Hermanus Johannes de Graaf (2 December 1899 – 24 August 1984) was a Dutch historian specialising in the history of Java, Indonesia, the world's most populous island. Trained as historian at Leiden University, he moved to Batavia (today's Jakarta) to take a government job, and later became a teacher for various schools in Indonesia. At the same time, he pursued his interest in the history of Indonesia and published books and articles on the topic. After a brief assignment at the University of Indonesia, he returned to the Netherlands. He taught at various institutions, including Leiden, until 1967 and continued to publish scholarly works, even after his retirement. He suffered a serious stroke in 1982 and died two years later.
His works covered the history of Indonesia in general, with emphasis on sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Java. His works extensively consulted both European and Indonesian sources, one of the first trained historians to do so. Historian M. C. Ricklefs called him the "father of the study of Javanese history", while Javanist Theodoor Gautier Thomas Pigeaud said his works formed "a substantial contribution to the study of the national history of Indonesia."
Biography
Early life
De Graaf was born on 2 December 1899 in Rotterdam, The Netherlands, where he attended school. In 1919, he went to Leiden University to study history. The historian and orientalist Johan Huizinga was among his professors there. In 1926 he took up a government job in Dutch East Indies (today's Indonesia). While he sailed to Batavia (today's Jakarta), he read about Indonesian history, sparking his interest for the first time. He was posted at Surabaya to become a history teacher in a Hogere Burgerschool (HBS, high school) for a year. Subsequently, he moved to Batavia, first to work at the city's museum library, and then at the Inspectorate of Middle Schools. While at Batavia he met the Javanese professor Poerbatjaraka, who then gave him weekly lessons in Javanese language and culture. He began to pursue his scholarly interest while still having the Inspectorate job. His first scholarly article was published in 1929. In the same year he married a teacher, Carolinia Johanna Mekkink.
Academic career in Indonesia
In 1931 de Graaf left government service and became a schoolmaster in Malang, and then Prabalingga. In 1935 he returned to Leiden to earn his doctorate. His supervisor was H. T. Colenbrander, whose work had initially sparked his interest in Indonesian history. His dissertation was on the murder of Captain François Tack in the Mataram court in 1686,
In 1935, he returned to the Indies and resumed teaching in Surakarta. He took his Javanese students to visit historical sites and Islamic holy sites throughout Java, despite the school being a Protestant school. During school vacations he continued his research in Batavia, publishing articles on the Trunajaya rebellion and the fall of Mataram. He also wrote for the Chinese Geschiedenis in 1941. Fear about the work's unflattering description of the Japanese led its publisher to largely destroy it in 1942 as the Japanese took over the Indies as part of World War II.
He was then interned and spent the war in several camps and befriended the linguist C. C. Berg. De Graaf's wife was interned separately in a women's camp, and in 1944 their nine-year-old daughter Elisabeth Anna died in captivity.
World War II was followed by the Indonesian National Revolution (1945–49) which pitted the newly independent Indonesia against the Dutch trying to regain its colony. He taught briefly in Bandung before Berg invited him to Jakarta to teach in what would become the University of Indonesia. He accepted the invitation and stayed in Jakarta until 1950. During this period he authored various works, including The Crown of Majapahit (Dutch: Over de kroon van Madja-Pait, 1948) and his famous A History of Indonesia (Dutch: Geschiedenis van Indonesië, 1949). He also made a research trip to the Netherlands in 1947–48, during which he worked through Dutch East India Company archives sent to him in Arnhem from The Hague. He also felt disillusionment with the direction of the young Republic of Indonesia and the leadership of Sukarno.
This disillusionment, as well as his wife's safety concerns about teaching as a foreigner in Indonesia, and frustration over not being made a professor—he thought this was promised to him—led him to leave Indonesia for good in 1950.