THE SUNKEN LAND OF BUSS AND OTHER PHANTOM ISLANDS
Beside those legendary Atlantic islands that may cast some light on
visits of white men to America before Columbus or have been at some
time linked therewith by speculation or tradition--notably Antillia
and its consorts, Brazil, Man or Mayda, Green Island, Estotiland and
Drogio, the Island or Islands of St. Brendan, and the Island of the
Seven Cities--there are numerous others, quite a swarm indeed, excusing
Ptolemy’s and Edrisi’s extravagant estimate of 27,000. Sometimes, but
not always, they are of more recent origin and are explainable in
various ways.
Several are linked to the idea of volcanic destruction or seismic
engulfment. Of course the colossal and classical instance of Atlantis
comes first into mind, it being the earliest as well as in every way
the most imposing. Most likely the well-known story, repeated, if not
originated, by Plato, developed naturally, as we have seen, from the
insistent need to account for the obstructive weedy wastes of the
Sargasso Sea beyond the Azores and recurrent facts of minor cataclysms
among them.
The next oldest instance, perhaps, is supplied by Ruysch’s map of
1508,[289] an inscription on which avers that an island in the sea
about midway between Iceland and Greenland had been totally destroyed
by combustion in the year 1456. We do not know his authority for this
startling announcement. The spot is where one would naturally look
for Gunnbjörn’s skerries of the older Icelandic writings; and no one
can find them now, unless they were, after all, but projecting points
of the eastern Greenland coast. Also Iceland is at times tremendously
eruptive; and this islet, or these islets, would not be far away. The
assertion is not in itself incredible, but there seems no corroboration.
THE DISCOVERY OF BUSS
The “Sunken Island of Buss” presents a suggestion of engulfment on
a more extensive scale. The whole episode is of rather recent date,
Buss being the latest born of mythical or illusory islands, unless we
except Negra’s Rock and other alleged and unproven apparitions of land
on a very small scale, which may not have wholly ceased even yet. Buss
is, at any rate, the one moderately large phantom map island the time
and occasion of whose origin are securely recorded. For, as narrated
by Best and published in Hakluyt’s compilation, on Frobisher’s third
voyage (1578), one of his vessels, a buss, or small strong fishing
craft, of Bridgewater, named _Emmanuel_, made the discovery. In his
words:
The Buss of Bridgewater, as she came homeward, to the
southeastward of Frisland, discovered a great island in the
latitude of 57 degrees and a half, which was never yet found
before, and sailed three days along the coast, the land seeming
to be fruitful, full of woods, and a champaign country.[290]
Best must have had his information at second or third hand, with
liberal play of fancy in the final touches on the part of his informant
or himself. His was the first account published, but not long afterward
appeared that of an eyewitness, “Thomas Wiars, a passenger in the
_Emmanuel_, otherwise called the Busse of Bridgewater,” repeated
in Miller Christy’s admirable little treatise on the subject.[291]
Wiars says they fell with Frisland (probably a part of Greenland) on
September 8 and on September 12 reached this new island, coasted it for
parts of two days, and considered it 25 leagues long. There was much
ice near it. He gives no suggestion of fertility, woods, or fields.
[Illustration: FIG. 24--Map of Buss Island from John Seller’s
“English Pilot,” probably 1673. (After Miller Christy’s photographic
facsimile.)]
ITS DISAPPEARANCE FROM THE MAP
The only other witnesses to the visual existence of the island, so
far as recorded, were James Hall (probably by honest mistake) in 1606
and Thomas Shepherd (gravely distrusted) in 1671.[292] Nevertheless
an impressive insular figure grew up in the maps, bearing the name
“Buss” to commemorate the vessel that first found it. In some instances
it was made a very large island indeed. Shepherd’s map, reproduced
herewith (Fig. 24), was accompanied by a brief descriptive narrative
which may be attributed to a fancy for yarning, with no strong curb of
conscience on the fancy. Buss remained an accepted figure of geography
for considerably more than a century.
Quite naturally, however, the efforts of reliable searchers failed
to find this island again, for it was not really there. A theory of
cataclysm seemed more acceptable than to discard outright what so
many maps, books, and traditions had attested. Van Keulen’s chart of
1745[293] led the way with the inscription “The submerged land of Buss
is nowadays nothing but surf a quarter of a mile long with rough sea.
Most likely it was originally the great island of Frisland.” So the
name “Sunken Land of Buss” passed into general use with geographic
sanction. After much disturbance of mariners’ and cartographers’ minds
not only the phantom island but its legacy, the supposed line of
breakers and dangers, vanished altogether from the records. There is
no “Buss” to be found on maps after about the middle of the nineteenth
century, though the preceding hundred years had been prolific in them.
Probably we must suppose a later date for the cessation of current
mention of the sunken land of that name, in recognition of what,
according to belief, once had been but existed (above water) no longer.
Indeed, even after the opening of this twentieth century the same
hypothesis has revived,[294] with scientific support of a submarine
range in 53° N. and 35° W., really ocean-bottom mountains 8,000 feet
high between Ireland and Newfoundland, reported upon in 1903 by Captain
de Carteret of the cable ship _Minia_. They are not on the same spot
and would still require a great lift to reach the surface. Of course
their past sinking is not impossible, but there is no need to explain
Buss by cataclysm any more than Mayda or Brazil Island, Drogio or
Icaria.
ISLANDS OF DEMONS
Somewhat allied by nature to these reported isles of destruction and
disappearance are the islands of imported diabolism, appearing on
maps now and then through the centuries. Bianco’s “The Hand of Satan”
(1436[295]; Fig. 25), if correctly translated (see Ch. X, p. 156), is
probably the first to present this quality. He locates the sinister
island well to the southward; but the most pictorial appearance is
Gastaldi’s (for Ramusio) “Island of Demons,”[296] with its eager and
capering imps at the bleak and savage northern end of Newfoundland. The
preferred site, however, would seem to be yet a little farther north.
Ruysch, in the map referred to above, which announces the burning up
of Gunnbjörn’s skerries, exhibits two Insulae Demonium near the middle
of the dreaded Ginnungagap passage between Labrador and Greenland.
There is no suggestion of volcanic action in their case, and it does
not appear that any real islands occupied the spot. The reason for the
delineation and the name is still to seek.
The map of 1544, attributed to Sebastian Cabot,[297] makes a single
island of them, “marked Y. de Demones”, and brings it nearer
the eastern front of Labrador below Hamilton Inlet. Agnese[298]
in the same century enlarges it greatly but still keeps it just off
the Labrador coast. The Ortelius map of 1570[299] (Fig. 10) shows
the insular haunt of devils, plural again in form and name, but
retains approximately the site chosen by Cabot. Mercator’s world
map of 1569[300] keeps the islands plural beside the upper tip of
Newfoundland, approximating Gastaldi’s position. There seems to have
been a pronounced and general concurrence of belief in diabolical evil
in the northeastern coast of America, perhaps because it is there that
the Arctic current brings down its tremendous freight, and tempests are
at their wildest, and all barrenness and bleakness at their worst.
[Illustration: FIG. 25--Section of the Bianco map of 1436 showing
the Island of the Hand of Satan and Antillia. (After Kretschmer’s
hand-copied reproduction.)]
SAINTLY ISLANDS
Much farther south, on the lines followed by Columbus and his Latin
successors and in the tracks of vessels plying between the eastern
Atlantic archipelagoes and the West Indies, what may be considered
as a contrary impulse--that of exultant religious enthusiasm--came
into play in island naming. The Island of the Seven Cities (Ch. V)
will be recalled but needs no further consideration here. St. Anne,
La Catholique, St. X, and Incorporado (in the sense of Christ’s
Incarnation) are among the more conspicuous instances. The second-named
was always in low latitudes. It occurs in the latitude of the tip of
Florida, in mid-Atlantic in the Desceliers map of 1546[301] (Fig. 9);
also as “La Catolico” on Portuguese maps, with similar situation.
Desceliers shows Encorporade (Incorporado) about east of Cape Hatteras
and south of western Newfoundland; but he also has Encorporada Adonda
not far from Nova Scotia. Thomas Hood (1592)[302] makes a wild and
unenlightened transformation of Incorporado to “Emperadada” and puts
it about opposite the site of Savannah, but not so far east as the
considerable outjutting of the coast which must be meant for Cape
Hatteras and its neighborhood. However, this location is not very
different from that usually given it. Desceliers has two islands
marked St. X, one being in the longitude of St. Michaels and latitude
of Bermuda; the other in the longitude of eastern Newfoundland and
latitude of the Hudson. In about the same latitude as the latter, and
more than half way between it and the Azores, an island called St.
Anne is shown. There seems nothing real to prompt the derivation of
these religiously named islands. Perhaps they are merely the offspring
of optical delusion, fancy, and fervor.
DACULI AND BRA
On the other side of the Atlantic the much earlier map island Daculi
must be reckoned as of kin to them, since its map legends deal with
beneficent wonder working or magical medical aid, and its name may be
identical with or have originated the saintly one which still denotes
an outlying Hebridean island. Though less renowned than the island of
Brazil and less significant, Daculi shares with it the record for first
appearance of mythical islands on portolan maps.
Dalorto’s map of 1325[303] (Fig. 4) already indicated as the earliest
one of much interest in this special regard, presents many islands of
familiar or unfamiliar names near Ireland and Scotland. Nobody can
mistake the rightly located Man, Bofim, and Brascher (the Blaskets).
Insula Sau must be Skye, though with the outline of the Kintyre
peninsula. Sialand seems to be Shetland. Tille may be Orkney displaced.
Galuaga or Saluaga probably stands for the main body of the Long Island
(Harris, Lewis, etc.) of the outer Hebrides. Bra is no doubt Barra and
has generally been thus accepted, though out of line with Galuaga and
too far eastward. Brazil, as already reported, is naturally farther at
sea opposite Brascher. Finally our subject for present consideration,
Daculi, lies off the northwestern corner of Ireland, north of Brazil
Island and west of Bra, with which last it has in later maps a curious
legendary association. With Insula de Montonis, as Brazil is also
called on Dalorto’s map, it may be linked in another way by their
Italian names, for Daculi seems capable of that derivation, “culla”
being “cradle” in that language, plural “culli,” easily modified to
“culi” by careless speech or writing. The introductory preposition “da”
in one use has an especial relation to nativity; thus Zuan da Napoli
means John born at Naples, that is John of Naples in this sense. The
blending of preposition and noun in one word, “Daculi,” is no more than
sometimes happened on the maps to the article and noun “Li Conigi,” the
Rabbit Island, making it “Liconigi,” now long known as Flores. This
explanation would interpret Daculi as the “Island of the Cradles,”
or “Cradle Island.” Some other derivation may indeed possibly be as
defensible; but it should be borne in mind that Italian traders ranged
very early up and down the Irish coast, and that name would curiously
coincide with the tradition at least afterward current concerning the
island.
To review a few later but still very early maps:--Dulcert, 1339,[304]
shows some irrelevant changes farther north and east; but his Hebridean
islands repeat very nearly the form given them by Dalorto (believed by
many to be the same man), and there is no significant change in Bra or
Daculi, though the first syllable of the latter becomes Di.
The Atlante Mediceo, of 1351,[305] makes more changes than Dulcert
among these islands and leaves unnamed the one which by position seems
meant for Bra, or Barra. Daculi is largely expanded and named Insul
Dach indistinctly.
The Pizigani map of 1367[306] (Fig. 2) modifies many names. Daculi
becomes Insuldacr in one word; but its place remains nearly as in
Dalorto’s map, though most of the other islands are drawn closer to
Ireland, so that Bra is nearly stranded thereon. A line of inscription
seems to relate to Bra--“Ich sont ysula qu--[possibly pronominal
abbreviation] abitabi honõ quõ morit may.” Perhaps some of these words
should be read differently, and “abitabi” needs some recasting. I will
not attempt to interpret but should infer that Bra had its troubles.
They do not seem to have extended to Daculi.
Pareto’s fine map of 1455[307] (Fig. 21) applies the following more
extended and significant legend to Daculi: “Item est altera insulla
nomine Bra in qua femine que in insulla ipsa habitant non pariuntur
sed quando est eorum tempus pariendi feruntur foras insulla et ibi
pariuntur secundum tempus.” From this we may gather that the outer
island Daculi was believed to afford especial aid in childbearing to
women carried thither after being baffled on the inner island Bra,
and we see readily the appositeness of the name “cradle” applied to
the former. Beccario’s map of 1435[308] (Fig. 20), though without the
legend, had already adopted in “Insulla da Culli” almost exactly the
form of the name which we have divined, with apparently that meaning.
St. Kilda seems to me the most plausible original for Daculi that has
been suggested. It is true that Barra is actually south of the parallel
of latitude of that most lonely western sentinel of the Hebrides,
and there is no obvious link of relation between them. Also the rock
islet of North Barra is about as far above it, equally unconnected and
not likely ever to have maintained much population. But so simple a
misunderstanding on the part of the old cartographers would be no more
than what happened to them all the time, and exact identity of latitude
is unimportant. There is, in fact, no land on the site given Daculi in
any of these old maps; and Bra, as noted, is absurdly out of place for
Barra. How the tradition grew up we do not know. Perhaps it was some
tale picked up by coasting Italian traders, partly misunderstood and
passed on by them to the map-makers at home. St. Kilda, lost in the
mists and mystery of the Atlantic, of holy name and miracle-working
associations, and out of touch with most tests of reality, seems a
likely place to be linked to some less abnormal island by a fanciful
contribution of saintly white magic, a rumor originating nobody knows
how.
GROCLAND, HELLULAND, ETC.
On the western side of the Atlantic there are divers instances of
island names given of old--sometimes with considerable changes of
location, area, or outline, or of all three--to regions which we
know quite otherwise. Some of these have been dealt with extensively
already. Greenland has a lesser neighbor, Grocland, on its western
side in divers sixteenth-century maps; which I take to be a magnified
presentation of Disko or possibly a reflection of Baffin Land brought
near. It appears conspicuously in Mercator’s map of the Polar basin
(1569),[309] the Hakluyt map of 1587 illustrating Peter Martyr,[310]
and the map of Mathias Quadus (1608).[311]
This is not the place to enlarge on the Helluland, Markland, and
Vinland of the Norsemen beginning with the eleventh century, as this
theme has been dealt with elsewhere.[312] But they were often thought
of as islands, as shown by the notice of Adam of Bremen. Perhaps
there was never any great clearness of conception as to extent or
form. But in a general way they may be identified respectively with
northern Labrador, Newfoundland, and the warmer parts of the Atlantic
coast. Great Iceland, or White Men’s Land, seems also to have been
understood as what we should now call America. Eugène Beauvois located
it conjecturally about the mouth of the St. Lawrence River.[313]
Dr. Gustav Storm, on the other hand, thought it was merely Iceland
misunderstood.[314]
STOKAFIXA
Perhaps the latter explanation is the best yet given of the mysterious
island Scorafixa, or Stokafixa, in Andrea Bianco’s map of 1436.[315]
It has sometimes been understood as Newfoundland, which bore long
afterward the name Bacalaos, the equivalent in a different tongue of
the northern “stockfish,” our codfish. But it would naturally be freely
applied to any island in rather high latitudes which was conspicuous
for that fishery, and Stokafixa seems near of kin to Fixlanda, which
figures on divers maps as a combined suggestion of Iceland and the
imaginary Frisland but with geographical features mainly borrowed
from the former. The first-named identification may be tempting as
establishing another pre-Columbian discovery of America, but it quite
lacks corroboration; and Iceland was a great center of codfishery,
distributing its name and attributes rather liberally in legend and
on the maps. Humboldt incidentally mentions “l’île des Morues (île de
Stockfisch, _Stokafixa_)” on the seventh map of the atlas of Bianco,
1436. I do not clearly make out the name on T. Fischer’s facsimile
reproduction;[316] but from position and appearance the island seems
meant for Iceland.
OTHER MAP ISLANDS IN THE NORTHWESTERN ATLANTIC
The Grand Banks and other banks of Newfoundland, with the Virgin Rocks
and perhaps other piles or pinnacles rising from that bed nearly to
the surface so as to be uncovered in some tides; Sable Island, a
rather long way offshore; Cape Breton Island and fragments of the main
shore--may be held responsible for some map islands such as Arredonda
and Dobreton, Jacquet I., Monte Christo, I. de Juan, and Juan de Sampo.
There are still other islands mostly north of the latitude of Bermuda
and between it and the Azores or northeastern America, but far at sea,
of which one can make little, except as probably complimenting some
pilot, skipper, or other individual, or commemorating some incident
which has nevertheless been generally forgotten. Thus Negra’s Rock,
which has hardly ceased to appear on the maps, does not really exist
but may keep us in mind, by its rather sinister and mythical sound,
that a certain Captain Negra once thought he saw something solid in
the great liquid and reported accordingly. Of such origin, perhaps,
are I. de Garcia, Y Neufre, Y d’Hyanestienne, Lasciennes, and divers
others scattered over various maps and offering no promise of reward
for hunting down their pedigrees or history. All these distinctly
post-Columbian islands are quite too recent and casual to throw any
light on the earlier historically and geographically significant
“mythical islands” or on what these reveal.