The Linschoten-Vereeniging is a Dutch society established in 1908 with the primary aim of publishing historical travel narratives in their original text editions. From the outset, the organisation set out to make rare or previously unpublished accounts of travels — often hidden away in Dutch and Belgian libraries, archives or private collections — accessible to a wider readership by editing and issuing them exactly as they were written, complete with scholarly annotations and contextual introductions. Every year, a new volume is added to the Werken van de Linschoten-Vereeniging series, preserving the authentic voice, spelling and style of these priceless sources.
Over more than a century, the Linschoten-Vereeniging has built a remarkable catalogue of publications and a lively programme of activities. Its core output is the annual Werken volume, which features original journals, letters and travel descriptions ranging from ship logs to diplomatic reports and personal accounts of voyages across the globe; these are published with introductions and annotations that help readers understand the historical context. In addition to books, the society stages events such as annual presentations of new works — often held at historic venues with lectures or exhibitions. We participate in conferences and workshops with related organisations to discuss scholarly editing and the future of travel history; we cherish our warm relations with the Hakluyt Society, our English sister society.
The text editions produced by the Linschoten-Vereeniging are enjoyable to read as compelling travel literature, but their significance extends well beyond simple storytelling. They are invaluable research tools for historians, offering first-hand evidence of past voyages, encounters, and geographic knowledge; for anthropologists and cultural scholars, they reveal how people and places were perceived across time and space; for linguists, they preserve authentic historical language and expression; and even for interdisciplinary fields such as environmental and climate history, these narratives can contain observations of landscapes, flora and weather that inform long-term change.
