Widowhood and female agency in the Dutch-colonial Indian Ocean World. Rethinking social networks through local women’s lives (1750–1800)

Situated within the broader historiographical discussion of women’s agency in colonial port cities across the Indian Ocean World, this article examines the lived experiences of women who formed relationships spanning cultural, linguistic, and religious lines. Drawing on detailed case studies from Galle (Sri Lanka) and Melaka (Malaysia), the article rethinks marriage, intimacy, and social connectivity in the eighteenth century. A comparative look at their testamentary decisions reveals the lives of widows and the ways they were able to exercise agency within a colonial order shaped by both patriarchy and racial hierarchy. Despite their differences, these women all contributed to the social cohesion in culturally highly diverse spaces through acts of marriage, child-rearing, and the maintenance of familial relationships. By bringing to light these women’s participation in informal credit networks in particular, the article highlights how individuals from diverse socioeconomic backgrounds helped weave the horizontal connections that sustained urban life under colonial rule. In doing so, it challenges persistent portrayals of VOC societies as isolated enclaves centered on European settler families and male authority, showing instead how family histories illuminate the complexities of empire as it was lived. Ultimately, it argues that these intimate relationships formed the connective tissue of VOC colonial society, linking households, economies, and imperial worlds across continents.