commencement of these explorations, it appears that in 1415, the year of
Ceuta, the prince sent out one John de Trasto on a voyage which brought
the Portuguese to Grand Canary. There was no discovery here, for the
whole Canarian archipelago was now pretty well known to French and
Spanish mariners, especially since the conquest of 1402-06 by French
adventurers under Castillan overlordship; but in 1418 Henry's captain,
Joao Goncalvez Zarco rediscovered Porto Santo, and in 1420 Madeira, the
chief members of an island group which had originally been discovered
(probably by Genoese pioneers) before 1351 or perhaps even before 1339,
but had rather faded from Christian knowledge since. The story of the
rediscovery of Madeira by the Englishman Robert Machim or Machin,
eloping from Bristol with his lady-love, Anne d'Arfet, in the reign of
Edward III. (about 1370), has been the subject of much controversy; in
any case it does not affect the original Italian discovery, nor the
first sighting of Porto Santo by Zarco, who, while exploring the west
African mainland coast, was driven by storms to this island. In
1424-1425 Prince Henry attempted to purchase the Canaries, and began the
colonization of the Madeira group, both in Madeira itself and in Porto
Santo; to aid this latter movement he procured the famous charters of
1430 and 1433 from the Portuguese crown. In 1427, again, with the
co-operation of his father King John, he seems to have sent out the
royal pilot Diogo de Sevill, followed in 1431 by Goncalo Velho Cabral,
to explore the Azores, first mentioned and depicted in a Spanish
treatise of 1345 (the _Conoscimiento de todos los Reynos_) and in an
Italian map of 1351 (the _Laurentian Portolano_, also the first
cartographical work to give us the Madeiras with modern names), but
probably almost unvisited from that time to the advent of Sevill. This
rediscovery of the far western archipelago, and the expeditions which,
even within Prince Henry's life (as in 1452) pushed still deeper into
the Atlantic, seem to show that the infante was not entirely forgetful
of the possibility of such a western route to Asia as Columbus attempted
in 1492, only to find America across his path. Meantime, in 1418, Henry
had gone in person to relieve Ceuta from an attack of Morocco and
Granada Mussulmans; had accomplished his task, and had planned, though
he did not carry out, a seizure of Gibraltar. About this time, moreover,
it is probable that he had begun to gather information from the Moors
with regard to the coast of "Guinea" and the interior of Africa. In
1419, after his return to Portugal, he was created governor of the
"kingdom" of Algarve, the southernmost province of Portugal; and his
connexion now appears to have begun with what afterwards became known as
the "Infante's Town" (_Villa do Iffante_) at Sagres, close to Cape St
Vincent; where, before 1438, a _Tercena Nabal_ or naval arsenal grew up;
where, from 1438, after the Tangier expedition, the prince certainly
resided for a great part of his later life; and where he died in 1460.
In 1433 died King John, exhorting his son not to abandon those schemes
which were now, in the long-continued failure to round Cape Bojador,
ridiculed by many as costly absurdities; and in 1434 one of the
prince's ships, commanded by Gil Eannes, at length doubled the cape. In
1435 Affonso Goncalvez Baldaya, the prince's cup-bearer, passed fifty
leagues beyond; and before the close of 1436 the Portuguese had almost
reached Cape Blanco. Plans of further conquest in Morocco, resulting in
1437 in the disastrous attack upon Tangier, and followed in 1438 by the
death of King Edward (Duarte) and the domestic troubles of the earlier
minority of Affonso V., now interrupted Atlantic and African exploration
down to 1441, except only in the Azores. Here rediscovery and
colonization both progressed, as is shown by the royal licence of the
2nd of July 1439, to people "the seven islands" of the group then known.
In 1441 exploration began again in earnest with the venture of Antam
Goncalvez, who brought to Portugal the first slaves and gold-dust from
the Guinea coasts beyond Bojador; while Nuno Tristam in the same year
pushed on to Cape Blanco. These successes produced a great effect; the
cause of discovery, now connected with boundless hopes of profit, became
popular; and many volunteers, especially merchants and seamen from
Lisbon and Lagos, came forward. In 1442 Nuno Tristam reached the Bay or
Bight of Arguim, where the infante erected a fort in 1448, and where for
years the Portuguese carried on vigorous slave-raiding. Meantime the
prince, who had now, in 1443, been created by Henry VI. a knight of the
Garter of England, proceeded with his Sagres buildings, especially the
palace, church and observatory (the first in Portugal) which formed the
nucleus of the "Infante's Town," and which were certainly commenced soon
after the Tangier fiasco (1437), if not earlier. In 1444-1446 there was
an immense burst of maritime and exploring activity; more than 30 ships
sailed with Henry's licence to Guinea; and several of their commanders
achieved notable success. Thus Diniz Diaz, Nuno Tristam, and others
reached the Senegal in 1445; Diaz rounded Cape Verde in the same year;
and in 1446 Alvaro Fernandez pushed on almost to our Sierra Leone, to a
point 110 leagues beyond Cape Verde. This was perhaps the most distant
point reached before 1461. In 1444, moreover, the island of St Michael
in the Azores was sighted (May 8), and in 1445 its colonization was
begun. During this latter year also John Fernandez (q.v.) spent seven
months among the natives of the Arguim coast, and brought back the first
trustworthy first-hand European account of the Sahara hinterland.
Slave-raiding continued ceaselessly; by 1446 the Portuguese had carried
off nearly a thousand captives from the newly surveyed coasts; but
between this time and the voyages of Cadamosto (q.v.) in 1455-1456, the
prince altered his policy, forbade the kidnapping of the natives (which
had brought about fierce reprisals, causing the death of Nuno Tristam in
1446, and of other pioneers in 1445, 1448, &c.), and endeavoured to
promote their peaceful intercourse with his men. In 1445-1446, again,
Dom Henry renewed his earlier attempts (which had failed in 1424-1425)
to purchase or seize the Canaries for Portugal; by these he brought his
country to the verge of war with Castile; but the home government
refused to support him, and the project was again abandoned. After 1446
our most voluminous authority, Azurara, records but little; his
narrative ceases altogether in 1448; one of the latest expeditions
noticed by him is that of a foreigner in the prince's service, "Vallarte
the Dane," which ended in utter destruction near the Gambia, after
passing Cape Verde in 1448. After this the chief matters worth notice in
Dom Henry's life are, first, the progress of discovery and colonization
in the Azores--where Terceira was discovered before 1450, perhaps in
1445, and apparently by a Fleming, called "Jacques de Bruges" in the
prince's charter of the 2nd of March 1450 (by this charter Jacques
receives the captaincy of this isle as its intending colonizer);
secondly, the rapid progress of civilization in Madeira, evidenced by
its timber trade to Portugal, by its sugar, corn and honey, and above
all by its wine, produced from the Malvoisie or Malmsey grape,
introduced from Crete; and thirdly, the explorations of Cadamosto and
Diogo Gomez (q.v.). Of these the former, in his two voyages of 1455 and
1456, explored part of the courses of the Senegal and the Gambia,
discovered the Cape Verde Islands (1456), named and mapped more
carefully than before a considerable section of the African littoral
beyond Cape Verde, and gave much new information on the trade-routes of
north-west Africa and on the native races; while Gomez, in his first
important venture (after 1448 and before 1458), though not accomplishing
the full Indian purpose of his voyage (he took a native interpreter with
him for use "in the event of reaching India"), explored and observed in
the Gambia valley and along the adjacent coasts with fully as much care
and profit. As a result of these expeditions the infante seems to have
sent out in 1458 a mission to convert the Gambia negroes. Gomez' second
voyage, resulting in another "discovery" of the Cape Verde Islands, was
probably in 1462, after the death of Prince Henry; it is likely that
among the infante's last occupations were the necessary measures for the
equipment and despatch of this venture, as well as of Pedro de Sintra's
important expedition of 1461.
The infante's share in home politics was considerable, especially in the
years of Affonso V.'s minority (1438, &c.) when he helped to make his
elder brother Pedro regent, reconciled him with the queen-mother, and
worked together with them both in a council of regency. But when Dom
Pedro rose in revolt (1447), Henry stood by the king and allowed his
brother to be crushed. In the Morocco campaigns of his last years,
especially at the capture of Alcazar the Little (1458), he restored the
military fame which he had founded at Ceuta and compromised at Tangier,
and which brought him invitations from the pope, the emperor and the
kings of Castile and England, to take command of their armies. The
prince was also grand master of the Order of Christ, the successor of
the Templars in Portugal; and most of his Atlantic and African
expeditions sailed under the flag of his order, whose revenues were at
the service of his explorations, in whose name he asked and obtained the
official recognition of Pope Eugenius IV. for his work, and on which he
bestowed many privileges in the new-won lands--the tithes of St Michael
in the Azores and one-half of its sugar revenues, the tithe of all
merchandise from Guinea, the ecclesiastical dues of Madeira, &c. As
"protector of Portuguese studies," Dom Henry is credited with having
founded a professorship of theology, and perhaps also chairs of
mathematics and medicine, in Lisbon--where also, in 1431, he is said to
have provided house-room for the university teachers and students. To
instruct his captains, pilots and other pioneers more fully in the art
of navigation and the making of maps and instruments he procured, says
Barros, the aid of one Master Jacome from Majorca, together with that of
certain Arab and Jewish mathematicians. We hear also of one Master
Peter, who inscribed and illuminated maps for the infante; the
mathematician Pedro Nunes declares that the prince's mariners were well
taught and provided with instruments and rules of astronomy and geometry
"which all map-makers should know"; Cadamosto tells us that the
Portuguese caravels in his day were the best sailing ships afloat;
while, from several matters recorded by Henry's biographers, it is clear
that he devoted great attention to the study of earlier charts and of
any available information he could gain upon the trade-routes of
north-west Africa. Thus we find an Oran merchant corresponding with him
about events happening in the negro-world of the Gambia basin in 1458.
Even if there were never a formal "geographical school" at Sagres, or
elsewhere in Portugal, founded by Prince Henry, it appears certain that
his court was the centre of active and useful geographical study, as
well as the source of the best practical exploration of the time.
The prince died on the 13th of November 1460, in his town near Cape St
Vincent, and was buried in the church of St Mary in Lagos, but a year
later his body was removed to the superb monastery of Batalha. His
great-nephew, King Dom Manuel, had a statue of him placed over the
centre column of the side gate of the church of Belem. On the 24th of
July 1840, a monument was erected to him at Sagres at the instance of
the marquis de Sa da Bandeira.
The glory attaching to the name of Prince Henry does not rest merely on
the achievements effected during his own lifetime, but on the subsequent
results to which his genius and perseverance had lent the primary
inspiration. To him the human race is indebted, in large measure, for
the maritime exploration, within one century (1420-1522), of more than
half the globe, and especially of the great waterways from Europe to
Asia both by east and by west. His own life only sufficed for the
accomplishment of a small portion of his task. The complete opening out
of the African or south-east route to the Indies needed nearly forty
years of somewhat intermittent labour after his death (1460-1498), and
the prince's share has often been forgotten in that of pioneers who were
really his executors--Diogo Cam, Bartholomew Diaz or Vasco da Gama. Less
directly, other sides of his activity may be considered as fulfilled by
the Portuguese penetration of inland Africa, especially of Abyssinia,
the land of the "Prester John" for whom Dom Henry sought, and even by
the finding of a western route to Asia through the discoveries of
Columbus, Balboa and Magellan.
See _Alguns documentos do archivo nacional da Torre do Tombo acerca
das navegacoes ... portuguezas_ (Lisbon, 1892); Alves, _Dom Henrique o
Infante_ (Oporto, 1894); _Archivo dos Acores_ (Ponta Delgada,
1878-1894); Gomes Eannes de Azurara, _Chronica do descobrimento e
conquista de Guine_, ed. Carreira and Santarem (Paris, 1841; Eng.
trans. by Raymond Beazley and Edgar Prestage, Hakluyt Society, London,
1896-1899); Joao de Barros, _Decadas da Asia_ (Lisbon, 1652); Raymond
Beazley, _Prince Henry the Navigator_ (London, 1895), and introduction
to Azurara, vol. ii., in Hakluyt Soc. trans. (see above); Antonio
Cordeiro, _Historia Insultana_ (Lisbon, 1717); Freire (Candido
Lusitano), _Vida do Infante D. Henrique_ (Lisbon, 1858); "Diogo
Gomez," in Dr Schmeller's _Uber Valentim Fernandez Alemao_, vol. iv.
pt. iii., in the publications of the 1st class of the Royal Bavarian
Academy of Sciences (Munich, 1845); R. H. Major, _The Life of Henry of
Portugal, surnamed the Navigator_ (London, 1868); Jules Mees, _Henri
le Navigateur et l'academie ... de Sagres_ (Brussels, 1901), and
_Histoire de la decouverte des iles Acores_ (Ghent, 1901); Duarte
Pacheco Pereira, _Esmeraldo de situ orbis_ (Lisbon, 1892); Sophus
Ruge, "Prinz Heinrich der Seefahrer," in vol. 65 of _Globus_, p. 153
(Brunswick, 1894); Gustav de Veer, _Prinz Heinrich der Seefahrer_
(Danzig, 1863); H. E. Wauwerman, _Henri le Navigateur et l'academie
portugaise de Sagres_ (Antwerp and Brussels, 1890). (C. R. B.)
HENRY OF ALMAIN (1235-1271), so called from his father's German
connexions, was the son of Richard, earl of Cornwall and king of the
Romans. As a nephew of both Henry III. and Simon de Montfort he wavered
between the two at the beginning of the Barons' War, but finally took
the royalist side and was among the prisoners taken by Montfort at Lewes
(1264). In 1268 he took the cross with his cousin Edward, who, however,
sent him back from Sicily to pacify the unruly province of Gascony.
Henry took the land route with the kings of France and Sicily. While
attending mass at Viterbo (13 March 1271) he was attacked by Guy and
Simon de Montfort, sons of Earl Simon, and foully murdered. This revenge
was the more outrageous since Henry had personally exerted himself on
behalf of the Montforts after Evesham. The deed is mentioned by Dante,
who put Guy de Montfort in the seventh circle of hell.
See W. H. Blaauw's _The Barons' War_ (ed. 1871); Ch. Bemont's _Simon
de Montfort_ (1884).
HENRY OF BLOIS, bishop of Winchester (1101-1171), was the son of
Stephen, count of Blois, by Adela, daughter of William I., and brother
of King Stephen. He was educated at Cluny, and consistently exerted
himself for the principles of Cluniac reform. If these involved high
claims of independence and power for the Church, they also asserted a
high standard of devotion and discipline. Henry was brought to England
by Henry I. and made abbot of Glastonbury. In 1129 he was given the
bishopric of Winchester and allowed to hold his abbey in conjunction
with it. His hopes of the see of Canterbury were disappointed, but he
obtained in 1139 a legatine commission which gave him a higher rank than
the primate. In fact as well as in theory he became the master of the
Church in England. He even contemplated the erection of a new province,
with Winchester as its centre, which was to be independent of
Canterbury. Owing both to local and to general causes the power of the
Church in England has never been higher than in the reign of Stephen
(1135-1154), Henry as its leader and a legate of the pope was the real
"lord of England," as the chronicles call him. Indeed, one of the
ecclesiastical councils over which he presided formally declared that
the election of the king in England was the special privilege of the
clergy. Stephen owed his crown to Henry (1135), but they quarrelled
when Stephen refused to give Henry the primacy; and the bishop took up
the cause of Roger of Salisbury (1139). After the battle of Lincoln
(1141) Henry declared for Matilda; but finding his advice treated with
contempt, rejoined his brother's side, and his successful defence of
Winchester against the empress (Aug.-Sept. 1141) was the turning-point
of the civil war. The expiration of his legatine commission of 1144
deprived him of much of his power. He spent the rest of Stephen's reign
in trying to procure its renewal. But his efforts were unsuccessful,
though he made a personal visit to Rome. At the accession of Henry II.
(1154) he retired from the world and spent the rest of his life in works
of charity and penitence. He died in 1171. Henry seems to have been a
man of high character, great courage, resolution and ability. Like most
great bishops of his age he had a passion for architecture. He built,
among other castles, that of Farnham; and he began the hospital of St
Cross at Winchester.
AUTHORITIES.--Original: William of Malmesbury, _De gestis regum_; the
_Gesta Stephani_. Modern: Sir James Ramsay, _Foundations of England_,
vol. ii.; Kate Norgate's _Angevin Kings_; Kitchin's _Winchester_.
HENRY OF GHENT [Henricus a Gandavo] (c. 1217-1293), scholastic
philosopher, known as "Doctor Solennis," was born in the district of
Mude, near Ghent, and died at Tournai (or Paris). He is said to have
belonged to an Italian family named Bonicolli, in Flemish Goethals, but
the question of his name has been much discussed (see authorities
below). He studied at Ghent and then at Cologne under Albertus Magnus.
After obtaining the degree of doctor he returned to Ghent, and is said
to have been the first to lecture there publicly on philosophy and
theology. Attracted to Paris by the fame of the university, he took part
in the many disputes between the orders and the secular priests, and
warmly defended the latter. A contemporary of Aquinas, he opposed
several of the dominant theories of the time, and united with the
current Aristotelian doctrines a strong infusion of Platonism. He
distinguished between knowledge of actual objects and the divine
inspiration by which we cognize the being and existence of God. The
first throws no light upon the second. Individuals are constituted not
by the material element but by their independent existence, i.e.
ultimately by the fact that they are created as separate entities.
Universals must be distinguished according as they have reference to our
minds or to the divine mind. In the divine intelligence exist exemplars
or types of the genera and species of natural objects. On this subject
Henry is far from clear; but he defends Plato against the current
Aristotelian criticism, and endeavours to show that the two views are in
harmony. In psychology, his view of the intimate union of soul and body
is remarkable. The body he regards as forming part of the substance of
the soul, which through this union is more perfect and complete.
WORKS.--_Quodlibeta theologica_ (Paris, 1518; Venice, 1608 and 1613);
_Summa theologiae_ (Paris, 1520; Ferrara, 1646); _De scriptoribus
ecclesiasticis_ (Cologne, 1580).
AUTHORITIES.--F. Huet's _Recherches hist. et crit. ... de H. de G._
(Paris, 1838) has been superseded by F. Ehrle's monograph in _Archiv
fur Lit. u. Kirchengeschichte des Mittelalters_, i. (1885); see also
A. Wauters and N. de Pauw in the _Bull. de la Com. royale d'histoire
de Belgique_ (4th series, xiv., xv., xvi., 1887-1889); H. Delehaye,
_Nouvelles Recherches sur Henri de Gand_ (1886); C. Werner, _Heinrich
von Gent als Reprasentant des christlichen Platonismus im 13ten
Jahrh._ (Vienna, 1878); A. Stockl, _Phil. d. Mittelalters_, ii.
738-758; C. Brechillet Jourdain, _La Philosophie de St Thomas d'Aquin_
(1858), ii. 29-46; Alphonse le Roy in _Biographie nationale de
Belgique_, vii. (Brussels, 1880); and article SCHOLASTICISM.
HENRY OF HUNTINGDON, English chronicler of the 12th century, was born,
apparently, between the years 1080 and 1090. His father, by name
Nicholas, was a clerk, who became archdeacon of Cambridge, Hertford and
Huntingdon, in the time of Remigius, bishop of Lincoln (d. 1092). The
celibacy of the clergy was not strictly enforced in England before 1102.
Hence the chronicler makes no secret of his antecedents, nor did they
interfere with his career. At an early age Henry entered the household
of Bishop Robert Bloet, who appointed him, immediately after the death
of Nicholas (1110), archdeacon of Hertford and Huntingdon. Henry was on
familiar terms with his patron; and also, it would seem, with Bloet's
successor, by whom he was encouraged to undertake the writing of an
English history from the time of Julius Caesar. This work, undertaken
before 1130, was first published in that year; the author subsequently
published in succession four more editions, of which the last ends in
1154 with the accession of Henry II. The only recorded fact of the
chronicler's later life is that he went with Archbishop Theobald to Rome
in 1139. On the way Henry halted at Bec, and there made the acquaintance
of Robert de Torigni, who mentions their encounter in the preface to his
Chronicle.
The _Historia Anglorum_ was first printed in Savile, _Rerum Anglicarum
scriptores post Bedam_ (London, 1596). The first six books excepting
the third, which is almost entirely taken from Bede, are given in
_Monumenta historica Britannica_, vol. i. (ed. H. Petrie and J.
Sharpe, London, 1848). The standard edition is that of T. Arnold in
the Rolls Series (London, 1879). There is a translation by T. Forester
in Bohn's _Antiquarian Library_ (London, 1853). The Historia is of
little independent value before 1126. Up to that point the author
compiles from Eutropius, Aurelius Victor, Nennius, Bede and the
English chronicles, particularly that of Peterborough; in some cases
he professes to supplement these sources from oral tradition; but most
of his amplifications are pure rhetoric (see F. Liebermann in
_Forschungen zur deutschen Geschichte_ for 1878, pp. 265 seq.). Arnold
prints, in an appendix, a minor work from Henry's pen, the _Epistola
ad Walterum de contemptu mundi_, which was written in 1135. It is a
moralizing tract, but contains some interesting anecdotes about
contemporaries. Henry also wrote epistles to Henry I. (on the
succession of kings and emperors in the great monarchies of the world)
and to "Warinus, a Briton" (on the early British kings, after Geoffrey
of Monmouth). A book, _De miraculis_, composed of extracts from Bede,
was appended along with these three epistles to the later recensions
of the _Historia_. Henry composed eight books of Latin epigrams; two
books survive in the Lambeth MS., No. 118. His value as a historian,
formerly much overrated, is discussed at length by Liebermann and in
T. Arnold's introduction to the Rolls edition of the _Historia_.
(H. W. C. D.)