Hendrik Adriaan Van Reed Tot Drakestein 1636-1691 and Hortus, Malabaricus

J. Heniger

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351441070
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Biowissenschaften
• Subtopic: Botanik

This text is a reference work for botanists studying the flora of South Asia. As commander of Malabar, van Reed was responsible for compiling the Hortus Malabaricus, a major publication of the flora and medical use of plants.

Part One

Hendrik Adriaan van Reede tot Drakenstein

1

Van Reede in the Netherlands 1636–1650

Not much is known about Van Reede’s early days. Hendrik was born in 1636 as the youngest child of Ernst van Reede, lord of De Vuursche and Drakenstein, and Elisabeth Utenhove. His parents had him christened on Sunday, 13 April of that year, in the Old Church in Amsterdam¹.

Ernst van Reede at first fulfilled the function of forester of the Land of Utrecht, 1619–1626². At that time he lived in the city of Utrecht at St. Janskerkhof³. During the last years of his life he was a member of the Council of the Admiralty in Amsterdam, 1633–1640⁴.

Hendrik’s mother died in February 1637, and his father followed her shortly afterwards, in October 1640, into the grave⁵. The couple had had twelve children in all, some of whom died at an early age⁶. The many orphans, and thus also Hendrik, were placed under the guardianship of an uncle, Godard van Reede van Nederhorst, a brother of Ernst van Reede⁷.

But this uncle died already in 1648, when Hendrik was only twelve years old. Perhaps Hendrik’s eldest brother Gerard, who had meanwhile come of age, then took over the guardianship⁸. The actual guardianship of Gerard cannot have been of long duration, for ‘from the beginning of my fourteenth year I have done nothing but travel beyond the borders of my native country’, Hendrik wrote about himself. From this it also follows that he will not have received much schooling; in his later career, too, he had no opportunity for this or, as he himself testified: ‘I do not excel either in varied and profound learning or in accurate knowledge of botany, spices, and medicaments’⁹.

Although we know next to nothing about Hendrik’s boyhood, something can indeed be said about the setting from which he sprang and the extent to which this may have influenced his later behaviour and interests. Hendrik’s later life was to be dominated by a complex of coherent factors. In his career we shall be concerned by turns with nobility, military affairs, administration, diplomacy, finance, reclamation, trade, colonization, religion, building affairs, and -last but not least- science. Although it cannot strictly be proved, it may be assumed that already in his youth Hendrik came into contact with the majority of these factors in his direct environment.

By birth Hendrik belonged to a very distinguished and influential noble family, which, divided into different branches, produced many military men, diplomats, and public servants from the 16th to the 18th century. The centre of the Van Reedes lay in the province of Utrecht, where they owned extensive estates. They owed their standing to the ownership of various manor-houses (privileged castles and country-houses), which gave them access to the Equestrian Order of Utrecht, and thus to prominent public offices. During the 17th century the Van Reedes held important posts in the States of Utrecht and in the States General¹⁰.

Among the older relations of Hendrik we find as the best-known persons his uncle and guardian, Godard van Reede van Nederhorst, negotiator in the Treaty of Munster (1648), which put an end to the Eighty Years’ War against Spain¹¹. Another uncle was Johan van Reede van Renswoude, president of the States of Utrecht and ambassador in England and Brandenburg¹². His famous cousin, Godard Adriaan van Reede van Amerongen, served as ambassador in Denmark, Sweden, and Brandenburg¹³. They helped to make possible the development of the Republic to a leading European power.

The honour and glory of the family was a delicate point with the Van Reedes. Amidst the predominantly middle-class society in the Republic the noble families formed a minority, which tended to decrease rather than increase. In Hendrik’s branch of the family a distasteful affair had occurred. His grandfather, Gerard van Reede van Nederhorst, had married far beneath his high rank. By doing so, he endangered the full nobility of his descendants, and consequently also their access to the Equestrian Order. With difficulty he could possess himself of his patrimony, the parentage of his wife remained obscure¹⁴. Nevertheless Hendrik bore the fictitious arms of his grandmother quite undismayed and considered himself to belong to the high nobility of Utrecht¹⁵. His imperious attitude later on as commander of Malabar, and as commissioner-general, may partly be attributed to his sense of honour as a nobleman.

Through intermarriages the Van Reedes formed a well-knit clan¹⁶ which played a dominant role in the Equestrian Order. Thus they were able to pave the way to a successful career also for relatives who were less richly blessed with worldly goods, and to raise the status of the family by this means. Thus, the offices of forester of the Land of Utrecht and of councillor of the Admiralty in Amsterdam were allotted to Hendrik’s father, Ernst van Reede, who himself did not own a recognized manor-house.

Against this general background the young Hendrik will have grown up. He was to make his own contribution to the honour and glory of the Van Reedes by dedicating several volumes of Hortus Malabaricus to his nearest relations¹⁷.

Figure 2. House Drakenstein near De Vuursche about 1650. Anonymous Indian ink drawing, 18.2 x 39.5 cm. RAU, Topographical Atlas 1119:185.

Apart from their role in the States of Utrecht, the Van Reedes made many contributions to the cultural and economical flourishing of the province of Utrecht. In part the rise of the Utrecht country-seat is due to their delight in building, while large parts of the then still existing wilderness were reclaimed thanks to their exertions.

The Van Reedes devoted much attention to their manor-houses. They altered and embellished them. Sometimes on the site of these old-fashioned medieval castles they erected entirely new country-seats. A well-known example is the reconstruction of the house of Nederhorst, which was completed about 1635 by Hendrik’s uncle and guardian, Godard van Reede van Nederhorst. Hendrik will undoubtedly have known this beautiful country-seat quite well in his youth¹⁸. The castle of Amerongen was embellished considerably by Godard Adriaan van Reede van Amerongen¹⁹. Gerard van Reede van Renswoude built the famous, still existing house of Renswoude²⁰. Since 1640 Hendrik’s own brother, Gerard van Reede van Drakenstein, built the remarkable octagonal house of Drakenstein, from which the two brothers were to derive the second part of their surname, Van Reede van (tot) Drakenstein (Fig.2)²¹. In the same period the house of Rijnhuizen was erected by their brother-in-law, René van Tuyll van Serooskerken²².

In addition Hendrik’s nearest relations were greatly interested in reclamation and colonization projects. His grandfather, Gerard van Reede van Nederhorst, and the latter’s sons invested a good deal of money in draining Horstermeer¹⁴. In 1626 Hendrik’s father bought the manor De Vuursche with vast waste lands and began to reclaim them and make them habitable. Shortly after 1640 Hendrik’s brother Gerard erected the church and the village of De Vuursche and spent nearly the whole of his fortune on the completion of this project²³. Hendrik’s uncle and guardian Godard too was not behindhand in this respect. He took part in the damming-in of Heer-Hugowaard in North Holland, dug the Rhedervaart in the village Nederhorst-den-Berg, and after 1640 engaged in the foundation of the colony Nederhorst on Staten Island, New York²⁴. In his colonial career Hendrik’s passion for building and pioneering was to become a subiect of fierce criticism

All these building and reclaiming activities weighed upon the finances of the Van Reedes. Hendrik’s father for a long time had groaned under heavily burdened family estates²⁵. In 1636 he even became involved in an embezzlement scandal, which reached such a height that the States General intervened in it²⁶. Hendrik’s brother Gerard finally went bankrupt⁸. The uncle and guardian Godard and his descendants, too, were hard put to it to keep their heads above water²⁷. One is inclined to think of a family trait when later, in his Malabar period, Hendrik is reproached with constant impecuniosity and excessive financial demands.

In military matters Hendrik had an impressive example. His mother’s father was the famous colonel Antoni Utenhove, who during the Eighty Years’ War had become widely known because of his stubborn, but vain defence of the fortresses of Oostende (1604) and Emmerich (1606) against the Spanish general Spinola²⁸. Much less known are Hendrik’s uncles by marriage, Maurits Lodewijk de la Baye and Ernst van Abcoude van Meerten, who also served in the army of the States²⁹. A fact of more direct influence on the young Hendrik will have been the fate of his elder brother Frederik, captain in the army of the Dutch West India Company in Brazil. Frederik was one of the numerous casualties in the disastrous battle of the Guarapes of 19 February 1649, which heralded the expulsion of the Dutch from Brazil by the Portuguese³⁰. In Hendrik’s family therefore there existed a military tradition, and a certain heroic aspect cannot even be denied to it. In this respect Hendrik was to consolidate that tradition by the heroic part he played in the conquest of Cochin in 1663.

A special aspect with which Hendrik was to be confronted in Malabar was the religious situation there. The Van Reedes in general appear to have been orthodox Protestants, or at least behaved as such; otherwise it would not have been very well possible for them to hold public offices in the Republic. There was, however, one striking exception among them: Hendrik’s father, Ernst van Reede, was a convinced follower of the heterodox Arminians, who took rather a liberal attitude towards people of other persuasions. In 1626 Ernst became involved in Arminian riots in Utrecht, and later too, when he lived in Amsterdam, he continued to side with the Arminians³¹. Hendrik’s indulgent attitude in Malabar towards the “heathen” and the Roman Catholics, and his friendships with the Discalced Carmelite Matthew of St. Joseph and the Spinozist clergyman of Cochin, Johannes Casearius, both of them co-founders of Hortus Malabaricus, might be attributed to his childhood.

In scientific respects, the Van Reedes did not have much demonstrable interest. Among the older generations only Frederik van Reede van Amerongen published a genealogical booklet (1595), in which he tried to enhance the lustre of his family by means of falsifications³². With the exception of Hendrik himself, the best-known member of the younger generations was Frederik Adriaan van Reede van Renswoude, who studied at the Faculty of Arts of Utrecht University and who afterwards was in correspondence with the famous Delft naturalist Antoni van Leeuwenhoek on the control of insects in orchards. But Hendrik was to become acquainted with Frederik Adriaan only after his return from the East.

An interest in overseas regions was unmistakable among Hendrik’s nearest relations, especially in the West India Company. His father and his brother Gerard, as members of the Council of the Admiralty of Amsterdam, were concerned with the military equipment of that Company. His other brother Frederik served in the Brazilian army of the same Company, and his uncle and guardian Godard erected the settlement Nederhorst in New York, then still a colony of that Company.

Notes

1 The text of the registration of baptism of Hendrik reads: ‘On Sunday 13 ditto [April 1636] we received for their covenant as follows: the child of “Joncheer” Ernst van Reden van de Vuijrs and of “Joffrouw” Elijsabet Uijtenhove, in the presence of Petronella Reuters, wife of Mr. Elbert Spiegel, and “Joncheer” Charles Uijtenhove, Sr. Pieter Martsz Hoefijser, tax collector of the Convoy. All these were witnesses to the baptism of Hendrick’ (GAA, DTB 7, Register Baptisms Old Church, p.83). It is striking that the child did not receive both Christian names, Hendrik Adriaan, which he used himself later on and by which he is known in history.

2 In the existing literature there is sometimes confusion with Ernst’s cousin Ernst van Reede tot Amerongen (...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Introduction
• Summary
• Samenvatting
• PART ONE: HENDRIK ADRIAAN VAN REEDE TOT DRAKENSTEIN
• PART TWO: HORTUS MALABARICUS
• PART THREE: ANNOTATED LIST OF PLANTS