The Dutch Cinnamon War and the Fall of Kandy

By the late seventeenth century, the Dutch East India Company had driven the Portuguese out of coastal Ceylon, but their true obsession was not gold or spices in general—it was cinnamon. This episode explores the brutal monopoly enforced by the VOC over the Knuckles Mountains, where they seized control of the spice trade through violence, coercion, and the manipulation of Kandyan politics. We look at how Governor Frederik de With used the kingdom’s internal succession disputes to install puppet kings, turning the independent Sinhala heartland into a captive supplier of Ceylon cinnamon. The narrative follows the resistance led by figures like King Rajasinghe II and the eventual betrayal that left Kandy isolated, highlighting the economic strangulation that defined colonial rule long before formal annexation.

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