The Kandy Kingdom - II

The Kandy Kingdom - II

Contiued with part one   here to go previous one

It was one thing for Batavia to formulate a policy of restraint but quite another to get van Goens to implement it, especially in a situation where the initiative lay so much with the man on the spot. Van Goens was a man of great influence (with the Directors of the V.O.C. in the Netherlands, to whom he appealed over the heads of the Batavian authorities) and vision. He was impressed by the island’s potential as a center of Dutch interest in South Asia; he regarded Sri Lanka as being superior to Java and felt that Colombo and not Batavia should be the chief seat of Dutch power in the East. What he had in mind was the creation of a major sphere of Dutch interest in South Asia based on Sri Lanka (as its core) and the South Indian coast. For the moment, however, he gave in to Batavian pressure and desisted from any significant moves to extend the land frontiers of the Dutch possessions in the island. But these restraints did not extend to plans to expand the V.O.C.’s influence along the sea. The Dutch had laid claim to the exclusive possession of the littoral of Sri Lanka, and the right to keep out all other Europeans. Extensive tracts of the coast, however, were under Kandyan control, and this was especially signi¬ficant as regards the east where Trincomalee and Batticaloa as well as smaller ports served as centers of a thriving trade with India and beyond.

The most menacing prospect for the Dutch lay in the trade conducted by English and Danish merchants who from the 1650s were sailing into the port of Kottiyar in Trincomalee Bay in their port to port small-scale trading in the Bay of Bengal; the Kandyan ruler, for his part, actively encouraged this. The Dutch, on the other hand, was apprehensive about his control over ports on the east coast, not merely because it threatened their economic and trading interests: they realized that trade links could mature into political ones and that it was through these ports that these would be established. All these questions assumed much greater urgency when the English East India Company began to show interest in acquiring a trading settle¬ment on the east coast of Sri Lanka. The English East India Company wanted a station on the island which would serve a dual purpose: it would enable them both to break the monopoly of the island's cinnamon trade which the Dutch had established and to participate in the flourishing Indo-Sri Lanka trade. Well aware of the rift between the Dutch and the Kandyans, the English East India Company was encouraged to open negotiations with Rajasimha II to acquire a trading station and concession in or around Trincomalee. Besides, in 1659/60 the crews of two English vessels which had touched on the east coast had been captured by the Kandyans. The English East India Company's officials in Madras were urged to establish contact with Rajasimha II for the purpose of securing trade concessions and also to obtain the release of these captives.

The Dutch soon came to know of these plans and tightened their naval watch on the Kandyan ports. Although both the English and the Kandyans went ahead with their negotiations, eluding the Dutch blockade as best they could, no official English embassy could be sent to Kandy. And nothing came of these negotiations, largely because the English were unable to give the Kandyan ruler the quid pro quo he wanted most the promise of armed support against the Dutch. The Dutch used their superior naval power in Asian waters to keep English vessels out of Kandyan ports. Nevertheless, the English refused to concede Dutch claims of monopoly and sought to exercise the freedom of the seas and free mutual relations with Asian rulers. But their attempt to gain entry on the east coast of Sri Lanka served to strengthen the hands of Dutch officials like van Goens, whose advocacy of further territorial expansion in the island became more persuasive in consequence. They now kept pressing for the occupation of the east coast ports—for Trincomalee at least and, if permitted, Batticaloa as well. Batavia was at last persuaded of the danger of leaving the east coast unoccupied, and convinced of the need to maintain a presence there to keep out other European nations.

Then in 1664 there came quite unexpectedly an opportunity, which van Goens grasped with alacrity, to embark on something much wider in scope than this limited programme of expanding Dutch control over the ports. A major rebellion broke out that year in the Kandyan One of these captives was Robert Knox who later wrote a celebrated book on the Kandyan kingdom: A Historical Relation of Ceylon (1st end, London, 1681; ed. James Ryan and publ. Glasgow, 1911). kingdom against Rajasimha II, led by Ambanvalarala, and although the king got the better of his adversaries, he nevertheless felt compelled in 1665 to seek Dutch assistance against the rebels. He asked for a detachment of Dutch troops in Kandy, and for naval patrols in east coast waters. In making this appeal Rajasimha II played right into the hands of van Goens, who had come back in September 1664 to assume the office of Governor for the second time. These unforeseen developments in the Kandyan kingdom strengthened him in his con¬viction that he was dealing with a weak adversary, who was no match for the Dutch.

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