets during the three Anglo-Dutch Wars (1652–1674). Warships or ships of the line were the main instruments of naval warfare, and hence key to any measurements of sea power. Detailed tables of the fleets with the number of warships and guns for the major engagements show the balance of sea power at the time. Attaining and maintaining the balance of (sea) power in the early modern era was not just an abstract idea, but also an interactive process, based on numerical analysis. The author argues that there was a real or naval balance of sea power between the fleets or alliances of fleets; that the balance of sea power was acknowledged in the international alliance treaties; and that the balance of sea power became an element of early modern political discourse.","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"2012 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-08-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191702","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-08-28DOI: 10.1177/08438714241274974
Tristan Mostert
{"title":"Book Review: Empire of the Winds: The Global Role of Asia’s Great Archipelago by Philip Bowring","authors":"Tristan Mostert","doi":"10.1177/08438714241274974","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241274974","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"59 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-08-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191705","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2024-08-28DOI: 10.1177/08438714241262174
Karel Davids
Seamanship is the art of handling and manoeuvring a ship. For centuries, seamanship skills were transmitted not in writing, but by hands-on instruction on board. However, between circa 1600 and 1920, this ‘tacit’ knowledge was increasingly made ‘explicit’ in printed literature. Why did this happen? To answer this question, this article analyses dozens of books on seamanship produced in Britain, France, Spain, the Netherlands and Italy. It discusses the different genres, the background of the authors and the intended reading publics. It shows that the transformation occurred almost simultaneously across Europe and that it was not triggered by technological change. The article argues that the explanation instead can be found in the rise of new institutions for the education and selection of seamen, which was linked with the growing aspirations of states and other organizations to gain more control over the quality of the personnel needed to man their ships.
{"title":"Changing ways to learn seamanship in Europe circa 1600–1920: Books, institutions and sociopolitical contexts","authors":"Karel Davids","doi":"10.1177/08438714241262174","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/08438714241262174","url":null,"abstract":"Seamanship is the art of handling and manoeuvring a ship. For centuries, seamanship skills were transmitted not in writing, but by hands-on instruction on board. However, between circa 1600 and 1920, this ‘tacit’ knowledge was increasingly made ‘explicit’ in printed literature. Why did this happen? To answer this question, this article analyses dozens of books on seamanship produced in Britain, France, Spain, the Netherlands and Italy. It discusses the different genres, the background of the authors and the intended reading publics. It shows that the transformation occurred almost simultaneously across Europe and that it was not triggered by technological change. The article argues that the explanation instead can be found in the rise of new institutions for the education and selection of seamen, which was linked with the growing aspirations of states and other organizations to gain more control over the quality of the personnel needed to man their ships.","PeriodicalId":43870,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Maritime History","volume":"75 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3,"publicationDate":"2024-08-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142191700","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}