The Natuurkundige Commissie in the Netherlands Indies (1820-1850)

Erscheinungsjahr 2025
ISBN: 978-90-04-69686-0
Verlag: Brill

Buch, Englisch, Band 8, 404 Seiten, Format (B × H): 162 mm x 241 mm, Gewicht: 948 g

Reihe: Emergence of Natural History

The Natuurkundige Commissie in the Netherlands Indies was one of
the largest state-sponsored colonial collecting endeavours of the
early nineteenth-century world. As a result, the newly founded ’s Rijks
Museum van Natuurlijke Historie (present-day Naturalis Biodiversity
Center in Leiden) was filled with countless specimens. The Commissie
consisted of thirty naturalists and was active for thirty years
(1820–1850). This book shows how its stakeholders had different
objectives that evolved over time: what started as a collection vehicle
to showcase the ‘glory’ of the Dutch colonial empire became a useful
surveying tool for the Indies government.

This volume is the first detailed study of the Commissie in
English. It tells the story of naturalists from the Netherlands, France,
and German-speaking lands and of countless indigenous people working
alongside the Commissie as knowledge brokers, hunters, preparators, and
porters. This long overlooked indigenous contribution to European
knowledge was both substantial and fundamental.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Wingerden, Pieter van

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Wissenschafts- und Universitätsgeschichte
• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaften: Allgemeines Geschichte der Naturwissenschaften, Formalen Wissenschaften & Technik

Über Autor(innen)

Pieter van Wingerden, Ph.D. (2023), Leiden University, is an independent researcher and a collection specialist at the University Library of the University of Groningen. He has published several articles on the intersection of empire and science in the Netherlands Indies.