Dutch Golden Age - Monopoly On Trade With Japan

Monopoly On Trade With Japan

These various reasons for the domination of Amsterdam as a trade center led to a trade monopoly in 1640 by the Dutch East India Company (VOC) with Japan through the trading post on Dejima. The former island in the bay of Nagasaki measured 15,000 square meters- from here the Dutch traded between China and Japan and at the same time paid tribute to the Shogun. Until 1854, the Dutch were Japan's sole window to the western world. The collection of scientific learning introduced from Europe became known in Japan as Rangaku or Dutch Learning. The Dutch became instrumental in transmitting to Japan some knowledge of the industrial and scientific revolution that was occurring in Europe. The Japanese purchased and translated numerous scientific books from the Dutch, obtained from them Western curiosities and manufactures (such as clocks), and received demonstrations of various Western innovations (such as the demonstrations of electric phenomena, and the flight of a hot air balloon in the early 19th century). In the 17th and 18th centuries, the Dutch were arguably the most economically wealthy and scientifically advanced of all European nations, which put them in a privileged position to transfer Western knowledge to Japan.