Netherlands/ Madagascar: Dutch ship captain Bontekoe barters for goods on an island off Madagascar in 1619. To the left, a Dutch sailor entertains the locals with his fiddle.

Willem Ysbrandtszoon Bontekoe (1587—1657) was born in Hoorn in Holland. In 1607, at the age of 20, Bontekoe succeeded his father as captain of the ship Bontekoe. In 1617, the ship was seized by Barbary pirates and Bontekoe ended up at a slave market. He was bought free, but his ship was lost. He became a skipper for the Dutch East India Company (VOC), and made just one eventful voyage for the company (1618–25).

After a pleasant nine-day stay on Ile Sainte-Marie near Madagascar, things went badly wrong. A fire, caused by a shipmate accidentally setting fire to a cask of brandy, caused the gunpowder magazine to explode and sink the ship. Of the 119 still on the ship only two survived, including Bontekoe, but he was wounded. There were 70 in two lifeboats, so 72 survived. Sails were made from the shirts of the crew. They were shipwrecked at sea; some drank seawater or urine. Bontekoe did the latter until it became too concentrated. Sometimes there was relief by catching birds and flying fish, and by drinking rainwater. The hunger became so severe again that the crew decided to soon kill the cabin boys. Bontekoe writes that he was against that, so they agreed to wait three more days. Just in time, 13 days after the shipwreck, they reached land where they could eat coconuts. It was an island in the Sunda Strait, 15 miles off Sumatra.

Bontekoe became widely known for a journal of his adventures that was published in 1646 under the delightful title, ‘Journal or Memorable Description of the East Indian Voyage of Willem Bontekoe from Hoorn, Including Many Remarkable and Dangerous Things that Happened to Him There’.

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