| Home >> Search Results >> History >> HAMEL, Hendrik. Relation du naufrage d''un vaisseau Holandois, sur la coste de l''Isle de Quelpaerts: avec la description du Royaume de Corée. Traduite du flamand, par Monsieur Minutoli.
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| Data.No. | 325 |
Title
Annotation | HAMEL, Hendrik. Relation du naufrage d''un vaisseau Holandois, sur la coste de l''Isle de Quelpaerts: avec la description du Royaume de Corée. Traduite du flamand, par Monsieur Minutoli.
Exceedingly rare book .The eyewitness Hendrik Hamel as the first European in Korea. Paris, Thomas Jolly, 1670. 12mo. Contemporary mottled calf, spine gilt in compartments, red sprinkled edges. (8), 165, (1, 2 blank) pp. First edition in French of an account of a stay of thirteen years in Korea by Hendrik Hamel, translated into French by Vincent Minutoli (ca. 1640 in Geneva -1710), a reformed minister in Holland and close friend of Pierre Bayle, who has translated also other Dutch travel accounts. There are also copies of his translation with the imprint ''Paris, L. Billaine, 1670'' with the name of the author on the title-page. In 1718 this translation was reprinted in Amsterdam in J.F. Bernard''s Recueil de voyages au Nord, vol. IV, p. 1-82 (and in the 1732 ed., vol. IV, p. 243-306, as well as in vol. VIII of Ant. F. Prévost d''Exiles''s Histoire général des voyages, p. 412-429.Hamel sailed as the ship''s secretary from Texel to Batavia on ''De Sperwer'' in January 1653. After visiting Batavia and Formosa, the ship set sail for Japan with the newly appointed V.O.C. governor for Korea, Cornelis Lessen, on board. Unfortunately the ship wrecked at the coast of an unknown island near Korea, which they named the Isle of Quelparts. Many of the crew drowned. Those who survived, including Hamel, went ashore, where they were imprisoned by the Koreans and brought to the main land where they were held for no less than thirteen years. In 1666 Hamel and a few of his companions succeeded to escape and they managed to reach Japan. In 1668 they arrived back in the Netherlands. Still in the same year the account of his misadventures was published at Rotterdam by Joh. Stichter. Hamel''s account, which is the first Western eyewitness of Korea, became very popular, and was not only translated into French, but also, in 1732, into English with the title An account of the shipwreck of a Dutch vessel on the coast of the Isle of Quelpaert. Good copy of a rare popular book with ownership''s entry on the title: ''De Ressevel''. Pagès, Bibl. Jap. 316; Polak 4284; Chadenat 1617, 3766; Tiele 449 (issue printed by Billaine, not mentioning the present issue); Tiele, Mémoire p. 271-5; Cordier, Japonica 404; Alt-Japan Kat. 626 (the 18th-cent. editions).
First edition of this title in Dutch was published in 1668 in Netherlands.
Hamel's account gave the West its first direct knowledge of Korea.
In 1593, a Spanish Jeuit ,Father de Cespedes ,had accompanied the Japanese
troops of Toyotomi Hideyoshi during their invasion of Korea.
But in their annual letters to their superior in Europe ,the Jesuits of Japan just related the campaign without carrying to include information on the country and
its inhabitants.
Fr.de Guzman used these letters in his Historia(1601) adding generally confusing infomation on Korea of Chinese origin.
The reason for this ignorance was the strict rules prohibiting foreigners
to enter Korea and the European navigators,who were trading with Japan,avoided sailing near the penininsula.
In 1627,a VOC ship ,the Ouderkerk,having gone near the coast,sent a canoe to fetch some fresh water and three sailors who were aboard were captured by the inhabitants.One of them,Jan Janse Weltervree,who had taken the name Pak Yon,was still alive when Hamel and his companions were stranded on Cheju
(Quelpaert) Island in 1653.
The VOC vessel Sperwer left Batavia on June 18th 1653 with sixty-four men on board .Hendrik hamel waa the ship's "Secretary" .In August the vessel was caught in a severe storm and twenty-eight of the crew perished.
The survvors were interened and subsequently transferred to Seoul.
It was at Quelpaert,while waiting for a long time for orders from the court concerning the fate,that Hamel and his companions met Jan Weltevree who acted
as translator for them. It was from him they learnt that onece in Korea one could not escape.It was on in 1666,after thirteen years ,when the supervision had relaxed ,that Hamel and seven of his companions could get hold of boat and were carried towards the Japanese island of Kyusu by the winter monsoon.In nagasaki,the rescued sailors were questioned at length by the Japanese and by the Director of the Deshima factory,Their answers,taken down in the company register dated Septrember 14th,1666,match the account which Hamel started writing at once.
The last image is The Chosun Ilbo,January 13,2004 ( one of the largest and leading daily
newspapers in Korea) reporting this book.
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A New Version of Hamel's Old Book
by Yoo Seok-jae (karma@chosun.com)
The first edition of the "Journal of Hamel" published in 1670 in French, has come to Korea. Yoon Hyoung-won, the CEO of an antiquarian bookseller Art Bank, disclosed the first French edition of the journal on Monday. Yoon said he recently purchased the book from a Dutch antiquarian bookseller.
Hendrick Hamel was a Dutch explorer and the first Westerner to discover Korea. His journal on Korea is significant in that it was the first book to introduce Korea to the Western world.
The edition is a translated version of the original Dutch edition of the Journal of Hamel in 1668. It was translated into French by Minutoly. The English title of the 168-page version is "Report of the Shipwreck of a Dutch Vessel On the Cost of Jeju Island: With the Description of the Kingdom of Coree by Thomas Jolly." Previously, the oldest version of the Journal of Hamel had been the first edition in German published in 1672, owned by Myungji University and the LG Yonam Foundation.
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| Author | Hamel Hendrik |
| Publisher | Paris, Thomas Jolly |
| Pub.Year(s) | 1670 |
| Language | French |
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