ABSTRACT
As the title suggests, this chapter examines the Dutch experience with airs and places beyond their own shores and how their physicians understood the challenge of regimen in hostile colonial climates. In particular, it looks at Kunst-broederlyke lessen of noodige aanmerkingen, wegens de Koortszen op Schepen van Oorlog (“Teachings of a Brother of the Art … Concerning Fevers on Warships”) (1742), and the Geneeskonst der heelmeesters in dienst der zeevaart (“Ships’ Surgeons Medicine”) (1752) by the Amsterdam surgeon Abraham Titsingh. These books offer an illuminating example of how Western physicians, with ideas often inherited from Antiquity, responded to the often very different conditions and illnesses of the tropics, in a way parallel to Mark Harrison’s work on the emergence of empirical methods in British imperial context. The chapter also considers the vital Enlightenment concept of race in the dietetics suitable in the multi-ethnic Dutch colonies.
