The arms of the British South Africa Company.
A chartered company is an association formed by investors or shareholders for the purpose of trade, exploration and colonization.
History[]
Companies enabled merchants to band together to undertake ventures requiring more capital than was available to any one merchant or family. Typically, these companies were formed from the sixteenth century onwards by groups of European investors to underwrite and profit from the exploration of Africa, India, the Caribbean and North America, usually under the patronage of one state, which issued the company's charter. But chartered companies go back into the medieval period. One claimed to be the oldest is the Stora Enso with a charter of 1347 for a copper mine. Chartered companies enabled states to use private resources for exploration and trade beyond the means of the limited resources of the treasury, which is a liberal form of indirect rule; some companies did themselves employ a form of indirect rule of territories through traditional leaders, such as princely states with whom they (not the European state) made treaties.
Chartered companies were usually formed, incorporated and legitimised under a royal or, in republics, an equivalent government charter. This document set out the terms under which the company could trade; defined its boundaries of influence, and described its rights and responsibilities.
For example, the charter of the British South Africa Company, given by Queen Victoria, allowed the company to:
- Trade with African rulers such as King Lobengula
- Form banks
- Own, manage and grant or distribute land
- Raise its own police force (the British South Africa Police).
In return, the British South Africa Company agreed to develop the territory it controlled; to respect existing African laws; to allow free trade within its territory and to respect all religions.
Chartered companies in many cases benefited from the trade monopolies (such as the English Royal African Company, which held a monopoly on African slaving from 1672 to 1698).
In order to carry out their many tasks, which in many cases included functions - such as security and defence - usually reserved for a sovereign state, some companies achieved relative autonomy. A few chartered companies such as the British Honourable East India Company (HEIC) and Dutch Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie (VOC) had military and naval forces of their own that dwarfed even the average European state's armed forces, and adequate funds to buy the best men and equipment, in effect making them a state within a state.
More chartered companies were formed during the late nineteenth century's "Scramble for Africa" with the purpose of seizing, colonising and administering the last 'virgin' African territories, but these proved generally less profitable than earlier trading companies. In time, most of their colonies were either lost (often to other European powers) or transformed into crown colonies. The last chartered company to administer territory directly in Africa was the Companhia de Moçambique in Portuguese East Africa (now Mozambique), which handed over rule of the colonies of Manica and Sofala to the Portuguese republic's colonial government in 1942.
Notable chartered companies and their abbreviations/ years of formation[]
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British crown charters[]
- 1711 South Sea Company
- 1792 Sierra Leone Company
- 1752 African Company of Merchants (abolished 1821)
- 1824 Van Diemen's Land Company
- 1835 South Australian Company
- 1839 New Zealand Company
- 1847 Eastern Archipelago Company
- 1881 British North Borneo Company
- 1886 Royal Niger Company
- 1889 British South Africa Company
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English crown charters[]
The British East India Company's headquarters in London.
1/8 share certificate of the Stora Kopparberg mine, dated June 16, 1288.
- 1407 Company of Merchant Adventurers of London
- 1553 Company of Merchant Adventurers to New Lands
- 1555 Muscovy Company
- 1577 Spanish Company
- 1579 Eastland Company
- 1581 Turkey Company
- 1588 Morocco Company
- 1600 East India Company (HEIC)Template:Smallsup
- 1604 New River Company
- 1605 Levant CompanyTemplate:Smallsup
- 1606 Virginia Company
- 1609 French Company
- 1610 London and Bristol Company
- 1616 Somers Isles Company
- 1629 Massachusetts Bay Company
- 1629 Providence Island Company
- 1664–1674 Royal West Indian Company
- 1670 Hudson's Bay Company
- 1672 Royal African Company
- 1693 Greenland Company
French[]
- 1613 Company of One Hundred Associates
- 1664 Compagnie de l'Occident
- 1717 Compagnie du Mississippi
- 1635 Compagnie des Îles de l'Amérique
- 1660 Compagnie de Chine
- 1664 Compagnie des Indes Orientales
- 1664 Compagnie des Indes occidentales
German[]
- 1682 Brandenburg African Company
- 1752 Emden Company
- 1882 German West African Company
- 1884 German New Guinea Company
- 1884 German East Africa Company
- 1891 Astrolabe Company
Portuguese[]
- 1482 Companhia da Guiné
- 1628 Portuguese East India Company
- 1888 Companhia de Moçambique
- 1891 Companhia do Niassa
Low Countries[]
- 1602 Dutch East India Company (VOC)
- 1614–1642 Nordic Company
- 1614 New Netherland Company
- 1621 Dutch West India Company
- 1717 Ostend CompanyTemplate:Smallsup
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[]
- 1347 or earlier Stora Enso
- 1616 Danish East India CompanyTemplate:Smallsup
- 1671 Danish West India Company (1671)
- Template:Spaces Royal Greenland
- 1638–1655 New Sweden CompanyTemplate:Smallsup
- 1649–1667 Swedish Africa CompanyTemplate:Smallsup
- 1731–1813 Swedish East India Company
- 1786–1805 Swedish West India CompanyTemplate:Smallsup
- 1738 Swedish Levant CompanyTemplate:Smallsup
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Russian[]
- 1799–1867 Russian American Company
Scotland[]
- 1634 Guinea Company of Scotland
- 1698 Company of Scotland
See also[]
- British colonization of the Americas
- Hongs
- American Colonization Society
Notes[]
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References[]
- Chartered companies
- Colonial flags of Mozambique
- Ferguson, Niall, 2003. Empire—How Britain Made the Modern World, Allan Lane, London, United Kingdom.
- Hudson's Bay Company
- Ross, R., 1999. A Concise History of South Africa, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
- WorldStatesmen
- Micklethwait, John, and Adrian Wooldridge. 2003. The company: A short history of a revolutionary idea. New York: Modern Library.
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