The establishment of the Portuguese and Dutch on Timor
By James J. Fox
While Larantuka remained firmly in Portuguese control, the disputed fort on Solor, known as Fort Henricus to the Dutch, changed hands several times during the first half of the seventeenth century. At one stage, in 1629, the Dutch commander of the fort, Jan de Hornay, deserted to Larantuka where he married a local girl, converted to Catholicism and became known thereafter as João de Hornay. (De Hornay’s desertion allowed the Dominicans to retake the fort at Solor in 1630 and hold it until 1636.)
João de Hornay, through his sons, Antonio and Francisco, gave rise to one of the dynasties that provided the leadership to the Black Portuguese community on Timor. The other dynastic founder was Mateus da Costa, a rival companion in arms of Antonio de Hornay. Mateus had married a princess of Timor (by one account, the daughter of the ruler of Amanuban; by another account, the daughter of the ruler of Ambenu). His son, Domingos, continued the da Costa dynasty on Timor.
These two families fought and feuded, intermarried and succeeded one another, establishing in the process Timorese clans that continue to this day 5. In the seventeenth century, a wise Viceroy in Goa sent his envoy to Larantuka with identical letters of appointment, one for Antonio de Hornay and the other for Mateus da Costa, instructing him to appoint as his representative whoever he found was in power. (As it happened,
this turned out to be Antonio de Hornay but Mateus did not accept this judgment, claiming that his earlier appointment was still valid.)
In 1641, the native ruler of the domain of Ambenu on the north-west coast of Timor (at what is now referred to as Oecussi) was converted to Catholicism by the Dominican friar Antonio de São Jacinto. Prior to this time, the Topasses had traded for sandalwood at several harbours along the coast. Thereafter they made the harbour of Lifao in Oecussi
their main trading base, establishing a small settlement there.
In 1642, a Topass captain named Francisco Fernandez, who had been born on Solor, led a band of 90 musketeers across the island of Timor from north to south to strike a blow at the power of the indigenous rulers of the island – the kingdom of Sonba’i in the interior
and the kingdom of Wehali on the south coast. Striking at and burning these centres was a demonstration of Topass power and allowed the Topasses to redirect the sandalwood trade through their hands 6.
From this point, the Topasses steadily extended their influence and control into the main mountainous sandalwood-growing areas of Timor. Their most important stronghold was in the Mutis mountains but their influence extended to the south coast as well.
The Dutch, in turn, repositioned themselves in 1653, by shifting their main garrison from Solor to Timor. On Timor, they took control of and enlarged the fortifications begun by Friar Jacinto in the Bay of Kupang. There they erected a stone fort to which they gave the name Concordia. This location gave them the advantage of an all-weather harbour with a fortified settlement which could be supplied from Batavia but it put them at a distance from the main sources of sandalwood on Timor which the Topasses and their local allies controlled.
5 The da Costa family established itself in the Noimuti region; the de
Hornay family in Anas.
6 For a further discussion of this event and its consequences, see Fox
(1982).
To rectify this disadvantage, the Dutch East India Company called upon its most illustrious general, Arnoldus de Vlaming van Oudshoorn, to deal with the Black Portuguese. In 1656, with troops fresh from triumphs on Ambon, de Vlaming marched into the interior of Timor
and was completely routed by the Topasses and their allies led by Antonio de Hornay and Mateus da Costa. For a time, after this serious defeat, the Dutch contemplated withdrawing entirely from Timor. For the next 150 years, the Dutch remained confined to Kupang and their influence was limited to a radius of several miles around Concordia.7
The Portuguese, who attempted to assert formal rule from Goa, fared no better than the Dutch. The late seventeenth century onward is a catalogue of uprisings against Portuguese authority. Thus, in 1695, Mateus da Costa fomented an uprising in Larantuka to overthrow the first Viceroy-appointed ‘Governor and Captain-General of the islands of Solor and Timor’, Antonio de Mesquita Pimentel.
In 1701, Antonio Coelho Guerreiro was sent to be governor. He made Lifao the official Portuguese settlement in 1702 and managed to maintain his position for more than two years until he was also expelled and forced to call on the Dutch for his passage back to Goa in 1705. In 1722, Antonio de Albuquerque Coelho was appointed but was besieged
in Lifao for three years by the Topasses and their allies led by Francisco de Hornay. His successor also faced fierce opposition and was besieged for long periods of time while the Topasses continued to control the trade in sandalwood from the interior of Timor.
During this period, the Topasses made three unsuccessful attempts – in 1735, 1745 and 1749 – to drive the Dutch from Kupang. Often the Dutch and Portuguese co-operated in their efforts to control the Black Portuguese. Thus, in 1761, the Opperhoofd in Kupang, Hans Albert von Pluskow, was murdered by Francisco de Hornay and Antonio da Costa
in Lifao where he had gone to attempt to negotiate the reinstatement of the Portuguese governor.
Finally, under siege by the Topasses and with his provisions exhausted, Portuguese Governor Antonio José Telles de Menezes, on the night of 11 August 1769, abandoned Lifao and sailed eastward to establish a new Portuguese settlement at Dili, far from any threat of the Topasses. (It was at this point that Francisco de Hornay offered the Dutch East India. Company the possession of Lifao, an offer that was officially considered
and declined.)
7 For a discussion of the early history of the Kupang area, see Fox (1977);
for a more popular account of the history of Kupang itself, see Fox (1981).
It is appropriate at this juncture to quote an eighteenth century commentator on Timor, the Scots sea captain, Alexander Hamilton, writing in 1727:
[The Timoreans] permitted the Portuguese colony of Macao in China,
to build a Fort on it, which they called Leiffew, and the Dutch a factory
called Coupang, but would never suffer either to interfere with the
Government of their country … they found that the Timoreans would
not lose their liberty for fear of the loss of blood … (1930, II:74).
Only in the nineteenth century – in fact only late in the nineteenth century – through a process of relentless intrusions by military force, were the two colonial powers able to exert their influence on the interior of Timor. Despite continuing contact with Europeans, dating to the early sixteenth century, Timor was never colonised as were other parts
of the Indies. For most of the colonial period, control was a matter of pretence and veneer. The Portuguese claimed to have pacified their territory by 1912, the Dutch theirs by 1915.
This content downloaded from 182.1.79.61 on Thu, 17 Jan 2019 15:57:08 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
