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Frederick de Houtman ( – 21 October 1627) was a Dutch explorer, navigator, and colonial governor who sailed on the first Dutch expedition to the East Indies from 1595 until 1597, during which time he made observations of the
southern celestial hemisphere The southern celestial hemisphere, also called the Southern Sky, is the southern half of the celestial sphere; that is, it lies south of the celestial equator. This arbitrary sphere, on which seemingly fixed stars form constellations, appea ...
and contributed to the creation of 12 new southern
constellations A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The origins of the earliest constellation ...
.


Career


East Indies

De Houtman was born in Gouda. De Houtman assisted fellow Dutch navigator Pieter Dirkszoon Keyser with astronomical observations during the first Dutch expedition to the East Indies from 1595 until 1597. In 1598, de Houtman sailed on a second expedition led by his brother,
Cornelis de Houtman Cornelis de Houtman (2 April 1565 – 1 September 1599) was a Dutch merchant seaman who commanded the first Dutch expedition to the East Indies. Although the voyage was difficult and yielded only a modest profit, Houtman showed that the Po ...
, who was killed during the voyage. Frederick was imprisoned by the Sultan of Aceh, Alauddin Riayat Syah, in northern Sumatra. He used his two years of captivity—from September 1599 until August 1601—to study the local
Malay language Malay (; ms, Bahasa Melayu, links=no, Jawi alphabet, Jawi: , Rejang script, Rencong: ) is an Austronesian languages, Austronesian language that is an official language of Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore, and that is also spo ...
and to make astronomical observations. These observations supplemented those made by Keyser on the first expedition. The constellations formed from their observations were first published in 1597 or 1598 on a globe by
Petrus Plancius Petrus Plancius (; 1552 – 15 May 1622) was a Dutch-Flemish astronomer, cartographer and clergyman. He was born as Pieter Platevoet in Dranouter, now in Heuvelland, West Flanders. He studied theology in Germany and England. At the age of 24 he ...
, and later globes incorporated adjustments based on De Houtman's later observations. Credit for these constellations is generally assigned jointly to Keyser, De Houtman, and Plancius, though some of the underlying stars were known beforehand. The constellations are also widely associated with Johann Bayer, who included them in his celestial atlas, ''
Uranometria ''Uranometria'' is a star atlas produced by Johann Bayer. It was published in Augsburg in 1603 by Christoph Mangle (''Christophorus Mangus'') under the full title ''Uranometria: omnium asterismorum continens schemata, nova methodo delineata, a ...
'', in 1603. After De Houtman's return to Europe, De Houtman published his stellar observations in an appendix to his dictionary and grammar of the Malayan and
Malagasy language Malagasy (; ) is an Austronesian language and the national language of Madagascar. Malagasy is the westernmost Malayo-Polynesian language, brought to Madagascar by the settlement of Austronesian peoples from the Sunda islands around the 5th c ...
s.


Australia

In 1619 De Houtman sailed in the
Dutch East India Company The United East India Company ( nl, Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, the VOC) was a chartered company established on the 20th March 1602 by the States General of the Netherlands amalgamating existing companies into the first joint-stock ...
ship , along with Jacob Dedel in the . They sighted the Australian coast near present-day
Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth i ...
, which they called Dedelsland. After sailing northwards along the coast he encountered and only narrowly avoided a group of shoals, subsequently called the
Houtman Abrolhos The Houtman Abrolhos (often called the Abrolhos Islands) is a chain of 122 islands and associated coral reefs, in the Indian Ocean off the west coast of Australia, about west of Geraldton, Western Australia. It is the southernmost true coral ...
. De Houtman then made landfall in the region known as
Eendrachtsland Eendrachtsland or Eendraghtsland ( nl, het Landt van d'Eendracht and ) is an obsolete geographical name for an area centred on the Gascoyne region of Western Australia. Between 1616 and 1644, during the European age of exploration, ''Eendraghtsl ...
, which the explorer
Dirk Hartog Dirk Hartog (; baptised 30 October 1580 – buried 11 October 1621) was a 17th-century Dutch sailor and explorer. Dirk Hartog's expedition was the second European group to land in Australia and the first to leave behind an artefact to record his ...
had encountered earlier. In his journal, De Houtman identified these coasts as
Locach Lochac, Locach or Locat is a country far south of China mentioned by Marco Polo. The name is widely believed to be a variant of ''Lo-huk'' 罗斛: the Cantonese name for the southern Thai kingdom of Lopburi (also known as Lavapura and Louvo), whic ...
, mentioned by Marco Polo to have been a country far south of China and indicated as such on maps by cartographers Plancius and Linschoten.


See also

* Dutch celestial cartography in the Age of Exploration ( Early systematic mapping of the far southern sky, c. 1595–1599) *
Constellations created and listed by Dutch celestial cartographers The history of cartography refers to the development and consequences of cartography, or mapmaking technology, throughout human history. Maps have been one of the most important human inventions for millennia, allowing humans to explain and navig ...
* John Davis – English explorer who accompanied De Houtman on the first East Indies' expedition as its pilot


References


Footnotes


Bibliography

English * * * * Dutch * * * * * *


External links

*
Frederick de Houtman’s catalogue
{{DEFAULTSORT:Houtman, Frederick De 16th-century Dutch explorers 16th-century Dutch cartographers 17th-century Dutch cartographers 17th-century Dutch colonial governors 17th-century Dutch explorers 1570s births 1627 deaths Cartography in the Dutch Republic Dutch celestial cartography in the Age of Discovery Dutch East India Company people H Explorers of Western Australia People from Gouda, South Holland Sailors on ships of the Dutch East India Company Year of birth uncertain