In 1621, the States-General chartered the wic in order to open an Atlantic front in the war with the Spanish king (the Eighty Years’ War). Cutting off the Spanish crown’s Atlantic riches was to undermine the financial basis for the Spanish war effort in Europe. The activities of the New Netherland Company – a Dutch company chartered in 1614 that monopolized the (primarily fur) trade to Dutch North America – were integrated in the governance structure of the wic. New Netherland was, however, not managed by the Board of Directors of the Company (Heeren xix), but was controlled directly by the wic chamber of Amsterdam.23 Since New Netherland was flanked by New England and Virginia – both in English hands – it did not feature prominently in the ‘grand design’ of the Company’s war effort against the Spanish king.24 As the Portuguese and Spanish kingdoms formed a dynastic union (1580-1640), the wic considered the Portuguese colony in Brazil central to their plans to break the Habsburg Crown economically. In 1624, the Company’s attempt at conquering the sugar-producing colony resulted in a nine-month occupation of the city of Salvador in the Bay of All Saints. After Portuguese forces recaptured the city, the Company attacked the Captaincy of Pernambuco and established a Dutch colony in the northeast of Brazil that lasted from 1630 until 1654.25

Just like the Dutch had frequented many other empires in the Atlantic before the founding of their chartered companies, the ‘Dutchness’ of the wic colonies was primarily an imperial façade obscuring a hotchpotch of different groups inside the colony.26 Apart from the Dutch colonisers there were large numbers of other Europeans. In Brazil these were principally the Portuguese; in North America, they identified as English. Moreover, a minority in both colonies were of Dutch origin, with large groups originating in the German lands, the Southern Netherlands, the British Isles, and Scandinavia, as well as from other areas of Europe.27 An important difference between the populations of New Netherland and Brazil was the presence of Jews. While Recife had a sizeable Jewish population and the first synagogue in the Americas, the twenty-three Sephardim fleeing Brazil in 1654 and arriving in New Amsterdam were asked ‘in a friendly way to depart’ by the colonial leadership, as they were ‘not allowed further to infect and trouble this new colony’.28 It was only after Jewish Amsterdam merchants petitioned on the refugees’ behalf to the wic Board of Directors in Amsterdam in 1655 that they were allowed to stay.29 Yet Jews never made up more than a tiny percentage of New Netherland’s population. Apart from Europeans, there were also both enslaved and free Africans and indigenous Americans. In Brazil, the Dutch took over more than 40,000 enslaved people who had lived in Portuguese Brazil prior to the Dutch invasion, while under wic rule at least 23,000 more were imported, primarily from the West African and Southwest African coasts.30 The enslaved population in New Netherland was relatively small, largely because the colony did not have a plantation economy; by 1664 they totalled approximately five hundred.31 New Netherland was the more diverse of the colonies in terms of indigenous population, including the Iroquois Five Nations, the Algonquin-speaking Munsees and Lenapes, and the Iroquoian-speaking Susquehannocks.32 Despite the larger geographical scope of the conquests in Brazil, Dutch sources make a distinction between only three Amerindian groups: the Tupi, the Tapuya, and the Tupi-speaking Potiguar (see also fig. 3).33 In sum, in both colonies the wic led a dominant group of English or Portuguese ‘co-colonisers’, a large indigenous population with which the company traded, fought, and forged military alliances, and, particularly in Brazil, a large number of enslaved Africans.34

In the minds of the directors and many others in the Dutch Republic, Brazil took primacy over New Netherland. The files of the States-General dealing with the West Indian Affairs, for instance, are filled with material related to Brazil, while dealing with New Netherland only sporadically. The primacy of Brazil was further expressed in the form of address of Company functionaries: Johan Maurits was the Governor-General of Brazil (1637-1644), whereas Peter Stuyvesant in New Netherland was ‘merely’ termed Director-General (1647-1664). Both men, however, presided over a council that formed the highest authority in the colony (for simplicity they will both be henceforth referred to as ‘High Councils’). Lower legal jurisdiction in both colonies was in the hands of a council of a schout and multiple schepenen, the former acting as prosecutor, and the latter as a body of judges. In Brazil, this council was still named a câmara, in the Portuguese fashion, but unlike in Portuguese times the câmara now combined its municipal administrative function with a judicial role.35 Typically, but not always, the schout would be Dutch, while the schepenen could more often be Portuguese or English. While these lower courts in both colonies had juridical duties, the câmara also had municipal administrative responsibilities. In practice this meant that the câmara would receive political petitions, while the lower councils in New Netherland did not. The only exception was the council of burgermeesters and schepenen in the city of New Amsterdam on Manhattan Island that was allocated administrative tasks.36 It should be noted, however, that in both colonies these local councils also functioned as a way of communicating concerns to the respective High Councils. As the highest authority, the High Council was the primary recipient of petitions concerning affairs in the colony and the only colonial governing body of the wic of which petitions have survived.37

Petitions in the colony were not exclusive to colonisers originating in the Dutch Republic. A well-known example of enslaved Africans petitioning in New Netherland occurred in 1644, when a group of eleven jointly – and successfully – requested manumission.38 However, this was the only petition expressly submitted by enslaved or formerly-enslaved people. The enslaved population does not feature prominently in petitions in New Netherland; the only other occasion was a petition by Edmund Scarborough, who requested permission to sail ‘with some purchased Negroes’ to Virginia.39 In the history of Dutch Brazil, only five petitions were submitted by enslaved people, a small number compared to the large enslaved population.40 Three of the five were submitted in 1635, when enslaved Africans serving in the army – Manuel Ferdinandus, Manuel de Barres, and Casper Rodriges – petitioned for manumission and continuation of their military service as free men.41 In Brazil, there is one example of a slave not active in the army who petitioned for manumission: Simão Gonçalves in February 1654, who had served ‘in loyal service’ on the shipyard for eighteen years. He noted that a long time ago he had already been promised his freedom.42 The final example of a petition by Africans occurred on 29 August 1645. That day ‘a few free negroes and others’ entered the meeting of the High Council in Recife and jointly petitioned for the establishment of a permanent army company ‘under their own captains and officers’.43 The High Government resolved to appoint two people to create a list of ‘people as well as slaves’ that wished to enlist in this army division.44 An explanation for the relatively low number of petitions by enslaved Africans serving in the army might be that they were organised in brotherhoods and could make requests from the High Council through their captain.45

It was not just Africans who were enslaved in the colonies. The indigenous population was also enslaved, and on occasion men from the Barbary states whose ships had been seized were brought as slaves to Brazil.46 There are seemingly no petitions of enslaved people other than those by Africans. The free indigenous population did petition on their own behalf in Brazil, but in New Netherland Indians only feature as the topic of petitions, such as in the request signed by Oloff Stevenson and Allert Anthony in March 1656.47 This petition moved to restrict the freedom of movement of Indians within the city of New Amsterdam on account of their becoming a nuisance after ‘drinking themselves drunk’.48 Petitions by the indigenous population in Brazil, however, were quite numerous – possibly because Europeans had been present in the country for longer. For instance, on 28 August 1642 Johannes Listrij, ‘the commandeur of Brasilians’, entered the meeting with several petitions intending to limit abuses in native villages (aldeias).49 While these requests appear to be largely supportive of the Company’s plans for governance, other petitions are more closely tied to the interests of the Tapuya (fig. 3). These include petitions for payments of arrears or other type of requests intended to enforce earlier promises. The Tapuya, furthermore, succeeded in influencing regulations such as defining and limiting the use of meadows by cattle of private persons as well as the Company. Although the Tapuya made use of a European go-between to facilitate contact with the Company in this instance, this changed after 1645 when the High Council confirmed one Potigar and two Tapuya regedores, or civic magistrates, proposed by the indigenous groups themselves.50 These regedores took over the responsibility of facilitating exchanges between the Company and the indigenous Brazilians that had previously fallen to commandeurs like Johannes Listrij.51

The petitions of the enslaved and free non-European people demonstrate that they had the ability to influence the decision-making processes of the High Council, and that they had some autonomy with regard to how they structured their own lives – petitions were powerful. The ability of the indigenous population in Dutch Brazil to shape their governance structure is proof of the power of their petitions to influence the political decision-making process. Moreover, after the colony was lost in the 1650s, one of the Tapuya who was elected regedor in 1645, Antonio Paraupaba, even crossed the Atlantic and submitted petitions to the States-General in the Dutch Republic.52 This demonstrates the faith he and other Tapuya had in the power of petitions, based on their experience in the Brazilian colony. This faith was, surely in part, a result of their experience in addressing authority in the colony. Free Africans, likewise, had a successful experience in petitioning for the creation of a new army company. This is a rare instance of an African petition that extended beyond the personal relation of the petitioner with the addressee. This is best illustrated through an example from New Netherland, where even when the High Council granted eleven petitioners and their spouses their freedom, it simultaneously stipulated that their (future) children would still be born in slavery.53

On 11 April 1645, ‘a large number of [indigenous] Brazilians’ appeared in the meeting of the High Council and ‘delivered a written petition’.54 Their petition included many topics, including the supply of the necessary teachers and ministers and permission to administratively merge two aldeias. Of particular interest is their request to erect their own câmara ‘for the convenience of our nation and community’.55 The High Council granted this request, and selected members from a list proposed by the Tapuya and Potigar to form a total of three câmaras. This effectively meant that the Tapuya and Potigar of Dutch Brazil henceforth had the authority and jurisdiction to try smaller offences within their own community without interference by the Company. At the same time, through this petition, the Tapuya and Potigar accepted the wic as both overlord and as possessing the legitimate power to authorise their formation of this câmara. The petition re-affirmed the legitimacy of the wic rule.

The Indians were by no means the only group that addressed issues of authority in petitions. A striking example from New Netherland is a petition from December 1653, jointly drafted by nineteen English representatives from several villages on Long Island. The petitioners claimed to be ‘under our sovereigns, the high and mighty, lords States-General, whom we acknowledge as our rulers’, as well as under the directors of the West India Company, ‘whom we acknowledge as lords-superiors of this place, with you as their representatives’.56 The petitioners requested six things, amongst which were checks and balances for the colonial administration before ‘disposing of life and goods of any individual’; influence in the election procedure of officers and magistrates; clear orders and proclamations as the petitioners often found themselves ignorant of them; and a general deed of freedoms and privileges.57 In other words, even though the petitioners acknowledged the ‘paternal government’ of the wic in the colony, they demanded more influence on important affairs and freedom to make decisions on their own. The Council was baffled by this request and exhibited its arrogance by responding that the petition was either poorly translated (into Dutch) or just unclearly phrased; they would need a better petition in order to be able to discuss it.58

Given the limited number of individuals with legal training in the colony, it is not surprising that the villages turned to the city council of New Amsterdam on Manhattan to request its assistance as a political broker. The next day, 12 December, seventeen of the original nineteen signatories got together again.59 This time the petitioners presented themselves as ‘we, the burgemeesters en schepenen of this City of New Amsterdam with the respective commissioners of the village of Gravesend, Flushing, Middelburgh, Heemsteede, Amersfoort, Breuckelen, and Midwout’.60 They submitted individual copies of the more clearly written petition (dealing with the same points as the previous one) to each council member, adding that they would prefer a timely resolution as ‘the commissioners are here at great expense’ – an argument also put forward in many petitions in the Dutch Republic.

Before responding to the petition’s content, the High Council focused on its form and procedure, saying that ‘the Director-General and Council are ignorant of any commissioners from the respective villages’, and asserted that ‘Midwout, Amersfoort, and Breuckelen have neither court nor jurisdiction’ and ‘consequently they are unqualified to send commissioners’. In order to protect the rights of the lords and rulers, the Council felt compelled to protest against this present gathering. The Director-General and Council further stated that ‘they do not feel bound to a private and unclear remonstrance by a few unauthorized commissioners’ who were ‘assuming the rights and privileges of the whole’, ordering them not to use this name and title ever again.61

In their discussion of the petition’s actual content, the High Council continued their criticism, now also addressing the city council of New Amsterdam. The city council should have been more careful than ‘to sign what an Englishman has drafted, as if there was no one of Dutch origin intelligent enough and capable to draft a petition’. It was also unclear to them what ‘a paternal government established by God and nature’ meant exactly, and they deemed it ‘doubtful whether the author […] understands it himself’.62 The response to the six points was negative, as the Council either felt that the English already had privileges that were more advanced than those of the Dutch, or because they outright refused it.

Balancing the careful act of addressing the correct governing body and finding the right tone, the villages from Long Island tried again the following day. This time, the collective supplied a new petition, now introducing themselves as ‘representatives from the respective villages’ rather than commissioners, and denying the allegations of ‘an unlawful usurpation of authority’. They argued that, on the contrary, ‘the laws of nature give all men the right to assemble for the welfare and protection of their freedom’.63 In this third remonstrance, the petitioners were assisted by Dirk van Schelluyne, probably the only public notary in New Netherland at the time.64 The lawyer also made sure that the petition included the threat that in the event of a refusal, the petitioners felt compelled to address themselves to the States-General as well as their patroons, the directors of the wic. Neither Schelluyne’s legal assistance nor the threat had any immediate effect, as the Council remained of the same opinion and denied all requests by what they named ‘the so-called delegates’.65 With regard to the threat made by petitioners, the Council responded that it wished to prevent no-one from writing to high authorities as long as they maintained respect and truth. However, they added, ‘the remonstrants have no authority to write as representatives of this province’.66

The threat to approach the States-General was by no means idle. Several times individuals had crossed the Atlantic to petition the States-General or other political bodies in the Dutch Republic.67 It was still fresh in the memory of the Council that a few years earlier, in the fall of 1649, another individual by the name of Adriaan van der Donck had acted on this threat and departed on a ship for the Republic. However, unlike Van der Donck and others, the villages of Long Island did not in fact send a delegation to the Republic. Considering that a majority of them were of English origin, it might have been difficult for them to arrange a meeting with the States-General. On the other hand, as mentioned before, Brazilian Indians did succeed in 1654 and 1656 in meeting the States-General, so their threat might not have been that far-fetched.68 For the Long Island villagers, crossing the Atlantic was unnecessary, as the mere threat of doing so proved sufficient. During 1655-1656, they would slowly request more authority and privileges and then consequently received a positive apostille.69

In March 1656, Thomas Wheeler and fifteen English companions requested to ‘submit’ themselves ‘unto the government of the said Netherlands’ and its jurisdiction, provided that they could continue to enjoy their own liberties in choosing their officers for the administration. In their response, the Council allocated a place called Vreedlant to them and granted them the same ‘conditions and [patents] as other free people in the villages of Middleburgh, [Breuckelen], Midwout, and Amersfoort’.70 This included the privilege of nominating a ‘double number’ for the local administration from which the High Council would select administrators, further indicating that the other villages on Long Island now enjoyed more authority than they had previously. In May 1658, the recently conquered Swedish inhabitants of Tinnicum in New Sweden also petitioned for, and received, certain privileges and regional authority while being incorporated in New Netherland.71

In comparison to the English in New Netherland, the Portuguese co-colonisers had a different starting point, since much of the governmental structure had already been in place when the colony was under Portuguese rule. Like the people in the villages of Midwout or Breuckelen, the members of the Portuguese câmaras were selected by the High Council from a double number. The câmara of Olinda had petitioned for a specific time for the High Council to receive requests concerning ‘Portuguese affairs’: every Tuesday and Friday morning between eight and twelve o’clock.72 This was, of course, a less viable option for the municipalities that were further away from Recife. Therefore, in 1640, the high Council organised a ‘Portuguese Meeting’, inviting delegates of the six different jurisdictions in Dutch Brazil: Mauritsstad, Paraíba, Itamaracá, Iguaraçu, Porto Calvo, and Serinhaem. Each jurisdiction sent representatives of its respective câmara and representatives of one or more commonalities (gemeente). Mauritsstad, for example, sent three schepenen from the câmara and representatives from the commonalities of Várzea, Cabo, Pojuca, St. Lourens, Moribeecque, St. Amaro, Paratibe, and Jaquaribe. In total no fewer than fifty-five representatives from all over the colony were in attendance.

The jurisdictions of Iguaraçu and Mauritsstad petitioned for a matter that sheds light on the issue of authority.73 Both requested that they be permitted to appoint a solicitor in their câmara to increase accessibility for inhabitants of the colony. Appointing a solicitor could streamline the process and make sure that all petitions were adequately addressed and formulated. Receiving petitions, and especially having the ability to respond to them, would acknowledge the (increased) authority of these two jurisdictions. In fact, the proposal was such a change to the structure of the colony that the High Council was unable to grant it. Nevertheless, they showed their support by not refusing it outright, instead forwarding the request to the Board of Directors in the Dutch Republic. The Directors henceforth granted the request.74

Claiming authority was one thing, addressing it another. Although a petition could lead to the granting of lower-level authority, it was not wise to ‘usurp authority,’ since that would inevitably prejudice one’s cause. Requesting authority from the High Council reinforced and reconfirmed the legitimacy of the address; the act of requesting something acknowledges that it is within the Council’s powers to grant. Furthermore, it is clear that authority was not just delegated from the metropole to the colony, but also from the High Council to the lower councils. This decentralisation of authority was not limited to European co-colonisers, as it was through a petition that the indigenous population gained the ability to select their own councils within the Company’s colonial framework.

Petitions were not only about authority, but also about the rules and regulations governing all of the colonists’ lives. Petitions submitted for rules and regulations even included requests for rules and regulations to be attached to the practice of petitioning. Following a petition by the Portuguese co-colonisers in Brazil, the High Council regulated that a decision on a ‘large petition’ would cost eighteen stuivers and a ‘normal’ or ‘small’ petition twelve stuivers. What constituted large or small was not specified. Presenting the petition would cost another twelve stuivers. The revenue would benefit the câmara. The fee structure for solicitors was also regulated: they could ask one guilder for presenting a petition and an additional guilder for listening to the response.75 In New Netherland, the High Council seemingly did not act in response to a petition when it decided to formalise the payments for the secretary of the courts of Brooklyn, Flatlands, and Flatbush in 1655. From then on, drafting a petition ranged between sixteen and twenty-five stuivers depending on the size and function of the petition. Recommendation of a petition at the court would cost an additional twelve stuivers.76 This made petitioning slightly pricier in North than in South America, but in both cases it remained affordable – a day labourer and his slave made about six guilders a day, a carpenter between four and five guilders. Its affordability contributed to the great influence petitions had for the on-the-spot organization of rules and regulations.

One example of petitioning for rules and regulations from Brazil concerns a petition requesting a prohibition on the overnight storage of sugar in order to increase quality by preventing spoilage that could result from morning dew. Although the effect on the sugar would not be noticeable in Brazil, the added moisture that resulted from overnight storage would be detrimental in competition on the European sugar market. Another example was a request to limit the slaughter of yearlings to make sure the colony would have enough livestock in the future. Both petitions were granted by the High Council, which once again shows the power of petitions in the colony as the co-colonisers succeeded in contributing to the future of the colony and the success of its commodities. Perhaps even more consequential was the High Council’s agreement to limit what could be sold by creditors during foreclosure.77

Another example that demonstrates how a petition could influence regulation can be found in a request from September 1642, when two schepenen from Mauritsstad, Halters and Cavalcanti appeared in front of the High Council. On behalf of the other members of their câmara they loudly complained about ‘the Negroes from Recife and Mauritsstad, who, when collecting grass, water, or firewood in the varzea [the rural land around Recife] were cutting the sugarcane in order to consume or sell to others’, causing great financial losses for the owners of the sugar cane.78 This led to the promulgation of an ordinance five days later. Johan Maurits and the other members of the High Council legitimised their decision by referring to ‘the daily complaints presented to them’. From then on, the Council forbade ‘the Negroes from Recife and Mauritsstad to collect grass, water, or firewood in the várzea’, to cut sugarcane there for themselves, or to take it with them.79

These examples clearly show how legislation was created through petitions. Not only was the incentive to publish this ordinance provided through the petitions from the câmara of Mauritsstad, the ordinance also directly copied the rhetoric and some of the phrasing from the petition. Another potential solution to the problem of the enslaved Africans going into the várzea to feed themselves with sugarcane was also suggested in the petition, namely to hand out farinha (manioc flour) to them. This solution was suggested in the petition, too, but discarded by the supplicants because it would increase the price of this staple good too much. The High Council thus also followed the rationale of the petition in the drafting of its ordinance.

In New Netherland, petitions were also used to shape and structure the rules and regulations of the colony. Unlike Brazil, the colony did not grow sugar, but it did plant tobacco. As a result of one petition, the High Council decided that ‘the inspectors must examine it [tobacco], and mark the barrels in order to maintain its reputation’.80 As in Brazil, the population petitioned for rules and regulations that would protect the quality of their products and safeguard the competitiveness of their goods on the global market. At other times, this type of quality assurance of goods was more locally oriented, such as the petition of Pieter le Febre which succeeded in effecting a prohibition on competing brewers, merchants, grocers, or distillers serving customers wine or beer ‘by the small measure’. The High Council granted the petitioner the exclusive right to sell spirits for ‘reasonable and tolerable’ prices.81 Similarly, the bakers of Beverwijck petitioned for a regulation that prohibited the sale of bread by others, particularly the Indians.82 These examples clearly demonstrate how petitions could contribute to a form of regulatory capture.83

What perhaps shows the potential of petitions even more clearly is a case from November 1653, when ‘some of the most prominent citizens and inhabitants’ of the city of New Amsterdam came together to draft a petition.84 The issue at hand was the maintenance of public works in the city. The city council had asked its inhabitants to furnish the money required to pay for public works, but had found that the required sum was not readily available. As a solution, the city council proposed to collect the excises on beer and wine by the city treasury rather than the Company and use the revenue to pay for public works. The High Council agreed with the proposed solution.85

Despite these examples, petitioners were not always successful. When a number of Dutch and English merchants petitioned together a few years later to abolish the excises on the export of wines, beers, and spirits, they received nihil on their request, presumably because the excise had already been farmed out – and those excises included the export duties.86 A Portuguese petition proposed that contracts signed in the period under Spanish rule (from 1580 until the invasion of the wic) should be considered under the Spanish law instead of Roman-Dutch law of 1580 – a proposal which would have far-reaching consequences. The High Government responded that it was not their decision to make and forwarded the petition to the Board of Directors in the Dutch Republic.87 The Directors ultimately either denied the petition or never responded to it, and consequently the request was never granted.

These were not the only examples of petitions that received a negative response. One petition presented by the Jewish population of New Netherland, for example, was denied ‘for important reasons’.88 Yet the Jews did not only receive negative responses. The same three petitioners – Abraham de Lucena, Salvador de Andrada, and Jacob Cohen – were allowed to establish a Jewish burial ground on the land belonging to the Company.89 When Salvador de Andrada petitioned on behalf of the Jewish population to the High Council because the city of New Amsterdam had denied their petition for citizenship in 1657, the High Council sided with the petitioners and ordered the city government to grant citizenship to the Jews.90 Another well-known petition tied to religious issues in New Netherland that received a negative response was the so-called ‘Flushing Remonstrance’ in which about thirty residents of Vlissingen (Flushing) on Long Island requested an exemption from the ban on Quaker worship.91 What made the petition of these thirty English co-colonisers particularly interesting is that they themselves were not Quakers, and thus petitioned for the rules and regulations that primarily affected the lives of others.

Studying petitions in the wic colonies in Brazil and New Netherland demonstrates the centrality of petitions for the creation, shaping, and maintenance of the colonial organisations in the seventeenth century. The daily reality of empire was not one of lofty ideals or zealous Dutch regents; it was a petition-and-response system. These petitions ranged from the mundane requests for a higher wage to requests for the establishment of decentralised authority, from requests for rules to safeguard the global competitiveness of colonial commodities to requests for religious tolerance. If the English and Portuguese were the co-colonisers of the empire, the petitioners were its co-creators.

For something so central to colonial administration it is striking that the record-keeping of petitions was not uniform. In the early years, the High Council in New Netherland regularly copied the petitions directly. Later they started referring to their Book of Petitions and noted their apostille in their minutes. As mentioned earlier, it is unclear whether this Book of Petitions ever existed at all, since it has not survived and when the minutes refer to it, the specific folio has been left blank. Compared with those of New Netherland, the copied petitions in Brazil’s High Council minutes are few and far between; most information on petitions in this colony can only be derived from the summary of the request and the response. For comparison, the States-General kept a large number of petitions in liassen (assorted papers) organised by topic or geographic origin. The voc (the Dutch East India Company) kept even fewer copies of petitions in their administration, but often mentioned that an issue had ‘become apparent’.92 The inconsistency in record-keeping of petitions demonstrates the informality of petitioning; petitioning may not have been a right, but responding to them was a responsibility. Petitions were part and parcel of the sphere of on-the-spot negotiation.

This space for on-the-spot colonial negotiation was not limited to subjects of Dutch origin, but was open to virtually all inhabitants of the colony, including enslaved and freed Africans, the indigenous population, a variety of other Europeans, and diverse religious groups. That being said, there is little historical evidence of the enslaved population influencing the lives of anyone other than themselves. The above-mentioned informality of petitioning meant that the colonial administration could deny a request without citing any justification other than ‘important reasons’ or because there were mistakes in the way an issue was addressed. Nevertheless, the influence of petitions on colonial decision-making was clearly far-reaching. When focusing specifically on non-Dutch petitioners it becomes evident that their petitioning was paramount for the creation, shape, and maintenance of the Dutch Atlantic. Petitioning was not a bilateral ‘middle ground’ between white colonists and the indigenous other; rather, it provided a space for on-the-spot negotiation that was open to a variety of subjects from different backgrounds. This included other European co-colonisers, but also subjects from the Americas and Africa. In other words, petitioning allowed all colonial inhabitants to contribute to the creation of the Dutch Atlantic.