A review of the ethnological investigations in the Dutch Indian archipelago / by J.C. van Eerde.

  • Eerde, J. C. van (Johan Christiaan), 1871-1936.
Date:
1923
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: A review of the ethnological investigations in the Dutch Indian archipelago / by J.C. van Eerde. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    wrote in Tijdschr. K. N. Aardrijksk. Gen. 1916 a])out.Redjang. For the Lubu’y in Mandailing we still depend on the discriptions by Heytino, VAN Ophuysen, Kreemee, van Dijk, etc. The islands along the western coast of Sumatra also harbour a very interesting population which requires further study in spite of the efforts of missionaries, of civil servants and of scientific travellers to collect good data. Of separate works there may lie mentioned: Modigliani (1890), and Schroder (1917) on Mas, Maass on Mentawei (1902); numerous papers in periodicals dealing with the islands of this chain, which extends from Simalur to Engano, must per force remain unmentioned. The Dutch have now been settled in Java for more than three centuries and throughout the island the activities of their government are many-sided and intensive. Ryckloff v^an Goens gave as early as 1656 a “Corte Beschryvinge van ’t Eyland Java” (Bydragen 1856 p. 366); nevertheless a good ethnographical description is wanting. We know more about the Achehnese and the Toradja, the Gajo and the Balinese than we do about the Javanese. Is the reason that, within the space of twenty years, the Gajo, on account of their smaller number, could be better investigated than the tens of millions in Java during a couple of centuries? Or is the reason that the power of the colonial government in Java wms so great as to render the peculiarities of the population unimportant? Or again, was it because in this island, “where no one has time”, no opportunity remained for reflection and the study of what is, after all, the most important subject in Java, its population? What ever the answer to these questions, the literature is overwhelming but the good works are a select few. From Raffles’ “History of Java” (1817) to Chailley’s “Java et ses habitants” (1914) there is a century of the policy of “the Dutch in Java” (Clive Day 1904). Yan Imhoff’s journey of 1743 (Bijdragen 1853) is separated from Augusta de Wit’s “Facts and Fancies” (1905) by a century and a half and yet we remain quite unsatisfied with the picture which Mayer gives us of the life of the people in Java (1897) or with his sketch of the Javanese as human being (1894); this in spite of Poensen’s character sketches (Med. Med. Zendgen. XXIII) and their predecessors. This dissatisfaction does not exclude the gratitude which we owe to penetration and diligence shown by Yeth in the compilation of his “Java” (1878 revised edition 1896), but since then we have been spoilt by the Achehnese and the Toradja and we now demand something better. Meanwhile we have an encyclopaedia of the Sundanese in de Haan’s Priangan (1910); of the Baduj’s there is an important sketch by Jacobs and Meyer (1891), and the Native States are dealt with in Rouffaer’s competent encyclopaedic article; concerning the Madurese there is a great