Batavia

Yesterday we drove to Lilystad to see a replica of the 17th century sailing ship Batavia.
T and I have both been reading Batavia's Graveyard by Mike Dash (T in Dutch, me in English). The Batavia sailed from Amsterdam in 1629 heading for Java but ran aground west of Fremantle in Australia and the survivors were stranded. I am still to find out about the horrors that followed. The replica ship was very impressive - built in 6 months - amazing. The VOC (East India Company) produced 1500 of these ships in one century. Batavia's Graveyard is a fascinating read just for the history of the
VOC and Holland. Mike Dash also wrote Tulipomania.

The Batavia museum which is attached to the ship also has the headquarters of NISA which is the Institute for the Study of Shipwrecks. When they drained a part of the Zuiderzee nearby in the seventies to make new land they uncovered hundreds of wrecked sailing ships, as well as planes from WWII with crew still on board and even a Roman boat, which is now in the NISA building. They took the most interesting ships away and buried the others under polythene and earth to be dug up later. So the land is full of ships' graves
























The Batavia's mast was cut down when the ship ran aground