Nathaniel's Nutmeg: How One Man's Courage Changed the Course of History

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The story ends with a moral; a somewhat ironic one. The British defeat at the hands of the Dutch was resolved by Run going to the Dutch and Manhattan (which had been colonized by the Dutch West India Company) going to the British; setting in motion a chain of events that would lead to the establishment of the greatest city the world has ever known. The prize for which so many died is now worthless, while the consolation prize, a piece of land nobody cared for, is now the richest place on earth – built not by violence at the service of looters but by the power of unbridled innovation and uncoerced (read free) trade. Ratnikas, Algirdas J. "Timeline Indonesia". Timelines.ws. Archived from the original on 10 July 2010 . Retrieved 12 August 2010. In 1614 he was accused of purloining company resources and other offences by one dying man named, Edward Langley. [3] This was the period of the Spice Wars; when the British, the Portuguese and the Dutch engaged in frantic searches for a safer route to the Spice Islands (in what is now Indonesia) and a protracted conflict with the locals and each other over control of the world’s spice supply. The Spaniards for a time also sought a role in the spice trade, but their search for a westward route to the islands led them to the New World where they became distracted by the rape of a continent.

Milton, Giles (1 June 2021). "Soldier, Sailor, Frogman, Spy". Macmillan Publishers . Retrieved 1 July 2021. Both the Dutch East India Company and the English East India Company were para-state organizations; with charters from their Kings which encouraged the greed and bloodlust of corruptible men to engage in plunder, in piracy, in genocide, in colonization, in ethnic cleansing, in torture and in the construction of monopolies held by violence. This is the story of pre-enlightenment mischief sanctioned by absolute rulers for the enrichment of a few. Nutmeg in more than trace quantities is a medicinial herb that is still used today. It has a more than mild sophoric effect, is slightly anti-histimine, and is a euphoric. Big Chief Elizabeth: The Adventures and Fate of the First English Colonists in America, 2000 ISBN 978-0340748824 Nathaniel Courthope (born 1585;– died c. October 20, 1620) (sometimes written Courthopp) was an English East India Company officer [1] involved in the wars with the Dutch over the spice trade.T]he monks vaunted nutmeg's ability to prevent sore throats, hemorrhoids, scarlet fever and ailments of the spleen." In Medieval and Renaissance banquets, exotic spices, including mace and nutmeg, along with the popular cinnamon, were added in large amounts to various dishes. Fashionable French gourmets would bring their own nutmeg graters to add their nutmeg to appropriately improve on a wealthy host's dinner. Such affectations generally disappeared in the 18th century ...

During the Renaissance, nutmeg was still considered a preventive medicine by Western medical authorities but its properties were usually used to treat memory loss, dizziness and blood in the urine." A 16th century monk praised nutmeg oil rubbed on a part of the male anatomy for the same purpose that Viagra is used today. Over all the Spice Islands, Run was the most coveted – covered as it was from one end to the other with Nutmeg trees; trees that would grow nowhere else. At that time Nutmeg was thought to cure the plague; and was the most valuable commodity in the world. Fascinating Footnotes From History" is a collection of lesser-known stories from world history, featuring topics like Adolf Hitler's cocaine use, Joseph Stalin's criminal experience, and other anecdotes about famous historical figures. The stories have been drawn from Milton's research and previously published as separate e-books. The book is available in the United States as two volumes, titled "When Hitler Took Cocaine and Lenin Lost His Brain: History's Unknown Chapters" and "When Churchill Slaughtered Sheep and Stalin Robbed A Bank."

About Joel D. Hirst

In an online review ( BarnesandNoble.com of "Nathaniel's Nutmeg: Or the True and Incredible Adventures of the Spice Trader Who Changed the Course of History" by Giles Milton (1999, Farrar, Straus and Giroux): Nathaniel Courthope: Oxford Biography Index entry". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press . Retrieved 12 August 2010. Fortnightly Club of Redlands, California". RedlandsFortnightly.org. 1 November 2001 . Retrieved 12 August 2010. Have you heard of the Island of Run? Neither had I. In fact this most insignificant island of the Banda archipelago – 1.9 miles by .65 miles – often doesn’t even make it onto modern maps of the region. Nevertheless, for much of the 16 th and 17 th centuries this tiny atoll in the middle of the Pacific Ocean captivated the popular imagination and inspired the imperial avarice of the four great powers of that period.

Milton is the writer and narrator of the podcast series Ministry of Secrets, produced by Somethin' Else and Sony. Thanks to Courthope's defence of the island however, Britain was able to barter its legal title to the island of Run with the Dutch, for another island by the name of Manhattan. [7] Further reading [ edit ] Nutmeg is not a nut, but the seed kernel inside the fruit of the nutmeg tree (Myristica fragrans), which is native to Indonesia. It's a spice, once rare and expensive, over which several minor wars were fought between competing countries (Venice, Genoa, the Netherlands, Portugal and England). The English departed without a struggle shortly after Courthope's death and their local allies - who considered themselves to be under His Majesty's reign - were being oppressed. [6]What we saw running amok in the shadowy corners of the world was two imperial powers vying for conquest. What I see in this story is a warning of what can happen with unsupervised authority – when power requires no consent and legitimacy is not derived from natural laws; laws that were rediscovered during the enlightenment and have been steadfastly and progressively protected using institutions built by and for us as individuals at the service of our reason.

East Indies: July 1614." Calendar of State Papers Colonial, East Indies, China and Japan, Volume 2, 1513-1616. Ed. W Noel Sainsbury. London: Her Majesty's Stationery Office, 1864. 301-313. British History Online Retrieved 11 July 2019. [ dead link] Despite numerous letters from the Company's directors allowing Courthope to leave his post, and even awarding him repeatedly for his efforts, he never gave in. Even after the fleet of Sir Thomas Dale sent from England to Run had been defeated by the Dutch governor of the archipelago, Jan Pieterszoon Coen, the decision never changed. White Gold: The Extraordinary Story of Thomas Pellow and North Africa's One Million European Slaves, 2005, Sceptre, ISBN 978-0-340-79469-2 Szulinski, Cathi (30 April 2009). "The First Russian Students in England". Krotov.info . Retrieved 12 August 2010.On 25 December 1616, he landed his ships, Swan and Defence, on the island known as Run, the smallest (about 2 by 2.5 miles (3.2km ×4.0km)) of the Banda Islands, in a quest to break the Dutch hold on the nutmeg supply. He persuaded the islanders to enter an alliance with the British for nutmeg. After losing his two ships to mutiny and sinking by the Dutch, he fortified the island by erecting forts to overlook approaches from the east. [4] With 39 men and the natives, with scarce food and water (springs of which the island is devoid of) supply, he proceeded to hold off a siege of the Dutch - who outnumbered them considerably - for over 1,540 days. Russian Roulette" is an historical account of British spies who were sent to Soviet Russia after the 1917 Bolshevik revolution, aiming to thwart Lenin's plans. The book is based on previously unknown secret documents found in archives. the Portuguese built a Fort in Oman named Muscat ['place of falling' in Arabic] a good place to refuel their sailors coming and going. Perhaps European nutmeg, which comes from the Moluccan Islands, is of better quality than U.S. nutmegs that are grown in Grenada. Furthermore, ground nutmeg and pulverized mace rapidly lose their volatile oleoresins, and thus only freshly ground specimens are of major gustatory value."