Jan Compagnie, noun phrase

/ˌjan kɔmpanˈ(j)i/
Forms:
Also Jan Kompanie.
Origin:
DutchShow more Dutch, Jan John + Compagnie Company; see quotation 1786.
historical
An informal name for the Dutch East India Company (see Company). Also partial translation Jan Company.
1786 G. Forster tr. of A. Sparrman’s Voy. to Cape of G.H. II. 21Many of the ignorant Hottentots and Indians not having been able to form any idea of the Dutch East-India Company and the board of direction, the Dutch from the very beginning in India, politically gave out the company for one individual powerful prince, by the christian name of Jan or John...On this account I ordered my interpreter to say farther, that we were children of Jan Company, who had sent us out to view this country.
1936 Cambridge Hist. of Brit. Empire VIII. 174Not the least of the grievances of the colonists against ‘Jan Compagnie’ was this shoddy currency which was only exchangeable into hard money of foreign merchants at a discount of between 20 and 30 per cent.
1958 E.H. Burrows Hist. of Medicine 17Since the surgeons of the Company’s vessels are the principal characters of our story..it is necessary to examine their relationship to Jan Compagnie more closely.
1963 J. Packer Home from Sea 58They..were already establishing outlying republics such as Swellendam, in the days of the Dutch East India Company, for they liked the rule of ‘Jan Kompanie’ no better than they did the British régime which followed it.
1973 M. Phillips 19th Burgher 29The talk among us is of national independence and free trade...It must come, and when it does it will mean the death of Jan Compagnie and the birth of a nation.
An informal name for the Dutch East India Company (see Company). Also partial translation Jan Company.
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17861973

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historical
janbruin, nounn.ja-nee, adverbadv.
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