359. Spice Wars: The Birth of New York (Ep 2)

Hello and welcome to Empire with me, Anita Arnan. And me, William DeRumpel. And today's episode, the second in our amazing story. of the VOC, the forgotten East India Company, that we always omit from stories when we talk about the English East India Company, is, I think, one of the most extraordinary and little-known stories in the history of Empire, at least little known in the English-speaking world. It's about the deathly rivalry between the English and the Dutch.

and the two East India companies, these two corporations that were empires, these incredibly rich precursors to the great and incredibly powerful corporations of our day. And the story revolves around a spice so valuable that they were willing to torture and kill for it. And the story culminates in a 17th-century deal that changed the fortune of Manhattan. Forever. Well when we say valuable, I mean just I just want to give you an idea of how valuable.

Okay. Um, and honestly, this doesn't speak um well of of the kind of reading that I've been doing, but weight for weight, it's interesting, in the 1600s, nutmeg was more valuable than cocaine is today. Let that sit with you for a second. I did the sums, that's all I did. Did you did you experiment?

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