Hendrik Godfried Duurkoop (5 May 1736,

Dornum Dornum is a village and a municipality in the East Frisian district of Aurich, in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is located near the North Sea coast, approx. 15 km east of Norden, and 20 km north of Aurich. Division of the municipality The ...

– 27 July 1778, at sea) was a Dutch merchant-trader and VOC Opperhoofd in Japan. During his career with the

Dutch East Indies Company The United East India Company ( ; VOC ), commonly known as the Dutch East India Company, was a chartered trading company and one of the first joint-stock companies in the world. Established on 20 March 1602 by the States General of the Neth ...

(the ''Verenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie'' or ''VOC''), he worked on Dejima, a small artificial island in the harbor of

Nagasaki , officially , is the capital and the largest Cities of Japan, city of Nagasaki Prefecture on the island of Kyushu in Japan. Founded by the Portuguese, the port of Portuguese_Nagasaki, Nagasaki became the sole Nanban trade, port used for tr ...

, Japan. Duurkoop was born in

East Frisia East Frisia () or East Friesland (; ; ; ) is a historic region in the northwest of Lower Saxony, Germany. It is primarily located on the western half of the East Frisia (peninsula), East Frisian peninsula, to the east of West Frisia and to the ...

. In 1755 he arrived in Batavia, where his brother lived. In 1759 he was sent to the VOC trading post or "factory" at

Dejima or Deshima, in the 17th century also called , was an artificial island off Nagasaki, Japan, that served as a trading post for the Portuguese (1570–1639) and subsequently the Dutch (1641–1858). For 220 years, it was the central con ...

. In 1771 he was appointed bookkeeper. Duurkoop took up his duties as ''

Opperhoofd is a Dutch word (plural ) that literally translates to "upper-head", meaning "supreme headman". The Danish cognate , which is a calque derived from a Danish pronunciation of the Dutch or Low German word, is also treated here. The standard Ge ...

'' or chief negotiant in November 1776. Early 1777 he made a hofreis to Edo. The Japanese insisted that after one year each opperhoofd had to leave the post. During his stay in Batavia, he was infected with malaria; he died on board the ship "Huis ter Spijk" en route back to Japan in 1778. His corpse was taken to Japan and buried there on August 15.A Note on the Tombstone of Hendrik Duurkoop, the Dutch Merchant (Opperhoofd) of Dejima Factory by Ryuji Hiraok

/ref> His death meant that Arend Willem Feith could not be relieved of his duties as Opperhoofd at Dejima for yet another year when

Isaac Titsingh Isaac Titsingh FRS ( January 1745 – 2 February 1812) was a Dutch diplomat, historian, Japanologist, and merchant.Nussbaum, Louis-Frédéric. (2005). "Isaak Titsingh" in . During a long career in East Asia, Titsingh was a senior official of the ...

would eventually arrive in 1779.

Notes

References

* Dornum-Aurich Lutheran Church Archives. ''Taufregister Dornum 1736.'' Dornum. * Netherlands National Archives. ''Scheepssoldijboek "Overnes" 1754/5.'' Den Haag. * Netherlands National Archives. ''Rollen gekwalificeerde Civiele Dienaren 1775.'' .Den Haag * Netherlands National Archives. ''Day register of the Factory in Japan (Dagregister van de Factorij te Japan).'' Den Haag. * Screech, Timon. (2006)
''Secret Memoirs of the Shoguns: Isaac Titsingh and Japan, 1779-1822.''
London:

RoutledgeCurzon Routledge ( ) is a British multinational publisher. It was founded in 1836 by George Routledge, and specialises in providing academic books, journals and online resources in the fields of the humanities, behavioural science, education, law, a ...

.
OCLC 65177072
{{DEFAULTSORT:Duurkoop, Hendrik Godfried 1736 births 1778 deaths Dutch chiefs of factory in Japan 18th-century Dutch diplomats East Frisians People from Aurich (district) Dutch people of Frisian descent Dutch merchants