Dirck van Os

undefinedDirck van Os as an ensign in 1583. This portrait by Cornelis de Visscher is in the Stedelijk Museum Alkmaar.

Dirck van Os (Antwerp, March 1556 – Amsterdam, May 1615) was an Amsterdam merchant, insurer, and financier, originally from Brabant. He is among the founders of the Compagnie van Verre, the United East India Company (VOC), the Beemster and the Amsterdam Exchange Bank.[1]

Biography

Van Os was born to a trader in pigments and tapestries, originally from ‘s-Hertogenbosch, who had moved to Antwerp around 1550.[2][3]

Dirck served as captain of militia in the Fall of Antwerp, wherein the city surrendered to the Duke of Parma in 1585. After this point he moved to Middelburg. In January 1588, Van Os married Margretha van der Piet.[4] He and his brother Hendrick (-1623) traded in grain, salt and precious stones, primarily in the Levant and ports on the Baltic Sea.[5] Van Os cooperated together with Isaac le Maire on Danzig. In 1595, they organized an expedition to get salt in Setúbal and ship it to Archangelsk.

In March 1602 he was one of the founders of the Dutch East India Company, and served as one of the first directors. (The shares were sold at his house in the Nes; likely they rented part of monastery, now Brakke Grond.1 The brothers hired a bookkeeper who moved in.) With 47,000 guilders, they were the largest investors.[6] This number grew to 120,000 by 1609.[7] The oldest stock share in the world, dated 27 September 1606, was  signed by him.[8][9]

In 1607 he was involved in reclaiming the Beemster, but this polder inundated in 1609 after a storm. He cooperated with Leeghwater, an expert in wind mills. The second attempt was more succesful.2

The company, a partnership, had an account at the Wisselbank from the beginning. In 1609 they were involved in the expedition of Henry Hudson to find an alternative route to the East. In 1612 the Van Os acquired more than one-seventh of the land in Beemster and in the Purmer where they again lost a lot of money.3[10]

It seems he was buried at Nieuwezijds Kapel in 1615 but a record does not exist.

Family

Dirck van Os had several children: Maria, Dirck, Hendrick, David, Margrieta, Elisabeth, Anna and Francois (1592-1660).4 As they inherited the oldest shares in the VOC they all must be regarded as quite rich. Maria married David Sohier. Margrieta married Philip van Straeten. Francois married Agneta Pels and Sara Wijs.  He lived at Zwaansvliet in the Beemster, next to his brother.5 6 David who married Anna Wijntjes moved to Alkmaar. 

References

  1. ^ Dillen, J.G. van (1958) Het oudste aandeelhoudersregister van de Kamer Amsterdam der Oost-Indische Compagnie, p. 110-111
  2. ^ https://biografieportaal.nl/recensie/dirk-van-os-een-brabantse-koopman-in-amsterdam/
  3. ^ Alice Boots en Rob Woortman (2023) Een geniale koopman. Dirk van Os en de invloed van Zuid-Nederlanders op de Amsterdamse geldmarkt.
  4. ^ Dillen, J.G. van (1958) Het oudste aandeelhoudersregister van de Kamer Amsterdam der Oost-Indische Compagnie, p. 110
  5. ^ Gelderblom, Oscar (August 24, 2000). Zuid-Nederlandse kooplieden en de opkomst van de Amsterdamse stapelmarkt (1578-1630). Uitgeverij Verloren. ISBN 9065506209 – via Google Books.
  6. ^ “Beursplein netwerkdiner 2012 | Toespraak | Rijksoverheid.nl”. Archived from the original on 2014-04-08. Retrieved 2014-04-07.
  7. ^ “Financieel Erfgoed op de Kaart”. www.financieelerfgoedopdekaart.nl.
  8. ^ the oldest Share : VOC 1606 / die älteste Aktie der Welt
  9. ^ Shorto, Russell (27 September 2013). “The Ghosts of Amsterdam”. The New York Times. Retrieved 7 April 2014. But when I’m on the Nes I feel I’m about to run into a tall, handsome, wily man who in his day favored lace collars and a twisty little mustache. His name was Dirck van Os, and, while history has forgotten him, his house on this street (which, alas, no longer exists) could be considered the birthplace of capitalism.
    For four months in 1602, Amsterdammers streamed into his parlor to buy pieces of a new kind of corporation, one that allowed backers to sell their portion at a later date, at a higher (or lower) value. The Dutch East India Company transformed the world, and it made Amsterdam, briefly and improbably, the most powerful city in the world.
    But its biggest contribution to history may be in the fact that in this little alley van Os and his merchant colleagues gave birth to the concept of “shares of stock.” A few years later, a little farther down the street, came the first stock exchange. Things would never be the same.
  10. ^ “BeemsterBuitenplaatsen PK57”. Archived from the original on 2015-05-14. Retrieved 2014-04-07.
  11. ^ “Oneindig Noord Holland / Dirck van Oss, stamvader VOC-mentaliteit”. Archived from the original on 2014-04-08. Retrieved 2014-04-07.
  12. ^ Logan, Casey (April 6, 2014). “Joslyn Finds Rembrandt In Its Attic”. The Omaha World-Herald Newspaper, Omaha, Douglas County, NE, USA. pp. 1 & 4A. Only In The World-Herald
  1. https://brakkegrond.nl/de-geschiedenis-van-de-brakke-grond ↩
  2. https://onh.nl/verhaal/dirck-van-oss-stamvader-voc-mentaliteit ↩
  3. https://geschiedenislokaalwaterland.nl/bronnen/dirck-van-os ↩
  4. https://www.historischgenootschapbeemster.nl/wp-content/uploads/DNS005.pdf ↩
  5. https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/meij090hekk01_01/meij090hekk01_01_0011.php ↩
  6. https://beemsterraadsinformatie.purmerend.nl/Vergaderingen/Gemeenteraad/2015/10-februari/21:00/Ingekomen-stukken-/1a-20150106-bijlage-nota-Geluk-in-de-Beemster.pdf ↩

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