Algonquian ball headed club; mid-17th century<BR> Maple; l. 55,5 cm.; ball: d. 10 cm.<BR> RMV 360-1579; formerly in Royal Cabinet of Rarities, The Hague<BR> <BR> In September 1609 on a journey of exploration contracted by the Dutch East India Company, Captain Henry Hudson steered his ship Halve Maen (Half Moon) into the river that would eventually bear his name. This historic occasion established the claim of the States-General of Holland to what would become the colony of New Netherland in North America. Initially only trading in furs with the Indians of the region, the Dutch followed up by establishing settlements. They founded New Amsterdam on the tip of Manhattan Island, soon to be followed by settlements further inland along the Hudson and Delaware Rivers. The colony never prospered and was lost to the British in 1664.<BR> <BR> Only one artifact of Native North American origin in the Dutch museum collections can be directly linked to the Dutch colony with a degree of certainty: this ball headed club. In 1681 Jacobus Voorn published a catalogue of the anatomical cabinet of Leiden University in Latin. In its 1691 English translation is says: "a mallet or hammer that the savages in New York kill with, presented by Harman Broem." The artifact is mentioned again in the 1739 catalogue, which list as contents of case D: "A Sea-Spider from New Netherland ... a Killing-Hammer from the Savages of New Netherland,” and lists both specimens as acquired from Reverend Hermanus Bloem (Schuyl 1739:13). The weapon then disappears from the inventories, but a ball headed club appears in the inventories of the Royal Cabinet of Curiosities. It could not be established with absolute certainty that this is the same as the one in the anatomical cabinet. However, because only one such artifact is mentioned in the Dutch inventories, exchanges between collections were common affair in the 18th and 19th century, and the chronology fits, it is highly likely that the ball headed club originally donated by Hermanus Blom transferred from the Leiden anatomical cabinet to the Royal Cabinet of Curiosities in The Hague, and in 1883 to the National Museum of Ethnology in Leiden.<BR> <BR> From 1660 Blom worked as a Reformed minister in the small Dutch settlement of Wiltwyck on the Hudson River. It was also known as Esopus, after the local Indians, and the Dutch name of the settlement meant “Savage Neighborhood.” A peace treaty had just been concluded between the Esopus and Governor Stuyvesant, but deportation of several Indian captives resulted in new clashes and atrocities on both sides. On June 7, 1663, the Indians attacked Wiltwyck and in a letter to the ecclesiastical authorities in Amsterdam, Blom wrote about settlers killed by “the bullets and axes of the savages.” In reprisal, the Dutch attacked the Esopus and almost destroyed the tribe. On May 16, 1664, another peace-treaty was negotiated, and the remnants of the Esopus joined the Wappingers. Blom probably picked up the ball headed club after the attack on Wiltwyck, or obtained it after the subsequent Dutch raid on the Esopus. In 1668 he returned to The Netherland, became minister in his native Woubrugge, and died in 1682.<BR> <BR> The use of clubs as weapons by Iroquois and Algonquian Indians is mentioned in a number of contemporary Dutch sources on New Netherland. In his 1651 narrative on the Mohawks, Reformed Reverend Johannes Megapolensis wrote: "Their weapons in war were formerly a bow and arrows, with a stone axe and mallet; but now they get from our people guns, swords, iron axes and mallets" (1909:176). Adriaen van der Donck who undertook a journey through Mohawk territory in 1655 records: "Their weapons formerly were bows and arrows, with a war-club hung to the arm, and a square shield which covered the body up to the shoulders; … at present many of them use fire-arms…; at present they also use small axes instead of their war-clubs …" (1968:72,100).<BR> <BR> The club is made of a solid piece of maple. Its elegant form and the beauty of the polished wood almost belie its use. The small triangular indentations on the upper rim above the handle also occur on several seventeenth century Iroquois and Eastern Algonquian clubs. According to Frank Speck these were made by tapping the end of a file in the wood. This design occurs with some frequency on Delaware woodwork (cf. Brasser 1961:82).<BR> <BR> Pieter Hovens<BR> Rijksmuseum voor Volkenkunde, Leiden, The Netherlands<BR> <BR> Ted Brasser, War Clubs. In: American Indian Tradition 7/3:77-83; 1961. Johannes Megapolensis, A Short Account of the Mohawk Indians; in: J. Franklin Jameson, ed., Narratives of New Netherland, 1609-1664:163-180; Charles Scribner's Sons; New York, 1909. Frans Schuyl, Catalogus van de Principaalste Rariteiten die op de Anatomie Kamer binnen de Stadt Leiden vertoont werden; p.p; Leiden, 1639. Adriaen Van der Donck, A Description of New Netherlands; Syracuse University Press; Syracuse, 1968. Jacobus Voorn, A Catalogue of All the Chiefest Rarities in the Publick Theater and Anatomie-Hall of the University of Leyden; Leiden, 1691 (orig. Latin ed. 1681).<BR> <BR> <BR> <BR> Toen de eerste Nederlandse kolonisten zich rond de Hudson baai vestigden en Nieuw Amsterdam - het huidige New York - stichtten, werden zij daar met de autochtone bevolking van Irokezen en Algonkin Indianen geconfronteerd. Met name in de jaren 1643-55 waren er regelmatig treffens tussen de kolonisten en deze Indianen. De bewindvoerder van de West-Indische Compagnie, Peter Stuyvesant (1592-1672), had echter weinig ernstige moeilijkheden met de Indiaanse bevolking en het is waarschijnlijk aan hem te danken dat de Engelsen zich er, na de verovering van de stad in 1664, rustig konden vestigen. Aan deze episode in de Nederlandse geschiedenis danken wij wellicht deze strijdknots van Indiaanse herkomst, hoogstwaarschijnlijk een van de oudste voorwerpen uit de Amerikaanse geschiedenis vanaf de kolonisatie. Enkele andere exemplaren bevinden zich thans in het Nationaal Museum te Kopenhagen, waarschijnlijk eveneens van Nederlandse herkomst. Op de steel van de uit een stuk hout gesneden strijdknots is een eenvoudige decoratie, bestaande uit driehoekige inkepingen, aangebracht. Een gat vlak boven de handgreep heeft waarschijnlijk gediend ter bevestiging van een leren polsriempje. <BR> <BR> Engelse tekst:<BR> When the first Dutch colonists settled at the mouth of the Hudson River and established New Amsterdam, now New York, they encountered the autochthonous population of Iroquois and Algonquin Indians. Between 1643 and 1655 there were repeated clashes with these Indians. The governor appointed by the Dutch West Indian Company, Peter Stuyvesant (1592-1672), had few difficulties with the Indians, however, and it was probably thanks to him that the British were able to live peacefully after they took over the city in 1664. This episode in the history of The Netherlands probably explains the presence there of this Indian war club which in all likelihood is one of the oldest objects belonging to the period of the colonization of America. The National Museum in Copenhagen has a few of these clubs, which probably reached there via The Netherlands. The shaft of this war club is made of a single piece of wood and carries a simple incised decoration consisting of triangles. The hole just above the grip probably served for the attachment of a leather wrist-band.<BR> <BR> Aan één zijde heeft de platte kant van de steel twaalf driehoekige inkervingen.