Jan Huyghen van Linschoten

Jan Huyghen van Linschoten was a Dutch Protestant merchant, traveler and historian. He is credited with publishing important information about Asian trade, such as the navigational routes that enabled the passage to the elusive East Indies to be opened to the English and the Dutch. This enabled the British East India Company and the Dutch East India Company to break the 16th century monopoly enjoyed by the Portuguese on trade with the East Indies.

Jan Huyghen was born in Haarlem in the Netherlands, the son of a public notary, but the family moved to the town of Enkhuizen when he was young. He left for Spain during December 1576 to be with his brother in Seville, staying in Spain until 1580 when he got a job working with another merchant in Lisbon. With the help of his brother, Willem, who was acquainted with the newly appointed Archbishop of the Portuguese colony of Goa, Dominican Vicente da Fonseca, he was appointed Secretary to the Archbishop. So, Jan Huyghen sailed for Goa on 8 April 1583, arriving five months later. He spent five years in Goa as Secretary to the Archbishop and had access to maps and portolans and sensitive commercial information.

On his return the Netherlands Huyghen sold the story of his travels to the Amsterdam publisher Cornelis Claesz, who published it in 1596 under the title Itinerario: Voyage ofte schipvaert van Jan Huyghen van Linschoten naar Oost ofte Portugaels Indien … 1579-1592. The work was lavishly illustrated and contained the commercially sensitive information he had had access to in Goa, thereby giving Dutch merchants information on Portuguese sea-routes to the Far East, of Portuguese territories, and of spice trees (and spice growing areas) and other commodities. The book was a huge success and was reprinted in German, English, French and Latin.