The North Atlantic Fisheries, 1100-1976 - University of Hull

Years’ War (1586-1648) and the impact of Flemish privateering upon it.
Conflicts about fishing net regulations in the Zuyder Zee in the late
nineteenth century were studied by J.M. Kerkhoven. An ethnological
approach was applied by R. van Ginkel in his study of fishermen’s
communities on the isle of Texel in the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries, 181 as he had done before in a booklet on a similar kind of
community in Zeeland, which lived mainly from oyster and mussel
farming. An interesting sideline is the book by S.J. de Groot on the
history of the fishing research in the Netherlands and Dutch East Indies.
Recent developments include publications on the inland fisheries. 182
As well as this selection of more sizeable studies, various smaller
publications are available, generally in local and regional journals. The
subjects range from the fish auction at Middelharnis and shipowners at
Katwijk to a special issue of the regional journal Holland on nineteenth
and twentieth century fisheries (vol.16, 1984). Publications over the past
25 years can be found in the extensive bibliography in each issue of the
Mededelingen of the Dutch Society for Maritime History, from 1982 the
Tijdschrift voor Zeegeschiedenis. An annotated bibliography is available
in the four volumes of the Maritieme Geschiedenis der Nederlanden
(Bussum 1976-1978) which also provides the reader with a good
introduction to the history of the fisheries and whaling, ranging from the
early Middle Ages to the late 1970s. 183
Boelmans Kranenburg’s observation of 1961 that the fisheries are a
rather neglected field of historical research, is still more or less valid.
However, this observation does not apply to whaling. The history of the
Dutch ventures in the Arctic and Davis Strait has been fairly well
researched. The Dutch played a prominent role in early whaling. At its
peak (1721), nearly 260 ships were involved. A solid amount of
statistical information in contemporary sources forms the backbone of
many studies. Muller’s book, mentioned above, refers to the founding
period. The South African C. de Jong wrote a good but not easily
accessible survey of Dutch whaling in the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries. A.M. van der Woude integrated whaling into the social,
economic and demographic structure of the northern part of Holland. P.
181 See also the International Journal of Maritime History Vol. VI (1994), 199-231.
182 Martens, De zalmvissers; Harbers, ‘Binnenvisserij’ and Harbers, ‘Riviervisserij’.
183 See also De Vries and Van der Woude, Nederland 1500-1815, 284-321.
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