Chests Full of Trading Objects: Understanding the Provenance of Objects Collected during the Gonini- and Tapanahoni-expeditions to Suriname (1903-1904)

At the beginning of the 20th century, the “Koninklijk Nederlands Aardrijkskundig Genootschap” organized several expeditions to map the country of Suriname, which was a colony of the Netherlands from 1667 to 1922. The main reason for organizing these expeditions was the mapping of Suriname, intending to find areas that could be exploited. During the Gonini-expedition in 1903 and Tapanahoni-expedition in 1904, there was a second goal: collecting objects of the Maroon (formerly enslaved people that escaped the plantations) and Indigenous communities living in these areas. A goal that can be explained by the growing interest in the ethnography of Indigenous people at that time. Archives and journals show that the objects collected during these expeditions were acquired by trading Indigenous and Maroon objects for Western objects. Although this can be argued to be a fair way of collecting, it is, however, important to realize the circumstances in which the objects were collected. By...Show moreAt the beginning of the 20th century, the “Koninklijk Nederlands Aardrijkskundig Genootschap” organized several expeditions to map the country of Suriname, which was a colony of the Netherlands from 1667 to 1922. The main reason for organizing these expeditions was the mapping of Suriname, intending to find areas that could be exploited. During the Gonini-expedition in 1903 and Tapanahoni-expedition in 1904, there was a second goal: collecting objects of the Maroon (formerly enslaved people that escaped the plantations) and Indigenous communities living in these areas. A goal that can be explained by the growing interest in the ethnography of Indigenous people at that time. Archives and journals show that the objects collected during these expeditions were acquired by trading Indigenous and Maroon objects for Western objects. Although this can be argued to be a fair way of collecting, it is, however, important to realize the circumstances in which the objects were collected. By realizing that the expedition was started to explore more exploitable areas and also acknowledging the fact that the Dutch expedition would have not been able to collect information and objects without the help of indigenous and Maroon people as guides. This colonial context is furthermore evident in the environment they were eventually and still are placed in: The National Museum of World Cultures in the Netherlands. With this in mind, this thesis discusses how the provenance of these objects can be understood in the colonial context they were collected in.Show less

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Chests Full of Trading Objects: Understanding the Provenance of Objects Collected during the Gonini- and Tapanahoni-expeditions to Suriname (1903-1904)