Caspar Schamberger

Schamberger left Europe in the same year aboard the Eiland Mauritius, but the ship wrecked four months later near the Cape of Good Hope.

The next few years he worked as a ship surgeon, visiting Portuguese Goa, Ceylon, Gamron and Kismis (Persia), to return to Batavia again in 1646.

During that time Schamberger attracted the attention of Imperial commissioner Inoue Masashige, who was responsible for the internal security of the empire and its relations to the VOC.

This report and the contentment and continuous interest among high-ranking officials and feudal lords led to the birth of the so-called “Caspar-style-surgery" (kasuparu-ryû geka), the first Western-style school of medicine inspired by a surgeon stationed in Dejima.

In 1686, Schamberger published an extensive description of three illustrations depicting a great variety of people, exotic fruits, coins, animals, and artifacts he had observed all over "East India".

Schamberger's name stands for the beginning of a lasting interest in Western style medicine that gradually led to the upcoming of the so-called Dutch Studies (rangaku) in early modern Japan.