When I was on holiday I had a nice discussion with someone from Belgium who mentioned that the Dutch at some point perpetrated something like the Red Wedding from A Song of Ice and Fire, where they invited the leaders of a bunch of communities for some kind of meeting, at which they proceeded to kill them wholesale, ending resistance to their colonization efforts in the region. He called it the "prinsenmoorden" which translates roughly to "murder of princes."
Now, there is a tendency in The Netherlands not to talk too much about our colonial past, so I'm not too surprised I hadn't heard about this before. But I'm having a hard time finding any information about this. Googling "prinsenmoorden" only turns up two links that have nothing to do with this, for instance. Also, the period of colonization of the Dutch East Indies spans hundreds of years, so I have no idea where to start looking. I'm really curious if anything like this happened at all, and if it did, where I can find more information about it.
/u/CommonSeance
The VOC and its successor the Dutch colonial government used guile and violence in many instances. It will be great to have some context: when, where?
Here are several instances:
In 1621, in his attempt to pacify the Banda islands, VOC governor Coen forced local leaders (orang kaya) to negotiate with him. At the peace conference, they were captured and held in the holds of his ships. When other native leaders refused to capitulate, he decided to make an example out of those already captured. They were tortured and killed. His own men submitted report of this violence to the VOC managers in Amsterdam.
Keep in mind that in 1609, the native leaders did similarly to the Dutch. They invited the VOC expedition's commander Verhoeff, who was then ambushed and killed.
Following Coen's victory, the VOC engaged in a campaign of destruction and murder, as they sought to depopulate the islands to keep control of the production of spices.
There is a lot of material on this subject. In 1623, VOC officer van Speult was governing the fortified outpost in Amboyna after Coen set sail to Batavia. The English also had an outpost nearby. The two countries were in theory at peace. Van Speult had suspicion that the English were up to no good, and when his soldiers captured a Japanese mercenary employed by the English sneaking around near his fort, they tortured him and obtained confession that the English were indeed up to no good. Van Speult then invited English officers to dinner, at which they were captured, tortured, and murdered. No princes were involved here.
Famously shown in Pieneman's painting displayed in the Rijksmuseum, Prince Diponegoro was a major warlord in the Java War, where local Princes fought against what they saw as incursions against their privilege and power. Dutch commander de Kock invited Diponegoro to negotiate, but then seized him.
Pieneman's painting showed the Dutch perspective: the bowing Prince asking his followers to disarm. But Raden Saleh painted the Javanese perspective: an angry Prince defying the Dutch commander.
So, plenty of examples, the question is which.