Isaq Schrijver
Encyclopedia
Isaq Schrijver was a Dutch ensign and South African explorer. Although born and raised in Leiden, both his parents were born near Aachen
, Germany. Little else is known of his origins, but by 1667 he was a marine.
In February 1684, Schrijver, then a sergeant in the Dutch East India Company
and stationed at the Cape
, headed a reconnaissance expedition into Namaqualand
. They went as far north as Garies
and brought back samples of copper ore to Cape Town
.
Schrijver was involved in salvage operations of the Nossa Senhora dos Milagros which had run aground on the night of 16 April 1686 at Struisbaai
near Cape Agulhas
. This was a Portuguese vessel with 150 crew, commanded by Don Emmanual Da Silva, en route from Goa
to Portugal
and bearing diplomatic gifts from Narai
, King of Siam to Pedro, King of Portugal, Louis XIV of France and Charles II of England
. Also aboard were three Siamese ambassadors who were left to fend for themselves by the crew. Two were found in a desperate state a month after the wreck, the third having succumbed. Simon van der Stel
sent a party consisting of lieutenant Olof Bergh, Isaq Schrijver and others to salvage what they could. Very little of any value was returned to the governor, but rumours of theft of the treasure soon started circulating, substantiated by the attempted sale of items to Cape Town residents and the unearthing in Olof Bergh's garden of a box holding objects from the wreck. Bergh later confessed to the theft and alleged that van der Stel himself was involved. Bergh was sentenced to three and a half years on Robben Island
while Schrijver was cleared of any wrongdoing.
On 4 January 1689, two years after being promoted to the rank of ensign
, Schrijver embarked on his most enterprising expedition. His orders were to barter cattle with the Inqua Hottentots of the Eastern Cape
. He set off with a party of about 20 well-armed soldiers and 2 wagons on a trip which would cover about 1600 km. Also in the party was Heinrich Bernhard Oldenland (1663–99), an able botanist and expert on herbs, who had studied medicine for 3 years at Leiden University
, and who would in 1693 be appointed as master gardener in the Company's
garden in Cape Town, and oddly as land surveyor for the Government followed by the post of superintendent of roads, bridges and buildings. The mission lasted more than three months and reached as far east as the present-day town of Aberdeen
, returning on 10 April 1689 with about a thousand head of cattle from trading with a Xhosa-Khoi
tribe and quite amazingly having suffered no loss of life.
Early travelers were obliged to cross the Outeniqua Mountains near present-day Mossel Bay
so as to avoid the near-impenetrable ravines and forests to the east. At that time the only way across the mountains was through Attaquas Kloof, named after a chief of the Hessequa Khoikhoi
. This route was pioneered by Schrijver who, following an elephant track, traversed the kloof to the Olifants River
in January 1689. The Duivenhoks River at Heidelberg
was named by Schrijver, and "Schrijvershoek" near Langebaan lagoon was named after him.
He retired in 1699 to his farm Schoongezicht near Stellenbosch - the farm was substantially enlarged by the addition of surrounding property that had formed part of the deceased estates of freed slaves. Schoongezichts history goes back to 1692 when Simon van der Stel
, Governor of the Cape, granted 17 hectares of land to freed slaves Manuel and Antonia of Angola
, Louis of Bengal
and Isaac Schryver.
Schrijver married Marie Elizabeth van Coningshoven. Soon after, Schryver travelled north once again to search for copper. He returned after a few years and finally died on the farm, survived by Marie Elizabeth, who later married Jacob Groenewald. The farm remained in the family ownership for some 100 years. Schoongezicht passed through numerous hands in the three centuries of its existence. Coenraad Fick built the gabled Cape Dutch
home about 1830. In the 1920s a Mrs. English bought the estate, restored the buildings, and improved the vineyards, renaming it Lanzerac after a wine-growing region in France. In 1958 the entrepreneur David Rawdon converted the estate into a successful hotel. In 1990 business tycoon Christo Wiese purchased the property, converting it into a winery and hotel.
Contemporary copies of Schrijver's journals of the expeditions have survived and are now kept in the Cape Archives.
Aachen
Aachen has historically been a spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Aachen was a favoured residence of Charlemagne, and the place of coronation of the Kings of Germany. Geographically, Aachen is the westernmost town of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, ...
, Germany. Little else is known of his origins, but by 1667 he was a marine.
In February 1684, Schrijver, then a sergeant in the Dutch East India Company
Dutch East India Company
The Dutch East India Company was a chartered company established in 1602, when the States-General of the Netherlands granted it a 21-year monopoly to carry out colonial activities in Asia...
and stationed at the Cape
Cape
Cape can be used to describe any sleeveless outer garment, such as a poncho, but usually it is a long garment that covers only the back half of the wearer, fastening around the neck. They were common in medieval Europe, especially when combined with a hood in the chaperon, and have had periodic...
, headed a reconnaissance expedition into Namaqualand
Namaqualand
Namaqualand is an arid region of Namibia and South Africa, extending along the west coast over and covering a total area of 170,000 square miles/440,000 km². It is divided by the lower course of the Orange River into two portions - Little Namaqualand to the south and Great Namaqualand to the...
. They went as far north as Garies
Garies
Garies is a small agricultural centre situated in South Africa's Northern Cape province about 110 km south of Springbok, the chief town of the Namaqualand district. Current population approximately 1500....
and brought back samples of copper ore to Cape Town
Cape Town
Cape Town is the second-most populous city in South Africa, and the provincial capital and primate city of the Western Cape. As the seat of the National Parliament, it is also the legislative capital of the country. It forms part of the City of Cape Town metropolitan municipality...
.
Schrijver was involved in salvage operations of the Nossa Senhora dos Milagros which had run aground on the night of 16 April 1686 at Struisbaai
Struisbaai
Struisbaai is a coastal settlement in the Overberg region of South Africa's Western Cape province. The town is two hours South from Cape Town in the Cape Agulhas Local Municipality within the Overberg District, and four kilometers from the southernmost point of the African continent at Cape...
near Cape Agulhas
Cape Agulhas
Cape Agulhas is a rocky headland in the Western Cape, South Africa. It is the geographic southern tip of Africa and the official dividing point between the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
. This was a Portuguese vessel with 150 crew, commanded by Don Emmanual Da Silva, en route from Goa
Goa
Goa , a former Portuguese colony, is India's smallest state by area and the fourth smallest by population. Located in South West India in the region known as the Konkan, it is bounded by the state of Maharashtra to the north, and by Karnataka to the east and south, while the Arabian Sea forms its...
to Portugal
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
and bearing diplomatic gifts from Narai
Narai
Somdet Phra Narai or Somdet Phra Ramathibodi III was the king of Ayutthaya from 1656 to 1688 and arguably the most famous Ayutthayan king. His reign was the most prosperous during the Ayutthaya period and saw the great commercial and diplomatic activities with foreign nations including the...
, King of Siam to Pedro, King of Portugal, Louis XIV of France and Charles II of England
Charles II of England
Charles II was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.Charles II's father, King Charles I, was executed at Whitehall on 30 January 1649, at the climax of the English Civil War...
. Also aboard were three Siamese ambassadors who were left to fend for themselves by the crew. Two were found in a desperate state a month after the wreck, the third having succumbed. Simon van der Stel
Simon van der Stel
Simon van der Stel was the last Commander and first Governor of the Cape Colony, the Dutch settlement at the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa.-Background:...
sent a party consisting of lieutenant Olof Bergh, Isaq Schrijver and others to salvage what they could. Very little of any value was returned to the governor, but rumours of theft of the treasure soon started circulating, substantiated by the attempted sale of items to Cape Town residents and the unearthing in Olof Bergh's garden of a box holding objects from the wreck. Bergh later confessed to the theft and alleged that van der Stel himself was involved. Bergh was sentenced to three and a half years on Robben Island
Robben Island
Robben Island is an island in Table Bay, 6.9 km west of the coast of Bloubergstrand, Cape Town, South Africa. The name is Dutch for "seal island". Robben Island is roughly oval in shape, 3.3 km long north-south, and 1.9 km wide, with an area of 5.07 km². It is flat and only a...
while Schrijver was cleared of any wrongdoing.
On 4 January 1689, two years after being promoted to the rank of ensign
Ensign (rank)
Ensign is a junior rank of a commissioned officer in the armed forces of some countries, normally in the infantry or navy. As the junior officer in an infantry regiment was traditionally the carrier of the ensign flag, the rank itself acquired the name....
, Schrijver embarked on his most enterprising expedition. His orders were to barter cattle with the Inqua Hottentots of the Eastern Cape
Eastern Cape
The Eastern Cape is a province of South Africa. Its capital is Bhisho, but its two largest cities are Port Elizabeth and East London. It was formed in 1994 out of the "independent" Xhosa homelands of Transkei and Ciskei, together with the eastern portion of the Cape Province...
. He set off with a party of about 20 well-armed soldiers and 2 wagons on a trip which would cover about 1600 km. Also in the party was Heinrich Bernhard Oldenland (1663–99), an able botanist and expert on herbs, who had studied medicine for 3 years at Leiden University
Leiden University
Leiden University , located in the city of Leiden, is the oldest university in the Netherlands. The university was founded in 1575 by William, Prince of Orange, leader of the Dutch Revolt in the Eighty Years' War. The royal Dutch House of Orange-Nassau and Leiden University still have a close...
, and who would in 1693 be appointed as master gardener in the Company's
Dutch East India Company
The Dutch East India Company was a chartered company established in 1602, when the States-General of the Netherlands granted it a 21-year monopoly to carry out colonial activities in Asia...
garden in Cape Town, and oddly as land surveyor for the Government followed by the post of superintendent of roads, bridges and buildings. The mission lasted more than three months and reached as far east as the present-day town of Aberdeen
Aberdeen, Eastern Cape
Aberdeen is a small town in the Cacadu District Municipality of the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. set in the Camdeboo Mountains. With its numerous examples of Victorian architecture, it is one of the architectural conservation areas of the Karoo....
, returning on 10 April 1689 with about a thousand head of cattle from trading with a Xhosa-Khoi
Khoi
Khoi may refer to:*The common name of Siamese Rough Bush, Streblus asper Lour*The Khoikhoi people*One of the Khoe languages*The Khoekhoe language*Khoy, a city in Iran*Khoy County, an administrative subdivision of Iran...
tribe and quite amazingly having suffered no loss of life.
Early travelers were obliged to cross the Outeniqua Mountains near present-day Mossel Bay
Mossel Bay
Mossel Bay is a harbour town of about 130,000 people on the Southern Cape of South Africa. It is an important tourism and farming region of the Western Cape Province...
so as to avoid the near-impenetrable ravines and forests to the east. At that time the only way across the mountains was through Attaquas Kloof, named after a chief of the Hessequa Khoikhoi
Khoikhoi
The Khoikhoi or Khoi, in standardised Khoekhoe/Nama orthography spelled Khoekhoe, are a historical division of the Khoisan ethnic group, the native people of southwestern Africa, closely related to the Bushmen . They had lived in southern Africa since the 5th century AD...
. This route was pioneered by Schrijver who, following an elephant track, traversed the kloof to the Olifants River
Olifants River (Southern Cape)
Olifants River has its origins in the Traka and Kalkwal Rivers north of the Swartberg, and becoming the Olifants River after flowing through the Toorwaterpoort, flowing west through Oudtshoorn and joining the Gourits River, then heading south to its mouth at Gouritsmond.The northern tributaries of...
in January 1689. The Duivenhoks River at Heidelberg
Heidelberg, Western Cape
Heidelberg is a town in Western Cape, South Africa. It is located near South Africa's south coast, on the N2 highway, 274 km east of Cape Town...
was named by Schrijver, and "Schrijvershoek" near Langebaan lagoon was named after him.
He retired in 1699 to his farm Schoongezicht near Stellenbosch - the farm was substantially enlarged by the addition of surrounding property that had formed part of the deceased estates of freed slaves. Schoongezichts history goes back to 1692 when Simon van der Stel
Simon van der Stel
Simon van der Stel was the last Commander and first Governor of the Cape Colony, the Dutch settlement at the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa.-Background:...
, Governor of the Cape, granted 17 hectares of land to freed slaves Manuel and Antonia of Angola
Angola
Angola, officially the Republic of Angola , is a country in south-central Africa bordered by Namibia on the south, the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the north, and Zambia on the east; its west coast is on the Atlantic Ocean with Luanda as its capital city...
, Louis of Bengal
Bengal
Bengal is a historical and geographical region in the northeast region of the Indian Subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal. Today, it is mainly divided between the sovereign land of People's Republic of Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal, although some regions of the previous...
and Isaac Schryver.
Schrijver married Marie Elizabeth van Coningshoven. Soon after, Schryver travelled north once again to search for copper. He returned after a few years and finally died on the farm, survived by Marie Elizabeth, who later married Jacob Groenewald. The farm remained in the family ownership for some 100 years. Schoongezicht passed through numerous hands in the three centuries of its existence. Coenraad Fick built the gabled Cape Dutch
Cape Dutch
Cape Dutch are people of the Western Cape of South Africa who descended primarily from Dutch and Flemish as well as smaller numbers of French, German and other European immigrants along with a percentage of their Asian and African slaves, who, from the 17th century into the 19th century, remained...
home about 1830. In the 1920s a Mrs. English bought the estate, restored the buildings, and improved the vineyards, renaming it Lanzerac after a wine-growing region in France. In 1958 the entrepreneur David Rawdon converted the estate into a successful hotel. In 1990 business tycoon Christo Wiese purchased the property, converting it into a winery and hotel.
Contemporary copies of Schrijver's journals of the expeditions have survived and are now kept in the Cape Archives.