Jan Joosten

Jan Joosten van Lodensteiyn was an agent of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), who first arrived in Japan in 1600 aboard the Liefde; he and his shipmates were the first Dutchmen (and the first Englishman, William Adams) to ever travel to Japan.

The Liefde left Europe alongside four other ships, on a mission to challenge the Iberian monopoly in Japanese trade. By the time they arrived in Japan on 1600/3/7, however, the Liefde was the only ship left. Joosten and Adams were among 21 survivors of what was originally a 110-man crew. Most of the others were kept in detention for several months, while Joosten and Adams were granted an audience with Tokugawa Ieyasu on 3/29 (or perhaps 4/10). Ieyasu later took both men into his service, granting Joosten a 100 koku fief near Nagasaki, and a mansion in Edo.

Once the VOC formally established a factory in Japan in 1609, Joosten began working more actively for them, while also making private investments in the Southeast Asia trade. Once the British East India Company established its Japanese factory in 1613, Joosten began using his influence with Ieyasu to push for greater Dutch privileges (over the English), to the chagrin of Richard Cocks, head of the British factory. Even so, Cocks is known to have sent gifts to Joosten's wife and daughter in 1616. Little is known about Joosten's Japanese wife, or about his daughter, except that she was old enough by 1622 to get married herself.

References

• Gary Leupp, Interracial Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900, A&C Black (2003), 59.