History of Mauritius - Dutch

Dutch

In 1598, a Dutch expedition consisting of eight ships, under the orders of admirals Jacques Cornelius Van Neck and Wybrandt Van Warwyck, set sail from the port of Texel, Netherlands towards the Indian subcontinent. The eight ships ran into foul weather after passing the Cape of Good Hope, and were separated. Three found their way to the northeast of Madagascar, while the remaining five regrouped and sailed in a southeasterly direction. On 17 September, the five ships under the orders of Admiral Van Warwyck came into view of the island. On 20 September, they entered a sheltered bay which they gave the name of "Port de Warwick" (present name is "Grand Port"). They landed and decided to name the island "Prins Maurits van Nassaueiland", after Prince Maurits (Latin version: Mauritius) of the House of Nassau, the stadtholder of Holland, but also after the main vessel of the fleet which was called "Mauritius". From those days, only the name Mauritius has remained. On 2 October, the ships again took to the sea towards Bantam.

From then on, the island’s "Port de Warwick" was used by the Dutch as a stopover after long months at sea. In 1606, two expeditions came for the first time to what would later become Port-Louis in the northwest part of the island. The expedition, consisting of eleven ships and 1,357 men under the orders of Admiral Corneille came into the bay, which they named “Rade des Tortues” (literally meaning "Harbor of the Tortoises") because of the great number of terrestrial tortoises they found there.

From that date, Dutch sailors shifted their choice to “Rade des Tortues” as a harbor. In 1615, the shipwreck and death of governor Pieter Both, who was coming back from India with four richly laden ships in the bay, caused the route to be considered as cursed by Dutch sailors, and they tried to avoid it as much as possible. In the meantime, the British and the Danes were beginning to make incursions into the Indian Ocean. Those who landed on the island freely cut and took with them the precious heartwood of the ebony trees, then found in profusion all over the island.