In 1609, a delegation from the Dutch East India Company traveled to Sunpu, Shizuoka Prefecture, for an audience with Tokugawa Ieyasu (1543-1616). The company, founded in Amsterdam seven years earlier and widely known by its Dutch acronym, VOC, was keen to trade with Japan, particularly to gain access to its abundant reserves of silver. This required negotiating some form of commercial agreement, and the first step in that process was to secure the support of Ieyasu, the country’s supremo. Though then officially retired, Ieyasu was still managing foreign affairs.

The Dutch were ill-prepared. Their delegation was underwhelming — a mere five men — and they arrived almost empty-handed. To the most powerful man in the land, they had nothing better to offer than two cases of silk, some ivory and lead, along with a couple of gold cups. And even to find these, they had to dash to Nagasaki at the last minute on a shopping spree.

The Dutch East India Company in Early Modern Japan, by Michael Laver.184 pagesBLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC