Maarten Dirk van Renesse van Duivenbode (June 2, 1804 – March 31, 1878) was a Dutch merchant, trader of bird skins for fashion and naturalia, captain, commander and honorary major in

Ternate Ternate (), also known as the City of Ternate (; ), is the List of regencies and cities of Indonesia, city with the largest population in the province of North Maluku and an island in the Maluku Islands, Indonesia. It was the ''de facto'' provi ...

(

Dutch East Indies The Dutch East Indies, also known as the Netherlands East Indies (; ), was a Dutch Empire, Dutch colony with territory mostly comprising the modern state of Indonesia, which Proclamation of Indonesian Independence, declared independence on 17 Au ...

). From 1858 to 1861 he provided lodging and assistance to

Alfred Russel Wallace Alfred Russel Wallace (8 January 1823 – 7 November 1913) was an English naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist, biologist and illustrator. He independently conceived the theory of evolution through natural selection; his 1858 pap ...

when he travelled through the Moluccan islands.

Biography

Maarten Dirk was born in Ternate. His father was Dirk Maartens van Duivenbode. In 1825 he married Carolina Jacoba Weintré (1812–1836). They got three sons and one daughter. The eldest son is called Lodewijk Willem Alexander who became also a trader in naturalia. After the death of his wife he remarried the Chinese born Gim Nio, later baptised Antoinette Elisabeth Johanna. They had three children. One of them is Adolphina Susanna Wilhelmina (1844 – 1919

Delft Delft () is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of South Holland, Netherlands. It is located between Rotterdam, to the southeast, ...

). In 1865 she married with

Antonie Augustus Bruijn 250 px, Antonie Augustus Bruijn (Surabaya, 1865) Antonie Augustus Bruijn (December 27, 1842 – August 11, 1890) was a Dutch navy officer, naturalist and trader in naturalia from the Dutch East Indies. He was the son-in-law of Maarten Dirk van Ren ...

who took over the business in naturalia in Ternate with his brothers in law. In 1867 the Governor of the Dutch Indies granted Maarten Dirk the addition of the name

Van Renesse The Van Renesse family is an old Dutch nobility, Dutch noble family and cadet branch of the :nl:Heren_van_Voorne, Van Voorne Family (in Dutch) that stems from the town of Renesse in Zeeland. History The eldest documented ancestor of the family ...

to his family name.

Wallace and Van Duivenbode

Wallace travelled from 1854 to 1862 through the Malay Archipelago. From January 1858 on, he stayed three years on Ternate in a house owned by Van Duivenbode (spelled as "van Duivenboden") and used this house as base camp for expeditions to other

Maluku Islands The Maluku Islands ( ; , ) or the Moluccas ( ; ) are an archipelago in the eastern part of Indonesia. Tectonics, Tectonically they are located on the Halmahera Plate within the Molucca Sea Collision Zone. Geographically they are located in West ...

like Gilolo. Maarten Dirk van Duivenbode was the man

called "...''Mr. Duivenboden, a native of Ternate, from an ancient Dutch family''..." Mr Duivenbode served the Dutch Trade Company (Nederlandse Handelmaatschappij) as a merchant. He was the owner of many ships, plantations and the whole district of Doalasi. Because of his wealth he was nicknamed the "King of Ternate". According to Wallace he was richer and more important than the real sultan of Ternate. Wallace also mentioned the sons of Maarten Dirk who accompanied him when visiting Gilolo. During this period, 9 March 1858 he sent the manuscript ''Tendency of varieties to depart indefinite from the original type'' to

Charles Darwin Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English Natural history#Before 1900, naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all speci ...

who received this document on 18 June 1858 which urged him to finish his famous ''

On the Origin of Species ''On the Origin of Species'' (or, more completely, ''On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life'')The book's full original title was ''On the Origin of Species by M ...

''. Darwin considered Wallace's idea to be identical to his concept of natural selection.

Duivenbode's legacy

The family and company name of a father, son, and son in law Anton Bruijn traded in, amongst other things, specimens of birds, especially

birds of paradise The birds-of-paradise are members of the family Paradisaeidae of the order Passeriformes. The majority of species are found in eastern Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, and eastern Australia. The family has 45 species in 17 genera. The members of this ...

, and thereby giving their name to: * Duivenbode's bird of paradise * Duivenbode's riflebird * Duivenbode's six-wired bird of paradise * Duyvenbode's lory (''Chalcopsitta duivenbodei''), also known as the brown lory *

Elegant sunbird The elegant sunbird (''Aethopyga duyvenbodei'') is a large, up to 12 cm long, Australasian sunbird in the genus ''Aethopyga''. The male has an iridescent blue-green crown, shoulder patch and uppertail coverts, yellow bar across lower back, re ...

(''Aethopyga duyvenbodei'') * and a dragonfly ''Brachydiplax duivenbodei'' They also delivered items to

Hermann Schlegel Hermann Schlegel (10 June 1804 – 17 January 1884) was a German ornithologist, herpetologist and ichthyologist. Early life and education Schlegel was born at Altenburg, the son of a brassfounder. His father collected butterflies, which stimulated ...

(

Leiden Leiden ( ; ; in English language, English and Archaism, archaic Dutch language, Dutch also Leyden) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Provinces of the Nethe ...

Adolf Bernhard Meyer Adolf Bernhard Meyer (11 October 1840, Hamburg – 22 August 1911, Dresden) was a German anthropologist, ornithologist, entomologist, and herpetologist. He served for nearly thirty years as director of the Königlich Zoologisches und Anthropologi ...

(

Dresden Dresden (; ; Upper Saxon German, Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; , ) is the capital city of the States of Germany, German state of Saxony and its second most populous city after Leipzig. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, 12th most p ...

) and other European museums. The

Zoological Museum Amsterdam The Zoological Museum Amsterdam (ZMA) was a natural history museum located close to Oosterpark in Amsterdam, Netherlands. It was part of the Faculty of Science, Mathematics and Computer Science (Science) of the University of Amsterdam. It was o ...

received in 1883 about hundred skins, used for the International Trade Exhibition in Amsterdam.Junge, G.C.A. 1953. Ornithologisch onderzoek in de Indische archipel. Ardea 41:301–336. cited in C.J. Heij (2011)

Sources

*Heij, dr. C.J. (2011) ''Biographical Notes of Antonie Augustus Bruijn (1842–1890)''. IBP Press, Bogor. . {{DEFAULTSORT:Renesse van Duivenbode, Maarten Dirk van 1804 births 1878 deaths 19th-century Dutch naturalists Dutch colonial governors and administrators People from Ternate 19th-century Dutch scientists