William Durnpole

whereupon Arab sailors would take it up the Red Sea to Cairo.

And then the Venetians would take it from Cairo to Venice.

Venice was the great center of the spice trade in Italy.

And then Northern Europeans, the English or the Dutch, would buy it from Venice.

And at each stage, there would be a 200% markup.

So it went through five different hands originally before it got to Northern Europe, where it was useful for stockpiling.

As well as Viagra and so on, and all these plagues and all these other uses, particularly useful for curing meats in winter at a time when you didn't have refrigeration.

Now, in the last episode, we told the story of how the Dutch managed to short the Portuguese who were already in exile.

in this area and take over the spice trade and make an enormous sum of money on the way.

But paint us a picture of the early 1600s with this Cold War developing between these two nations that have been, in a sense, allies up to this point.

They're both Protestant nations.

They're both fencing off against the Catholics, whether it's the Spanish or the Portuguese.

But

next to each other with rival companies, with rival warehouses on either side of a river in Batavia, things begin to get nasty.

Reminds me of certain people today who are making similar claims.

And probably got scurvy, which is another perennial problem sailing out over the oceans to run.

And he arrives in Run in 1616 with two ships and 38 men, and almost immediately the Dutch turn up on the horizon.

It's not looking promising by the sound of it.

Quickly, Giles, a question.

We've very much sort of demonised the Dutch and we've got the kind of brave little English in their dungeon.