Jan Pieterszoon Coen

Who was Jan Pieterszoon Coen?

Jan Pieterszoon Coen, the founder of Batavia, was an officer of the Dutch East India Company in Indonesia in the early seventeenth century, holding two terms as its Governor-General of the Dutch East Indies.

Renowned for providing the impulse that set the VOC on the path to dominance in the Dutch East Indies, he was long considered a national hero in the Netherlands. A famed quote of his from 1618, "Despair not, spare your enemies not, for God is with us", amply illustrates his single-minded ruthlessness, as well as his unstinting belief in the divinely-sanctioned nature of his project. The utilization of such self-professed divine sanction in the use of violence pursuant to his ultimate goals of Monopoly Trade was deemed by many to be excessive, even for such a relatively violent age. Consequently since the independence of Indonesia he has been looked at in a more critical light, and historians view his often violent means to have been excessive.

Coen was known in his time on account of strict governance and harsh criticism of people who did not share his views, at times directed even at the 17 Lords of the VOC.