Variations of African Life in the Eighteenth-Century Netherlands: Between a Boy Servant at the Court of Orange-Nassau and a Lord of the Manor in the Province of Groningen

Today De Gruyter Oldenbourg published the book 'The European Experience in Slavery, 1650-1850', edited by Rebekka von Mallinckrodt of the Univerisity of Bremen and stemming from a conference on the subject held there in 2017. In it a contribution by Annemieke van der Vegt and me titled 'Variations of African Life in the Eighteenth-Century Netherlands: Between a Boy Servant at the Court of Orange-Nassau and a Lord of the Manor in the Province of Groningen.'

In our chapter we analyse the position of young African men in the Netherlands in the era of the Atlantic slave trade through the biographies of Christiaan van der Vegt, who was brought over from the Gold Coast of West Africa (current day Ghana) in the 1740s in servitude and presented to the court of Orange-Nassau, and Arij de Graaff, son of a Dutch West India Company official and an African lady, who, as an orphan, was brought to Groningen in the 1730s.

Christiaan's life was long, but also full of tribulations and focussed on survival after the Court had handed him over to the mayor of Weesp. Arij came under the full protection of the West India Company, had a glowing career in its service, became rich as a slave trader, and eventually settled as a Lord of the Manor in Groningen. Both men are examples at the two ends of the spectrum of African lives in the Netherlands in the 18th century. Through their lives we analyse common patterns and specificities for the larger group of young Africans in the Netherlands in this period.

The book is open access and can be downloaded from the De Gruyter website.

Link for our chapter: Variations of African Life in the Eighteenth-Century Netherlands: Between a Boy Servant at the Court of Orange-Nassau and a Lord of the Manor in the Province of Groningen

Link for the book: The European Experience in Slavery, 1650–1850