Legacy Adriaen van der Donck

daylighted saw mill river in van der donck park in getty square neighborhood of yonkers. post office left, pedestrian bridge , train station ahead, , park s boardwalk on right.

johnson s translation long recognized defective , inept , until 2008 remained translation available. nevertheless, mariana van rensselaer called van der donck s description of new netherland exceptionally intelligent book of kind , praising quality natural history monograph. quality ethnography has been praised anthropologists , historians. thomas o donnell wrote,

had written in english rather dutch, description have won posterity same kind, if not same amount, of veneration has been bestowed on bradford s of plymouth plantation. turned out, van der donck s book written, published, read, put aside, and, alas, forgotten long before bradford s book published @ all.

though english took on colony, city of new amsterdam retained municipal charter van der donck had lobbied for, including uniquely dutch features, such guarantee of free trade.