After five years of archival reconstruction in Jakarta, Louisa Balk, Frans van Dijk and Diederick Kortlang have compiled a new inventory of the VOC (Dutch East India Company) and colonial archives to be found in the Indonesian capital. This much-needed research aid is now available both in print as well as online. Several early fragmentary inventories from 1770 onwards were rendered obsolete by Jacobus van der Chijs who published a full inventory and catalogue in 1882. While the work of Van der Chijs did not meet the standards of archival indexing set in 1898, it has contributed significantly to the preservation of the VOC archives in Jakarta and Den Haag until today. With the 2007 catalogue by Balk, Van Dijk and Kortlang, the VOC archive has gained a useful and well-described catalogue that meets modern international standards and – at a first glance – provides easy access to the sources currently preserved in Jakarta. In addition, Femme S. Gaastra's history of the VOC as well as Henk Niemeijer's introduction on the structure of administration offer valuable tips to assist researchers. This background information is supplemented by a history of the archive as well as useful search hints in a chapter penned by Balk, Van Dijk and Kortlang. Each introductory chapter together with the preface are featured in Dutch, Bahasa Indonesia, and English that ensures accessibility to Dutch, Indonesian and also international readers. Still, it must be immediately adjoined that a sound command of the Dutch language is a prerequisite for accessing and navigating the archive and the sources in any meaningful way.

To have a comprehensive catalogue of archival materials at one's fingertips is naturally the joy of every serious researcher. The question, however, remains: How useful is this catalogue in the archive at this point in time? It must be stated that the catalogue is immensely helpful in many respects, even if lugging around a tome of around 3 kilogrammes can sometimes seem inconvenient. The online version which can be accessed via the website of TANAP (Towards a New Age of Partnership) is not (yet) available in the archive, since the reading room still lacks an internet connection, and there was also no wireless access at the time of the last visit. A number of teething problems remained at my last two visits to the Jakarta archive. I was initially asked to use the old index books, but these did not correspond to the catalogue numbers. The next visit in 2009 revealed that the process of re-cataloguing and re-indexing had not been completed. The vast majority of items requested were accessible neither by the old nor by the new shelf numbers. Still, when the re-cataloguing of the materials has been completed, it will doubtlessly enhance the research experience in the Jakarta archives. Access to this catalogue in printed or on-line form will be quite indispensable.