"This Booke was wrote by mee Robert Knox (the sonne of Robert Knox who died one the Iland of Zelone) when I was aboute 39 years of Age."
Thus begins the autobiographical note written by Robert Knox, the author of the now-famous An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon in the East-Indies. He continued:
"I was taken prisoner one Zelone, 4th Aprill, 1660. I was borne one Tower hill in London, 8th Feb: 1641. My Age when taken was 19 years: 1 Month & 27 dayes. Continewed prisoner thare 19 years 6 month 14 dayes so that I was a prisoner thare 4 Month & 17 dayes longer then I had lived in the world before, & one the 18 October 1679 God set mee free from that Captivity, being then with the Hollanders at Arepa fort to whome be all Glory & prayse."
The date 4 April 1660 is according to the English Julian (Old Style) calendar. Its modern Gregorian equivalent is 14 April 1660.
In Part IV of his famous book, Knox described the events that led to his capture.
"By this time the King of the Countrey had notice of our being there, and as I suppose gave suspicion of us, not having all that while by any Message made him acquainted with our intent and purpose in coming. Therefore he dispatched down a Dissauva or General with an Army to us. Who immediately sent a Messenger on Board to acquaint the Captain with his coming, and desired him to come ashore to him, pretending a Letter to him from the King. We saluted the Message with firing of Guns, and my Father the Captain ordered me with Mr. John Loveland, Merchant of the Ship, to go on shore and wait upon him."
The king referred to by Knox was King Rajasingha II, who ruled from 1635 until 6 December 1687. The Dissave representing the king was Dissave Tennekoon I. The Englishmen welcomed him warmly, unaware that they were about to be deceived and arrested.
Knox continued:
"The next Morning the Present, which was Cattle, Fruit, &c. was brought to the Sea-side, and delivered to the Captain; the Messengers telling him withal, that we were upon the way coming down, with the Dissauva; who desired his Company on shore against his coming, having a Letter from the King to deliver into his own hand. Hereupon the Captain mistrusting nothing, came up with his Boat into a small River, and being come ashore, sat down under a Tamarind Tree, waiting for the Dissauva and us. In which time the Native Soldiers privately surrounded him and his Men, having no Arms with them; and so he was seized on and seven men with him, yet without any violence or plundering them of any thing: and then they brought them up unto us, carrying the Captain in a Hammock upon their Shoulders.
The next day after, the Long-boats Crew, not knowing what had happened, came ashore to cut a Tree to make Cheeks for the Main-mast, and were made Prisoners after the same manner, tho' with more violence."
This carefully planned operation by Dissave Tennekoon I was soon known to the Dutch, who were closely monitoring developments in King Rajasingha II's territory.
Only about four months later, on 3 August 1660, Captain Petrus Wasch and the VOC council aboard the flute ship Elburgh, anchored near the Koddiyar bay, recorded what they had learned in a resolution that was forwarded through Governor Laurens Pit to the Directors of the Dutch East India Company.
"Since 29 July, when we arrived at this roadstead, we have made every effort to discover what had happened between the English and the Sinhalese. We have received no direct information, only reports at second and third hand.
These reports state that the English, who had appeared here in April with a very valuable cargo, had somehow won over the Disava Tennecon (Tennekoon). After following him for a considerable time with deceptive promises, they finally succeeded in capturing the ship's merchant together with the skipper's son, then afterwards the skipper himself, and shortly thereafter the rest of the boat's crew, who had come ashore to obtain fresh water and firewood. They were carried off to the court of King Candia (Kandy)."
The Dutch account was based entirely on second- and third-hand information and consequently confuses the roles of the English and Tennekoon. Nevertheless, it independently confirms that Dissave Tennekoon I was the Kandyan official responsible for the operation that resulted in the capture of Robert Knox and his companions.
Nineteen years later, following his escape, Robert Knox gave a detailed account of his captivity to the Dutch. His deposition was taken at Colombo on 20 November 1679 and forwarded to the VOC Directors on 3 December 1679.
The report begins:
"Report of a certain Englishman named Robert Knox, born in London, about 36 years of age, concerning his experiences and observations in the Kingdom of Kandy, made at Colombo on 20 November 1679.
The above-mentioned person states that about twenty years ago, while the ship Anna was lying at the roadstead of Masulipatnam taking on cargo in preparation for its voyage home to England, and before even half of the goods had been loaded, a great storm caused the ship to drag its anchor. They were therefore forced to seek another landfall farther to the south, since they had lost their mainmast.
The captain (being the reporter's own father, also named Robert Knox) therefore sailed to Porto Novo, where he obtained another mast and a quantity of textiles. Having reached an agreement with the owners of those cloths, he undertook to carry them as freight to Kottiyar, which was accordingly done, and they came to anchor there.
At that place they sought to obtain additional timber for repairs.
The reporter, together with the ship's merchant, named Loveland (who died about seven years ago), was commissioned to..."
The deposition then provides an important detail omitted from Knox's published book.
"Since he had received a letter from the King, instructing him to summon Old Tinnecon (Tennekoon), Disava of the Seven Korales, and to ask him the reason why they had come there, the Disava did not seem at all displeased. He said that, since they had come ashore, it was necessary that the letter be delivered into the captain's own hands. Thus, under this pretext, he intended to get the reporter's father to come ashore.
The Disava was answered that the captain could not come, because he was too far from his ship. According to his estimate, they were about four miles from the shore, in a bay called Killewittij.
The Disava replied that this was very good, and that he would send some refreshments aboard the ship and invite the captain to come ashore to receive the said letter from His Royal Majesty.
Believing this, the reporter's father came ashore in the boat. Immediately upon landing, he noticed a large number of Lascarins, whom he supposed had been sent to receive him ceremoniously. Instead, he found himself suddenly surrounded by them, taken prisoner, and brought before the Disava.
The Disava then ordered him to instruct his ship's crew to bring the ship somewhat closer to the shore and into the river.
To this he replied that, since he was now a prisoner, his crew would no longer obey him.
One of the chiefs standing beside the Disava answered that he too was a captain, and that if he commanded the crew they would have to obey him.
The captain replied that if the Disava had captured him aboard his own ship, or if the Disava's soldiers came aboard under his orders, then indeed they would obey him.
No further reply was made.
Instead, the Disava ordered that the reporter (Robert Knox) should be sent aboard the ship, saying that he did not doubt the crew would obey him.
This was done, but with an entirely different instruction—namely, that if they were not all released from captivity within twenty days, they were to sail back to Madraspatnam, and that they should keep their cannon and everything else in readiness to remain on guard so as not to be surprised and likewise taken prisoner. He further instructed the reporter (Robert Knox) that, despite this unfortunate circumstance, he should not abandon his father. The reporter promised that he would not.
After having been aboard the ship for only about two hours, he returned ashore, bringing with him a letter addressed to the Disava, written by the reporter himself and signed by the ship's officers. Its contents stated that, so long as the captain remained in detention, they would neither weigh anchor nor obey any commands.
When the Disava saw this (or so the reporter supposed), he realized that the captain was innocent.
After the lapse of two months, the ship departed, and the reporter, together with his father, the ship's merchant, and another thirteen sailors, were taken as prisoners into the interior. They were distributed among the Four Korales and the Seven Korales, and separated from one another.
The reporter and his father were taken to a place in the Four Korales called Koswatte, where his father died at the age of fifty-five, after they had been there for about eight months. This caused the reporter great sorrow.
The reporter remained at the said Koswatte for another four years, after which he and all his fellow countrymen who were prisoners were summoned to Kandy."
The 1679 Dutch deposition is particularly significant because it identifies the official as "ouden Tinnecon, dessave van 7 corles"—literally, "the elder Tennekoon, Disava of the Seven Korales." The adjective ouden ("elder" or "older") was commonly used in seventeenth-century Dutch to distinguish one person from another bearing the same name. By 1679, this distinction appears to have been necessary.
Taken together, Knox's published account, the Dutch report of August 1660, and Knox's own deposition of November 1679 consistently identify the official responsible for the arrest as Dissava Tennekoon I, the Dissave of the Seven Korales. Thirty-one months after the arrest of the Knox party, on 24 November 1662, Dissave Tennekoon I was publicly beheaded on the orders of King Rajasingha II. By 1679, another Tennekoon had become known to the Dutch, making the designation "the elder Tennekoon" both understandable and historically significant.
References
Knox, Robert. An Historical Relation of Ceylon. Edited by James Ryan. Glasgow: James MacLehose and Sons, 1911.
NL-HaNA, VOC 1.04.02, invv. 1232, fol. 873; inv. 1243, fol. 827; inv. 1351, fol. 250; inv. 1383, fol. 738 (GLOBALISE transcriptions).
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