III. CAPE BRETON AHD THE SOUTHERLY COAST OF NEWFOUNDLAND, HERE
CLAIMED TO HAVE BEEN DISCOVERED, WERE KNOWN PREVIOUSLY. PERVERSION
OF THE TEXT OF THE LETTER BY RAMUSIO.
By the two courses and distances just mentioned, the explorers are
brought first to the island of Cape Breton, and then to the cape of
that name, where the coast first takes a decided turn, from its
easterly direction, to the north, and forms the westerly side of the
strait leading into the gulf of St. Lawrence. This cape, according
to the letter, is distant easterly one hundred and fifty, and fifty,
leagues from the harbor in the great bay, distances which, for
reasons already mentioned, are to be regarded as estimates only, but
which taken exactly would have carried them beyond Cape Race in
Newfoundland. They are to be considered, however, as properly
limited to the turn of the coast before mentioned, as that is a
governing circumstance in the description. Beyond this point, north,
and east, the letter presents the claim to the discovery in another
aspect. Thus far it relates to portions of the coast confessedly
unknown before its date. But from Cape Breton, in latitude 46
Degrees N. to latitude 50 Degrees N. on the east side of
Newfoundland, it pretends to the discovery of parts, which were in
fact already known; and it makes this claim circumstances which
prove it was so known by the writer, if the letter were written as
pretended. Having described their attempts at intercourse with the
natives at Cape Breton, the narrative concludes the description of
the coast with the following paragraph.
"Departing from thence, we kept along the coast, steering northeast,
and found the country more pleasant and open, free from woods, and
distant in the interior, we saw lofty mountains but none which
extended to the shore. Within fifty leagues we discovered thirty-two
islands, all near the main land, small and of pleasant appearance,
but high and so disposed as to afford excellent harbors and
channels, as we see in the Adriatic gulf, near Illyria and Dalmatia.
We had no intercourse with the people, but we judge that they were
similar in nature and usages to those we were last among. After
sailing between east and north one hundred and fifty leagues MORE,
and finding our provisions and naval stores nearly exhausted, we
took in wood and water, and determined to return to France, having
discovered (avendo discoperto) VII, [Footnote: "The MS. has
erroneously and uselessly the repetition VII, that is, 700 leagues."
Note, by M. Arcangeli. It is evident that VII is mistakenly rendered
502 in the transcription used by Dr. Cogswell.] that is, 700 leagues
of unknown lands."
The exact point at which they left the coast, and to which their
discovery is thus stated to have extended, is given in the
cosmography which follows the narrative, in these words:
"In the voyage which we have made by order of your majesty, in
addition to the 92 degrees we ran towards the west from our point of
departure (the Desertas) before we reached land in the latitude of
34, we have to count 300 leagues which we ran northeastwardly, and
400 nearly east along the coast before we reached the 50TH PARALLEL
OF NORTH LATITUDE, the point where we turned our course from the
shore towards home. BEYOND THIS POINT THE PORTUGUESE HAD ALREADY
SAILED AS FAR AS THE ARCTIC CIRCLE, WITHOUT COMING TO THE
TERMINATION OF THE LAND."
That this latitude must be taken as correctly determined follows
from the representation of the letter, that they took daily
observations of the sun and made a record of them, so that no
material error could have occurred and remained unrectified for over
twenty-four hours; and from the presumption that they were as
capable of calculating the latitude as other navigators of that
period, sent on such purposes by royal authority, like Jacques
Cartier, whose observations, as the accounts of his voyage to this
region show, never varied half a degree from the true latitude. The
fiftieth parallel strikes the easterly coast of Newfoundland three
degrees north of Cape Race, and to that point the exploration of
Verrazzano is therefore to be regarded as claimed to have been made.
[Footnote: Damiam de Goes, Chronica do felicissimo rei Dom Emanuel
parte I. C. 66. (Fol., Lisboa, 1566)]
This intention is made positively certain by the remark which
follows the statement of the latitude, that "beyond this point the
Portuguese had already sailed as far north as the Arctic circle
without coming to the termination of the land." The exploration of
the Portuguese here referred to, and as far as which that of
Verrazzano is carried, was made by Gaspar Cortereal in his second
voyage, when according to the letter of Pasqualigo the Venetian
embassador, he sailed from Lisbon on a course between west and
northwest, and struck a coast along which he ran from six to seven
hundred miles, "without finding the end." [Footnote: Paesi novamente
ritrovati. Lib. sexto. cap. CXXXL. Venice, 1521. A translation into
English of Pasqualigo's letter, which is dated the 19th of October,
1501, is given in the memoir of Sebastian Cabot, p. 235-6.] No other
exploration along this coast by the Portuguese, tending to the
Arctic circle is known to have taken place before the publication of
the Verrazzano letter. The first voyage of Cortereal, was, according
to the description of the people given by Damiam de Goes, among the
Esquimaux, whether on the one side or the other of Davis straits it
is unnecessary here to inquire, as the Esquimaux are not found south
of 50 Degrees N. latitude. The land along which he ran in his second
voyage, was, according to the same historian, distinctly named after
him and his brother, who shared his fate in a subsequent voyage. It
is so called on several early printed maps on which it is
represented as identical with Newfoundland. It appears first on a
map of the world in the Ptolemy of 1511 edited by Bernardus Sylvanus
of Eboli, and is there laid down as extending from latitude 50
Degrees N. to 60 Degrees N. with the name of Corte Real or Court
Royal, latinized into Regalis Domus. [Footnote: Claudii Ptholemaei
Alexandrini liber geographiae, cum tabulis et universali figura et
cum additione locorum quae a recentioribus reporta sunt diligenti
cura emendatus et impressus. (Fol., Venetiis, 1511.)] The length of
the coast, corresponds with the description of Pasqualigo, and its
position with the latitude assigned by the Verrazzano letter for
their exploration. Its direction is north and south. There can be no
question therefore as to the pretension of the Verrazzano letter to
the discovery of the coast by him, actually as far north as the
fiftieth parallel.
That it is utterly unfounded, so far as regards that portion of the
coast lying east and north of Cape Breton, that is, from 46 Degrees
N. latitude to 50 Degrees N., embracing a distance of five hundred
miles according to actual measurement, or eight hundred miles
according to the letter, is proven by the fact, that it had all been
known and frequented by Portuguese and French fishermen, for a
period of twenty years preceding the Verrazano voyage. The
Portuguese fisheries in Newfoundland must have commenced shortly
after the voyages of the brothers Cortereaes in 1501-2, as they
appear to have been carried on in 1506, from a decree of the king of
Portugal published at Leiria on the 14th of October in that year,
directing his officers to collect tithes of fish which should be
brought into his kingdom from Terra Nova; [Footnote: Memorias
Economicas da academia Real das Sciencias da Lisboa, tom. III, 393.]
and Portuguese charts belonging to that period, still extant, show
both the Portuguese and French discoveries of this coast. On a map
(No. 1, of the Munich atlas,) of Pedro Reinel, a Portuguese pilot,
who entered the service of the king of Spain at the time of fitting
out Magellan's famous expedition, Terra Nova, and the land of Cape
Breton are correctly laid down, as regards latitude, though not by
name. On Terra Nova the name of C. Raso, (preserved in the modern
Cape Race) is applied to its southeasterly point, and other
Portuguese names, several of which also still remain, designating
different points along the easterly coast of Newfoundland, and a
Portuguese banner, as an emblem of its discovery by that nation, are
found. Another Portuguese chart, belonging to the period when the
country between Florida and Terra Nova was unknown (No. 4 of the
same atlas) delineates the land of Cape Breton, not then yet known
to be an island, in correct relation with the Bacalaos, accompanied
by a legend that it was discovered by the Bretons. [Footnote: Atlas
zur entdeckingsgeschichte Amerikas. Herausgegeben von Friedrick
Kunstmann, Karl von Sprusser, Georg M. Thomas. Zu den Monumenta
Saecularia der K.B. Akademie der Wissenschaften, 28 Maers, 1859.
Munchen.] The French authorities are more explicit. The particular
parts of this coast discovered by the Normands and Bretons with the
time of their discovery, and by the Portuguese, are described in the
discourse of the French captain of Dieppe, which is found in the
collection of Ramusio. This writer states that this land from Cape
Breton to Cape Race was discovered by the Bretons and Normandy in
1504, and from Cape Race to Cape Bonavista, seventy leagues north,
by the Portuguese, and from thence to the straits of Belle Isle by
the Bretons and Normands; and that the country was visited in 1508
by a vessel from Dieppe, commanded by Thomas Aubert, who brought
back to France some of the natives. This statement in regard to the
Indians is confirmed by an account of them, which is given in a
work, printed in Paris at the time, establishing the fact of the
actual presence of the Normands in Newfoundland in that year, by
contemporaneous testimony of undoubted authority. [Footnote: Eusebii
Chronicon, continued by Joannes Multivallis of Louvain, (Paris
1512) fol. 172.
We give here, a translation of the interesting passage referred to
in the text, from this volume, which came from the celebrated press
of Henri Estienne.
"An Salutis, 1509. Seven savages were brought to Rouen with their
garments and weapons from the island they call Terra Nova. They are
of a dark complexion, have thick lips and wear marks on their faces
extending along their jaws from the ear to the middle of the chin
LIKE SMALL LIVID VEINS. Their hair is black and coarse like a
horse's mane. They have no beard, during their lives, or hairs of
puberty. Nor have they hair on any part of their persons, except the
head and eye-brows. They wear a girdle on which is a small skin to
cover their nakedness. They form their speech with their lips. No
religion. THEIR BOAT IS OF BARK and a man may carry it with one hand
on his shoulders. Their weapons are bows drawn with a string made of
the intestines or sinews of animals, and arrows pointed with stone
or fish-bone. Their food consists of roasted flesh, their drink is
water. Bread, wine and the use of money they have none. They go
about naked or dressed in the skins of bears, deer, seals and
similar animals. Their country is in the parallel of the seventh
climate, more under the west than France is above the west." PLUS
SUB OCCIDENTE QUAM GALLICA REGIO SUPRA OCCIDENTEM. By "west" here is
meant the meridional line, from which longitude was calculated at
that time, through the Island of Ferro, the most westerly of the
Canary islands, and the idea here intended to be conveyed is that
the country of these Indians was further on this side than France
was on the other side, of that line.
This description, as well as the name, Terra Nova, indicates the
region of Newfoundland as the place from whence these Indians were
taken. According to the tables of Pierre d'Ailly, the seventh
climate commences at 47 Degrees 15' N. and extends to 50 Degrees 30'
N. beginning where the longest day of the year is 15 hours and 45
minutes long. (IMAGO MUNDI, tables prefixed to the first chapter.)
This embraces the greater part of the southerly and easterly coasts
of Newfoundland. The practice of tattooing their faces in lines
across the jaw, as here described, was common to all the tribes of
this northern coast, the Nasquapecs of Labrador, the red Indians of
Newfoundland and the Micmacs of Cape Breton and Nova Scotia. It was
from the use of red ochre for this purpose that the natives of
Newfoundland obtained their designation of red Indians. The Micmacs
used blue and other colors; hence it would appear from the
circumstance of the marks upon these Indians being livid (LIVIDAE)
or blue, like veins, that they belonged to the tribes of Cape
Breton. (Hind's Labrador II, 97-110. Purchas, III. 1880-1. Denys.
(HIST. NAT. DE L'AMERIQUE SEPT. II, 887.))]
That the French and especially the Normands had soon afterwards
resorted to Newfoundland for the purpose of taking fish, and were
actually so engaged there at the time of the Verrazzano voyage, is
evident from the letter of John Rut, who commanded one of the ships
sent out on a voyage of discovery by Henry VIII of England in 1527.
That voyager states that, driven from the north by the ice, he
arrived at St. Johns in Newfoundland on the third of August in that
year, and found there eleven Normand, one Breton and two Portuguese
vessels, "all a fishing." [Footnote: Purchas, III, 809. Memoir of
Sebastian Cabot, pp. 108, 268, and the authorities there cited.]
This was at a single point on the coast, and in latitude 47 Degrees
30' N.; and so large a number of vessels there denotes a growth of
many years, at that time, of those fisheries.
These facts not only prove that Newfoundland and Cape Breton were
well known in France and Portugal before the Verrazzano voyage and
therefore that he did not discover them, but that he must have known
of them before, and that the letter is intentionally false in that
respect. It might perhaps be insisted with some plausibility under
other circumstances, that he ran along the coast, believing that it
was a new land, and therefore made the representation of having
discovered it in good faith. But admitting that it was even possible
for him to have sailed along those shores without encountering a
single fishing craft which would have assured him that he was not in
unknown waters, it is impossible that he could have sailed from
Dieppe and returned to that port where, of all the places in France
or Europe, the knowledge of these facts most existed, and where they
were as familiar as household words, and where they must have
entered into the thoughts and hopes of many of its inhabitants,
without their being known to him; and that he could have written the
letter from that same port, claiming the discovery of the country
for himself, without intending a fraud. It was the port to which
Aubert belonged and where he landed the Indians he brought from
Newfoundland. It was the principal port of Normandy from which the
fishing vessels made their annual voyages to that country. It was
the port from whence he manned and equipped his own fleet of four
ships, with crews which must have been largely composed of Normand
sailors who were familiar with the navigation and the coast. And
there was not a citizen of Dieppe, probably, who had not an interest
of some nature in one or more of the fishing vessels, and could have
told him what country it was that he had explored.
It bears unequivocal testimony to the fictitious character of this
claim, that Ramusio thought it necessary to interpolate in his
version a passage representing the discovery of Verrazzano as
terminating where the discoveries of the Bretons began, and to omit
the cosmography which states it was at the point where those of the
Portuguese towards the Arctic circle commenced. By this alteration
the letter is made to acknowledge the prior discoveries by the
Bretons, which are entirely excluded in the original version, and to
adopt the latitude of 50 Degrees N. for the Verrazzano limit thus
making the false statement, as to the extent of the discovery, a
mistake as it were of nautical observation. The following parallel
passages in two versions will best explain the character and effect
of the alteration.
VERSION OF CARLI,
Narrative.
Navicando infra 'l subsolano ed
aquilone in spatio di leghe CL et
de gia avendo consumato tutte le
nostre substantie navale et vettovaglie,
avendo discopruto leghe DII
cive leghe 700, piu do nuova terra
fornendoci di acque et legne
deliberammo di tornare in Francia.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Cosmography.
In questa nostra navigatione
fatta per ordine du V. S. M.,
oltre i gradi 92 che dal detto
meridiano verso lo occidente della
prima terra trovamo gradi 34
navigando leghe 300 infra oriente
e settentrione leghe 400, quasi allo
oriente continuo el lito della terra
siamo pervenuti per infino a gradi
50, lasciando la terra che piu
tempe fa trovorno li Lusitani,
quali seguirno piu al septentrione,
pervenendo sino al circulo
artico e'l fine lasciendo incognito.
Translation Narrative.
After sailing between east and
north the distance of one hundred
and fifty leagues more and finding
our provisions and naval
stores nearly exhausted, we took
in wood and water, and determined
to return to France having
discovered VII that is 700
leagues of unknown lands.
* * * * * * * * * * *
Cosmography.
In the voyage which we made
by order of your Majesty, in
addition to the 92 degrees we ran
towards the west from our point
of departure, before we reached
land in the latitude of 34, we
have to count 300 leagues which
we ran northeastwardly, and 400
nearly east along the coast before
WE REACHED THE 50TH PARALLEL OF
NORTH LATITUDE, THE POINT WHERE WE
TURNED OUR COURSE FROM THE SHORE
TOWARDS HOME. BEYOND THIS POINT
THE PORTUGUESE HAD ALREADY SAILED
AS FAR NORTH AS THE ARCTIC CIRCLE,
WITHOUT COMING TO THE TERMINATION
OF THE LAND.
VERSION OF RAMUSIO,
Narrative.
Navigando fra levante &
tramontana per spatio di leghe
150, PERVENIMO PROPINQUI ALLA
TERRA EGE PER IL PASSATO
TREVORONO I BRETTONI, QUALE
STA IN GRADI 50 & havendo
horamai consumati tutti li
nostri armeggi & vettovaglie,
havendo scoperto leghe 700,
& piu di nuova terra, fortnitoci
di acque & legue, deliberammo
tornare in Francia.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Cosmography omitted.
Translation Narrative.
Sayling northeast for the space
of 150 leagues WE APPROACHED TO
THE LANDE THAT IN TIMES PAST WAS
DISCOVERED BY THE BRITONS, WHICH IS
IN FIFTIE DEGREES. Having now
spent all our provision and
victuals and having discovered
about 700 leagues and more of
newe countries, and being
furnished with water and wood we
concluded to returne into Fraunce.
(Hakluyt, Divers voyages).
(Cogswell, Coll. of N. Y. Hist.
Society, Second series, I.)
Ramusio in omitting the cosmography and confining his version to the
narrative would have left the letter without any designation of the
northerly limit reached by Verrazzano, had he not transferred to the
narrative, the statement of the latitude attained, namely, the
fiftieth degree, from the cosmographical part; which was therefore
properly done; though as an editor he should have stated the fact.
But he transcended his duty entirely in asserting, in qualification
of the latitude, what does not appear in the letter, that it was
near where the Bretons had formerly made discoveries, and omitting
all reference to the Portuguese. The Bretons are not mentioned or
even alluded to in either portion of the original letter. The effect
of this substitution therefore is to relieve the original from
making a fake claim to the discovery north of Cape Breton, by
admitting the discoveries of the Bretons, and making the alleged
extent of the Verrazzano discovery, as already remarked, a mistake
of nautical observation only. That it was deliberately made, and for
that purpose, is shown by his taking the designation of the latitude
from the same sentence in the cosmography as that in which the
mention of the Portuguese discoveries occurs, in qualification of
the latitude.
The motive which led Ramusio to make this alteration is found in the
discourse of the French captain of Dieppe, in which it is stated
that this part of the coast was discovered by the Normands and
Bretons and the Portuguese, many years before the Verrazzano voyage.
Ramusio, as he informs us himself, translated that paper from the
French into the Italian and published it in the same volume, in
conjunction with the Verrazzano letter, which he remodelled. He thus
had the contents of both documents before him, at the same time, and
saw the contradiction between them. They could not both be true. To
reconcile them, alterations were necessary; and this change was made
in the letter in order to make it conform to the discourse. The fact
of his making it, proves that he regarded the letter as advancing an
indefensible claim.
It is also to be observed that in adopting the fiftieth parallel as
the extent of the discovery in the north, Ramusio obtained the
statement from the cosmography, showing that he had that portion of
the letter before him; and confirming the conclusion, expressed in a
previous section, that his version was composed from the Carli copy
of the letter, in which alone the cosmography occurs. Whether this
limit was so transposed by him for a purpose or not, may be a
question; but the origin of it cannot be disputed.