The sixteenth century was a time of momentous change in Europe. The Age of Exploration began in the late 1400s with forays into the Atlantic by two European nations—Portugal and Spain. Although these countries took the lead and Christopher Columbus has been glorified as a central figure in the history of that exploration, they were soon joined by other European players including England, France, the Netherlands, and Denmark. Their extensive overseas exploration and the exploding web of connections in the Atlantic World—the Columbian Exchange, the colonization of the Americas, and the development of the Atlantic slave trade—forever changed people’s understanding of what the world was like and the face and direction of history. Yet far more was altered in the sixteenth century than the human conception of the earth; profound changes in European religious belief also transformed the way many Christians thought of the life they hoped for beyond this one.
Timeline: Foundations of the Atlantic World.(credit “1000”: modification of work “Skálholt-map” by Sigurd Stefánsson/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain; credit “1139”: modification of work “King Afonso Henriques, first King of Portugal, in a 16th century miniature” in The Portuguese Genealogy (Genealogia dos Reis de Portugal)/British Library/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain; credit “1492”: modification of work “The Landing of Columbus” by Albert Bierstadt/City of Plainfield, New Jersey/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain; credit “1494”: modification of work “Map of Meridian Line set under the Treaty of Tordesillas” by Library of Congress/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain; credit “1521”: modification of work “An indigenous Mexican complaint against an abusive encomendero” by Codex Kingsborough/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain; credit “1675–1676”: modification of work “Philip King of Mount Hope by Paul Revere” by Yale University Art Gallery/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
Locator Map: Foundations of the Atlantic World.(credit: modification of work “World map blank shorelines” by Maciej Jaros/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
When Columbus set sail across the Atlantic in 1492, the people of western and central Europe, regardless of their country or language, were united by a common religion. In the same year as Columbus’s momentous voyage, Spain defeated the last Muslim stronghold on the Iberian Peninsula and expelled Jewish people from the land. Muslims were given a brief respite, but in 1501 they too were ordered to leave or to convert to Catholicism. With the exception of small Jewish communities in the Low Countries (Belgium and the Netherlands) and the German lands, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, the people of western and central Europe were uniformly Roman Catholics. Challenges to the authority of the Catholic Church were brewing, however, and the passage of less than a century found Europeans hopelessly divided over matters of faith as the result of an event known as the Protestant Reformation.
The Rise of Maritime Nations
Christopher Columbus’s 1492 voyage did not represent the first contact between European explorers and Indigenous peoples on the North American continent. Through archaeological and historical research, historians can now date that contact to nearly five hundred years before Columbus reached his first stop in the Caribbean.
In the early 1000s, Leif Erikson, a Viking explorer living in Greenland, heard from fellow explorer Bjarni Herjólfsson that another land lay only a few hundred miles to the west. In a journey during which he was blown off course, Erikson found a land to the west that he called Vinland, for the grapes that grew near its shores. He stayed there only through the winter, never making direct contact with the Indigenous peoples and returning to Greenland in the spring. His brother Thorvald was the first to make contact, which ended in violent conflict and the deaths of several Native Americans and Thorvald himself. In a third exploration, men and women of Erikson’s family encountered the Indigenous people of Vinland again but maintained peace, creating a small but steady relationship with them based on trade.
North America as Seen by the Norse. An Icelandic map from 1690 shows North America with Norse (medieval Scandinavian) place names, like Markland (Labrador Peninsula) and Helluland (Baffin Island). (credit: “Skálholt-map” by Sigurd Stefánsson/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
The Viking explorers referred to these Indigenous peoples as Skraelings. Scholars are not sure which Indigenous group they belonged to, but twentieth-century archaeological digs in Nova Scotia have verified much of the information found in the Icelandic sagas of Vinland. In the 1960s, explorers Helge and Anne Ingstad discovered in Newfoundland, Canada, the buried ruins of a Viking camp from around the time of Erikson’s explorations, in a place called L’Anse aux Meadows. This find definitively proved at last that the Norse had traveled to the Americas before Columbus. Over the years, it has been suggested that other people besides the Vikings also discovered the Americas before Columbus, including Irish monks, African sailors, and Chinese members of Admiral Zheng He’s treasure fleet. There is no widely accepted proof of any of these voyages, however.
LINK TO LEARNING
Learn how archaeologists found evidence of Viking settlers in Canada and were able to determine the year the Norse were in North America.
The settlements in Newfoundland never became permanent, likely because Indigenous groups developed an increasing hostility toward the often-violent Vikings. By the 1400s, the frontier colonies of Greenland populated by Norse peoples had also all but disappeared. But knowledge of a land farther west survived in the Norse sagas, and it is possible that it trickled across Europe into Italy and Spain and eventually into the mind of a young Christopher Columbus.
In the meantime, with the collapse of Constantinople and the fall of the Byzantine Empire to the Ottomans in 1453, many Europeans felt a sense of doom. Not only had they lost a bastion of Christian power, but Muslims now controlled their tenuous overland connections to South and East Asia. As a result, they now had to go through Muslim intermediaries to purchase valuable spices such as cinnamon, pepper, cloves, and nutmeg that grew in only a few key locations. European nations, therefore, wanted to find an all-water passage to India and the chain of sparsely populated Indonesian islands known as the Spice Islands.
In the fifteenth century, Europe experienced a timely navigational revolution as a result of adopting new non-Western maritime technologies. In the first millennium CE, Arab sailors in the Middle East had created the lateen sail, a triangular sail that allowed ships to travel against the wind. The square European sail gave ships power, but the lateen sail increased their ability to maneuver. When Europeans combined the two kinds of sail on three-masted ships, they could navigate confidently in any direction. The sternpost rudder, created in China in the thirteenth century, also allowed for steering against the currents. For directional guidance, the ancient Greek astrolabe, which used constellations as a guide and enabled mariners to find their north–south position on the earth’s surface, came to Europe after being refined in the Middle East.. The magnetic compass also came to Europe in the fifteenth century, making its way from China where it was guiding ships by 1100 CE. The adoption of these inventions allowed Europeans to abandon their long-standing practice of navigating by sailing along a coastline. Now they could venture into the open ocean, beyond sight of land.
Technological Advances in Navigation. (a) Lateen sails like the ones in this drawing enabled ships to sail into the wind. (b) Astrolabes, instruments used for measuring slope and elevation, aided in navigation. In this sixteenth-century illustration, a man measures the height of a building using an astrolabe. (credit a: modification of work “Lateen Sails” by Pearson Scott Foresman/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain; credit b: modification of work “Elucidatio fabricae usuque astrolabii … Ex secunda autoris recognition” by Johannes Stöffler/ Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
LINK TO LEARNING
Learn how an astrolabe works in this video, “How to use an astrolabe,” by William Greenwood of the British Museum, a short but thorough explanation of the mechanics of an incredible navigational tool.
However, technological advancements and a desire for expanded trade and territory could take explorers only so far without financial backing. The commercial empire that funded European overseas exploration began in the Italian city-states of the Middle Ages, but the investment system on which it was based did not originate there. This system, called commenda, established a sort of financial patronage by which investors funded merchants to expand their trading enterprises and earned a more extensive business network in the process. Like many of the technologies that drove European ships, the commenda was first developed by Muslim merchants.
By the late fifteenth century, Italian city-states were supporting a variety of small family-owned businesses and large companies. Capital was concentrated in land and commerce rather than in industrial pursuits, but credit was widely used. Across Europe, risk-sharing business ventures and joint investment schemes were already commonplace among merchants. Spain, which Muslim rulers had conquered and settled, had connections across the Mediterranean to Africa and the Middle East, while northern and central Europe wielded a sprawling maritime exchange across the North and Baltic Seas.
Portuguese Exploration
In the late 1400s, both Portugal and Spain were emerging from centuries of rule by North African Muslim states. Portugal had become an independent country by the twelfth century.. At the beginning of the fifteenth century, it was a small country with poor soil. However, it did have one advantage—a geographical location that lent itself to exploration, specifically down the African coastline and across the Atlantic. Portugal also had plenty of coves and natural harbors suited for shipping, and speedy crosswinds and currents that gave it a shipping superhighway of sorts between northern and southern Europe. Various nearby islands such as the Azores also teemed with untapped fishing potential.
Afonso Henriques. In this detail from a page in an illuminated manuscript of the 1530s, Afonso Henriques declares himself king of the independent country of Portugal following his victory over Muslim forces at the Battle of Ourique in 1139. (credit: “King Afonso Henriques, first King of Portugal, in a 16th century miniature” in The Portuguese Genealogy (Genealogia dos Reis de Portugal)/British Library/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
In the 1340s, King Afonso IV of Portugal raised public funds to build a commercial fleet that by the fifteenth century had transformed the nation into a maritime power. In 1341, the Portuguese sailed to the Canary Islands in the Atlantic. This was only the beginning of their exploration and conquest. In 1415, John I, grandson of Afonso IV, dispatched Portuguese forces to capture the city of Ceuta in Morocco. John hoped that control of a port on the North African coast would open that continent to both conquest and trade. To further cement his control of the region, he requested papal recognition of his efforts. In April 1418, Pope Martin V granted the Portuguese king the right to all African lands taken from Muslim rulers.
Under John’s son Prince Henry, dubbed “the Navigator” by historians, Portuguese explorers claimed the Madeira Islands, the Azores, and the Cape Verde Islands off the coast of Africa. They also sailed down the western coast of Africa as far as today’s Sierra Leone. Eventually, Portuguese expeditions reached the southern tip of Africa, and in 1488, Bartolomeu Dias, who had participated in the Battle of Ceuta, sailed around the Cape of Good Hope to reach the eastern side of the continent.
The Portuguese were driven by both religious fervor and a desire for wealth. Since the Middle Ages, they, like other Europeans, had been intrigued by stories of a lost Christian kingdom somewhere in Africa or Asia, ruled by a legendary king named Prester John. By the 1400s, they had come to believe his lands were located in Africa, and their hope of forming an alliance with him to defeat the forces of Islam helped motivate their exploration there.
Prester John.This image of the mythical Christian ruler Prester John is a detail from an atlas created in the late 1550s by the Portuguese mapmaker Diogo Homem. (credit: “East Africa with Prester John enthroned” by British Library/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
The Portuguese also hoped to gain access to the wealth of Africa. As they moved southward along the continent’s coast, they established citadels on land leased from local rulers, like the fortress of Elmina, located on the coast of present-day Ghana. From there, they bartered for gold, ivory, and enslaved people. The first shipment of enslaved Africans arrived in Portugal in 1441. To further its economic interests, Portugal also established relations with the African kingdoms of Benin and Kongo. Its connection to Kongo, in what is now Angola, was particularly close. Members of Kongo’s ruling family and nobility converted to Roman Catholicism and adopted Portuguese names. Kongo became an important source of enslaved laborers, and its kings readily assisted the Portuguese in taking captives from enemy tribes. The Portuguese claim to the riches of African trade was affirmed in 1455 in the Romanus Pontifex, a papal decree issued by Pope Nicholas V that granted Portugal exclusive rights to trade in Africa south of Cape Bojador, on the coast of Morocco. The interests of the Africans who controlled these lands were not considered.
Spanish Exploration
Despite the Romanus Pontifex, the Spanish monarchs Isabella I of Castille and Ferdinand II of Aragon were not willing to allow Portugal to take the lead in establishing maritime trade with places outside Europe. By 1492, the final Muslim stronghold on the Iberian Peninsula had been defeated, and, no longer worried about the threat posed by the Muslim presence, Isabella and Ferdinand could turn to matters beyond the peninsula. In 1486, the Genoese navigator Christopher Columbus approached them with a request for funds for exploration. Columbus proposed that he could reach Asia by sailing westward across the Atlantic Ocean. Eager to find an all-water route to Asia to compete with the Portuguese, Isabella and Ferdinand agreed to his request. Like the Portuguese monarchs, they were also dedicated to spreading Christianity and combating the spread of Islam. Indeed, they regarded themselves as Europe’s foremost defenders of Roman Catholicism.
On August 3, 1492, Columbus set sail from Spain with three ships. After stopping briefly in the Canary Islands, he set off again on September 6. Five weeks later, he reached the Bahamas, which he believed were a part of Southeast Asia called the Indies. From there, he sailed to Cuba and an island Columbus named Hispaniola (meaning “little Spain”), the island now divided between the Dominican Republic and Haiti. Columbus made contact with the inhabitants of Hispaniola, whom he called “Indians.” Some welcomed the Europeans, who attempted to learn whether the inhabitants had gold, but one group, perhaps mistrusting the newcomers, engaged them in battle.
Leaving behind a handful of men to found a settlement on Hispaniola, Columbus and his crew departed for Europe, taking with them some Arawak people they had kidnapped. They arrived in Spain in 1493, with Columbus believing he had succeeded in reaching the Indies. He returned to the Americas three more times. On the third voyage, he explored the coast of Venezuela, which he was certain was part of the Asian mainland.
The Voyages of Columbus. Christopher Columbus made four voyages between 1492 and 1504, all to the Caribbean. He continued to believe he had found a route to Asia. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
The success of Spain and Portugal in establishing settlements in the Americas, and more importantly, the profits they derived from those settlements, inspired other European nations to emulate them. The English, French, and Dutch all ventured across the Atlantic with the goal of founding colonies whose resources they could exploit in order to dominate rival powers.
The Rise of Mercantilism
Much European exploration was driven by an economic theory known as mercantilism, a name given to the theory by later historians. According to this theory, a nation’s power depended on the amount of gold and silver it held. The wealthier the nation, the larger the armies and navies it could support in its conflicts with rival powers. Amassing national wealth, in turn, depended on maintaining a favorable balance of trade, a situation in which a country exports goods of greater value than it imports. Mercantilism also assumed that the world’s wealth as measured in gold and silver was finite, so a gain for one nation was a loss for another. To surpass other nations in power, a country must possess more gold and silver than others. According to mercantilism, there could be only one victor in economic competition.
When a nation sold goods abroad, it accumulated gold and silver, but when it imported foreign products, it had to transfer gold and silver to other nations as payment. Thus, at the heart of mercantilism lay the need for a nation to maximize its exports and minimize its imports. Indeed, the ideal was to import nothing and produce everything in the home country, including agricultural produce. A nation that could not supply all its own needs should import raw materials, transform them into finished products, and sell them abroad for more money than it had cost to produce them. Any raw materials a nation possessed should be reserved for domestic manufacturing.
In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, mercantilist theory was embraced by most European nations, especially France and England. Perhaps as much as religious fervor and a thirst for knowledge, this premise drove exploration and the establishment of colonies. Mercantilists believed a colonial empire was necessary for economic domination. Colonies could supply raw materials for domestic consumption, so there was no need to purchase these resources from others. Colonial populations, in turn, provided a ready market for goods made in the home country. To ensure that colonies added to their national wealth, European countries that established them usually required that they trade only with the home country. Thus, for example, England’s colonies in North America could sell what they produced only in England.
Most mercantilist theorists believed government regulation of the economy was necessary to maximize wealth. Governments commonly prohibited certain imports to prevent them from competing with domestic industry. In 1539, for example, to protect domestic textile manufacturing, France banned the import of goods made of wool. Governments also imposed high tariffs, or taxes on imported goods. These made foreign products more expensive and thus promoted development of a nation’s own industries. Governments might also grant firms monopolies over certain kinds of domestic production, establish and provide financial support for certain industries to ensure domestic self-sufficiency, and pay for internal improvements, such as new roads, to promote domestic manufacturing and commerce. They also maintained large navies to protect international trade and defend foreign colonies.
France provides perhaps the preeminent example of the mercantilist theory in practice. France was an absolute monarchy. Absolute monarchies appeared in Europe in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries as feudalism declined and new countries arose from medieval kingdoms. These new nation-states were characterized by centralized administrations and codified laws. They were guarded by professional standing armies, not noble vassals at the head of their own private armies.
At the head of the state stood a monarch (usually a king) who claimed a divine right to rule. The medieval concept of monarchy had regarded kings as subservient to the pope, but absolute monarchs considered themselves subordinate to no one. They could rule as they wished with no need to confer with or seek the consent of others, or to share power with the noble class as medieval monarchs had done. Absolute monarchs proclaimed their own laws, formulated foreign policy, administered justice (or appointed those who did so), and imposed taxes as they wished. They were the sole source of authority in their lands and often took steps to weaken the power of their nobles so they did not pose a threat to their rule.
The most powerful of the absolute monarchies was France, and Louis XIV, who became king of France in 1643, was the epitome of a divine-right monarch. Unwilling to share power with the higher-ranked members of the French nobility, who had been responsible for numerous revolts against the French monarchy in the decades before he came to the throne, Louis deprived them of any role in governing or administering the state. He required that they live with him at his magnificent palace in Versailles, where they were invited to spend their time and money (which might otherwise have been used to plot revolts) in putting on displays of ostentatious living and competing with one another for the king’s favor—favor that might mean they were allowed to hold the king’s shirt as he dressed in the morning. All state matters were rigorously scrutinized by Louis, and he spent hours planning troop movements, overseeing the building of roads and canals, and promulgating legal codes for France’s colonies. “L’état, c’est moi” (“I am the state”), he once famously proclaimed.
France’s absolute monarchy made it possible for the nation to regulate economic life as countries with less powerful rulers and less centralized governments could not. France embraced mercantilism under the guidance of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, who became Louis XIV’s chief minister in 1661. As the controller-general of finances, Colbert sought to promote French manufacturing and foreign trade and decrease imports. Under his direction, the government increased tariffs on foreign-made goods and completely banned the importation of some such as lace. Colbert established royal manufacturing and glass works and granted private companies monopolies on lace manufacture. Reasoning that the higher the quality of a product, the more could be charged for it, Colbert enacted strict quality-control standards so French products would bring high prices overseas, and he punished those who tried to avoid these regulations. To increase the government’s wealth, he also sought to tax the French nobility, though unsuccessfully.
Protecting Domestic Industry under Mercantilism.Under King Louis XIV and his chief minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert, the Gobelins fine furnishings factory began operating on behalf of the Crown in 1662. This etching from a few years later shows Colbert visiting the factory’s tapestry-making operation. (credit: “Colbert Visiting the Gobelins” by Metropolitan Museum of Art, Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1953/Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0)
Colbert established a merchant marine to carry French goods abroad for trade, reducing the nation’s reliance on ships from other countries. By ensuring that the pay for transporting these goods went to the ships’ French captains and owners, he helped to keep wealth within the nation. Because the merchant marine could be called upon in time of war, Colbert had thus also strengthened France’s ability to engage in armed conflict with foreign powers.
Mercantilist theory influenced England and the Netherlands too. Although England’s Parliament did not exert as much control over its economy as the monarchy exerted in France, it nevertheless took steps to promote English trade and discourage the importation of foreign goods. Tariffs were placed on foreign products, and in the second half of the seventeenth century, laws were passed requiring that all ships bringing goods to England have English owners and a predominantly English crew. The Dutch adopted the mercantilist strategy of exporting high-quality goods, especially cloth, iron tools, and guns, to make up for the money the resource-poor country spent on raw materials supplied by other nations.
Like France, both England and the Netherlands granted monopolies on foreign trade to private companies—the British East India Company and the Dutch East India Company. The purpose was to prevent competition among merchants that might drive up the prices they were willing to pay for foreign goods and drive down the prices they charged for domestic goods sold abroad. To increase their access to raw materials and establish new markets for their goods, the Dutch, English, and French, noting the success of Spain and Portugal, also set out to establish colonies in the Americas. A colonial empire seemed essential to securing national wealth and power.
To compete with Spain and Portugal, their rivals England, France, and the Netherlands soon founded communities in North America. England established colonies on the mainland of North America in the sixteenth century, and by the middle of the eighteenth century, they stretched from Newfoundland to Georgia. Besides tobacco, they supplied England with a variety of goods ranging from timber, furs, and salted fish from the northern colonies to rice, indigo, and deer hides from the south. The colonies attracted many landless, unemployed young European men and women, too, who traveled to North America as indentured servants, bound by a contract to work for an agreed-upon number of years. After the landowner who paid for their passage had been compensated by their years of labor, indentured servants received their freedom and typically a grant of land as well.
Europe’s Footprint in the Americas.By the early seventeenth century, Spain, Portugal, England, France, and the Netherlands all had established colonies in the Americas. Spain’s empire was the largest. (credit: modification of work “Map of North America in 1750” by Bill of Rights Institute/Flickr, CC BY 4.0)
France and the Netherlands also founded colonies in North America. In 1535, Jacques Cartier claimed Canada, also called New France, in the name of King Francis I. Like England, France was unable to maintain a permanent settlement in North America until the seventeenth century, when Samuel de Champlain founded one at Quebec. The French established further settlements in what is now the state of Maine, on the southern coast of Newfoundland, and in Louisiana (named for King Louis XIV). Animal hides and furs were the main exports to France. A small Dutch colony also briefly flourished in what is now New York and New Jersey before it was ceded to England in 1664. Like the French, the Dutch colonists of New Netherlands were primarily engaged in the fur trade, although many Dutch farmers also settled in the Hudson Valley, in New Jersey, and on Long Island.
LINK TO LEARNING
Although Spain, Portugal, England, France, the Netherlands, and Denmark were the major countries that established colonies in the Americas between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries, they were not the only ones. At the Historic UK website, learn about the Darien scheme that was Scotland’s unsuccessful attempt to found a colony in Central America in 1698.
The European nations intended to extract the greatest possible wealth from their mainland colonies in the form of raw materials such as hides, furs, and agricultural products. France controlled immigration to Canada to ensure that its population remained limited to fur trappers and traders, a small number of farmers to provide them with food, and soldiers to guard them. In 1627, the French government granted a monopoly over the fur trade to the Company of New France. All fur trappers in Canada were to either work directly for the company or sell their furs to it. Traders had to pay the government a 25 percent sales tax. In 1663, Louis XIV placed the company under royal control.
Spain exercised the strictest control over colonial commerce. Trade was limited to only a few ports in the Spanish colonies and the port of Seville in Spain, and two trading fleets departed from Seville bound for the Americas each year. The Spanish government forbade trade at other times. In addition, those seeking to engage in trade had to procure a license to do so, at considerable expense. The Spanish government also held a number of monopolies, such as one on all silver produced in its colonies, as well as owning all the mercury produced in the colony of Peru. Spanish colonies that needed mercury, which was used for processing the gold and silver they mined, had to purchase it from Peru.
Although the mainland colonies yielded wealth for the European home countries, the chief prizes were the islands of the Caribbean where sugar could be grown. Over the course of the seventeenth century, England, France, and the Netherlands set up colonies throughout the Caribbean on islands either not claimed by Spain or taken from it. The three attempted to found colonies in Central or South America as well, but Spanish and Portuguese dominance there either made these efforts unsuccessful, like the Dutch attempts in Brazil, or they kept the colonies small, such as French Guiana and Dutch Guiana, now Suriname.
Mercantilism and Its Critics
Although European merchants and government ministers enthusiastically relied on mercantilist theory in the building of colonial empires, mercantilism also had many critics. Eighteenth-century Scottish philosopher David Hume argued that as more gold circulated in a country’s economy, prices would rise, eventually becoming so high that no one would purchase goods. Furthermore, Hume maintained, if abundance reduced the value of an item, then the more gold and silver a nation acquired, the less valuable it would be, an idea that undercut the mercantilist emphasis on accumulating precious metals to build wealth.
The eighteenth-century philosopher and economist Adam Smith, also a Scot, criticized mercantilism as well. Smith argued that economic gain for one nation did not mean economic loss for others. Rather, trade could be mutually beneficial for all. One nation could prosper by supplying raw materials to another, which could then convert these materials into finished goods to be sold at profitable prices. Smith also opposed government regulation of the economy. In his view, competition among the producers of goods and the influence of the market (that is, the desires of buyers and sellers) made for a healthy economy. If demand for an item were high, its price would rise. If demand were low or quality poor, price would fall. Although Smith believed government should assist business by, say, building roads and providing for national defense, it should not grant monopolies or subsidize businesses. This would only harm consumers by keeping prices artificially high. Without government assistance, business enterprises would have to learn to operate more efficiently, thus reducing prices, or they would fail.
Smith also argued that it made little sense for a nation to produce everything it needed. If Spain could make a particular product better than England could or could make it for less money, England should use the revenue generated by selling those goods it excelled at making to buy the Spanish product. England could produce textiles more efficiently than Spain, and Spain could make wine more cheaply than England. It was thus more efficient, Smith explained, for England to buy wine from Spain and Spain to buy cloth from England than for each country to produce both the wine and the cloth they required.
DUELING VOICES
For and Against Mercantilism: Two Perspectives
Many Europeans argued that the assumptions underlying mercantilist theory were flawed, and that putting it into practice was often harmful. Following are excerpts from Thomas Mun’s 1664 England’s Treasure by Forraign Trade, and Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations, published in 1776. Note the very different positions these economists take.
The ordinary means therefore to increase our wealth and treasure is by Forraign Trade, wherein wee must ever observe this rule; to sell more to strangers yearly than wee consume of theirs in value. For suppose that when this Kingdom is plentifully served with the Cloth, Lead, Tin, Iron, Fish and other native commodities, we doe yearly export the overplus to forraign Countreys to the value of twenty-two hundred thousand pounds; by which means we are enabled beyond the Seas to buy and bring in forraign wares for our use and Consumptions, to the value of twenty hundred thousand pounds: By this order duly kept in our trading, we may rest assured that the kingdom shall be enriched yearly two hundred thousand pounds, . . .
Behold then the true form and worth of forraign trade, which is The great Revenue of the King, The honour of the Kingdom, The Noble profession of the Merchant, The School of our Arts, The supply of our wants, The employment of our poor, . . .
—Thomas Mun, England’s Treasure by Forraign Trade
A great empire has been established for the sole purpose of raising up a nation of customers who should be obliged to buy from the shops of our different producers, all the goods with which these could supply them. For the sake of that little enhancement of price which this monopoly might afford our producers, the home-consumers have been burdened with the whole expense of maintaining and defending that empire. For this purpose, and for this purpose only, in the two last wars, more than two hundred millions have been spent . . . . It cannot be very difficult to determine who have been the contrivers of this whole mercantile system; not the consumers, we may believe, whose interest has been entirely neglected; but the producers, whose interest has been so carefully attended to; and among this latter class our merchants and manufacturers have been by far the principal architects.
—Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations
What does Mun believe are the benefits of mercantilism? Do you believe this is a realistic assessment? Why or why not?
What does Smith regard as one of the worst of mercantilist policies? How might he respond to Mun’s claims?
Because mercantilist theory saw economic gain for one nation as necessarily a loss for others, European nations engaged in trade wars as each tried to use tariffs to bar others from its markets. At times, real wars accompanied trade wars. England and the Netherlands fought four wars over the course of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, partially to gain control of transatlantic trade. England also fought France for access to the markets of India.
A Battle for Trade.England and the Netherlands fought four wars for control of transatlantic trade in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This 1657 ink and oil painting by Willem van de Velde the Elder depicts the 1653 Battle of Scheveningen, a Dutch victory. (credit: “The Battle of Terheide” by Rijksmuseum/Wikipedia, Public Domain)
Mercantilism affected the relationship not only between countries but also between classes. For instance, it elevated the interests of merchants and manufacturers over those of workers and consumers by arguing that wages should be kept low. More money would thus remain in employers’ hands, and people would be discouraged (or prevented) from buying luxury goods that could instead be exported for profit. Mercantilists also advocated high taxes to enrich governments. The perceived need to extract raw materials from colonies to benefit the home country’s interests often led governments to restrict colonies’ economic growth and harshly punish people who sought to evade trade restrictions. The desire to exploit the American colonies also led to the abuse of Indigenous populations and enslaved Africans in efforts to extract as much wealth as possible.
In the early 1500s, Europeans began founding new settlements in the Americas. Some came to get rich, others to win glory for their empires, a few to spread their faith. Some settlements withered and died, but others became profitable centers for international commerce as goods and people flowed across the Atlantic Ocean. Each community of Native Americans made unique choices and decided for themselves whether to embrace or resist the changing world. Regardless of their choices, however, most Indigenous people suffered severely from European colonization. They could slow the European advance into their world, but they could not stop it.
Spain’s Encomienda System
The Spanish were the first to establish major colonies in North America after Christopher Columbus’s arrival in 1492. They became the earliest Europeans to force the Indigenous population to labor for them, initially by outright enslavement, a practice that slowly evolved into systems that were more complex. By 1502, they had created the encomienda system as part of a broader search for “God, Gold, and Glory” in their vast empire. In this context, God refers to attempts to spread the Catholic faith, gold to the search for wealth, and glory to hopes of obtaining personal fame.
The term encomienda comes from the Spanish word encomendar, which means “to entrust.” The encomienda was a system of entrusting valuable territories and peoples to those who had proven to the crown that they were worthy of that trust. The Spanish government gave each grantee, known as an encomendero, the right to demand labor from Indigenous people living in a specific area. In exchange, the Spaniards were supposed to provide guidance, education, and leadership to these Native Americans. While encomiendas did not technically include the ownership of any land, encomenderos often took possession of lands where the people under their control lived. Sometimes the system of forced labor even devolved into what was functionally, if not legally, slavery.
Most recipients of encomiendas were conquistadors being rewarded for campaigns that had won glory for Spain. However, a few Native Americans also received them. When the expedition led by conquistador Hernán Cortés fought a war against the Aztec Empire (1519–1521), the Tlaxcalans of central Mexico allied with Cortés’s forces against the Aztecs, their traditional enemies. As a reward for their service, the Spanish government gave some Tlaxcalans encomiendas, and the tribe enjoyed a far better position in the Spanish Empire than many other Native American groups. Perhaps the most unusual encomendera was Malintzin, a formerly enslaved Indigenous woman who served as Cortés’s chief interpreter during the conquest of the Aztec Empire (see image below). Malintzin received her encomienda as a reward for this service, without which Cortés’s campaign against the Aztecs might have failed.
A Native American Encomendera. This page from an Aztec manuscript of the sixteenth or seventeenth century shows the Spanish army on the march, with Cortés and the translator named Malintzin at the far right. (credit: “Codex Azcatitlan” by Gallica Digital Library/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
Encomenderos typically abused their authority, overseeing an exploitive arrangement marked by horrific working conditions and acts of extreme violence against anyone who failed to comply with their demands. The encomienda system became the dominant source of labor in Spanish American colonies, which included areas now known as Florida, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Mexico, and much of South America.
Spain’s Colonies. This map shows the area controlled by Spain in its colonization of the Americas. Native American communities often retained effective control over territory that was “claimed” by European powers. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
After a brief period as an encomendero, in 1514 the Dominican friar Bartolomé de las Casas became one of the system’s greatest critics). He spent most of the next decade traveling across Latin America and Spain speaking out against its brutality. In his 1552 book, A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies, Las Casas argued that “the Spanish fell like ravening wolves upon” Native Americans. He claimed the Spanish “tear the natives to shreds, murder them and inflict upon them untold misery, suffering and distress, tormenting, harrying and persecuting them mercilessly.” Las Casas eventually convinced King Charles V to implement the New Laws of 1542 that sought to end the encomienda system, but Spanish settlers in the Americas violently opposed the reforms and the system remained.
Bartolomé de las Casas. (a) Shown in a sixteenth-century portrait by an unknown painter, Bartolomé de las Casas was one of the most outspoken critics of the encomienda system. (b) The cover of his book, A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies, is shown. (credit a: modification of work “Portrait of Bartolomé de Las Casas” by General Archive of the Indies/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain; credit b: modification of work “Cover of ‘A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies’” by John Carter Brown Library/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
DUELING VOICES
The Impact of Spanish Colonization
For insights into Spanish colonization, consider the two following primary sources, the first written by Christopher Columbus in 1492, and the second by Bartolomé de las Casas, a Spanish priest, looking back in 1542 after approximately forty years of experience in Spanish America.
Thursday, October 11
All I saw were youths, none more than thirty years of age. They are very well made, with very handsome bodies, and very good countenances. Their hair is short and coarse, almost like the hairs of a horse’s tail. . . . They neither carry nor know anything of arms, for I showed them swords, and they took them by the blade and cut themselves through ignorance. They have no iron, their darts being wands without iron, some of them having a fish’s tooth at the end, and others being pointed in various ways. . . . They should be good servants and intelligent, for I observed that they quickly took in what was said to them, and I believe that they would easily be made Christians, as it appeared to me that they had no religion.
Sunday, October 14
These people are very simple as regards the use of arms, as your Highnesses will see from the seven that I caused to be taken, to bring home and learn our language and return; unless your Highnesses should order them all to be brought to Castile, or to be kept as captives on the same island; for with fifty men they can all be subjugated and made to do what is required of them.
—The Journal of Christopher Columbus (During His First Voyage), Translated by Clements R. Markham
It was upon these gentle lambs, imbued by the Creator with all the qualities we have mentioned, that from the very first day they clapped eyes on them the Spanish fell like ravening wolves upon the fold, or like tigers and savage lions who have not eaten meat for days. The pattern established at the outset has remained unchanged to this day, and the Spaniards still do nothing save tear the natives to shreds, murder them and inflict upon them untold misery, suffering and distress, tormenting, harrying and persecuting them mercilessly. . . . When the Spanish first journeyed there, the indigenous population of the island of Hispaniola stood at some three million; today only two hundred survive. The island of Cuba, which extends for a distance almost as great as that separating Valladolid from Rome, is now to all intents and purposes uninhabited; and two other large, beautiful and fertile islands, Puerto Rico and Jamaica, have been similarly devastated. Not a living soul remains today on any of the islands of the Bahamas, which lie to the north of Hispaniola and Cuba, even though every single one of the sixty or so islands in the group, as well as those known as the Isles of Giants and others in the area, both large and small, is more fertile and more beautiful than the Royal Gardens in Seville.
—Bartolomé de las Casas, A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies
Questions to Consider
How does Columbus describe the Native Americans?
What insights does Las Casas’s account provide into life in the Spanish colonies?
Why do you think Columbus’s diary is so different from Las Casas’s book?
Read this longer account by Bartolomé de las Casas of the encomienda system and note the illustrations that accompany it. Consider how the words and text work together to communicate Las Casas’s criticism of the system and of abuses by Spanish colonizers in general.
The complaints of reformers, including Las Casas, inspired the black legend, which claimed the Spanish were particularly cruel imperialists who abused their colonial subjects. Like many historical legends, the black legend is rooted in fact. The Spanish often mistreated Native Americans, but writers from Spain’s colonial rivals, most notably the English, frequently exaggerated Spanish cruelty to justify their own colonial abuses. Despite their intense rivalries, both the English and the Spanish were guilty of abusing Native Americans. Even reformers like Las Casas, who opposed the worst abuses of Native Americans, were flawed. Las Casas’s approach to Native Americans was often paternalistic, and he typically treated non-Europeans as children who would benefit from the benevolent guidance of Europeans rather than as equals.
The English began their colonization efforts in the Americas nearly a century after the Spanish, motivated by both economic and ideological goals. In 1584, Queen Elizabeth gave Sir Walter Raleigh a charter, a royal document that authorized him to establish a colony in North America. The Protestant queen wanted colonies that would act as an ideological counterweight to Spanish Catholicism in the Americas and provide a base of operations for privateering expeditions that would raid Spanish shipping.
Roanoke Island
In July 1587, about 150 settlers led by explorer and artist John White established a colony on Roanoke Island, off the coast of modern North Carolina. The colonists baptized Manteo, a friendly member of the Croatoan tribe, and named him the Lord of Roanoke in an effort to build congenial relationships with the local Native Americans. In late August, White left for England with plans to gather additional investors to fund the colony. Once there, he convinced English merchants to invest in the colony in exchange for trading rights, but the arrival of the Spanish Armada in 1588 delayed his departure. When White finally returned to Roanoke Island in 1590, the colony was gone.
The only clue White found was the word “Croatoan” carved into a tree. There are clear signs the settlers intermarried with the Native American population and joined their society, but Europeans of the era dismissed this possibility, perhaps because they found it impossible to believe Europeans would willingly join a non-White society. It is also possible the word had nothing to do with the colony’s disappearance. John White was forced to leave before completing a thorough investigation. Today, Roanoke Island is known as “the lost colony,” and its fate remains a mystery.
The Lost Colony of Roanoke. In this engraving from a nineteenth-century history of the United States, John White discovers the single word Croatoan carved in a tree on Roanoke Island in 1590. It was the only clue found after the disappearance of the colonists. (credit: “Croatoan” by Unknown/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
Jamestown
The creation of joint stock companies provided English colonial efforts after Roanoke Island with improved funding that the English monarchy could not offer. A joint stock company, much like a modern corporation, raised money for its ventures by selling shares to investors. The company then used the pooled funds to conduct operations, including colonization efforts in the Americas. Shareholders were not legally liable for the actions of the company and could not lose more than the amount of their investment, but they could earn large profits if the joint stock company were successful. The combination of limited liability with the possibility of rich returns made joint stock companies an appealing investment for members of England’s growing merchant class, and the companies raised huge sums of money beginning in the early 1600s. England promoted colonization for religious and political reasons, but its reliance on private investors for funding often steered the effort toward profitable activities.
In 1606, the Virginia Company, a joint stock company named for Queen Elizabeth (who was known as the “virgin queen” because she never married), received a charter and sent 144 men and boys to North America. In 1607, these colonists founded Jamestown, named for the new English king, James I, on the banks of the Chesapeake Bay in what is now Virginia. Many of the settlers were the desperate younger sons of elite families who would not inherit property claimed by their older brothers in England. Many others were artisans, including goldsmiths and jewelers, unused to the hard physical labor that building a colony on a new continent required.
The settlers of Jamestown, like many Europeans of the 1600s and 1700s, rooted their economic ideas in mercantilism, an economic theory in which the world’s wealth, as measured in gold and silver, is assumed to be finite, so a gain of wealth for one nation is a loss for another. Mercantilist nations expected their colonies to export raw materials, most importantly precious metals like gold and silver, back to the home country and to purchase goods from it in turn. The English government hoped the Virginia Company would find gold to improve the nation’s trade balances and increase its wealth. Many in Jamestown also hoped to find gold and thereby get rich without having to work hard or suffer any hardships.
The Jamestown settlers did not find gold because there was little mineral wealth in the region, but they did find suffering due to bad weather, starvation, disease, internal political disputes, and military conflicts with the Powhatan tribe (named after its chief). The Powhatans grew to loathe the newcomers for bringing disease and violence to their homeland. Many colonists died during the winter of 1609–1610, known as “the starving time.” By May 1610, fewer than a hundred remained, and the colony, which had not produced a profit for the Virginia Company, almost failed.
Early Virginia colonists did find wealth and success in tobacco cultivation, however. Despite the need for hard work in difficult conditions, by 1614 Jamestown began exporting tobacco to Europe and earning profits for the Virginia Company. Smoking the highly addictive dried leaves of the plant became a popular habit in Europe.
Like their rivals the Spanish, English colonists struggled to produce agricultural goods using only their own labor. Instead, they relied heavily on indentured servants, European immigrants who typically agreed to work four to seven years in exchange for transportation to the colony and the hope of a new life there after completing their service. Up to 100,000 people, mostly poor men in their twenties, traveled to the English colonies as indentured servants in the 1600s. Many died of disease, exposure, and overwork, but those who survived their term of service often became reasonably comfortable and respected members of the growing settlements. A fortunate few even became wealthy planters.
In 1619, the first Africans arrived in Virginia. Initially they enjoyed the same opportunities to earn their freedom and build wealth as immigrants from Europe, but their condition quickly deteriorated. They were part of a trend that began with the importation of the first Africans into the Americas by the Spanish and Portuguese a century earlier. By the middle of the 1600s, policies were beginning to develop in the Americas that bound Africans to servitude for life, unlike European indentured servants who regained their freedom once they had completed their term of service.
European colonists in Virginia, like those in Mexico, South America, and the Caribbean, sought ways to maintain a permanent labor force, especially when it proved difficult to recruit sufficient indentured servants from Europe. Attempts to coerce the labor of fellow Europeans would have met with too much resistance. Faced with a growing underclass of embittered poor White former servants, who in 1676 sought to overthrow the colony’s government, Virginia’s elite sought to solve their problems by drawing legal distinctions between people of European and African ancestry. They extended privileges to Whites that were denied to Blacks and encouraged European settlers to perceive Africans as inferior people fit only for manual labor, while simultaneously depriving Africans of their freedom. In this way, slavery became associated with African ancestry and racial divisions were created that had not existed before. Racism became the basis on which the colonial labor system was built.
In 1680, the Virginia legislature passed “an act for preventing Negroes Insurrections” that forbid enslaved Africans from carrying weapons, gathering in public, and traveling without permission. Enslaved Africans became the most important source of coerced labor in Virginia, as well as the other English colonies established in the southern part of what became the United States, stretching from Maryland, the colony founded as a haven for English Catholics just north of Virginia, to Georgia. This enslavement in the United States ended only in 1865, after a devastating civil war and the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Slavery continued in other parts of the Western Hemisphere, with Brazil not abolishing it until 1888.
New England
In 1620, Puritan Separatists led by William Bradford left Plymouth, England, on the Mayflower and founded a colony they called Plymouth near what is now Boston, Massachusetts. The Separatists wanted to leave England to escape the Church of England, which they felt was corrupt, and whose interpretation of scripture the Separatists considered lax. Before landing, their leaders signed the Mayflower Compact, a document that emphasized their desire to found a colony for “the glory of God, and Advancement of the Christian Faith, and the Honour of our King and Country.” More than just a religious document, the Mayflower Compact also had a major political impact with its support of direct democracy and of building governments that reflected the will of the people.
Like the English settlers far to the south in Virginia, the Separatists struggled to survive in their new homes. Roughly half died of starvation, disease, malnutrition, and cold during the difficult winter of 1620–1621. Many of the survivors became too weak to work, and soon the entire colony was dependent on the seven who were healthy enough to do so. Political disputes broke out, and the first English colony in New England almost died. Just when Plymouth seemed doomed, Native Americans decided to help. They included Samoset, a member of the Abenaki tribe who had been living with the Wampanoag tribe, and Tisquantum (Squanto) of the Pawtuxet tribe, who had learned to speak some English from fishers who visited the coast before the Separatists arrived. Tisquantum had been kidnapped by English explorer Thomas Hunt and sold into slavery in Spain but had managed to escape to England. There, he joined the Newfoundland Company, another English joint stock company, and had returned to North America in 1619. Samoset, Tisquantum, and other friendly Native Americans helped the English negotiate treaties with nearby tribes and taught them to grow corn, which became the colony’s main food source. But a relationship that may have begun as a friendly attempt to help starving strangers quickly shifted to conflict as the colonizers began seizing Indigenous lands.
A larger group of Puritans followed in 1630 and founded the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Their leader John Winthrop gave a speech titled “A Model of Christian Charity,” which expressed his hopes that the Puritan community in the Americas would embrace the twin goals of building economic prosperity and founding a “City upon a Hill” that would serve as a shining example of an ideal Christian community to the entire world.
The Puritan colonies were also scenes of religious conflict from which dissenters like Anne Hutchinson, who questioned the all-male church leadership, and Roger Williams, who championed religious toleration, were exiled. The Massachusetts Bay Colony’s darkest moment may have come during the 1692 Salem witch trials, when Puritan leaders executed nineteen people for witchcraft. Despite such conflicts, the Puritan colonies eventually became self-sustaining communities that mostly achieved their twin objectives of promoting Puritan religious ideology and building a strong economy.
Puritan settlers hoped a strong economy would allow their colony to flourish, attract new settlers, and provide evidence of God’s favor. Like many Europeans of the 1600s and 1700s, they rooted their economic ideas in mercantilism. The desire to build economic wealth was the primary motive in many colonial ventures, such as Jamestown in Virginia, and provided a secondary motivation in more ideologically driven communities like those set up by the Puritans).
English Settlements. This map shows English colonies and key settlements in North America in the 1600s, as well as the neighboring territories inhabited by Native American tribes at the time. Many more tribes inhabited this region than the few whose names appear on the map. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
French and Dutch Settlements
In 1609, Dutch merchants hired Henry Hudson, an English sea captain, to lead an expedition into the Atlantic Ocean. The Dutch hoped Hudson would find the long-sought Northwest Passage, a mythical water route thought to allow ships from Europe to sail west through the North American continent, cross the Pacific Ocean, and arrive in Asia. Hudson discovered a deep-water port, now known as New York harbor, and a large river, now known as the Hudson, that led inland. For a moment it appeared he had found the Northwest Passage. However, the Hudson River became too shallow for ocean-going ships near present-day Albany, New York, and the expedition turned back. Hudson did not find the Northwest Passage, but he did find a valuable port and rich river valley that he claimed for the Dutch.
After Hudson returned to Europe, the Dutch West India Company, a joint stock company much like the Virginia Company, made plans to set up a small colony in North America. In contrast to the settled agricultural model preferred by English colonists, the Dutch focused on trade. Company directors hoped their colony would improve their access to the North American fur trade, ensure their control of the valuable port eventually known as New York Harbor, and solidify their claim on the area, which they suspected might contain additional sources of wealth they had not yet discovered. In 1624, thirty families aboard the ship Nieu Nederlandt arrived in what is now New York and founded the Dutch colony of New Netherlands. They came for many reasons, but many hoped to become rich by working in the fur trade.
The Dutch, like their Spanish and English colonial rivals, struggled to produce goods using paid labor and sought to remedy the problem with the importation of enslaved Africans. They also encouraged immigration from across Europe with promises of economic opportunities and some level of religious toleration that extended even to Jewish people, who faced severe discrimination in most of Europe. New Netherlands soon became a prosperous colony populated by people from across Europe and Africa. Colonists lived in a band of farms and towns stretching along the Hudson River Valley from New Amsterdam, which is now New York City, north to the village of Beverwijck, now Albany. They engaged in some farming, but they mostly relied on the fur trade for their income.
BEYOND THE BOOK
New Amsterdam
New Amsterdam was founded by the Dutch in 1624, at the southern tip of the island now known as Manhattan. The city quickly became a thriving center of trade and commerce. In 1664, an English military expedition captured the city and renamed it New York.
New Amsterdam.This painting of early New Amsterdam, which later became New York City, was made in 1664 by the Dutch artist and cartographer Johannes Vingboons. (credit: “Gezicht op Nieuw Amsterdam” by Geheugen van Nederland/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
Questions to consider
How is New Amsterdam depicted in this picture? What parts of the picture would have seemed familiar to people in the Netherlands?
Do you think this painting is an accurate depiction of life in seventeenth-century New Amsterdam? Why do you think the European artist chose to portray the city in this fashion?
New Netherlands became a scene of increasing conflict as the colony grew. Initially the Dutch enjoyed friendly relationships with Native Americans eager to trade their furs for European firearms, metal tools, and wool blankets. Serious disputes began, however, when the Dutch demanded payment for the benefits they believed they had brought, including knowledge of the Christian faith and connection to global markets. Native Americans refused to pay, and violence broke out. To protect New Amsterdam from attack, the Dutch forced enslaved Africans to build fortifications along what was then the city’s northeast boundary. The street that ran along these fortifications was known as Wall Street; it later became a major economic center and the home of the New York Stock Exchange.
Despite intense warfare, Native Americans were unable to expel the Dutch, who faced a far more dangerous threat from the English. In 1664, an English military expedition arrived in New Amsterdam as part of a broader conflict between England and the Netherlands. With little hope of defending themselves from the English warships, the Dutch surrendered. The English gave them generous peace terms and renamed New Amsterdam New York, in honor of the Duke of York who had organized the expedition.
Dutch and French Settlements.This map shows the location of Dutch and French colonies in North America in the seventeenth century and the tribal lands of Native Americans at the time of European conquest and resettlement. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
The French became aware of colonization opportunities in North America in 1534, when Jacques Cartier voyaged to the area now known as the Gulf of Saint Lawrence in Canada, but they did not rush to set up any colonies. Several early colonization efforts in what is now Canada struggled, mostly due to the harsh northern environment. In 1608, an expedition led by Samuel de Champlain founded Quebec, the first major French settlement in North America. The Company of New France, a joint stock company much like the Virginia Company and the Dutch West India Company, led the early French colonization efforts in North America and helped fund settlements. New France was a collection of French settlements begun in 1534 in what is now Newfoundland. It eventually included much of North America, including Canada and the Mississippi River Valley all the way to southern Louisiana on the Gulf of Mexico.
Like the Dutch, French colonizers focused on trade rather than the settled agricultural model preferred by the English. They earned most of their profits from the lucrative fur market and engaged in fishing off the coast of what is now Canada. Among the French settlers were a small number of French Catholic priests who attempted to convert Native Americans to Christianity, as the Spanish had done in their colonies. Most of these missionaries were members of the Society of Jesus, better known as the Jesuits, a religious organization dedicated to spreading Catholicism and opposing Protestantism. The Jesuits practiced cultural accommodation, a method of integrating a culture into the dominant society without forcing it to fully integrate and adopt all the dominant culture’s components. They just wanted Native Americans to become Catholics and did not care whether they adopted any other aspect of European culture. The Jesuits in Canada also likely realized that they had neither sufficient numbers nor the support from France that would have been necessary to force Indigenous peoples to submit to attempts to change their way of life.
The French probably enjoyed the friendliest relationships with Native Americans of any European colonizers. Unlike their rivals, they usually attempted to solve the shortage of labor by allying themselves with Native Americans. The French sought wealth in furs, and the assistance of Native American tribes, who knew the land much better than did the European newcomers, was needed to best exploit this valuable resource. Also, because few French women came to New France, many French colonists married Native American women, leading to the creation of a multicultural and multiracial society.
In 1627, Cardinal Richelieu, chief minister to King Louis XIII, provided a spiritual justification for Franco-Indian partnerships in the Ordonnance of 1627. The Ordonnance read in part, “The descendants of the French who are accustomed to this country [New France], together with all the Indians who will be brought to the knowledge of the faith and will profess it, shall be deemed and renowned natural Frenchmen, and as such may come to live in France when they want, and acquire, donate, and succeed and accept donations and legacies, just as true French subjects, without being required to take letters of declaration of naturalization.”
Not all Native Americans wanted to give up their traditional beliefs or become French, but the Ordonnance was an important gesture that the French government was willing to accept them as equal members of society. It helped the French build strong relationships with Native Americans, particularly the Algonquin-speaking tribes that populated most of New France. The French further reinforced their alliance with the Algonquins by providing them with weapons, which they used in their wars with rival Iroquoian-speaking tribes and with Dutch and English settlers.
Even when Indigenous peoples profited from their relationship with European colonists, however, they might still suffer negative consequences. The introduction of guns, for example, made Native American warfare more deadly. As the Iroquois, who were armed by the Dutch, waged war with the French-allied Wendat nation, their European trading partners profited from the trade in stolen pelts.
The use of guns and the incentives offered for killing as many animals as possible had environmental implications as well, because it depleted beaver and deer populations in some areas. The hunger for European manufactured goods encouraged some Native Americans to go into debt to European traders, while the reduction of animal populations left some without the means to pay. Many Indigenous people also became addicted to the alcohol sold or traded by Europeans.
In the mid-1700s, the British Empire grew from a minor player on the world stage to a dominant superpower. Trade that flowed through and from the British North American colonies made many British business and political leaders rich. Victory in the Seven Years’ War consolidated their power over European rivals. In hopes of further increasing their political and economic power, many supported further expansion of the empire into new areas. Britain therefore expanded its colonies in India and turned its eyes to China.
The Seven Years’ War (1756–1763) was a global conflict that began as a fight for dominance between European powers, primarily Great Britain and France, but it quickly involved groups from India, Africa, and the Americas. Conflicts that overlapped with the Seven Years’ War were the French and Indian War in North America and the Third Carnatic War in India.
The Seven Years’ War. This map shows a global view of the Seven Years’ War, which began in 1756. Note the many participants and the far-flung conflict zones. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
In the late 1600s and early 1700s, New France grew steadily. In 1663, King Louis XIV canceled the royal charter with the Company of New France and transformed the settlement into a royal colony. French merchants and priests gradually expanded their reach from Quebec through the Great Lakes and down the Mississippi River, founding New Orleans near the Gulf of Mexico in 1718.
The English proved a serious obstacle for the growth of New France, however. Wealthy farmers in the English colonies of North America wanted to expand into the Ohio River Valley, territory claimed by France and its Native American allies. In 1754, violence broke out between French soldiers and members of the Virginia militia near what is now Uniontown, Pennsylvania. Initially the French and their Native American allies performed well, launching skillful ambushes on English troops and forcing George Washington, a young officer in the Virginia colonial militia, to surrender Britain’s Fort Necessity.
IN THEIR OWN WORDS
George Washington on the French and Indian War
George Washington wrote to his mother on July 18, 1755, when he was twenty-three years old and fighting in the French and Indian War. His letter, excerpted here, describes the battle near Fort Duquesne, now Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. British soldiers and members of the Virginia militia met a surprise attack by French and Indian fighters and were defeated.
HONORED MADAM: As I doubt not but you have heard of our defeat, and perhaps have had it represented in a worse light (if possible) than it deserves; I have taken this earliest opportunity to give you some account of the engagement, as it happened within 7 miles of the French fort, on Wednesday the 9th instant.
We marched onto that place, without any considerable loss, having only now and then a straggler picked up by the French scouting Indians. When we came there, we were attacked by a body of French and Indians, whose number (I am persuaded) did not exceed three hundred men; ours consisted of about 1300 well-armed troops, chiefly regular soldiers, who were struck with such a panic that they behaved with more cowardice than it is possible to conceive. The officers behaved gallantly, in order to encourage their men, for which they suffered greatly; there being near sixty killed and wounded; a large proportion of the number we had. The Virginia troops showed a good deal of bravery, and were near all killed; for I believe, out of three companies that were there, there is scarce thirty men left alive. . . . In short, the dastardly behavior of those they call regulars exposed all others that were inclined to do their duty to almost certain death; and, at last, in despite of all the efforts of the officers to the contrary, they broke, and run as sheep pursued by dogs; and it was impossible to rally them. . . .
I luckily escaped without a wound, though I had four bullets through my coat, and two horses shot under me. Captains Orme and Morris . . . were wounded early . . . I was the only person then left to distribute the General’s orders, which I was scarcely able to do, as I was not half recovered from a violent illness that had confined me to my bed, and a wagon, for above ten days. I am still in a weak and feeble condition, which induces me to halt here two or three days in hopes of recovering a little strength, to enable me to proceed homewards; . . .
I am, honored Madam, your most dutiful son.
—George Washington, Letter to Mary Ball Washington, July 18, 1755
Why does Washington want to explain to his mother what happened during the battle?
What is Washington’s opinion of the regular British soldiers, British officers, and Virginia militia in the battle?
What obstacles did Washington face during the battle?
However, the early success of the French in forcing the British to retreat did not last. In 1758, the Shawnee tribe, the Delaware tribe, and the powerful Iroquoian Confederacy agreed to ally with the English in exchange for their promise to respect Indigenous rights to contested lands on the frontier. The Iroquois Confederacy was a collection of allied Native American tribes who called themselves Haudenosaunee, which means “people of the longhouse.” The name referred both to the rectangular homes in which they lived and their geographic territory, which extended from what is now Vermont in the east all the way to Lake Erie in the west, an area roughly the shape of a longhouse. The Iroquoian tribes had formed a military and economic alliance by 1600 that consisted of the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca tribes. The Tuscarora tribe joined the confederacy in 1722. Other, non-Iroquoian Native Americans, including several Algonquin tribes, remained loyal to the French until the end of the war in 1763. With Native American help, the English launched successful offensives against New France. The British turned in the tide in 1759, with a series of victories culminating in their capture of French Quebec after the Battle on the Plains of Abraham.
Key Battles. This map shows the key battles of the French and Indian War (1754–1763), including Britain’s loss at Fort Duquesne where George Washington fought and its decisive victory in Quebec. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
The French and Indian War ended with the victory of Great Britain and Prussia over France and Spain in the Seven Years’ War and the signing of the Treaty of Paris in February 1763. Under the treaty, the French government surrendered all its territory in North America, as well as outposts in the Caribbean, India, and Africa. Britain became the undisputed controller of eastern North America, from Canada in the north to the Florida border in the south, and from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Mississippi River in the west.
The Seven Years’ War had begun in Europe in 1756 when Frederick the Great of Prussia invaded Saxony and annexed the area as part of his broader plan to expand Prussian territory. In response, France, Spain, and Russia joined forces with Austria to oppose him. Great Britain allied itself with Prussia to maintain the balance of power in Europe, a situation in which competing nations have approximately equal military power. Maintaining this balance was a key feature of British foreign policy meant to prevent the domination of Europe by any one nation. Military alliances thus transformed what could have been a small border dispute in Europe into a major war that quickly spread around the world.
Allies in Europe.This map shows the many alliances made in Europe during the Seven Years’ War. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
In 1758, a British expeditionary force captured the French outpost of Senegal in West Africa, and other French outposts were taken during a series of subsequent offensives. The loss of valuable trading ports damaged the French economy at the very moment France desperately needed money to fund the war effort. More importantly, it deprived French military forces of strategic bases they could have used to raid British shipping and resupply their warships.
In Asia, the British East India Company, a joint stock company founded in 1600 with the original goal of trading in the Indian Ocean, was by now providing the British with a much stronger economic as well as military and diplomatic foundation than their French rivals had. To thwart these British advantages and gain control of valuable territory in India, the French formed an alliance with the Mughal Empire. At its height, this powerful Muslim realm had once ruled more than 150 million people living across 1.5 million square miles in what is now Afghanistan, India, and Bangladesh. The British defeated the French forces in 1761, however, when they captured Pondicherry, the most important French outpost in India. The Mughals continued to resist British domination even after the French had largely withdrawn from India.
In 1762, the British launched attacks on Spanish colonies in Asia and the Caribbean, capturing the port of Manila in the Philippines and occupying it until the end of the war in 1763. They were less successful in expanding their control over the islands, despite the assistance of Indigenous Filipinos who disliked Spanish rule. In the Caribbean, however, Britain succeeded in capturing Havana, Cuba, one of the most important ports in the Western Hemisphere, and held it until the end of the conflict.
Furthermore, with the signing of the Treaty of Paris, the French surrendered their imperial possessions in North America and India to the British, while the Spanish surrendered Florida to the British and France gave control of the Louisiana Territory to Spain. The subsequent Peace of Hubertusburg guaranteed Prussian control of Silesia, an area in central Europe, and confirmed Prussia’s status as a major force in Europe. The British, for their part, emerged from the Seven Years’ War as the world’s leading economic, military, and political power.Excerpted from: A. Kordas, et. al, World History Volume 2, from 1400, Houston: Open Stax, 2022, https://openstax.org/books/world-history-volume-2/pages/6-2-the-rise-of-a-global-economy https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
The Atlantic Slave Trade
To extract the greatest possible wealth from their American colonies, the nations of Europe planted them with cash crops Europeans craved but could not produce at home. To maximize profit, they drove workers hard without regard for their health or safety. When Indigenous peoples and European servants could not satisfy their demands, they turned to enslaved labor taken from Africa. The latter decision affected the lives of millions of people for centuries to come.
Slavery and the Triangular Trade
One of the largest migrations in history took place between the late fifteenth and early nineteenth centuries, as Europeans forcefully transported approximately twelve million Africans across the Atlantic Ocean to the Americas to provide labor for Europe’s economic enterprises. Some two million people died on the voyages across the Atlantic. The survivors made possible the extraction of wealth from European colonies on which the system of mercantilism was based.
The majority of Africans brought across the Atlantic were destined to labor on sugar plantations in the Caribbean and Brazil. Many enslaved Africans were also sent to the Spanish colonies in South America; relatively few went to the North American mainland, mostly Mexico. European colonists had originally considered using enslaved Indigenous peoples to perform the difficult and dangerous labor of harvesting sugar cane and other cash crops, but these efforts failed. Indigenous people died in large numbers from infectious diseases, leaving too few to labor in the fields. On the island of Hispaniola, for example, where both the Spanish and the French established sugar plantations, the native Taíno population was at least several hundred thousand strong when Columbus arrived in 1492. By 1514, however, only about thirty-two thousand Taíno remained. Some had been deliberately killed by the Spanish, and others had died from hard labor and poor living conditions after being enslaved. The vast majority, though, had died of disease.
For Europeans, the ideal laborers would be people as unfamiliar with the terrain as they were, because unlike enslaved Indigenous people who knew the best places to hide, they could more easily be recaptured if they ran away. In addition, they would be less affected by many of the infectious diseases from which Europeans suffered. Although Europeans did not understand what caused immunity, they knew those who had previously contracted certain diseases like smallpox and survived would not contract that disease again. They also knew, from long contact with Africans, that they did not die from European diseases in the same numbers that Indigenous Americans did. In the European view, Africans satisfied both their key requirements.
European indentured servants would also have fit the bill, but the hot Caribbean climate and diseases like malaria and yellow fever, brought from Africa with cargoes of enslaved people, led to high death rates among Europeans within the first year and discouraged most others from immigrating there. Indentured servitude did not satisfy the labor needs of tobacco planters in Virginia and Maryland either, where the death rate among Europeans was also high. Although some indentured servants were convicts sentenced to be transported to the colonies, the vast majority left Europe voluntarily, but they were not enough. In addition, a French law passed in 1664 that restricted planters’ right to beat their indentured servants made servants a less desirable form of labor in the eyes of French colonists. Thus, Europeans eager to extract a profit looked to Africa as the solution, and to slavery instead of indentured servitude. They believed Africans were physically better suited to hard labor than Europeans were, and Africans could also be enslaved for a lifetime, ensuring a constant supply of field hands.
The Portuguese, already using enslaved Africans to grow sugar on islands off the coast of Africa, were the first to bring them in large numbers to the Americas. The initial Portuguese voyage to do so transported two hundred Africans to the Spanish colony of Santo Domingo, on the island of Hispaniola, in 1525. Most were forced to grow sugar for Portuguese colonists in Brazil or were sold to the Spanish for this purpose. Captured Africans were also sold to the Spanish to work in mines in Mexico and Peru or to be employed as domestic servants. Soon the British, French, Spanish, Dutch, and Danes were also exporting captives from Africa to produce sugar, rice, indigo, tobacco, and, by the eighteenth century, coffee in the Americas.
Although the economic system that relied on the labor of enslaved Africans to grow sugar and other crops for European colonists in the Americas was a complex one, for purposes of simplification, it is often characterized as the triangular trade because it linked three regions (the Americas, Europe, and West Africa) in a network of exchange. The shipment of enslaved Africans across the Atlantic was one leg of the triangular trade. In the first leg, Europeans exchanged manufactured goods with African traders for enslaved Africans. The enslaved people were then shipped across the Atlantic to European colonies in the Americas. This journey was called the Middle Passage because it was the middle (or second) leg of the three-legged exchange. The money earned from the sale of enslaved Africans in the colonies was used to purchase the products grown by existing enslaved laborers. In the third leg of the triangle, those goods were shipped to Europe or to a European country’s other American colonies, where they were transformed into finished products.
The Triangular Trade.As its name suggests, the triangular trade consisted of three legs. Enslaved Africans were sent along the so-called Middle Passage (the red arrow) and sold in Europe’s American colonies, while the agricultural products they produced were shipped to Europe. European manufactured goods were exchanged in Africa for more enslaved people. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
For example, English slave traders exchanged rum for captives in African ports. The captives then traveled across the Atlantic in chains to England’s Caribbean colonies, where they were sold to the owners of plantations who set them to work growing sugar cane. The plantation owners then shipped molasses, a by-product of sugar production, to other English settlers in the colony of Massachusetts, who transformed it into rum and shipped that to England. English ship captains in Africa then exchanged rum along with manufactured products like cloth, guns, and ammunition for captives. African slave traders used the guns to capture more people to send along the Middle Passage, and the cycle continued. Enslaved people were the base on which the triangle rested. Without the sugar, tobacco, coffee, indigo, and rice produced through their labor, the trade would have collapsed.
The human toll of the transatlantic slave trade was immense. Conditions on the Middle Passage were brutal, and some ships held as many as five to six hundred people. Some captains, knowing that 10 to 20 percent would die on the voyage, packed as many people as possible into the hold, hoping enough would survive to earn them a good profit. In the hold, men were separated from women and children and were chained side by side on their backs, sometimes with only a few inches of space above them. In 1713, the Royal Africa Company, a British company, instructed captains that enslaved people should be allotted a space five feet long, eleven inches wide, and twenty inches high. The implication was that captains usually packed people into even smaller spaces.
Plan of a Slave Ship.This eighteenth-century diagram of a slave ship reveals how tightly packed the hold was with human beings. Captains stowed people in every possible space. (credit: modification of work “Slave ship diagram” by Lilly Library of Rare Books and Manuscripts, Indiana University/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
During the voyage, sailors gave the enslaved people food and water usually once a day. There were no facilities for bathing, and men and women alike relieved themselves in buckets or tubs that often overturned in rough seas. Ventilation was poor, the stench was horrible, and the heat excruciating. At times crews would bring the enslaved Africans onto the deck for fresh air and make them jump and dance to exercise their muscles, since buyers would not pay high prices for those who looked weak. Removing captives from the hold was always a risk for the crew, however, since this was the time when a revolt was most likely to take place. Slave ship captains harshly punished any attempt at rebellion. Taking enslaved people to the deck was also risky because many used the opportunity to commit suicide rather than endure the misery on board ship or the uncertain fate that awaited them. Some captains strung nets below the ships’ rails to catch those who jumped overboard.
Illness was the slave ship captains’ constant fear. In the close quarters of the ship, infectious disease could sweep like wildfire, and every person who died reduced the captain’s profit. The most feared of all diseases was trachoma, an infection of the eyes that did not kill but left its victims blind. Enslaved people who could not see would not be purchased. Even more frightening was the possibility that the infection would spread to the crew. If the sailors lost their sight, everyone on board faced a slow death from starvation as the ship sat adrift in the water, unable to reach any port.
Slave voyages were often heavily insured against loss. The captain of the Zong took full advantage of this. When bad weather slowed his ship’s voyage across the Atlantic in 1781, members of the crew and the enslaved cargo began to die of illness. Realizing that the ship owner’s insurance policy would pay for captives lost at sea but not for those who died of sickness, the captain ordered 132 enslaved people thrown overboard to drown.
African and North American Slavery
The captives purchased by European ship captains were sold by other Africans. Europeans did not introduce slavery to Africa; it had existed there for centuries before the triangular trade began. It was different in important ways, however, from the slavery that awaited Africans on the other side of the Atlantic.
Slavery existed in numerous African societies, and there were many ways in which a person could become enslaved. In some societies, slavery served as punishment for a crime. In others, people could be enslaved or sell their children into slavery to pay a debt. In times of hardship like famine, parents might sell children to more prosperous people to earn money to support themselves and ensure their children would be fed. In many societies, enslaved people were taken as prisoners of war.
Africans enslaved people primarily to enlarge their households, the basic economic units of society. Families suffered if they did not have enough able-bodied people to work in the fields or tend to herds, and slavery provided a solution. Some enslaved Africans remained with the slaveholder their entire lives, but others expected to regain their freedom. Those enslaved to pay a debt, for example, gained their freedom once the debt had been settled. Even people enslaved for life could participate fully in the life of the household or community. They could marry; their spouse might be free, and their children would be. They might own property, including enslaved people of their own. They were often well respected in the community, especially if they possessed important knowledge or skills. Africans regarded slavery as an unfortunate fate that might befall anyone; being enslaved did not imply an inherent difference or inferiority. The life of an enslaved person was not comfortable or easy, but it was not often what we think of when we consider Atlantic plantation slavery.
Slavery in the Americas was different. It was chattel slavery, in which one person is owned by another as a piece of property like an inanimate object. The enslaved had no status or legal rights as persons. They could be bought, sold, inherited, or given to another. They had no right to control their own bodies or their own labor, and they could be compelled to do whatever the slaveholder wished. Their status could be passed on to their children; in all the European colonies in the Americas, the child of an enslaved woman was born enslaved. Although chattel slavery also existed in Africa, this was the only form of slavery that existed in the Americas.
For centuries, Africans had participated in the trans-Saharan slave trade, selling prisoners in North Africa and on the Swahili Coast to be transported to destinations in the Mediterranean or the Middle East. The arrival of Europeans willing to pay large sums changed the focus of the African slave trade, however. Africans now captured and enslaved large numbers of other Africans with the intent of selling them to Europeans for transportation across the Atlantic. Wars were launched against rival peoples solely for the purpose of taking captives, and slave traders led expeditions into the interior of the continent to kidnap people who lived far away. Africans were not safe in their own homes. In the eighteenth century, slave traders kidnapped young Olaudah Equiano (later an abolitionist) and his sister as they played at home; while their parents were gone, strangers climbed over a wall into the courtyard of their house and carried the children away. Some people were tricked and sold to European slave traders by their own relatives.
Once captured, people were marched for days to one of the places on the coast where Europeans exchanged goods for human beings. Many died on the way. Slave traders commonly chained their captives together on the journey, and devices were sometimes fixed to captives’ necks so that if they managed to escape, they would die of thirst because they could not lower their heads into streams to drink. Once they reached the coast, the traders stripped them naked and shaved their heads to keep them free of lice. The traders then greased their bodies with palm oil to make them look fit and healthy when buyers came.
A number of slave trading ports flourished on the western coast of Africa from the fifteenth through the eighteenth centuries. Among them were Ouidah (Whydah), Grand-Popo, Jaquim, and Porto-Novo in modern Benin; Badagry in Nigeria; and Little Popo in Togo. In these ports, English, Dutch, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Danish, and Swedish traders and sea captains bargained with African slave traders for their captives. Some African city-states and kingdoms became wealthy from the slave trade, and their rulers protested only if their own people were taken. King Afonso of Kongo told the king of Portugal that, out of a desire for European goods, the people of his own kingdom were capturing their fellow Kongolese and selling them to Portuguese traders. He did not denounce the slave trade but asked only that the Portuguese bring their captives to officials of Kongo to be sure they were not free Kongolese wrongfully seized. According to King Gezo of Benin, “The slave trade is the ruling principle of my people. It is the source and the glory of their wealth . . . the mother lulls the child to sleep with notes of triumph over an enemy reduced to slavery.”
The transatlantic slave trade harmed those who remained in Africa as well as those who were taken. Families endured the emotional trauma of losing loved ones. Fear of falling prey to slave traders pervaded villages throughout West and Central Africa. Olaudah Equiano recalled that when adults in his village left for the fields, children stationed someone in a tree to keep watch for kidnappers while the others played.
The African economy suffered as well. Those most likely to be captured, men and women in the prime of life, had been contributing the greatest share of labor to their communities. When slave traders captured young adults, no one remained to care for children and the elderly, and fewer people were left to reproduce. According to one model, between 1750 and 1850 no population growth occurred south of the Sahara Desert and north of the Limpopo River as a result of the loss of people to the slave trade. To compensate for the disappearance of so many young men, who were the laborers most preferred by plantation owners, many African ethnic groups adopted polygyny, allowing men to take multiple wives. The loss of men also necessitated that women adopt traditionally male economic roles.
Desire for the goods Europeans traded for enslaved people also had devastating consequences for Africa. The importation of European textiles, according to some historians, spurred the industrialization of the European textile industry while harming African cloth producers, who could not compete on quantity or price. Weavers continued to produce goods for local markets, but no continent-wide market for African textiles ever had an opportunity to develop because Europeans already dominated the field. There were similar consequences for the African metal industry.
These effects have been long-lasting. One scholar has demonstrated that the areas from which the most enslaved people were taken are today the poorest in Africa, though at the time of the slave trade they were among the most developed. They are also more prone to civil conflict today than other areas of the continent. Other studies have shown that people from ethnic groups most likely to have been subject to the slave trade are less likely to trust others than are people from less affected groups. This may be due at least in part to the slave trade’s breaking down of the social and political structures intended to protect people.
The Economics of Slavery
Those who reached their final destination faced an existence as hellish as they had experienced on the Middle Passage. The labor to which they were put was backbreaking and never ending. Most of the crops grown by enslaved Africans in the Americas were labor intensive. At that time, tobacco seeds had to be planted by hand and the seedlings transplanted in the fields. At harvest time, workers stripped tobacco leaves from the plant, hung them to dry, and packed them in large barrels that they then rolled to the coast or a riverbank to be taken on board ship and transported to Europe.
Harvesting Tobacco.This 1670 illustration from Virginia shows enslaved Africans at work on a tobacco plantation. In the open shed on the left, tobacco leaves are being hung to dry. (credit: “Tobacco cultivation (Virginia, ca. 1670)” by Unknown/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
Rice cultivation also required the transplanting of seedlings by hand. Enslaved people first cleared the undergrowth from swampland, built earthen dikes, and then flooded the cleared land with water. As they worked in the swampy waters, they were exposed to snakes and mosquitos carrying malaria and yellow fever.
Sugar, the most valuable crop grown by enslaved people, also required the most labor, and sugar plantations often contained hundreds of workers. With the exception of the very youngest and the very oldest, all of them toiled all day as part of large work gangs. The labor was grueling and dangerous. Sugar cane was densely planted, and undergrowth in the fields could hide snakes that bit workers. After fertilizing and weeding the cane, workers harvested it by cutting it close to the ground with machetes and then chopping it into smaller pieces to make it easier to remove from the fields. Machetes wielded in tired workers’ sweaty hands often slashed legs and feet. Workers might bleed to death or die when wounds became infected. People who worked too slowly were beaten.
Laborers then transported the cut cane to a mill to be crushed by heavy rollers that often caught and mangled workers’ hands. This had to be done very quickly, within twenty-four hours of cutting the cane, because the sap evaporated quickly. The workers boiled the crushed cane to extract a liquid that was clarified and crystalized into sugar, a process that required hours of standing next to roaring fires where workers were often scalded. To maximize profits, planters rotated production, so while sugar cane was growing in one field, it was being harvested in another. Because sugar cane rapidly depleted nutrients in the soil, laborers frequently also had to clear land for new fields. In addition to growing and processing sugar cane, enslaved people had to tend to the plantations’ buildings and livestock and cut the wood needed to cook the cane sap.
Slaveholders spent little money on food for the enslaved people, so laborers spent additional time tending their own gardens, fishing, and foraging for wild foods. To give them energy and dull their pain, slaveholders often gave them shots of rum, a plentiful beverage on a sugar plantation.
LINK TO LEARNING
Visit the National Museums Liverpool site to learn more about slavery in the Caribbean and how archaeologists have learned about this institution.
BEYOND THE BOOK
Contrasting Images of Slavery
Few European painters created images of slavery. François-Auguste Biard of France and Agostino Brunias, who was born in Rome and lived on the Caribbean island of Dominica, were exceptions. The first painting that follows, by Brunias, shows women at the market. The women in the center wearing white may be free women of color, a favorite subject of this artist.
A Market in the West Indies.This painting by Agostino Brunias, A Linen Market with a Linen-stall and Vegetable Seller in the West Indies, was made about 1780 and depicts women at an outdoor market. (credit: “A Linen Market with a Linen-stall and Vegetable Seller in the West Indie” by Yale Center for British Art/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
The second image, by Biard, was made approximately fifty years later, shortly before slavery was abolished (for the second time) in the French colonies.
The Slave Trade.This 1840 painting, The Slave Trade by François-Auguste Biard, is set in a slave market on the coast of West Africa. (credit: “The Slave Trade (Slaves on the West Coast of Africa)” by National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, gift, 1933/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
How do these paintings differ in subject matter and style?
Brunias has been described as depicting slavery in a romantic way. Where do you see evidence of this in the painting shown here?
What details in Biard’s painting might make viewers support abolition?
Infectious disease, overwork, poor diet, and injuries claimed large numbers of lives. Because infant mortality among enslaved people in the Caribbean was rampant, the enslaved population was not self-reproducing, and slaveholders had to buy more people each year to maintain their labor force. Prices were high. A healthy young adult might cost as much as an average European could earn in a year’s worth of labor. In 1684, planters in Santo Domingo (the Dominican Republic) paid six thousand pounds of sugar per enslaved African. Some 2,500 to 3,000 new captives were required each year. This differed substantially from the English North American mainland colonies where, because the work of growing and processing tobacco was less physically grueling, enslaved people did not die in such high numbers, and the population was able to grow through reproduction.
Despite the conditions in which they lived, enslaved people in the Americas managed to retain their dignity and humanity. Couples married and produced children, some of whom survived. They formed new kin networks, calling fellow laborers “brother” and “aunt” to replace the relatives from whom they had been taken. They created new religions with elements of various African practices and Christian elements learned from their enslavers. They combined foods brought from Africa with local ingredients to create new cuisines that reminded them of home. The influence of Africa persisted in the music, dance, and stories they created. Enslaved people also resisted the slaveholders’ efforts to exploit them in numerous ways. They damaged tools, sabotaged machinery, and set fire to cane fields and barns full of sugar awaiting export to Europe. They ran away; in the mountains of Jamaica, runaways formed communities and lived in hiding. On several occasions, enslaved people rose up in armed rebellion, killing the slaveholders and overseers.
Largely unmoved by the misery of enslaved Africans, Europeans possessed an insatiable appetite for sugar that only grew as time passed. In 1650, planters in Barbados alone shipped about five thousand tons of sugar to England. Fifty years later, that amount had doubled. As the demand for sugar grew, so did the demand for enslaved laborers. Between 1450 and 1600, approximately 2,500 enslaved Africans a year were purchased by Europeans; in the sixteenth century, most of these people were sent to Hispaniola, Cuba, Brazil, and Venezuela. Beginning in the seventeenth century, however, as England, France, the Netherlands, and Denmark established sugar plantations in the Caribbean, the number of enslaved Africans brought to the Americas rose to some 18,680 per year. In the eighteenth century, by which time thousands of sugar mills dotted the coast of Brazil and the Caribbean islands, 61,330 people traversed the Middle Passage each year. Forty-two percent were sent to labor in the Caribbean and 38 percent to Brazil. The British colonies of the North American mainland claimed only 4 to 5 percent of the total.
Sugar and the Growth of the Atlantic Slave Trade.As the European demand for sugar increased, so too did the demand for enslaved laborers in Brazil and the Caribbean, which together would account for approximately 80 percent of enslaved Africans brought to the Americas at the turn of the eighteenth century. (data source: Slave Voyages; attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
The trade in both sugar and enslaved people sustained numerous industries and employed thousands of people, creating great wealth for some. Shipbuilders, ship captains, and sailors found employment, as did dock workers, freight drivers, customs agents, and workers in sugar refineries. Bakers, pastry cooks, candy makers, and grocers all indirectly made money from sugar. People who made the barrels that held sugar and the other products produced by enslaved people—tobacco, rice, and indigo—profited, as did those who supplied inexpensive clothing, shoes, and foodstuffs like salted fish for enslaved people. Banks and insurance companies earned enormous sums as well, and those who owned large sugar plantations often invested their profits in other industries, built magnificent mansions, or bought luxury goods.
Such wealth was easily transformed into political power. Sugar planters in Britain successfully lobbied Parliament to protect their interests, and many planters went into politics, holding seats in the House of Commons and, by using their wealth to purchase titles and estates, the House of Lords. It was thanks to the sugar lobby in Parliament that the British navy began to give its sailors a daily ration of grog, a mixture of rum, sugar, and lime juice, increasing the profits of British sugar planters even more.
The growing emphasis the Enlightenment placed on natural rights, the autonomy of the wealthy middle class, and the cross-cultural encounters of the burgeoning global economy generated many social and political transformations in the eighteenth century. In particular, the entrenched privileges of the nobility, the traditional dominance of the Catholic Church, and arbitrary royal entitlements were common targets of criticism among those who could participate in the public sphere of the era. As fiscal crises developed and tensions exploded between European kingdoms and their Atlantic colonies, the rhetoric of the Enlightenment fused with a series of popular uprisings and created revolutionary conditions on both sides of the Atlantic. By the end of the century, the American, French, and Haitian Revolutions were the results.
Each of these conflicts brought a different degree of change. They also all represented an imperfect realization of Enlightenment ideals, and they underscored the reality that political rights and liberties remained restricted to a small group that largely excluded women and the poor. With the exception of the Haitian Revolution, they did little to improve the conditions experienced by Black and Indigenous peoples.
The American Revolution
As colonial societies warmed to the idea that political power should be based on the consent of the people, a growing dissatisfaction with the British Crown’s arbitrary rules and taxes propelled the colonies in North America toward revolution. Britain’s Proclamation Line of 1763 declared the Appalachian Mountains the western settlement boundary for the thirteen North American colonies. Its goals were to prevent further conflict with the French and Native Americans there, and to avoid the costs of defending the frontier when Britain was already struggling with debt from the Seven Years’ War (1756–1763). The colonists, some of whom had already received land grants west of the Appalachians, viewed the edict as equivalent to tyranny and disregarded it.
Proclamation Line of 1763.This map depicts the boundary Britain imposed on westward settlement of its North American colonies in 1763, to save costs and avoid conflict with Native Americans and the French. The colonists viewed it as yet another instance of the tyranny of the king. (credit: modification of work “Eastern North America in 1775” by National Atlas of the United States/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
Tensions were further heightened by the imposition of taxes and commercial regulations. In particular, the Stamp Act of 1765 taxed legal documents and printed materials as a means of generating revenue for Britain, which led to widespread protests. North American colonists had paid taxes imposed by Parliament before, but the intent of those taxes had been to repay debts held by the government. Although this was also the original purpose of the Stamp Act, to pay debts accrued during the Seven Years’ War, the tax remained in place after the debt had been paid. This was the first time the colonists were expected to pay a tax intended solely to generate an ongoing source of revenue for the British government. Furthermore, colonists were unable to vote for members of Parliament and thus had no representatives to consent to this taxation on their behalf.
The Parliament repealed the Stamp Act in 1766 but merely replaced it with a variety of other taxes and duties that led to general turmoil in the colonies, especially in Boston. Indeed, in the same year the Stamp Act was repealed, Parliament passed the Declaratory Act, which stated that it had absolute authority to impose taxes on the colonies and to regulate their affairs. After Parliament took the extreme step of dispatching soldiers to Massachusetts to restore order and threatened customary liberties in the process, support in the colonies for a complete break with Britain intensified.
Parliament then granted the British East India Company a monopoly on the importation of tea, which angered colonial tea merchants and led to armed conflict, initiating the American Revolution in 1775. As the crisis escalated, revolutionary sentiment came to a head when the first and second Continental Congresses, assemblies of elected colonial representatives, met in Philadelphia in 1774 and 1775, respectively. The Second Continental Congress adopted the powers of government as a form of resistance to British tyranny and in 1776 approved the Declaration of Independence.
LINK TO LEARNING
At Monticello, a virtual exhibit called Paradox of Liberty explores the contradiction of the fight for liberty in the American Revolution taking place at a time when Thomas Jefferson and other founders owned enslaved people and supported the institution of slavery.
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The Declaration of Independence was modeled on Enlightenment principles of sovereignty and natural rights, particularly the social contract theory of the writer and philosopher John Locke. Although support for independence was not universal among the colonists, and a substantial minority remained neutral or actively supported the British, twelve of the thirteen colonies ultimately approved the Declaration of Independence, the only abstention being New York. In the military conflict that ensued, Britain initially won most of the battles, but the Continental Army led by General George Washington eventually prevailed, and the British surrendered at Yorktown, Virginia, in 1781. Some fighting continued until the fall of 1783, but peace was formally declared when representatives of the new United States and King George III of Great Britain signed the Treaty of Paris in September that year, officially ending the war.
Following the war’s conclusion, the first written constitution, known as the Articles of Confederation, was drafted in 1776–1777 and ratified by the thirteen colonies in 1781. Although they named the new nation the United States of America and granted Congress the authority to coin money and make alliances, the Articles of Confederation did not enable the federal government to impose taxes or control foreign policy. These shortcomings led delegates at the Constitutional Convention to write the Constitution in 1787, which granted the federal government powers such as the authority to tax and to regulate interstate commerce. When the Constitution was officially adopted in 1789, it replaced the Articles of Confederation and significantly strengthened the country’s central governmental authority.
In theory, the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution reflected the democratic ideals of the Enlightenment, but in practice, the colonists’ achievements were inherently contradictory, since many of the founders were slaveholders. Political liberty coexisted with the institution of slavery, and full constitutional rights and freedoms extended only to White men of property, a minority of the population, and not to women, African Americans, Native Americans, or many immigrants. Although women had participated in the war by leading charitable organizations and refusing to buy goods on which the British imposed taxes, they were excluded from political rights in the new republic. The institution of slavery, moreover, gained protection from the Constitution when members of the Constitutional Convention adopted the Three-Fifths Clause, which counted three-fifths of the enslaved population in the calculations on which the taxation and political representation of slaveholding states were based. By effectively implying that enslaved people were less than fully human and denying them voting rights, this clause enshrined racial prejudice in the Constitution’s foundations. Though the Three-Fifths Clause was eventually repealed in 1868, the political disenfranchisement of Black citizens persisted until the civil rights era and beyond.
The American Revolutionary War was also an unmitigated catastrophe for Native Americans. Based on the fear that a colonial victory would devastate their lands and betray their interests, Native American leaders such as Mohawk chief Thayendanegea had formed alliances with the British and provided them with strategic military support. Revolutionary armies then destroyed Native American towns and crops in western New York and Pennsylvania. At the war’s conclusion, Native American representatives were excluded from all negotiations, which ultimately resulted in significant loss of their lands and autonomy.
It may be tempting to see the American Revolution as a full-fledged victory for Enlightenment ideals of popular sovereignty and natural rights, but the actual application of these principles was spotty at best. Traditional narratives typically cite the love of liberty as its guiding principle and celebrate its democratic achievements, but its causes were far more complex. British efforts to consolidate control over the colonies in the years leading up to the war incited resistance from colonists seeking to maintain their autonomy, but the war’s roots lay in a variety of economic, political, and ideological disputes. Colonial elites sought the same rights as their counterparts in Britain, and their demands to levy taxes themselves and their resistance to the Crown heavily influenced the initial desire for independence. Merchants, however, primarily sought economic freedoms that would release them from British trade restrictions and taxes. Still others resisted British attempts to curb westward expansion and appropriate Native American lands. Ultimately, these diverse motives converged with growing popular protest and incited rebellions and violence, eventually leading to revolution.
The Haitian Revolution
Like the leaders of revolution in the North American colonies and France, the leaders of Haiti’s Revolution sought to reject tyranny and dismantle long-standing inequities. Unlike the British colonists, however, the Haitian revolutionaries made addressing racial discrimination and injustice their primary aim. The Haitian Revolution was the first uprising of enslaved people in history that not only toppled a colonial regime but also established national independence. Independence came at a tremendous cost, however, since France forced the new republic to pay steep indemnities to compensate French citizens for their property losses for many years, impoverishing the new nation. Nevertheless, the revolution represented one of the most significant challenges to colonialism raised in the Western Hemisphere.
Haitian Revolution.This 1802 engraving by Auguste Raffet depicts one of the major battles of the Haitian Revolution, the battle of Crête-à-Pierrot, which took place that year. The Haitian army initially suffered a crushing defeat there but eventually won an inspiring victory. (credit: “Haitian Revolution” by Auguste Raffet/Hebert in Library of Congress/Wikimedia Commons, Public Domain)
As France’s wealthiest colony, Saint-Domingue on the island of Hispaniola yielded roughly 40 percent of the sugar and nearly half the coffee imported to Europe in the eighteenth century. Producing these labor-intensive commodities depended on maintaining a ruthless regime that enslaved the majority of the colony’s population. At the beginning of the Haitian Revolution, roughly 500,000 enslaved people lived in Saint-Domingue, mostly of sub-Saharan African descent. A population of about forty thousand Whites was a mix of wealthy planters, middle-class professionals, and poor laborers. A third group of about thirty thousand were gens de couleur libres (a French term meaning free people of color), many of mixed-race heritage and some holding enslaved people themselves. Given sharp social divisions and the exploitation of the colony’s enslaved people, Saint-Domingue was poised for turmoil.
After news of the revolution in France reached the colony, its White planters and gens de couleur libres sent delegates to Paris in 1789 in hopes of securing greater economic and political freedoms from the French. Largely driven by self-interest, each group interpreted the principles and goals of the revolution differently. Whereas wealthy White planters sought political autonomy and greater freedom from trade restrictions, poor Whites were primarily interested in securing equal citizenship for themselves. Neither wealthy nor poor Whites were concerned with gaining equal political or legal rights for people of color. The gens de couleur libres, on the other hand, interpreted the revolutionary rhetoric of liberty to mean the extension of equal rights to all free people regardless of race. Given that some of them owned enslaved people, however, they did not call for an end to slavery. The incompatible goals of each group intensified hostilities among the free sectors of Saint-Domingue’s population. The conflict between Whites and gens de couleur libres exploded in 1791, after Haiti’s White population refused to acknowledge the citizenship rights that France had extended to wealthy people of color. The resulting turmoil and instability provided the perfect opportunity for rebellion, which expanded into a full-fledged revolution.
Although it may seem at first that the French Revolution and Enlightenment ideals provided the motivation for revolution in Haiti, much of the inspiration actually came from rumors that France had outlawed slavery, the existence of enslaved leaders poised to rebel against White plantation owners, and the influence of beliefs based on Vodou (Voodoo), a mix of Roman Catholic and indigenous West African religious practices. In August 1791, a group of enslaved people planning a rebellion met in a heavily wooded area known as Bois Caïman to formalize their pact in a Vodou ritual overseen by Dutty Boukman, a Vodou priest from Jamaica. It is difficult to know the precise nature of the ceremony. Because France had outlawed the practice of Vodou in its colonies, such gatherings were generally shrouded in secrecy. Nevertheless, it is clear that Vodou was a vital spiritual tradition for enslaved Africans, and one of the few areas in which they could achieve a sense of psychological independence. Due to its widespread appeal among Saint-Domingue’s enslaved population, Vodou thus united different rebel groups and played a significant role in propelling the revolution.
Within a few days of the Bois Caïman meeting, some gens de couleur libres joined forces with rebelling enslaved people in an uprising against White colonists. After initiating the rebellion in the north of Saint-Domingue and destroying numerous plantations, they continued to escalate the movement. By September 1791, revolt had spread to Port-au-Prince, the colony’s capital.
Other countries soon became involved in the rebellion in Haiti. In 1792, France, in an effort to stop the uprising in Haiti, sent troops to the island and extended the rights of citizenship to all free men of color in order to end their support for the rebellious enslaved people. By 1793, France found itself at war with most of the nations of Europe, including Britain and Spain. European rulers did not wish the French revolutionary sentiment that had led to the overthrow of Louis XVI to spread to their states, and France went to war to ensure that hostile monarchs did not bring an end to the revolution. In 1793, Britain and Spain landed troops in Haiti, where they supported the White colonists in their attempt to put down the slave rebellion. Both Spain and Britain hoped to weaken France by depriving it of revenues from the sale of Haitian sugar and to prevent the slave rebellion from spreading to their own Caribbean colonies. Military intervention did not end the rebellion, however. France officially abolished slavery in 1794, during the most radical phase of the revolution, and colonial officials in Saint-Domingue issued an emancipation decree.
With François-Dominique Toussaint Louverture, a military leader and formerly enslaved man, at the helm, many reforms were brought to the island of Hispaniola, which included Saint-Domingue and the Dominican Republic. Louverture freed the enslaved people in both colonies in 1801. He then promoted a constitution for the new nation of Haiti, which he nevertheless maintained was still part of the French Empire. The constitution was based on principles of natural rights and social contract theory similar to those that had guided the French and American Revolutions, but it also made Louverture governor-general of Haiti for life, gave him extensive powers, and allowed him to select his successor in office. Louverture also forced the formerly enslaved Haitian peasants to work in the sugarcane fields. Despite Louverture’s forced labor policy, Haiti, unlike the United States or France, directly addressed the issue of racial inequality, granted rights to all citizens regardless of race or social class, and extended citizenship to all Black, Indigenous, and mixed-raced people who had resided in the nation for at least one year. However, although political rights were extended to all male citizens, Haitian women had to wait until the twentieth century before receiving the right to vote, as did women in France and the United States.
The Island of Hispaniola.Hispaniola, an island in the Caribbean, is the home of the modern nations of Haiti and the Dominican Republic and was originally inhabited by the Taíno people of the Arawak tribe. (attribution: Copyright Rice University, OpenStax, under CC BY 4.0 license)
As the leader of the Haitian Revolution, Louverture was a target of French antagonism. Despite a brief cessation of hostilities, he was arrested in 1802 when Napoléon attempted to reclaim control of Saint-Domingue. After being deported to France, Louverture spent the brief remainder of his life in a French prison, writing his memoirs to defend himself against charges of treason.
IN THEIR OWN WORDS
Toussaint Louverture
After Toussaint Louverture, leader of the Haitian Revolution, was arrested by French troops and subsequently imprisoned in France in 1802, he began writing his memoirs to defend himself against accusations of treason. In the excerpt that follows, he details his commitment to the Haitian people, his vision for Haiti, and the integrity with which he led the fledgling country to independence.
If I did oblige my fellow-countrymen to work; it was to teach them the value of true liberty without license; it was to prevent corruption of morals; it was for the general happiness of the island, for the interest of the Republic. And I had effectually succeeded in my undertaking, since there could not be found in all the colony a single man unemployed, and the number of beggars had diminished to such a degree that, apart from a few in the towns, not a single one was to be found in the country . . .
It was my influence upon the people which was feared, and that these violent means were employed to destroy it. This caused me new reflections. Considering all the misfortunes which the colony had already suffered, the dwellings destroyed, assassinations committed, the violence exercised even upon women, I forgot all the wrongs which had been done me, to think only of the happiness of the island and the interest of the Government. . . . means have been employed against me which are only used against the greatest criminals. Doubtless, I owe this treatment to my color; but my color,—my color,—has it hindered me from serving my country with zeal and fidelity? Does the color of my skin impair my honor and my bravery?
Since I entered the service of the Republic, I have not claimed a penny of my salary . . . no one has been more prudent, more disinterested than I. I have only now and then received the extra pay allowed me; very often I have not asked even this. . . . I will sum up, in a few words, my conduct and the results of my administration. . . . I did not serve my country from interested motives; but, on the contrary, I served it with honor, fidelity, and integrity, sustained by the hope of receiving, at some future day, flattering acknowledgments from the Government; all who know me will do me this justice.
—Toussaint Louverture, Memoir of General Toussaint Louverture
How does Toussaint Louverture describe his role in the Haitian Revolution?
Why did the French consider him a threat, and why did they not support his cause even though they had just experienced their own revolution based on principles of liberty and equality?
How do the goals and ideals he lays out in this passage compare with those of other Atlantic revolutions of the era?
LINK TO LEARNING
See how others chose to depict Toussaint Louverture, both before and after his death in April 1803, in The Changing Faces of Toussaint Louverture at the John Carter Brown Library.
Although Napoléon attempted to reinstate slavery and reclaim French control of Saint-Domingue in 1802, his army was overpowered by the rebel army and Louverture’s successor, Jean-Jacques Dessalines. Dessalines and his victorious forces thereafter renamed their country Haiti, a term meaning mountainous that derived from the Taíno language of the precolonial people. After Dessalines declared Haiti’s sovereign independence on January 1, 1804, White plantation owners either fled or were killed, and lands were redistributed among Haiti’s former enslaved and free Black people. Despite the promise of Haiti’s fledgling nationhood, however, in 1825, France imposed an exorbitant independence debt that devastated the new country’s economy for many years thereafter. Principles of social equality, moreover, remained incomplete when former gens de couleur libres adopted the roles of the former plantation owners at the top of the social hierarchy. Thus, the Haitian Revolution did not bring lasting equality for all, but it did remove racial inequalities even though the gens de couleur libres brought an element of race into their views.
Despite economic instability and the complexities of race relations in Haiti after the revolution, its independence stood as a remarkable challenge to colonialism and the institution of slavery. Haiti also successfully resolved the incompatibility between revolutionary principles of liberty and the practice of slavery. The success of its revolution gave hope to other slave societies and sent shockwaves through slaveholding societies across the Atlantic. Ultimately, fear generated by the Haitian Revolution led to a conservative backlash among elites and a temporary expansion of slavery in neighboring countries such as Cuba. The United States did not officially recognize Haiti as an independent nation until 1862. However, the long-term legacy of Haitian independence later inspired slave revolts elsewhere in the Atlantic, such as the German Coast Uprising in Louisiana in 1811, and ultimately posed a significant challenge to the European colonial order.
1607–1754 in North America: colonies, slavery, and war
by Dr. Bryan Zygmont
American colonies
The early decades of the seventeenth century was a time of great cultural collision between several European powers in North America and the indigenous peoples who had occupied the continent for millennia.
Whereas generations of previous scholars have referred to this historical era as “Colonial America,” more recent writers have instead embraced the term “American Colonies.” Although this is a subtle change, it is an important one. Whereas Colonial America suggests a kind of singularity, American Colonies reinforces the plurality of those who came to settle on the Eastern seaboard in the larger context of North America.
Robert Walter Weir, Embarkation of the Pilgrims, 1857, oil on canvas, 122.2 x 183.5 cm (Brooklyn Museum)
Indeed, different groups of people came to differing parts of North America for a variety of distinct reasons. The Spanish conquistador Pedro Menendez de Aviles founded St. Augustine (in what is now Florida) in 1565. Samuel de Champlain founded the French colony of Quebec on the shores of the St. Lawrence river on 3 July 1608. The Dutch West India Company founded New Amsterdam (now New York) in July 1625.
John Smith founded the first English colony in Jamestown (named after King James I) in Virginia (named in honor of Queen Elizabeth I, the “Virgin Queen) in 1607. In the three decades that followed, other colonies began to dot the eastern seaboard.
The Pilgrims, Puritans led by William Bradford, landed at Plymouth Rock in what is now Massachusetts in 1620 and established Plymouth colony. In April 1630, a fleet of ships, with John Withrop and 700 colonists on board, embarked for New England, arriving in Salem that June. They established the Massachusetts Bay colony. Subsequent years saw the founding of Maryland (1632), Rhode Island (1636), and Connecticut (1636).
Why they came
Although these English colonies are united by a common language, they greatly differed in regards to the reason they were founded, who was attracted to settle them, and the religious affiliation of those colonialists. For example, Jamestown was not initially intended to be a lasting, permanent settlement—the initial envoy contained 105 men and 39 boys, but not a single woman.
The primary goal for this group of adventurers was to generate a profit, presumably through the discovery of gold, for the Virginia Company of London, the chartering company that financed the colony. Within a decade, those who had survived horrifically lean years had learned to harvest tobacco, a cash crop if ever there was one.
In the years that followed, those without — or without access to — family wealth arrived on the shores of Chesapeake Bay in search of their own fortunes. Because the overwhelming majority of those who landed in Virginia were Anglican, that is, belonging to the Church of England, it is clear that Virginia’s growth during the seventeenth century was largely the result of economic aspirations.
Map showing the Chesapeake Bay drainage basin (image: Kmusser, CC BY-SA 3.0)
In contrast, the Puritans who voyaged to New England did so not for material wealth, but in order to escape the religious persecution they had faced in England. Because the Puritans who immigrated to the New World did so in order to create a new, more perfect settlement (as opposed to financially exploit a new land), they closely recreated the patriarchal family structure that had been a part of their English roots. The Puritans believed this male-centered society mimicked God’s authority in the divine world and the supremacy of government in ours.
In time, Chesapeake Bay would develop immense tobacco plantations owned by the economic elite, and the lives of the colonists in New England would be defined by religious leadership and an increasingly wealthy merchant class.
The beginnings of slavery in the colonies
These regional differences, from the more densely populated areas of New England to the agrarian plantations in the tidewater area in Virginia, had profound repercussions as it pertains to the development of labor and the workforce. In many southern colonies, the need for labor far exceeded the supply that was then available. As a result, two related systems developed, rose to prominence, and were exploited in order to provide that labor: indentured servitude and slavery.
Although indentured servitude existed in the north, it was in the south (and particularly in the tidewater of Virginia) where it was most prevalent. There was more work to do than bodies to do it (in Virginia), and more (young) workers than quality jobs (in England). The able-bodied could sell their future labor — generally, but not always, seven years’ worth — for the cost of the westward voyage across the Atlantic Ocean, and then food and shelter once they arrived.
Although some women made this bargain, the majority of indentured servants were male. At the conclusion of their time of indenture, be it seven years or another amount, the person was free to seek other (that is, paid) employment.
Historians date the beginning of Colonial America to 1607 with the founding of Jamestown. It was not long after — less than 12 years — for enslaved Africans to be forcibly brought to Virginia. In August 1619 (400 years ago), the frigate White Lion, set ashore in Jamestown with 20 men and women from what is now Angola in southern Africa.
Covered sugar bowl, c. 1745, silver, 11.5 x 9.1 cm (Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art)
During the first part of the seventeenth century, African slaves were treated somewhat like indentured servants—their more willing European counterparts. As the seventeenth century progressed, however, Virginia introduced a variety of laws that increasingly codified forced slavery and transitioned African — who had a hope for freedom after seven years — to a life sentence of slavery, both for themselves and their born (or as yet unborn) children. The owning of African slaves spread rapidly, and in 1661, a law was passed that allowed any free (White) person to own slaves.
A global trade had already developed around sugar in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, bolstered by the growing popularity of tea, coffee, chocolate, and punch in Europe, that depended on the labor of enslaved people. It would take centuries and the American Civil War (1861–65), to finally dismantle the institution of slavery.
At the end of the seventeenth century, however, the enormous size of the tobacco and, increasingly, cotton plantations required more labor than the owners were willing to pay for, and as a result, the barbaric treatment of fellow human beings that had begun soon after the founding of Jamestown was vastly expanded.
The French and Indian War (Seven Year’s War)
We do not get everything right when it comes to our understanding of history. For example, many think of World War I (1914–18), as the first global conflict. However, the first war waged on numerous continents by a variety of world powers, was not fought early in the twentieth century, but rather was the Seven Years’ War (1756–63). This was a global conflict that had its genesis in 1754 in what American historians call the French and Indian War.
By the middle of the eighteenth century, the American colonies, and particularly those owned by Britain and France, had expanded to such an extent that there was tension along the borders of each countries’ purported borders. The British laid claim to the Atlantic seaboard from what is now Maine to Georgia, and France asserted ownership of what is now eastern and central Canada, the Ohio River Valley, and the area surrounding the Mississippi River (the state of Louisiana is named after the King of France, Louis XIV).
The French began to fortify their possessions through the construction of military forts, and this agitated the British settlers who were flooding into the fertile and largely unsettled land of the Ohio River Valley, parts of what are now Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Indiana.
In 1753, Robert Dinwiddie, the Lieutenant Governor of the Virginia, sent a young militia officer by the name of George Washington — yes, that George Washington — to the French Fort Le Boeuf, just south of Lake Erie, requesting that the French surrender and abandon their military post.
The French, confident in their position and unwilling to leave, sent Washington away. After he reported this news to Dinwiddie upon his return to Virginia in January 1754, the Lieutenant Governor sent a militia force to the “Forks of the Ohio,” the place where the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers conjoin to become the Ohio River. The mission: to construct Fort Prince George.
Bricks mark the outline of the former Fort Duquesne, Point State Park, Pittsburgh (photo: Kevin Myers, CC BY-SA 3.0)
Construction of this fort had begun by 17 February 1754, but about two months later, a French officer (Claude-Pierre Pécaudy de Contrecœur) led a battalion to seize the unfinished Fort Prince George from the British. Afterwards, the French continued this fort’s construction and renamed it Fort Duquesne.
Map of the French and Indian War (image: Hoodinski, CC BY-SA 3.0)
The lead up to revolution
In order to halt construction, the recently promoted Colonel Washington was dispatched with a small troop under his command to reacquire the fort. Washington and his men ambushed a 35-man French detachment on 28 May 1754. The British killed ten of these French soldiers, including the commanding officer, Joseph Coulon de Villiers, de Jumonville at what is now called the Battle of Jumonville Glen.
This small skirmish, which lasted no more than 15 minutes, is generally credited as the beginning of the French and Indian War and the larger Seven Years’ War. A brief encounter with truly great effect. Ultimately, the global conflict known as the Seven Years’ War would strain on the coffers of the British treasury. To recover those losses, the British Crown turned to their colonial subjects in the New World. The colonists would not be pleased with the taxation that followed.
Nicholas Pocock, The Battle of Quiberon Bay, 20 November 1759, 1812, oil on canvas, 67.3 x 108 cm (Royal Museums Greenwich)
Great Britain wins and loses
In 1759 when the North American component of the French and Indian War (also known as the Seven Years’ War) concluded, Britain’s control of the continent was all but assured and the balance of power in North America officially rested with Great Britain. As a result, France relinquished its territorial holdings in Canada and all its possessions east of the Mississippi River to their great rival.
The year 1760 not only saw the de facto conclusion of the French and Indian War, it also saw the ascension of George III to the British throne. The Seven Years’ War—a conflict Britain waged in Europe, Asia, and North America—had emptied Britain’s coffers to such an extent that the country had borrowed—from private investors and banks—more than £150 million pounds to finance the war. To put this into current terms, this sum amounts to tens of trillions—yes, trillions!—of dollars today.
If you are King George III and you need to raise money — tax the colonies
Allan Ramsay and studio, King George III in Coronation Robes, c.1765, oil on canvas, 236.2 x 158.7 cm (Art Gallery of South Australia)
As a result, Britain had two herculean obstacles at the end of the Seven Years’ War. In addition to being practically bankrupt, the rolls of the British army and had swelled to a size far greater than was necessary in peacetime. That payroll, combined with the already existing debt, required an immediate influx of money.
There are only so many ways in which governments can raise money. The most common way to do so is in the levying of taxes, and in the decade following the conclusion of this conflict, Britain specifically taxed their colonial subjects to such an extent that it was one of the primary causes for the rally for independence from the mother country.
The Sugar Act of 1764 was a continuation of the recently expired Molasses Act of 1733, and although the tax per gallon of molasses—crucial to the creation of rum—was decreased by half, the enforcement of the tax collection was greatly increased. The Stamp Act of 1765 taxed almost any product with paper, including legal documents and contracts, newspapers, and even playing cards. The failure of the Stamp Act brought about the Townshend Acts (1767–78) in which the crown attempted to tax everything from paper and tea to paint and lead.
Intolerable Acts
The spark that may have ignited the powder keg for independence, however, was the 1773 Tea Act. Finally, “no taxation without representation!” — made famous by James Otis in 1765—became a rallying cry for those who wanted to formally break with Great Britain. The Tea Act was passed on 10 May.
The Boston Tea Party—more a political act of resistance and defiance than anything else—took place late in the evening of 16 December 1773, a little more than seven months later.
Soon after, the British Parliament passed the first of the so-called Intolerable Acts, which were intended to punish the colonists and assert British control. The Boston Port Act, for example, provided the British navy the authority to prohibit all ships from either entering or leaving Boston harbor. Another, the Quartering Act of 1774, gave the royally appointed governor the authority to house British soldiers in private citizens homes.
The colonialists viewed these Intolerable Acts as nothing short of punitive acts of war. The Battles of Concord and Lexington, fought between the colonies and Britain, commenced the American Revolutionary War less than a year later.
John Trumbull, Surrender of Lord Cornwallis, 1820, oil on canvas, 365.7 x 548.6 cm (Rotunda U.S. Capitol)
The next fifteen years—that is, from 1775 until 1790—were tumultuous times in North America. If the war began on 19 April, 1775 at Concord and Lexington, it was the surrender of Lord Cornwallis after the Battle of Yorktown (17 October, 1781) that brought the fighting to an end. British and American delegates signed the Treaty of Paris on 2 September 1783, and this formalized the American colonies’ break with Great Britain. Those fifteen years also witnessed the writing of two of the most famous legal documents in the history of the United States.
The Declaration of Independence
Indeed, the Declaration of Independence (“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed, by their Creator, with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness”) and the Constitution of the United States (“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity…”) contain some of the most eloquent passages in regards to human governance that have been written.
John Trumbull, Declaration of Independence, 1819, oil on canvas, 366 x 549 cm (Rotunda U.S. Capitol)
But these two documents—the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution—had differing purposes. The first was to unite the colonial cause in opposition to tyranny, and the second was to create a working system of governance. Not surprisingly, the first of these—getting people to unite against despotism—is comparatively easier than the second.
The debates over the United States Constitution occupied large parts of the new nation from the moment it was presented in September 1787 until it was finally ratified by Rhode Island—the last of the 13 colonies—on 29 May, 1790. In the more than two and half years between those dates, something profound (yet not surprising) happened: two distinct groups—the Federalists and the Antifederalists—were formed because of vastly different views as to what the Constitution should be.
Title page of The Federalist: A Collection of Essays, Written in Favour of the New Constitution, as Agreed upon by the Federal Convention, September 17, 1787, Printed and sold by J. and A. McLean, New York, N.Y., 1788
The two-party system
This was the beginning of the two-party system in American politics. The Federalists—led by the writers of the Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison—advocated for a strong centralized federal government, while the Antifederalists—Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and Samuel Adams among others—believed that the United States was best served by having stronger states’ rights and a less prominent federal government.
The fact that Hamilton, Jay, and Madison needed to write the 85 essays that comprise what is collected as the Federalist Papers suggests the discord and disagreement that existed in the newly formed country in regards to what the United States was to become. This discord, however, was to continue through the end of the century with the creation of the two-party system that is part of American politics to this day.
Even though the American electoral landscape was somewhat united under the (comparatively) apolitical George Washington through the end of his second term as president in 1797, the voting for his successor in the election of 1796 was hotly contested and acrimonious, even within the political parties themselves. John Adams, Washington’s vice president, defeated Thomas Jefferson by a relatively narrow electoral count of 71 to 68. This election was indicative of the political divide that would continue to this day.
Inventing “America,” The Engravings of Theodore de Bry
by Dr. Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank
Theodore de Bry’s Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies
In the center of a print image we see a finely-dressed Christopher Columbus with two soldiers. Columbus stands confidently, his left foot forward with his pike planted firmly in the ground, signaling his claim over the land. Behind him to the left, three Spaniards raise a cross in the landscape, symbolizing a declaration of the land for both the Spanish monarchs and for the Christian God.
Theodore de Bry, Christopher Columbus arrives in America, 1594, engraving, 18.6 x 19.6 cm, from Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies(Collectiones peregrinationum in Indiam occidentalem), vol. 4: Girolamo Benzoni, Americae pars quarta. Sive, Insignis & admiranda historia de primera occidentali India à Christophoro Columbo (Frankfurt am Main: T. de Bry, 1594) (Rijksmuseum)
Unclothed Taínos, the Indigenous peoples of the island of Ayiti (better known by the later Spanish name, Hispaniola), walk toward Columbus bringing gifts of necklaces and other precious objects. Further in the background, on the right side of the print, other Taínos, with arms raised and twisting bodies, flee in fear from the Spanish ships anchored offshore.
This print from 1592, by the engraver Theodore de Bry, presents Columbus and his men as the harbingers of European civilization and faith, and juxtaposes them with Tainos, who are presented as uncivilized, unclothed, and pagan. This print, along with hundreds of others de Bry made for his 27 volume series, published over more than forty years, Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies (1590–1634), affirm and assert a sense of European superiority, as well as invent for Europeans what America—both its land and its people—was like.
Though de Bry is most famous for his engravings of European voyages to the Americas (and Africa, and Asia), he never actually traveled across the Atlantic. It is not surprising then that de Bry’s depiction of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas was a combination of the work of other artists who had accompanied Europeans to the Americas (artists were often brought on journeys in order to document the lands and peoples of the Americas for a European audience) as well as his own artistic inventions. For instance, he adapted (without credit) some of the images created by Johannes Stradanus, a well-known illustrator who created early images of the Americas. In his Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies, de Bry republished (and translated into multiple languages) the accounts of others who had spent time traveling around the globe, and created more than 600 engravings to illustrate the volumes. The engraving above of Columbus and the Taínos comes from volume 4 of the Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies. This volume reprinted the accounts of the Milanese traveler Girolamo Benzoni, who himself had drawn on the accounts of Columbus in his own writings.
The volumes of the Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies that treat the voyages across the Atlantic to the Americas are known as the Grands Voyages, while the Petit Voyages (small voyages), were those to Africa and Asia.
Documenting America
De Bry’s copperplate engravings were among the first images that Europeans encountered about the peoples, places, and things of the Americas, even if he began making them almost a century after Columbus’s initial voyage. In the ensgraving with Columbus on the shoreline, the barely clothed Taínos resemble Greco-Roman sculptures, especially their poses and musculature. De Bry apparently had no interest in documenting the actual appearance of the Taínos.
Left: Apollo Belvedere, c. 150 C.E., Roman copy of an original bronze statue of 330-320 B.C.E. (Vatican Museums) (photo: Tetraktys, CC BY-SA 3.0); right: detail. Theodore de Bry, Christopher Columbus arrives in America, 1594, etching and text in letterpress, 18.6 c 19.6 cm (Rijksmuseum)
De Bry’s Collected travels belongs to the genre of travel literature, which had been popular since the Middle Ages. Accounts of the Americas became wildly popular after Columbus’s first voyage. For example, Columbus’s 1493 letter to King Ferdinand and Queen Isabel (who had helped finance the voyage) was published in seventeen editions by 1497, and often included woodcuts depicting select moments of his voyage.
De Bry and his audiences
De Bry was a Protestant, and fled Liège (today in Belgium) where he was born to avoid persecution. He made his way to Frankfurt, which is where he started work on Grands Voyages. After his death in 1598, his family continued his work and finished the remaining volumes in 1634. Interestingly, different versions of the Grands Voyages catered to different Christian confessional groups. The volumes in German were geared towards Protestants, while those in Latin appealed to Catholics. De Bry created images that he could market to either audience, but he made changes to the texts to appeal more to either Catholics or Protestants. Psalms that Calvinists felt encapsulated their beliefs or longer passages criticizing Catholic beliefs or colonial practices were omitted from Latin versions, which were often filled in with more engravings duplicated from other parts of the text.
General subjects of the Grands Voyages engravings
Theodore de Bry, Indians pour liquid gold into the mouth of a Spaniard, 1594, from Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies(Collectiones peregrinationum in Indiam occidentalem)
While some of de Bry’s prints in Grands Voyages focus on the exploits of famed European navigators like Columbus, others show Indigenous groups and their customs. Some of these images display the atrocities that occurred in the wake of Europeans’ arrival, violent conquest, and colonization. Indigenous peoples are fed to dogs, hanged, or butchered. Still others depict native responses to the European invasion, such as drowning Spaniards in the ocean or pouring liquid gold into invaders’ mouths.
John White, The town of Secoton (bird’s-eye view of town with houses, lake at the top, fire, fields and ceremony), 1585-1593, watercolour over graphite, heightened with white (British Museum)
Travels to Virginia
The Grands Voyages (the section on cross-Atlantic voyages) begins with a reprint of an earlier text by the English colonist Thomas Hariot, A Brief and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia (1590). It also includes translations of this text into Latin, German, and French. De Bry’s accompanying engravings were based on watercolors by John White, who had settled on Roanoke Island, North Carolina in 1585 and who had created paintings while there. His watercolors document clothing, dwellings, and rituals of the eastern Algonquian peoples.
Even though Virginia and North Carolina were colonized by Europeans after they had seized other areas in the Americas, de Bry placed them in the first volume of his Grands Voyages. This may be because he had visited London just after Hariot’s book was published in 1588, and was given both that text and the watercolors of White. De Bry was clearly not interested in a providing a chronological account of European exploration and colonization.
One of White’s paintings represents the town of Secoton, with people going about their daily life activities. In the right foreground people dance in a circle. Corn grows in neat rows. Dwellings line a road. In his engraving, de Bry made several changes to White’s watercolor. He expanded the village and removed the textual inscriptions that identified important features of the village (instead incorporating a separate key).
Theodore de Bry, Bird’s-eye view of a native American village (Secoton), 1590, engraving (after the watercolor by John White above) for volume 1 of Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies which reprinted Thomas Hariot, A briefe and true report of the new found land of Virginia, of the commodities and of the nature and manners of the naturall inhabitants (British Library)
For his engravings, de Bry also transformed watercolors White had created of Scottish Picts (an ancient pagan Indigenous peoples of Scotland who lived in a loose confederation of groups and who painted their bodies). But why include a discussion of Picts in a book on the Americas?
Theodore de Bry, A Young Daughter of the Picts, 1590, engraving (after a watercolor by Jacques Le Moyne de Morgues — originally attributed to John White) for Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies which reprints Thomas Hariot, A briefe and true report of the new found land of Virginia, of the commodities and of the nature and manners of the naturall inhabitants (British Library)
Hariot’s text states that “Some picture of the Picts which in the old time did inhabit one part of the great Britain,” which according to him “show how that the inhabitants of the great Britain have been in times past as savage as those of Virginia.”[1] White compares them to the Algonquian peoples to suggest that Europe has its own history of uncivilized, pagan people. Despite attempting to reconcile the Algonquian peoples with the Picts in Europe, the manner in which he compares them—as savages—speaks to a presumed European superiority.
Theodore de Bry, Indians worship the column in honor of the French king, 1591, engraving for Collectiones peregrinationum in Indiam occidentalem, vol. 2: René de Laudonnière, Brevis narratio eorum quae in Florida Americae provincia Gallis acciderunt (Frankfurt am Main: J. Wechelus, 1591) (Rijksmuseum)
Jacques Le Moyne de Morgues, Laudonnierus et rex athore ante columnam a praefecto prima navigatione locatam quamque venerantur floridenses, gouache (New York Public Library)
Travels to Florida
Volume 2, published in 1591, focused on French voyages to Florida, and was based on the accounts of the French colonist René Goulaine de Laudonnière. De Bry created engravings based on the watercolors of Jacques Le Moyne de Morgues, who was part of the French expeditions to Florida that were headed by Jean Ribault in 1562 and Laudonnière in 1564. One of the engravings adapted from Le Moyne’s watercolors shows the Timucua worshipping a column that had supposedly been erected by Ribault. The most prominent figure, identified as chief Athore, stands next to Laudonnière, who has followed him to see the sight. The other Timucua kneel, while raising their arms in gestures of reverence in the direction of the column, itself decorated with garlands. Before it, offerings of food and vegetables abound. De Bry made several notable changes to the print, such as adjusting Athore’s features to look more European, with raised cheekbones and an aquiline nose. Le Moyne’s earlier watercolor had also Europeanized the Timucua peoples: he paints them with the same complexion as Laudonnière, but with even blonder hair.
Cannibalism in Brazil
Theodore de Bry, engraving depicting cannibalism in Brazil for volume 3 of Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies which reprinted Hans Staden’s account of his experiences in Brazil, 1594 (British Library)
Cannibalism was (and remains) commonly associated with certain Indigenous peoples of the Americas. In de Bry’s series, his third volume recounted Hans Staden’s experiences of cannibalism in Brazil. De Bry’s engravings for this volume were among the most well-known in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century, in large part because of their gruesome and sensationalistic character. Note that de Bry’s print, “Indians pour liquid gold into the mouth of a Spaniard,” may also depict cannibalism among the figures shown in the background.
Theodore de Bry, engraving depicting cannibalism in Brazil for volume 3 of Collected travels in the east Indies and west Indies which reprinted Hans Staden’s account of his experiences in Brazil, 1594 (British Library)
Staden, a German soldier who traveled to South America, had been captured in 1553 by the Tupinambá, an Indigenous group in Brazil. After his return to Europe in 1557, he wrote about Tupinambá customs, family life, and cannibalism, describing how the Tupinambá practiced it ceremonially, especially eating their enemies. Staden’s initial book included simple woodcuts, but de Bry’s updated engravings proved far more popular and enduring in the European cultural imagination. Perceptions of Indigenous Brazilians were shaped by these images, and reinforced the notion that the Tupinambá, and others like them, were depraved, primitive, and sinful.
One of his images depicts naked adults and children drinking a broth made from a human head and intestines, visible on plates amidst the gathering of people. Another depiction of the Tupinamba shows a fire below a grill, upon which body parts are roasted. Figures surround the grill, eating. In the back is a bearded figure, most likely intended to be Staden. Hand-colored versions of de Bry’s prints emphasize the disturbing subject of the images even more.
Cannibalism would come to be closely associated with peoples of the Americas. De Bry would even use images of cannibals to serve as the engraved frontispiece to volume 3. Showing the Tupinambá eating human flesh exoticized them, and justified European control.
Other volumes and the legacy of de Bry
The fourth, fifth, and sixth volumes of the set focus on Girolamo Benzoni’s accounts, such as Historia Mondo Nuovo, with part 6 discussing the atrocities committed against the Indigenous population of Peru. Parts 7 to 12 incorporated the travel accounts of Ulricus Faber, Sir Francis Drake and Walter Raleigh, José de Acosta, Amerigo Vespucci, John Smith, and Antonio de Herrera among others. Like the volumes that came before them, de Bry provided numerous images to increase readers understanding of the narratives.
The Grands Voyages, and the entire Collected Travels, relate more generally to the forms of knowledge and collecting popular at the time. Like a cabinet of curiosity, de Bry’s project organized information in text and images so that readers could come to know the Americas. The volumes seek to provide encyclopedic knowledge about the Americas, much as the objects did in a curiosity cabinet. De Bry’s many prints were important resources for Europeans who sought to better understand the Americas. It allowed readers to take possession of these distant lands and peoples, where they could become participants in the colonial projects then underway, allowing them to feel a sense of dominance over the peoples and lands across the Atlantic—lands which many in Europe would never see firsthand. These often inaccurate images and narratives supported a sense of superiority, with Europeans positioned as more civilized and advanced, and the American “others” as less so. De Bry’s images of America would cement for Europeans a vision of what America was like for centuries to come.
[1] “Some Pictvre of the Pictes which in the olde tyme dyd habite one part of the great Bretainne,” which according to him “showe how that the inhabitants of the great Bretainne haue been in times past as sauuage as those of Virginia.” 67. Thomas Hariot, with illustrations by John White, A Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia (1590).
Rodney Leon, African Burial Ground National Monument, 2006, New York City, an ARCHES video, speakers Dr. Renée Ater and Dr. Steven Zucker URL: https://youtu.be/iKLPUjmt5ao
The Journals of Christopher Columbus (During his First Voyage, 1492-1493)
Christopher Columbus (1451-1506 C.E.)
Composed between 1492-93 C.E.
Italy
Christopher Columbus was a Genoese Italian sailor and navigator who persuaded Spanish King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella to fund an expedition in 1492 to find a shorter route to India by sailing west. In October 1492, Columbus and his crew arrived in the Bahamas, believing that they had found Asia. Columbus made four transatlantic voyages and wrote letters, reports, and journal entries (not private entries, but entries to be read by other people) about his voyages. Some of the journal entries were entirely or partially lost. The journal for the first voyage was lost but partly reconstructed. Although Columbus was once celebrated as a hero who “discovered” America, this view has been challenged by other records of earlier travelers and the destructive consequences that European exploration and colonization of the Americas have had on indigenous peoples. Columbus’s journal entries and letters shed light on transatlantic cross-cultural encounters in the fifteenth and sixteenth century.
Written by Kyounghye Kwon
Monument to Columbus | Statues of Christopher Columbus and Queen Isabella in Madrid. Author: Luis García Source: Wikimedia Commons License: CC BY-SA 2.5
Selections from the Journals of Christopher Columbus The First Voyage
License: Public Domain
Christopher Columbus, translated by Clements R. Markham
This is the first voyage and the routes and direction taken by the Admiral Don Cristobal Colon when he discovered the Indies, summarized; except the prologue made for the Sovereigns, which is given word for word and commences in this manner. In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.
BECAUSE, O most Christian, and very high, very excellent, and puissant Princes, King and Queen of the Spains and of the islands of the Sea, our Lords, in this present year of 1492, after your Highnesses had given an end to the war with the Moors who reigned in Europe, and had finished it in the very great city of Granada, where in this present year, on the second day of the month of January, by force of arms, I saw the royal banners of your Highnesses placed on the towers of Alfambra, which is the fortress of that city, and I saw the Moorish King come forth from the gates of the city and kiss the royal hands of your Highnesses, and of the Prince my Lord, and presently in that same month, acting on the information that I had given to your Highnesses touching the lands of India, and respecting a Prince who is called Gran Can, which means in our language King of Kings, how he and his ancestors had sent to Rome many times to ask for learned men of our holy faith to teach him, and how the Holy Father had never complied, insomuch that many people believing in idolatries were lost by receiving doctrine of perdition: YOUR Highnesses, as Catholic Christians and Princes who love the holy Christian faith, and the propagation of it, and who are enemies to the sect of Mahoma and to all idolatries and heresies, resolved to send me, Cristobal Colon, to the said parts of India to see the said princes, and the cities and lands, and their disposition, with a view that they might be converted to our holy faith; and ordered that I should not go by land to the eastward, as had been customary, but that I should go by way of the west, whither up to this day, we do not know for certain that any one has gone.
Thus, after having turned out all the Jews from all your kingdoms and lordships, in the same month of January, your Highnesses gave orders to me that with a sufficient fleet
I should go to the said parts of India, and for this they made great concessions to me, and ennobled me, so that henceforward I should be called Don, and should be Chief Admiral of the Ocean Sea, perpetual Viceroy and Governor of all the islands and continents that I should discover and gain, and that I might hereafter discover and gain in the Ocean Sea, and that my eldest son should succeed, and so on from generation to generation for ever.
I left the city of Granada on the 12th day of May, in the same year of 1492, being Saturday, and came to the town of Palos, which is a seaport; where I equipped three vessels well suited for such service; and departed from that port, well supplied with provisions and with many sailors, on the 3d day of August of the same year, being Friday, half an hour before sunrise, taking the route to the islands of Canaria, belonging to your Highnesses, which are in the said Ocean Sea, that I might thence take my departure for navigating until I should arrive at the Indies, and give the letters of your Highnesses to those princes, so as to comply with my orders. As part of my duty I thought it well to write an account of all the voyage very punctually, noting from day to day all that I should do and see, and that should happen, as will be seen further on. Also, Lords Princes, I resolved to describe each night what passed in the day, and to note each day how I navigated at night. I propose to construct a new chart for navigating, on which I shall delineate all the sea and lands of the Ocean in their proper positions under their bearings; and further, I propose to prepare a book, and to put down all as it were in a picture, by latitude from the equator, and western longitude. Above all, I shall have accomplished much, for I shall forget sleep, and shall work at the business of navigation, that so the service may be performed; all which will entail great labour.
Friday, 3d of August
We departed on Friday, the 3d of August, in the year 1492, from the bar of Saltes, at 8 o’clock, and proceeded with a strong sea breeze until sunset, towards the south, for 60 miles, equal to 15 leagues; afterwards S.W. and W.S.W., which was the course for the Canaries.
Saturday, 4th of August
They steered S.W. \ S.
Sunday, 5th of August
They continued their course day and night more than 40 leagues.
Monday, 6th of August
The rudder of the caravel Pinta became unshipped, and Martin Alonso Pinzon, who was in command, believed or suspected that it was by contrivance of Gomes Rascon and Cristobal Quintero, to whom the caravel belonged, for they dreaded to go on that voyage. The Admiral says that, before they sailed, these men had been displaying a certain backwardness, so to speak. The Admiral was much disturbed at not being able to help the said caravel without danger, and he says that he was eased of some anxiety when he reflected that Martin Alonso Pinzon was a man of energy and ingenuity. They made, during the day and night, 29 leagues.
Tuesday, 7th of August
The rudder of the Pinta was shipped and secured, and they proceeded on a course for the island of Lanzarote, one of the Canaries. They made, during the day and night, 25 leagues.
Wednesday, 8th of August
Opinions respecting their position varied among the pilots of the three caravels; but that of the Admiral proved to be nearer the truth. He wished to go to Gran Canaria, to leave the caravel Pinta, because she was disabled by the faulty hanging of her rudder, and was making water. He intended to obtain another there if one could be found. They could not reach the place that day.
Thursday, 9th of August
The Admiral was not able to reach Gomera until the night of Sunday, while Martin Alonso remained on that coast of Gran Canaria by order of the Admiral, because his vessel could not be navigated. Afterwards the Admiral took her to Canaria, and they repaired the Pinta very thoroughly through the pains and labour of the Admiral, of Martin Alonso, and of the rest. Finally they came to Gomera. They saw a great fire issue from the mountain of the island of Tenerife, which is of great height. They rigged the Pinta with square sails, for she was lateen rigged; and the Admiral reached Gomera on Sunday, the 2nd of September, with the Pinta repaired.
The Admiral says that many honourable Spanish gentlemen who were at Gomera with Dona Ines Peraza, mother of Guillen Peraza (who was afterwards the first Count of Gomera), and who were natives of the island of Hierro, declared that every year they saw land to the west of the Canaries; and others, natives of Gomera, affirmed the same on oath. The Admiral here says that he remembers, when in Portugal in the year 1484, a man came to the King from the island of Madeira, to beg for a caravel to go to this land that was seen, who swore that it could be seen every year, and always in the same way. He also says that he recollects the same thing being affirmed in the islands of the Azores; and all these lands were described as in the same direction, and as being like each other, and of the same size. Having taken in water, wood, and meat, and all else that the men had who were left at Gomera by the Admiral when he went to the island of Canaria to repair the caravel Pinta, he finally made sail from the said island of Gomera, with his three caravels, on Thursday, the 6th day of September.
Thursday, 6th of September
He departed on that day from the port of Gomera in the morning, and shaped a course to go on his voyage; having received tidings from a caravel that came from the island of Hierro that three Portuguese caravels were off that island with the object of taking him. There was a calm all that day and night, and in the morning he found himself between Gomera and Tenerife.
Friday, 7th of September
The calm continued all Friday and Saturday, until the third hour of the night.
Saturday, 8th of September
At the third hour of Saturday night it began to blow from the N.E., and the Admiral shaped a course to the west. He took in much sea over the bows, which retarded progress, and 9 leagues were made in that day and night.
Sunday, 9th of September
This day the Admiral made 19 leagues, and he arranged to reckon less than the number run, because if the voyage was of long duration, the people would not be so terrified and disheartened. In the night he made 120 miles, at the rate of 12 miles an hour, which are 30 leagues. The sailors steered badly, letting the ship fall off to N.E., and even more, respecting which the Admiral complained many times.
Monday, 10th of September
In this day and night he made 60 leagues, at the rate of 10 miles an hour, which are 2 1/2 leagues; but he only counted 48 leagues, that the people might not be alarmed if the voyage should be long.
Tuesday, 11th of September
That day they sailed on their course, which was west, and made 20 leagues and more. They saw a large piece of the mast of a ship of 120 tons, but were unable to get it. In the night they made nearly 20 leagues, but only counted 16, for the reason already given.
Wednesday, 12th of September
That day, steering their course, they made 33 leagues during the day and night, counting less.
Thursday, 13th of September
That day and night, steering their course, which was west, they made 33 leagues, counting 3 or 4 less. The currents were against them. On this day, at the commencement of the night, the needles turned a half point to northwest, and in the morning they turned somewhat more north-west.
Friday, 14th of September
That day they navigated, on their westerly course, day and night, 20 leagues, counting a little less. Here those of the caravel Niña reported that they had seen a tern and a boatswain bird, and these birds never go more than 25 leagues from the land.
Saturday, 15th of September
That day and night they made 27 leagues and rather more on their west course; and in the early part of the night there fell from heaven into the sea a marvellous flame of fire, at a distance of about 4 or 5 leagues from them.
Sunday, 16th of September
That day and night they steered their course west, making 39 leagues, but the Admiral only counted 36. There were some clouds and small rain. The Admiral says that on that day, and ever afterwards, they met with very temperate breezes, so that there was great pleasure in enjoying the mornings, nothing being wanted but the song of nightingales. He says that the weather was like April in Andalusia. Here they began to see many tufts of grass which were very green, and appeared to have been quite recently torn from the land. From this they judged that they were near some island, but not the main land, according to the Admiral, “because,” as he says, “I make the main land to be more distant.”
Monday, 17th of September
They proceeded on their west course, and made over 50 leagues in the day and night, but the Admiral only counted 47. They were aided by the current. They saw much very fine grass and herbs from rocks, which came from the west. They, therefore, considered that they were near land. The pilots observed the north point, and found that the needles turned a full point to the west of north. So the mariners were alarmed and dejected, and did not give their reason. But the Admiral knew, and ordered that the north should be again observed at dawn. They then found that the needles were true. The cause was that the star makes the movement, and not the needles.
At dawn, on that Monday, they saw much more weed appearing, like herbs from rivers, in which they found a live crab, which the Admiral kept. He says that these crabs are certain signs of land. The sea-water was found to be less salt than it had been since leaving the Canaries. The breezes were always soft. Everyone was pleased, and the best sailers went ahead to sight the first land. They saw many tunny-fish, and the crew of the Niña killed one. The Admiral here says that these signs of land came from the west, “in which direction I trust in that high God in whose hands are all victories that very soon we shall sight land”. In that morning he says that a white bird was seen which has not the habit of sleeping on the sea, called rabo de junco (boatswain-bird).
Tuesday, 18th of September
This day and night they made over 55 leagues, the Admiral only counting 48. In all these days the sea was very smooth, like the river at Seville. This day Martin Alonso, with the Pinta, which was a fast sailer, did not wait, for he said to the Admiral, from his caravel, that he had seen a great multitude of birds flying westward, that he hoped to see land that night, and that he therefore pressed onward, A great cloud appeared in the north, which is a sign of the proximity of land.
Wednesday, 17th of September
The Admiral continued on his course, and during the day and night he made but 25 leagues because it was calm. He counted 22. This day, at 10 o’clock, a booby came to the ship, and in the afternoon another arrived, these birds not generally going more than 20 leagues from the land. There was also some drizzling rain without wind, which is a sure sign of land. The Admiral did not wish to cause delay by beating to windward to ascertain whether land was near, but he considered it certain that there were islands both to the north and south of his position, (as indeed there were, and he was passing through the middle of them). For his desire was to press onwards to the Indies, the weather being fine. For on his return, God willing, he could see all. These are his own words. Here the pilots found their positions. He of the Niña made the Canaries 440 leagues distant, the Pinta 420. The pilot of the Admiral’s ship made the distance exactly 400 leagues.
Thursday, 20th of September
This day the course was W. b. N., and as her head was all round the compass owing to the calm that prevailed, the ships made only 7 or 8 leagues. Two boobies came to the ship, and afterwards another, a sign of the proximity of land. They saw much weed, although none was seen on the previous day. They caught a bird with the hand, which was like a tern. But it was a river-bird, not a sea-bird, the feet being like those of a gull. At dawn two or three landbirds came singing to the ship, and they disappeared before sunset. Afterwards a booby came from W.N.VV., and flew to the S.VV., which was a sign that it left land in the W.N.VV.; for these birds sleep on shore, and go to sea in the mornings in search of food, not extending their flight more than 20 leagues from the land.
Friday, 21st of September
Most of the day it was calm, and later there was a little wind. During the day and night they did not make good more than 13 leagues. At dawn they saw so much weed that the sea appeared to be covered with it, and it came from the west. A booby was seen. The sea was very smooth, like a river, and the air the best in the world. They saw a whale, which is a sign that they were near land, because they always keep near the shore.
Saturday, 22nd of September
They shaped a course W.N.W. more or less, her head turning from one to the other point, and made 30 leagues. Scarcely any weed was seen. They saw some sandpipers and another bird. Here the Admiral says: “This contrary wind was very necessary for me, because my people were much excited at the thought that in these seas no wind ever blew in the direction of Spain.” Part of the day there was no weed, and later it was very thick.
Sunday, 23rd of September
They shaped a course N.W., and at times more northerly; occasionally they were on their course, which was west, and they made about 22 leagues. They saw a dove and a booby, another river-bird, and some white birds. There was a great deal of weed, and they found crabs in it. The sea being smooth and calm, the crew began to murmur, saying that here there was no great sea, and that the wind would never blow so that they could return to Spain. Afterwards the sea rose very much, without wind, which astonished them. The Admiral here says: “Thus the high sea was very necessary to me, such as had not appeared but in the time of the Jews when they went out of Egypt and murmured against Moses, who delivered them out of captivity.”
Monday, 24th of September
The Admiral went on his west course all day and night, making 14 leagues. He counted 12. A booby came to the ship, and many sandpipers.
Image 11.13: The Voyages of Christopher Columbus | A map showing the four sea voyages taken to the New World by Columbus.
Author: User “JasonAQuest”
Source: Wikimedia Commons
License: CC BY-SA 3.0
Tuesday, 25th of September
This day began with a calm, and afterwards there was wind. They were on their west course until night. The Admiral conversed with Martin Alonso Pinzon, captain of the other caravel Pinta, respecting a chart which he had sent to the caravel three days before, on which, as it would appear, the Admiral had certain islands depicted in that sea. Martin Alonso said that the ships were in the position on which the islands were placed, and the Admiral replied that so it appeared to him: but it might be that they had not fallen in with them, owing to the currents which had always set the ships to the N.E., and that they had not made so much as the pilots reported. The Admiral then asked for the chart to be returned, and it was sent back on a line. The Admiral then began to plot the position on it, with the pilot and mariners. At sunset Martin Alonso went up on the poop of his ship, and with much joy called to the Admiral, claiming the reward as he had sighted land. When the Admiral heard this positively declared, he says that he gave thanks to the Lord on his knees, while Martin Alonso said the Gloria in excelsis with his people. The Admiral’s crew did the same. Those of the Niña all went up on the mast and into the rigging, and declared that it was land. It so seemed to the Admiral, and that it was distant 25 leagues. They all continued to declare it was land until night. The Admiral ordered the course to be altered from VV. to S.W., in which direction the land had appeared. That day they made 4 leagues on a west course, and 17 S.W. during the night, in all 21; but the people were told that 13 was the distance made good: for it was always feigned to them that the distances were less, so that the voyage might not appear so long. Thus two reckonings were kept on this voyage, the shorter being feigned, and the longer being the true one. The sea was very smooth, so that many sailors bathed alongside. They saw many dorados and other fish.
Wednesday, 26th of September
The Admiral continued on the west course until after noon. Then he altered course to S.W., until he made out that what had been said to be land was only clouds. Day and night they made 31 leagues, counting 24 for the people. The sea was like a river, the air pleasant and very mild.
Thursday, 27th of September
The course west, and distance made good during day and night 24 leagues, 20 being counted for the people. Many dorados came. One was killed. A boatswain-bird came.
Friday, 28th of September
The course was west, and the distance, owing to calms, only 14 leagues in day and night, 13 leagues being counted. They met with little weed; but caught two dorados, and more in the other ships.
Saturday, 29th of September
The course was west, and they made 24 leagues, counting 21 for the people. Owing to calms, the distance made good during day and night was not much. They saw a bird called rabiforcado (man-o’-war bird), which makes the boobies vomit what they have swallowed, and eats it, maintaining itself on nothing else. It is a sea-bird, but does not sleep on the sea, and does not go more than 20 leagues from the land. There are many of them at the Cape Verde Islands. Afterwards they saw two boobies. The air was very mild and agreeable, and the Admiral says that nothing was wanting but to hear the nightingale. The sea smooth as a river. Later, three boobies and a man-o’-war bird were seen three times. There was much weed.
Sunday, 30th of September
The western course was steered, and during the day and night, owing to calms, only 14 leagues were made, 11 being counted. Four boatswain-birds came to the ship, which is a great sign of land, for so many birds of this kind together is a sign that they are not straying or lost. They also twice saw four boobies. There was much weed. Note that the stars which are called las guardias (the Pointers), when night comes on, are near the western point, and when dawn breaks they are near the N.E. point; so that, during the whole night, they do not appear to move more than three lines or 9 hours, and this on each night. The Admiral says this, and also that at nightfall the needles vary a point westerly, while at dawn they agree exactly with the star. From this it would appear that the north star has a movement like the other stars, while the needles always point correctly.
Monday, 1st of October
Course west, and 25 leagues made good, counted for the crew as 20 leagues. There was a heavy shower of rain. At dawn the Admiral’s pilot made the distance from Hierro 578 leagues to the west. The reduced reckoning which the Admiral showed to the crew made it 584 leagues; but the truth which the Admiral observed and kept secret was 707.
Tuesday, 2nd of October
Course west, and during the day and night 39 leagues were made good, counted for the crew as 30. The sea always smooth. Many thanks be given to God, says the Admiral, that the weed is coming from east to west, contrary to its usual course. Many fish were seen, and one was killed. A white bird was also seen that appeared to be a gull.
Wednesday, 3rd of October
They navigated on the usual course, and made good 47 leagues, counted as 40. Sandpipers appeared, and much weed, some of it very old and some quite fresh and having fruit. They saw no birds. The Admiral, therefore, thought that they had left the islands behind them which were depicted on the charts. The Admiral here says that he did not wish to keep the ships beating about during the last week, and in the last few days when there were so many signs of land, although he had information of certain islands in this region. For he wished to avoid delay, his object being to reach the Indies. He says that to delay would not be wise.
Thursday, 4th of October
Course west, and 63 leagues made good during the day and night, counted as 46. More than forty sandpipers came to the ship in a flock, and two boobies, and a ship’s boy hit one with a stone. There also came a man-o’-war bird and a white bird like a gull.
Friday, 5th of October
The Admiral steered his course, going 11 miles an hour, and during the day and night they made good 57 leagues, as the wind increased somewhat during the night: 45 were counted. The sea was smooth and quiet. “To God”, he says, “be many thanks given, the air being pleasant and temperate, with no weed, many sandpipers, and flying-fish coming on the deck in numbers.”
Saturday, 6th of October
The Admiral continued his west course, and during day and night they made good 40 leagues, 33 being counted. This night Martin Alonso said that it would be well to steer south of west, and it appeared to the Admiral that Martin Alonso did not say this with respect to the island of Cipango. He saw that if an error was made the land would not be reached so quickly, and that consequently it would be better to go at once to the continent and afterwards to the islands.
Sunday, 7th of October
The west course was continued; for two hours they went at the rate of 12 miles an hour, and afterwards 8 miles an hour. They made good 23 leagues, counting 18 for the people. This day, at sunrise, the caravel Niña, which went ahead, being the best sailer, and pushed forward as much as possible to sight the land first, so as to enjoy the reward which the Sovereigns had promised to whoever should see it first, hoisted a flag at the mast-head and fired a gun, as a signal that she had sighted land, for such was the Admiral’s order. He had also ordered that, at sunrise and sunset, all the ships should join him; because those two times are most proper for seeing the greatest distance, the haze clearing away. No land was seen during the afternoon, as reported by the caravel Niña, and they passed a great number of birds flying from N. to S.W. This gave rise to the belief that the birds were either going to sleep on land, or were flying from the winter which might be supposed to be near in the land whence they were coming The Admiral was aware that most of the islands held by the Portuguese were discovered by the flight of birds. For this reason he resolved to give up the west course, and to shape a course W.S.W. for the two following days. He began the new course one hour before sunset. They made good, during the night, about 5 leagues, and 23 in the day, altogether 28 leagues.
Monday, 8th of October
The course was W.S.W., and 11 1/2 or 12 leagues were made good in the day and night; and at times it appears that they went at the rate of 1 5 miles an hour during the night (if the handwriting is not deceptive). The sea was like the river at Seville. “Thanks be to God,” says the Admiral, “the air is very soft like the April at Seville; and it is a pleasure to be here, so balmy are the breezes.” The weed seemed to be very fresh. There were many land-birds, and they took one that was flying to the S.W. Terns, ducks, and a booby were also seen.
Tuesday, 9th of October
The course was S.W., and they made 5 leagues. The wind then changed, and the Admiral steered W. by N. 4 leagues. Altogether, in day and night, they made 11 leagues by day and 20 1/2 leagues by night; counted as 17 leagues altogether. Throughout the night birds were heard passing.
Wednesday, 10th of October
The course was W.S.W., and they went at the rate of 10 miles an hour, occasionally 12 miles, and sometimes 7. During the day and night they made 59 leagues, counted as no more than 44. Here the people could endure no longer. They complained of the length of the voyage. But the Admiral cheered them up in the best way he could, giving them good hopes of the advantages they might gain from it. He added that, however much they might complain, he had to go to the Indies, and that he would go on until he found them, with the help of our Lord.
Thursday, 11th of October
The course was W.S.W., and there was more sea than there had been during the whole of the voyage. They saw sandpipers, and a green reed near the ship. Those of the caravel Pinta saw a cane and a pole, and they took up another small pole which appeared to have been worked with iron; also another bit of cane, a land-plant, and a small board. The crew of the caravel Niña also saw signs of land, and a small branch covered with berries. Everyone breathed afresh and rejoiced at these signs. The run until sunset was 26 leagues.
After sunset the Admiral returned to his original west course, and they went along at the rate of 12 miles an hour. Up to two hours after midnight they had gone 90 miles, equal to 22 1/2 leagues. As the caravel Pinta was a better sailer, and went ahead of the Admiral, she found the land, and made the signals ordered by the Admiral. The land was first seen by a sailor named Rodrigo de Triana. But the Admiral, at ten in the previous night, being on the castle of the poop, saw a light, though it was so uncertain that he could not affirm it was land. He called Pero Gutierrez, a gentleman of the Kings bedchamber, and said that there seemed to be a light, and that he should look at it. He did so, and saw it. The Admiral said the same to Rodrigo Sanchez of Segovia, whom the King and Queen had sent with the fleet as inspector, but he could see nothing, because he was not in a place whence anything could be seen. After the Admiral had spoken he saw the light once or twice, and it was like a wax candle rising and falling. It seemed to few to be an indication of land; but the Admiral made certain that land was close. When they said the Salve, which all the sailors were accustomed to sing in their way, the Admiral asked and admonished the men to keep a good look-out on the forecastle, and to watch well for land; and to him who should first cry out that he saw land, he would give a silk doublet, besides the other rewards promised by the Sovereigns, which were 10,000 maravedis to him who should first see it. At two hours after midnight the land was sighted at a distance of two leagues. They shortened sail, and lay by under the mainsail without the bonnets. The vessels were hove to, waiting for daylight; and on Friday they arrived at a small island of the Lucayos, called, in the language of the Indians, Guanahani. Presently they saw naked people. The Admiral went on shore in the armed boat, and Martin Alonso Pinzon, and Vicente Yanez, his brother, who was captain of the Niña. The Admiral took the royal standard, and the captains went with two banners of the green cross, which the Admiral took in all the ships as a sign, with an F and a Y and a crown over each letter, one on one side of the cross and the other on the other. Having landed, they saw trees very green, and much water, and fruits of diverse kinds. The Admiral called to the two captains, and to the others who leaped on shore, and to Rodrigo Escovedo, secretary of the whole fleet, and to Rodrigo Sanchez of Segovia, and said that they should bear faithful testimony that he, in presence of all, had taken, as he now took, possession of the said island for the King and for the Queen, his Lords making the declarations that are required, as is more largely set forth in the testimonies which were then made in writing.
Presently many inhabitants of the island assembled. What follows is in the actual words of the Admiral in his book of the first navigation and discovery of the Indies. “I,” he says, “that we might form great friendship, for I knew that they were a people who could be more easily freed and converted to our holy faith by love than by force, gave to some of them red caps, and glass beads to put round their necks, and many other things of little value, which gave them great pleasure, and made them so much our friends that it was a marvel to see. They afterwards came to the ship’s boats where we were, swimming and bringing us parrots, cotton threads in skeins, darts, and many other things; and we exchanged them for other things that we gave them, such as glass beads and small bells. In fine, they took all, and gave what they had with good will. It appeared to me to be a race of people very poor in everything. They go as naked as when their mothers bore them, and so do the women, although I did not see more than one young girl. All I saw were youths, none more than thirty years of age. They are very well made, with very handsome bodies, and very good countenances. Their hair is short and coarse, almost like the hairs of a horse’s tail. They wear the hairs brought down to the eyebrows, except a few locks behind, which they wear long and never cut. They paint themselves black, and they arc the colour of the Canarians, neither black nor white. Some paint themselves white, others red, and others of what colour they find. Some paint their faces, others the whole body, some only round the eyes, others only on the nose. They neither carry nor know anything of arms, for I showed them swords, and they took them by the blade and cut themselves through ignorance. They have no iron, their darts being wands without iron, some of them having a fish’s tooth at the end, and others being pointed in various ways. They are all of fair stature and size, with good faces, and well made. I saw some with marks of wounds on their bodies, and I made signs to ask what it was, and they gave me to understand that people from other adjacent islands came with the intention of seizing them, and that they defended themselves. I believed, and still believe, that they come here from the mainland to take them prisoners. They should be good servants and intelligent, for I observed that they quickly took in what was said to them, and I believe that they would easily be made Christians, as it appeared to me that they had no religion. I, our Lord being pleased, will take hence, at the time of my departure, six natives for your Highnesses, that they may learn to speak. I saw no beast of any kind except parrots, on this island.” The above is in the words of the Admiral.
Saturday, 13th of October
“As soon as dawn broke many of these people came to the beach, all youths, as I have said, and all of good stature, a very handsome people. Their hair is not curly, but loose and coarse, like horse hair. In all the forehead is broad, more so than in any other people I have hitherto seen. Their eyes are very beautiful and not small, and themselves far from black, but the colour of the Canarians. Nor should anything; else be expected, as this island is in a line east and west from the island of Hierro in the Canaries. Their legs are very straight, all in one line, and no belly, but very well formed. They came to the ship in small canoes, made out of the trunk of a tree like a long boat, and all of one piece, and wonderfully worked, considering the country. They are large, some of them holding 40 to 45 men, others smaller, and some only large enough to hold one man. They are propelled with a paddle like a baker’s shovel, and go at a marvellous rate. If the canoe capsizes they all promptly begin to swim, and to bale it out with calabashes that they take with them. They brought skeins of cotton thread, parrots, darts, and other small things which it would be tedious to recount, and they give all in exchange for anything that may be given to them. I was attentive, and took trouble to ascertain if there was gold. I saw that some of them had a small piece fastened in a hole they have in the nose, and by signs I was able to make out that to the south, or going from the island to the south, there was a king who had great cups full, and who possessed a great quantity. I tried to get them to go there, but afterwards I saw that they had no inclination. I resolved to wait until to-morrow in the afternoon and then to depart, shaping a course to the S.W., for, according to what many of them told me, there was land to the S., to the S.W., and N.W., and that the natives from the N.W. often came to attack them, and went on to the S.W. in search of gold and precious stones.
“This island is rather large and very flat, with bright green trees, much water, and a very large lake in the centre, without any mountain, and the whole land so green that it is a pleasure to look on it. The people are very docile, and for the longing to possess our things, and not having anything to give in return, they take what they can get, and presently swim away. Still, they give away all they have got, for whatever may be given to them, down to broken bits of crockery and glass. I saw one give 16 skeins of cotton for three ceotis of Portugal, equal to one blanca of Spain, the skeins being as much as an arroba of cotton thread. I shall keep it, and shall allow no one to take it, preserving it all for your Highnesses, for it may be obtained in abundance. It is grown in this island, though the short time did not admit of my ascertaining this for a certainty. Here also is found the gold they wear fastened in their noses. But, in order not to lose time, I intend to go and see if I can find the island of Cipango. Now, as it is night, all the natives have gone on shore with their canoes.”
Sunday, 14th of October
“At dawn I ordered the ship’s boat and the boats of the caravels to be got ready, and I went along the coast of the island to the N.N.E., to see the other side, which was on the other side to the east, and also to see the villages. Presently I saw two or three, and the people all came to the shore, calling out and giving thanks to God. Some of them brought us water, others came with food, and when they saw that I did not want to land, they got into the sea, and came swimming to us. We understood that they asked us if we had come from heaven. One old man came into the boat, and others cried out, in loud voices, to all the men and women, to come and see the men who had come from heaven, and to bring them to eat and drink. Many came, including women, each bringing something, giving thanks to God, throwing themselves on the ground and shouting to us to come on shore. But I was afraid to land, seeing an extensive reef of rocks which surrounded the island, with deep water between it and the shore forming a port large enough for as many ships as there are in Christendom, but with a very narrow entrance. It is true that within this reef there are some sunken rocks, but the sea has no more motion than the water in a well. In order to see all this I went this morning, that I might be able to give a full account to your Highnesses, and also where a fortress might be established. I saw a piece of land which appeared like an island, although it is not one, and on it there were six houses. It might be converted into an island in two days, though I do not see that it would be necessary, for these people are very simple as regards the use of arms, as your Highnesses will see from the seven that I caused to be taken, to bring home and learn our language and return; unless your Highnesses should order them all to be brought to Castille, or to be kept as captives on the same island; for with fifty men they can all be subjugated and made to do what is required of them. Close to the above peninsula there are gardens of the most beautiful trees I ever saw, and with leaves as green as those of Castille in the month of April and May, and much water. I examined all that port, and afterwards I returned to the ship and made sail. I saw so many islands that I hardly knew how to determine to which I should go first. Those natives I had with me said, by signs, that there were so many that they could not be numbered, and they gave the names of more than a hundred. At last I looked out for the largest, and resolved to shape a course for it, and so I did. It will be distant five leagues from this of San Salvador, and the others some more, some less. All are very flat, and all are inhabited. The natives make war on each other, although these are very simple-minded and handsomely-formed people.”
Monday, 15th of October
“I had laid by during the night, with the fear of reaching the land to anchor before daylight, not knowing whether the coast was clear of rocks, and at dawn I made sail. As the island was more than 5 leagues distant and nearer 7, and the tide checked my way, it was noon when we arrived at the said island. I found that side facing towards the island of San Salvador trended north and south with a length of 5 leagues, and the other which I followed ran east and west for more than 10 leagues. As from this island I saw another larger one to the west, I clued up the sails, after having run all that day until night, otherwise I could not have reached the western cape. I gave the name of Santa Maria de la Concepcion to the island, and almost as the sun set I anchored near the said cape to ascertain if it contained gold. For the people I had taken from the island of San Salvador told me that here they wore very large rings of gold on their arms and legs. I really believed that all they said was nonsense, invented that they might escape. My desire was not to pass any island without taking possession, so that, one having been taken, the same may be said of all. I anchored, and remained until to-day, Tuesday, when I went to the shore with the boats armed, and landed. The people, who were numerous, went naked, and were like those of the other island of San Salvador. They let us go over the island, and gave us what we required. As the wind changed to the S.E., I did not like to stay, and returned to the ship. A large canoe was alongside the Niña, and one of the men of the island of San Salvador, who was on board, jumped into the sea and got into the canoe. In the middle of the night before, another swam away behind the canoe, which fled, for there never was boat that could have overtaken her, seeing that in speed they have a great advantage. So they reached the land and left the canoe. Some of my people went on shore in chase of them, but they all fled like fowls, and the canoe they had left was brought alongside the caravel Niña, whither, from another direction, another small canoe came, with a man who wished to barter with skeins of cotton. Some sailors jumped into the sea, because he would not come on board the caravel, and seized him. I was on the poop of my ship, and saw everything. So I sent for the man, gave him a red cap, some small beads of green glass, which I put on his arms, and small bells, which I put in his ears, and ordered his canoe, which was also on board, to be returned to him. I sent him on shore, and presently made sail to go to the other large island which was in sight to the westward. I also ordered the other large canoe, which the caravel Niña was towing astern, to be cast adrift; and I soon saw that it reached the land at the same time as the man to whom I had given the above things. I had not wished to take the skein of cotton that he offered me. All the others came round him and seemed astonished, for it appeared clear to them that we were good people. The other man who had fled might do us some harm, because we had carried him off, and for that reason I ordered this man to be set free and gave him the above things, that he might think well of us, otherwise, when your Highnesses again send an expedition, they might not be friendly. All the presents I gave were not worth four maravedis. At lo we departed with the wind S.W., and made for the south, to reach that other island, which is very large, and respecting which all the men that I bring from San Salvador make signs that there is much gold, and that they wear it as bracelets on the arms, on the legs, in the ears and nose, and round the neck. The distance of this island from that of Santa Maria is 9 leagues on a course east to west. All this part of the island trends N.W. and S.E., and it appeared that this coast must have a length of 28 leagues. It is very flat, without any mountain, like San Salvador and Santa Maria, all being beach without rocks, except that there are some sunken rocks near the land, whence it is necessary to keep a good lookout when it is desired to anchor, and not to come to very near the land; but the water is always very clear, and the bottom is visible. At a distance of two shots of a lombard, there is, off all these islands, such a depth that the bottom cannot be reached. These islands arc very green and fertile, the climate very mild. They may contain many things of which I have no knowledge, for I do not wish to stop, in discovering and visiting many islands, to find gold. These people make signs that it is worn on the arms and legs; and it must be gold, for they point to some pieces that I have. I cannot err, with the help of our Lord, in finding out where this gold has its origin. Being in the middle of the channel between these two islands, that is to say, that of Santa Maria and this large one, to which I give the name of Fernandina, I came upon a man alone in a canoe going from Santa Maria to Fernandina. He had a little of their bread, about the size of a fist, a calabash of water, a piece of brown earth powdered and then kneaded, and some dried leaves, which must be a thing highly valued by them, for they bartered with it at San Salvador. He also had with him a native basket with a string of glass beads, and two blancas, by which I knew that he had come from the island of San Salvador, and had been to Santa Maria, and thence to Fernandina. He came alongside the ship, and I made him come on board as he desired, also getting the canoe inboard, and taking care of all his property. I ordered him to be given to eat bread and treacle, and also to drink: and so I shall take him on to Fernandina, where I shall return everything to him, in order that he may give a good account of us, that, our Lord pleasing, when your Highnesses shall send here, those who come may receive honor, and that the natives may give them all they require.”
Tuesday, 16th of October
“I sailed from the island of Santa Maria de la Concepcion at about noon, to go to Fernandina island, which appeared very large to the westward, and I navigated all that day with light winds. I could not arrive in time to be able to see the bottom, so as to drop the anchor on a clear place, for it is necessary to be very careful not to lose the anchors. So I stood off and on all that night until day, when I came to an inhabited place where I anchored, and whence that man had come that I found yesterday in the canoe in mid channel. He had given such a good report of us that there was no want of canoes alongside the ship all that night, which brought us water and what they had to offer. I ordered each one to be given something, such as a few beads, ten or twelve of those made of glass on a thread, some timbrels made of brass such as are worth a maravedi in Spain, and some straps, all which they looked upon as most excellent. I also ordered them to be given treacle to eat when they came on board. At three o’clock I sent the ship’s boat on shore for water, and the natives with good will showed my people where the water was, and they themselves brought the full casks down to the boat, and did all they could to please us.“This island is very large, and I have determined to sail round it, because, so far as I can understand, there is a mine in or near it. The island is eight leagues from Santa Maria, nearly east and west; and this point I had reached, as well as all the coast, trends N.N.W. and S.S.E. I saw at least 20 leagues of it, and then it had not ended. Now, as I am writing this, I made sail with the wind at the south, to sail round the island, and to navigate until I find Samaot, which is the island or city where there is gold, as all the natives say who are on board, and as those of San Salvador and Santa Maria told us. These people resemble those of the said islands, with the same language and customs, except that these appear to me a rather more domestic and tractable people, yet also more subtle. For I observed that those who brought cotton and other trifles to the ship, knew better than the others how to make a bargain. In this island I saw cotton cloths made like mantles. The people were better disposed, and the women wore in front of their bodies a small piece of cotton which scarcely covered them.
“It is a very green island, level and very fertile, and I have no doubt that they sow and gather corn all the year round, as well as other things. I saw many trees very unlike those of our country. Many of them have their branches growing in different ways and all from one trunk, and one twig is one form, and another in a different shape, and so unlike that it is the greatest wonder in the world to see the great diversity; thus one branch has leaves like those of a cane, and others like those of a mastick tree: and on a single tree there are five or six different kinds. Nor are these grafted, for it may be said that grafting is unknown, the trees being wild, and untended by these people. They do not know any religion, and I believe they could easily be converted to Christianity, for they are very intelligent. Here the fish are so unlike ours that it is wonderful. Some are the shape of dories, and of the finest colours in the world, blue, yellow, red, and other tints, all painted in various ways, and the colours are so bright that there is not a man who would not be astonished, and would not take great delight in seeing them. There are also whales. I saw no beasts on the land of any kind, except parrots and lizards. A boy told me that he saw a large serpent. I saw neither sheep, nor goats, nor any other quadruped. It is true I have been here a short time, since noon, yet I could not have failed to see some if there had been any. I will write respecting the circuit of this island after I have been round it.”
Wednesday, 17th of October
“At noon I departed from the village off which I was anchored, and where I took in water, to sail round this island of Fernandina. The wind was S.W. and South. My wish was to follow the coast of this island to the S.E., from where I was, the whole coast trending N.N.W. and S.S.E.; because all the Indians I bring with me, and others, made signs to this southern quarter, as the direction of the island they call Samoet, where the gold is. Martin Alonso Pinzon, captain of the caravel Pinta, on board of which I had three of the Indians, came to me and said that one of them had given him to understand very positively that the island might be sailed round much quicker by shaping a N.N.W. course. I saw that the wind would not help me to take the course I desired, and that it was fair for the other, so I made sail to the N.N.W. When I was two leagues from the cape of the island, I discovered a very wonderful harbour. It has one mouth, or, rather, it may be said to have two, for there is an islet in the middle. Both are very narrow, and within it is wide enough for a hundred ships, if there was depth and a clean bottom, and the entrance was deep enough. It seemed desirable to explore it and take soundings, so I anchored outside, and went in with all the ship’s boats, when we saw there was insufficient depth. As I thought, when I first saw it, that it was the mouth of some river, I ordered the water-casks to be brought. On shore I found eight or ten men, who presently came to us and showed us the village, whither I sent the people for water, some with arms, and others with the casks: and, as it was some little distance, I waited two hours for them.
“During that time I walked among the trees, which was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen, beholding as much verdure as in the month of May in Andalusia. The trees are as unlike ours as night from day, as are the fruits, the herbs, the stones, and everything. It is true that some of the trees bore some resemblance to those in Castille, but most of them are very different, and some were so unlike that no one could compare them to anything in Castille. The people were all like those already mentioned: like them naked, and the same size. They give what they possess in exchange for anything that may be given to them. I here saw some of the ship’s boys bartering broken bits of glass and crockery for darts. The men who went for water told me that they had been in the houses of the natives, and that they were very plain and clean inside. Their beds and bags for holding things were like nets of cotton. The houses are like booths, and very high, with good chimneys. But, among many villages that I saw, there was none that consisted of more than from twelve to fifteen houses. Here they found that the married women wore clouts of cotton, but not the young girls, except a few who were over eighteen years of age. They had dogs, mastiffs and hounds; and here they found a man who had a piece of gold in his nose, the size of half a castellano, on which they saw letters. I quarrelled with these people because they would not exchange or give what was required; as I wished to see what and whose this money was; and they replied that they were not accustomed to barter.
“After the water was taken I returned to the ship, made sail, and shaped a course N.W., until I had discovered all the part of the coast of the island which trends east to west. Then all the Indians turned round and said that this island was smaller than Samoet, and that it would be well to return back so as to reach it sooner. The wind presently went down, and then sprang up from W.N.W., which was contrary for us to continue on the previous course. So I turned back, and navigated all that night to E.S.E., sometimes to east and to S.E. This course was steered to keep me clear of the land, for there were very heavy clouds and thick weather, which did not admit of my approaching the land to anchor. On that night it rained very heavily from midnight until nearly dawn, and even afterwards the clouds threatened rain. We found ourselves at the S.W. end of the island, where I hoped to anchor until it cleared up, so as to see the other island whither I have to go. On all these days, since I arrived in these Indies, it has rained more or less. Your Highnesses may believe that this land is the best and most fertile, and with a good climate, level, and as good as there is in the world.”
Thursday, 18th of October
“After it had cleared up I went before the wind, approaching the island as near as I could, and anchored when it was no longer light enough to keep under sail. But I did not go on shore, and made sail at dawn.”
Friday, 19th of October
“I weighed the anchors at daylight, sending the caravel Pinta on an E.S.E. course, the caravel Niña S.S.E., while I shaped a S.E. course, giving orders that these courses were to be steered until noon, and that then the two caravels should alter course so as to join company with me. Before we had sailed for three hours we saw an island to the east, for which we steered, and all three vessels arrived at the north point before noon. Here there is an islet, and a reef of rocks to seaward of it, besides one between the islet and the large island. The men of San Salvador, whom I bring with me, called it Saomete, and I gave it the name of Isabella. The wind was north, and the said islet bore from the island of Fernandina, whence I had taken my departure, east and west. Afterwards we ran along the coast of the island, westward from the islet, and found its length to be 12 leagues as far as a cape, which I named Cabo Hermoso, at the western end. The island is beautiful, and the coast very deep, without sunken rocks off it. Outside the shore is rocky, but further in there is a sandy beach, and here I anchored on that Friday night until morning. This coast and the part of the island I saw is almost flat, and the island is very beautiful; for if the other islands are lovely, this is more so. It has many very green trees, which are very large. The land is higher than in the other islands, and in it there are some hills, which cannot be called mountains; and it appears that there is much water inland. From this point to the N.E. the coast makes a great angle, and there are many thick and extensive groves. I wanted to go and anchor there, so as to go on shore and see so much beauty; but the water was shallow, and we could only anchor at a distance from the land. The wind also was fair for going to this cape, where I am now anchored, to which I gave the name of Cabo Hermoso, because it is so. Thus it was that I do not anchor in that angle, but as I saw this cape so green and so beautiful, like all the other lands of these islands, I scarcely knew which to visit first; for I can never tire my eyes in looking at such lovely vegetation, so different from ours. I believe that there are many herbs and many trees that are worth much in Europe for dyes and for medicines; but I do not know, and this causes me great sorrow. Arriving at this cape, I found the smell of the trees and flowers so delicious that it seemed the pleasantest thing in the world. To-morrow, before I leave this place, I shall go on shore to see what there is at this cape. There are no people, but there are villages in the interior, where, the Indians I bring with me say, there is a king who has much gold. To-morrow I intend to go so far inland as to find the village, and see and have some speech with this king, who, according to the signs they make, rules over all the neighbouring islands, goes about clothed, and wears much gold on his person. I do not give much faith to what they say, as well because I do not understand them as because they are so poor in gold that even a little that this king may have would appear much to them. This cape, to which I have given the name of Cabo Fermoso, is, I believe, on an island separated from Saometo, and there is another small islet between them. I did not try to examine them in detail, because it could not be done in 50 years. For my desire is to see and discover as much as I can before returning to your Highnesses, our Lord willing, in April. It is true that in the event of finding places where there is gold or spices in quantity I should stop until I had collected as much as I could. I, therefore, proceed in the hope of coming across such places.”
Saturday, 20th of October
“To-day, at sunrise, I weighed the anchors from where I was with the ship, and anchored off the S.W. point of the island of Saometo, to which I gave the name of Cabo de la Laguna, and to the island Isabella. My intention was to navigate to the north-east and east from the south-east and south, where, I understood from the Indians I brought with me, was the village of the king. I found the sea so shallow that I could not enter nor navigate in it, and I saw that to follow a route by the south-east would be a great round. So I determined to return by the route that I had taken from the N.N.E. to the western part, and to sail round this island to. . . .
“I had so little wind that I never could sail along the coast, except during the night. As it was dangerous to anchor off these islands except in the day, when one can see where to let go the anchor: for the bottom is all in patches, some clear and some rocky: I lay to all this Sunday night. The caravels anchored because they found themselves near the shore, and they thought that, owing to the signals that they were in the habit of making, I would come to anchor, but I did not wish to do so.”
Sunday, 21st of October
“At ten o’clock I arrived here, off this islet, and anchored, as well as the caravels. After breakfast I went on shore, and found only one house, in which there was no one, and I supposed they had fled from fear, because all their property was left in the house. I would not allow anything to be touched, but set out with the captains and people to explore the island. If the others already seen are very beautiful, green, and fertile, this is much more so, with large trees and very green. Here there are large lagoons with wonderful vegetation on their banks. Throughout the island all is green, and the herbage like April in Andalusia. The songs of the birds were so pleasant that it seemed as if a man could never wish to leave the place. The flocks of parrots concealed the sun; and the birds were so numerous, and of so many different kinds, that it was wonderful. There are trees of a thousand sorts, and all have their several fruits; and I feel the most unhappy man in the world not to know them, for I am well assured that they are all valuable. I bring home specimens of them, and also of the land. Thus walking along round one of the lakes I saw a serpent, which we killed, and I bring home the skin for your Highnesses. As soon as it saw us it went into the lagoon, and we followed, as the water was not very deep, until we killed it with lances. It is 7 palmos long, and I believe that there are many like it in these lagoons. Here I came upon some aloes, and I have determined to take ten quintals on board to-morrow, for they tell me that they are worth a good deal. Also, while in search of good water, we came to a village about half a league from our anchorage. The people, as soon as they heard us, all fled and left their houses, hiding their property in the wood. I would not allow a thing to be touched, even the value of a pin. Presently some men among them came to us, and one came quite close. I gave him some bells and glass beads, which made him very content and happy. That our friendship might be further increased, I resolved to ask him for something; I requested him to get some water. After I had gone on board, the natives came to the beach with calabashes full of water, and they delighted much in giving it to us. I ordered another string of glass beads to be presented to them, and they said they would come again to-morrow. I wished to fill up all the ships with water at this place, and, if there should be time, I intended to search the island until I had had speech with the king, and seen whether he had the gold of which I had heard. I shall then shape a course for another much larger island, which I believe to be Cipango, judging from the signs made by the Indians I bring with me. They call it Cuba, and they say that there are ships and many skilful sailors there. Beyond this island there is another called Bosio, which they also say is very large, and others we shall see as we pass, lying between. According as I obtain tidings of gold or spices I shall settle what should be done. I am still resolved to go to the mainland and the city of Guisay, and to deliver the letters of your Highnesses to the Gran Can, requesting a reply and returning with it.”
Monday, 22nd of October
“All last night and to-day I was here, waiting to see if the king or other person would bring gold or anything of value. Many of these people came, like those of the other islands, equally naked and equally painted, some white, some red, some black, and others in many ways. They brought darts and skeins of cotton to barter, which they exchanged with the sailors for bits of glass, broken crockery, and pieces of earthenware. Some of them had pieces of gold fastened in their noses, which they willingly gave for a hawk’s bell and glass beads. But there was so little that it counts for nothing. It is true that they looked upon any little thing that I gave them as a wonder, and they held our arrival to be a great marvel, believing that we came from heaven. We got water for the ships from a lagoon which is near the Cabo del Isleo (Cape of the islet), as we named it. In the said lagoon Martin Alonso Pinzon, captain of the Pinta, killed another serpent 7 palmos long, like the one we got yesterday. I made them gather here as much of the aloe as they could find.”
Tuesday, 23rd of October
“I desired to set out to-day for the island of Cuba, which I think must be Cipango, according to the signs these people make, indicative of its size and riches, and I did not delay any more here nor round this island to the residence of this King or Lord, and have speech with him, as I had intended. This would cause me much delay, and I see that there is no gold mine here. To sail round would need several winds, for it does not blow here as men may wish. It is better to go where there is great entertainment, so I say that it is not reasonable to wait, but rather to continue the voyage and inspect much land, until some very profitable country is reached, my belief being that it will be rich in spices. That I have no personal knowledge of these products causes me the greatest sorrow in the world, for I see a thousand kinds of trees, each one with its own special fruit, all green now as in Spain during the months of May and June, as well as a thousand kinds of herbs with their flowers; yet I know none of them except this aloe, of which I ordered a quantity to be brought on board to bring to your Highnesses. I have not made sail for Cuba because there is no wind, but a dead calm with much rain. It rained a great deal yesterday without causing any cold. On the contrary, the days are hot and the nights cool, like May in Andalusia.”
Wednesday, 24th of October
“At midnight I weighed the anchors and left the anchorage at Cabo del Isleo, in the island of Isabella. From the northern side, where I was, I intended to go to the island of Cuba, where I heard of the people who were very great, and had gold, spices, merchandise, and large ships. They showed me that the course thither would be W.S.W., and so I hold. For I believe that it is so, as all the Indians of these islands, as well as those I brought with me in the ships, told me by signs. I cannot understand their language, but I believe that it is of the island of Cipango that they recount these wonders. On the spheres I saw, and on the delineations of the map of the world, Cipango is in this region. So I shaped a course W.S.W. until daylight, but at dawn it fell calm and began to rain, and went on nearly all night. I remained thus, with little wind, until the afternoon, when it began to blow fresh. I set all the sails in the ship, the mainsail with two bonnets, the foresail, spritsail, mizen, main topsail, and the boat’s sail on the poop. So I proceeded until nightfall, when the Cabo Verde of the island of Fernandina, which is at the S.W. end, bore N.W. distant 7 leagues. As it was now blowing hard, and I did not know how far it was to this island of Cuba, I resolved not to go in search of it during the night; all these islands being very steep-to, with no bottom round them for a distance of two shots of a lombard. The bottom is all in patches, one bit of sand and another of rock, and for this reason it is not safe to anchor without inspection with the eye. So I determined to take in all the sails except the foresail, and to go on under that reduced canvas. Soon the wind increased, while the route was doubtful, and there was very thick weather, with rain. I ordered the foresail to be furled, and we did not make two leagues during that night.”
Thursday, 25th of October
“I steered W.S.W, from after sunset until 9 o’clock, making 5 leagues. Afterwards I altered course to west, and went 8 miles an hour until one in the afternoon; and from that time until three made good 44 miles. Then land was sighted, consisting of 7 or 8 islands, the group running north and south, distant from us 5 leagues.”
Friday, 26th of October
“The ship was on the south side of the islands, which were all low, distant 5 or 6 leagues. I anchored there. The Indians on board said that thence to Cuba was a voyage in their canoes of a day and a half; these being small dug-outs without a sail. Such are their canoes. I departed thence for Cuba, for by the signs the Indians made of its greatness, And of its gold and pearls, I thought that it must be Cipango.”
Saturday, 27th of October
“I weighed from these islands at sunrise, and gave them the name of Las Islas de Arena, owing to the little depth the sea had for a distance of 6 leagues to the southward of them. We went 8 miles an hour on a S.S.W. course until one o’clock, having made 40 miles. Until night we had run 28 miles on the same course, and before dark the land was sighted. At night there was much rain. The vessels, on Saturday until sunset, made 17 leagues on a S.S.W. course.”
Sunday, 28th of October
“I went thence in search of the island of Cuba on a S.S.W. coast, making for the nearest point of it, and entered a very beautiful river without danger of sunken rocks or other impediments. All the coast was clear of dangers up to the shore. The mouth of the river was 12 brazos across, and it is wide enough for a vessel to beat in. I anchored about a lombard-shot inside.” The Admiral says that “he never beheld such a beautiful place, with trees bordering the river, handsome, green, and different from ours, having fruits and flowers each one according to its nature. There are many birds, which sing very sweetly. There are a great number of palm trees of a different kind from those in Guinea and from ours, of a middling height, the trunks without that covering, and the leaves very large, with which they thatch their houses. The country is very level.” The Admiral jumped into his boat and went on shore. He came to two houses, which he believed to belong to fishermen who had fled from fear. In one of them he found a kind of dog that never barks, and in both there were nets of palm-fibre and cordage, as well as horn fish-hooks, bone harpoons, and other apparatus “for fishing, and several hearths. He believed that many people lived together in one house. He gave orders that nothing in the houses should be touched, and so it was done.” The herbage was as thick as in Andalusia during April and
May. He found much purslane and wild amaranth. He returned to the boat and went up the river for some distance, and he says it was great pleasure to see the bright verdure, and the birds, which he could not leave to go back. He says that this island is the most beautiful that eyes have seen, full of good harbours and deep rivers, and the sea appeared as if it never rose; for the herbage on the beach nearly reached the waves, which does not happen where the sea is rough. (Up to that time they had not experienced a rough sea among all those islands.) He says that the island is full of very beautiful mountains, although they are not very extensive as regards length, but high; and all the country is high like Sicily. It is abundantly supplied with water, as they gathered from the Indians they had taken with them from the island of Guanahani. These said by signs that there are ten great rivers, and that they cannot go round the island in twenty days. When they came near land with the ships, two canoes came out; and, when they saw the sailors get into a boat and row about to find the depth of the river where they could anchor, the canoes fled. The Indians say that in this island there are gold mines and pearls, and the Admiral saw a likely place for them and mussel-shells, which are signs of them. He understood that large ships of the Gran Can came here, and that from here to the mainland was a voyage of ten days. The Admiral called this river and harbour San Salvador.
Monday, 29th of October
The Admiral weighed anchor from this port and sailed to the westward, to go to the city, where, as it seemed, the Indians said that there was a king. They doubled a point six leagues to the N.W., and then another point, then east ten leagues. After another league he saw a river with no very large entrance, to which he gave the name of Rio de la Luna. He went on until the hour of Vespers. He saw another river much larger than the others, as the Indians told him by signs, and near he saw goodly villages of houses. He called the river Rio de Mares. He sent two boats on shore to a village to communicate, and one of the Indians he had brought with him, for now they understood a little, and show themselves content with Christians. All the men, women, and children fled, abandoning their houses with all they contained. The Admiral gave orders that nothing should be touched. The houses were better than those he had seen before, and he believed that the houses would improve as he approached the mainland. They were made like booths, very large, and looking like tents in a camp without regular streets, but one here and another there. Within they were clean and well swept, with the furniture well made. All are of palm branches beautifully constructed. They found many images in the shape of women, and many heads like masks, very well carved. It was not known whether these were used as ornaments, or to be worshipped. They had dogs which never bark, and wild birds tamed in their houses. There was a wonderful supply of nets and other fishing implements, but nothing was touched. He believed that all the people on the coast were fishermen, who took the fish inland, for this island is very large, and so beautiful, that he is never tired of praising it. He says that he found trees and fruits of very marvellous taste; and adds that they must have cows or other cattle, for he saw skulls which were like those of cows. The songs of the birds and the chirping of crickets throughout the night lulled everyone to rest, while the air was soft and healthy, and the nights neither hot nor cold. On the voyage through the other islands there was great heat, but here it is tempered like the month of May. He attributed the heat of the other islands to their flatness, and to the wind coming from the east, which is hot. The water of the rivers was salt at the mouth, and they did not know whence the natives got their drinking-water, though they have sweet water in their houses. Ships are able to turn in this river, both entering and coming out, and there are very good leading-marks. He says that all this sea appears to be constantly smooth, like the river at Seville, and the water suitable for the growth of pearls. He found large shells unlike those of Spain. Remarking on the position of the river and port, to which he gave the name of San Salvador, he describes its mountains as lofty and beautiful, like the Pena de las Enamoradas, and one of them has another little hill on its summit, like a graceful mosque. The other river and port, in which he now was, has two round mountains to the S.W., and a fine low cape running out to the W.S.W.
Tuesday, 30th of October
He left the Rio de Mares and steered N.W., seeing a cape covered with palm trees, to which he gave the name of Cabo de Palmas after having made good 15 leagues. The Indians on board the caravel Pinta said that beyond that cape there was a river, and that from the river to Cuba it was four days journey. The captain of the Pinta reported that he understood from that, that this Cuba was a city, and that the land was a great continent trending far to the north. The king of that country, he gathered, was at war with the Gran Can, whom they called Cami, and his land or city Fava, with many other names. The Admiral resolved to proceed to that river, and to send a present, with the letter of the Sovereigns, to the king of that land. For this service there was a sailor who had been to Guinea, and some of the Indians of Guanahani wished to go with him, and afterwards to return to their homes. The Admiral calculated that he was forty-two degrees to the north of the equinoctial line (but the handwriting is here illegible). He says that he must attempt to reach the Gran Can, who he thought was here or at the city of Cathay, which belongs to him, and is very grand, as he was informed before leaving Spain. All this land, he adds, is low and beautiful, and the sea deep.
Wednesday, 31st of October
All Tuesday night he was beating to windward, and he saw a river, but could not enter it because the entrance was narrow. The Indians fancied that the ships could enter wherever their canoes could go. Navigating onwards, he came to a cape running out very far, and surrounded by sunken rocks, and he saw a bay where small vessels might take shelter. He could not proceed because the wind had come round to the north, and all the coast runs N.W. and S.E. Another cape further on ran out still more. For these reasons, and because the sky showed signs of a gale, he had to return to the Rio de Mares.
Thursday, November the 1st
At sunrise the Admiral sent the boats on shore to the houses that were there, and they found that all the people had fled. After some time a man made his appearance. The Admiral ordered that he should be left to himself, and the sailors returned to the boats. After dinner, one of the Indians on board was sent on shore. He called out from a distance that there was nothing to fear, because the strangers were good people and would do no harm to anyone, nor were they people of the Gran Can, but they had given away their things in many islands where they had been. The Indian then swam on shore, and two of the natives took him by the arms and brought him to a house, where they heard what he had to say. When they were certain that no harm would be done to them they were reassured, and presently more than sixteen canoes came to the ships with cotton-thread and other trifles. The Admiral ordered that nothing should be taken from them, that they might understand that he sought for nothing but gold, which they call nucay. Thus they went to and fro between the ships and the shore all day, and they came to the Christians on shore with confidence. The Admiral saw no gold whatever among them, but he says that he saw one of them with a piece of worked silver fastened to his nose. They said, by signs, that within three days many merchants from inland would come to buy the things brought by the Christians, and would give information respecting the king of that land. So far as could be understood from their signs, he resided at a distance of four days’ journey. They had sent many messengers in all directions, with news of the arrival of the Admiral. “These people”, says the Admiral, “are of the same appearance and have the same customs as those of the other islands, without any religion so far as I know, for up to this day I have never seen the Indians on board say any prayer; though they repeat the Salve and Ave Maria with their hands raised to heaven, and they make the sign of the cross. The language is also the same, and they are all friends; but I believe that all these islands are at war with the Gran Can, whom they called Cavila, and his province Bafan. They all go naked like the others.” This is what the Admiral says. “The river,” he adds, “is very deep, and the ships can enter the mouth, going close to the shore. The sweet water does not come within a league of the mouth. It is certain,” says the Admiral, “that this is the mainland, and that I am in front of Zayto and Guinsay, a hundred leagues, a little more or less, distant the one from the other. It is very clear that no one before has been so far as this by sea. Yesterday, with wind from the N.W., I found it cold.”
Friday, 2nd of November
The Admiral decided upon sending two Spaniards, one named Rodrigo de Jerez, who lived in Ayamonte, and the other Luis de Torres, who had served in the household of the Adelantado of Murcia, and had been a Jew, knowing Hebrew, Chaldee, and even some Arabic. With these men he sent two Indians, one from among those he had brought from Guanahani, and another a native of the houses by the river-side. He gave them strings of beads with which to buy food if they should be in need, and ordered them to return in six days. He gave them specimens of spices, to see if any were to be found. Their instructions were to ask for the king of that land, and they were told what to say on the part of the Sovereigns of Castille, how they had sent the Admiral with letters and a present, to inquire after his health and establish friendship, favouring him in what he might desire from them. They were to collect information respecting certain provinces, ports, and rivers of which the Admiral had notice, and to ascertain their distances from where he was.
This night the Admiral took an altitude with a quadrant, and found that the distance from the equinoctial line was 42 degrees. He says that, by his reckoning, he finds that he has gone over 1,142 leagues from the island of Hierro. He still believes that he has reached the mainland.
Saturday, 3rd of November
In the morning the Admiral got into the boat, and, as the river is like a great lake at the mouth, forming a very excellent port, very deep, and clear of rocks, with a good beach for careening ships, and plenty of fuel, he explored it until he came to fresh water at a distance of two leagues from the mouth. He ascended a small mountain to obtain a view of the surrounding country, but could see nothing, owing to the dense foliage of the trees, which were very fresh and odoriferous, so that he felt no doubt that there were aromatic herbs among them. He said that all he saw was so beautiful that his eyes could never tire of gazing upon such loveliness, nor his ears of listening to the songs of birds. That day many canoes came to the ships, to barter with cotton threads and with the nets in which they sleep, called hamacas.
Sunday, 4th of November
At sunrise the Admiral again went away in the boat, and landed to hunt the birds he had seen the day before. After a time, Martin Alonso Pinzon came to him with two pieces of cinnamon, and said that a Portuguese, who was one of his crew, had seen an Indian carrying two very large bundles of it; but he had not bartered for it, because of the penalty imposed by the Admiral on anyone who bartered. He further said that this Indian carried some brown things like nutmegs. The master of the Pinta said that he had found the cinnamon trees. The Admiral went to the place, and found that they were not cinnamon trees. The Admiral showed the Indians some specimens of cinnamon and pepper he had brought from Castillo, and they knew it, and said, by signs, that there was plenty in the vicinity, pointing to the S.E. He also showed them gold and pearls, on which certain old men said that there was an infinite quantity in a place called Bohio, and that the people wore it on their necks, ears, arms, and legs, as well as pearls. He further understood them to say that there were great ships and much merchandise, all to the S.E. He also understood that, far away, there were men with one eye, and others with dogs’ noses who were cannibals, and that when they captured an enemy they beheaded him and drank his blood.
The Admiral then determined to return to the ship and wait for the return of the two men he had sent, intending to depart and seek for those lands, if his envoys brought some good news touching what he desired. The Admiral further says: “These people arc very gentle and timid; they go naked, as I have said, without arms and without law. The country is very fertile. The people have plenty of roots called zanahorias (yams), with a smell like chesnuts; and they have beans of kinds very different from ours. They also have much cotton, which they do not sow, as it is wild in the mountains, and I believe they collect it throughout the year, because I saw pods empty, others full, and flowers all on one tree. There are a thousand other kinds of fruits which it is impossible for me to write about, and all must be profitable.” All this the Admiral says.
Monday, 5th of November
This morning the Admiral ordered the ship to be careened, afterwards the other vessels, but not all at the same time. Two were always to be at the anchorage, as a precaution; although he says that these people were very safe, and that without fear all the vessels might have been careened at the same time. Things being in this state, the master of the Niña came to claim a reward from the Admiral because he had found mastick, but he did not bring the specimen, as he had dropped it. The Admiral promised him a reward, and sent Rodrigo Sanchez and master Diego to the trees. They collected some, which was kept to present to the Sovereigns, as well as the tree. The Admiral says that he knew it was mastick, though it ought to be gathered at the proper season. There is enough in that district for a yield of 1,000 qnintals every year. The Admiral also found here a great deal of the plant called aloe. He further says that the Puerto de Mares is the best in the world, with the finest climate and the most gentle people. As it has a high, rocky cape, a fortress might be built, so that, in the event of the place becoming rich and important, the merchants would be safe from any other nations. He adds: “The Lord, in whose hands are all victories, will ordain all things for his service. An Indian said by signs that the mastick was good for pains in the stomach.”
Tuesday, 6th of November
“Yesterday, at night”, says the Admiral, “the two men came back who had been sent to explore the interior. They said that after walking 12 leagues they came to a village of 50 houses, were there were a thousand inhabitants, for many live in one house. These houses are like very large booths. They said that they were received with great solemnity, according to custom, and all, both men and women, came out to see them. They were lodged in the best houses, and the people touched them, kissing their hands and feet, marvelling and believing that they came from heaven, and so they gave them to understand. They gave them to eat of what they had. When they arrived, the chief people conducted them by the arms to the principal house, gave them two chairs on which to sit, and all the natives sat round them on the ground. The Indian who came with them described the manner of living of the Christians, and said that they were good people. Presently the men went out, and the women came sitting round them in the same way, kissing their hands and feet, and looking to see if they were of flesh and bones like themselves. They begged the Spaniards to remain with them at least five days.” The Spaniards showed the natives specimens of cinnamon, pepper, and other spices which the Admiral had given them, and they said, by signs, that there was plenty at a short distance from thence to S.E., but that there they did not know whether there was any. Finding that they had no information respecting cities, the Spaniards returned; and if they had desired to take those who wished to accompany them, more than 500 men and women would have come, because they thought the Spaniards were returning to heaven. There came, however, a principal man of the village and his son, with a servant. The Admiral conversed with them, and showed them much honour. They made signs respecting many lands and islands in those parts. The Admiral thought of bringing them to the Sovereigns. He says that he knew not what fancy took them; either from fear, or owing to the dark night, they wanted to land. The ship was at the time high and dry, but, not wishing to make them angry, he let them go on their saying that they would return at dawn, but they never came back. The two Christians met with many people on the road going home, men and women with a half-burnt weed in their hands, being the herbs they are accustomed to smoke. They did not find villages on the road of more than five houses, all receiving them with the same reverence. They saw many kinds of trees, herbs, and sweet-smelling flowers; and birds of many different kinds, unlike those of Spain, except the partridges, geese, of which there are many, and singing nightingales. They saw no quadrupeds except the dogs that do not bark. The land is very fertile, and is cultivated with yams and several kinds of beans different from ours, as well as corn. There were great quantities of cotton gathered, spun, and worked up. In a single house they saw more than 500 arrobas, and as much as 4,000 quintals could be yielded every year. The Admiral said that “it did not appear to be cultivated, and that it bore all the year round. It is very fine, and has a large boll. All that was possessed by these people they gave at a very low price, and a great bundle of cotton was exchanged for the point of a needle or other trifle. They are a people”, says the Admiral, “guileless and unwarlike. Men and women go as naked as when their mothers bore them. It is true that the women wear a very small rag of cotton-cloth, and they are of very good appearance, not very dark, less so than the Canarians. I hold, most serene Princes, that if devout religious persons were here, knowing the language, they would all turn Christians. I trust in our Lord that your Highnesses will resolve upon this with much diligence, to bring so many great nations within the Church, and to convert them; as you have destroyed those who would not confess the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. And after your days, all of us being mortal, may your kingdoms remain in peace, and free from heresy and evil, and may you be well received before the eternal Creator, to whom I pray that you may have long life and great increase of kingdoms and lordships, with the will and disposition to increase the holy Christian religion as you have done hitherto. Amen!” “To day I got the ship afloat, and prepared to depart on Thursday, in the name of God, and to steer S.E. in search of gold and spices, and to discover land.” These are the words of the Admiral, who intended to depart on Thursday, but, the wind being contrary, he could not go until the 12th of November.
Monday, 12th of November
The Admiral left the port and river of Mares before dawn to visit the island called Babeque, so much talked of by the Indians on board, where, according to their signs, the people gather the gold on the beach at night with candles, and afterwards beat it into bars with hammers. To go thither it was necessary to shape a course E. b. S. After having made 8 leagues along the coast, a river was sighted, and another 4 leagues brought them to another river, which appeared to be of great volume, and larger than any they had yet seen. The Admiral did not wish to stop nor to enter any of these rivers, for two reasons: the first and principal one being that wind and weather were favourable for going in search of the said island of Babeque; the other, that, if there was a populous and famous city near the sea, it would be visible, while, to go up the rivers, small vessels are necessary, which those of the expedition were not. Much time would thus be lost; moreover, the exploration of such rivers is a separate enterprise. All that coast was peopled near the river, to which the name of Rio del Sol was given.
The Admiral says that, on the previous Sunday, the 11th of November, it seemed good to take some persons from amongst those at Rio de Mares, to bring to the Sovereigns, that they might learn our language, so as to be able to tell us what there is in their lands. Returning, they would be the mouthpieces of the Christians, and would adopt our customs and the things of the faith. “ I saw and knew” (says the Admiral) “ that these people arc without any religion, not idolaters, but very gentle, not knowing what is evil, nor the sins of murder and theft, being without arms, and so timid that a hundred would fly before one Spaniard, although they joke with them. They, however, believe and know that there is a God in heaven, and say that we have come from heaven. At any prayer that we say, they repeat, and make the sign of the cross. Thus your Highnesses should resolve to make them Christians, for I believe that, if the work was begun, in a little time a multitude of nations would be converted to our faith, with the acquisition of great lordships, peoples, and riches for Spain. Without doubt, there is in these lands a vast quantity of gold, and the Indians I have on board do not speak without reason when they say that in these islands there are places where they dig out gold, and wear it on their necks, ears, arms, and legs, the rings being very large. There are also precious stones, pearls, and an infinity of spices. In this river of Mares, whence we departed to-night, there is undoubtedly a great quantity of mastick, and much more could be raised, because the trees may be planted, and will yield abundantly. The leaf and fruit are like the mastick, but the tree and leaf are larger. As Pliny describes it, I have seen it on the island of Chios in the Archipelago. I ordered many of these trees to be tapped, to see if any of them would yield resin; but, as it rained all the time I was in that river, I could not get any, except a very little, which I am bringing to your Highnesses. It may not be the right season for tapping, which is, I believe, when the trees come forth after winter and begin to flower. But when I was there the fruit was nearly ripe. Here also there is a great quantity of cotton, and I believe it would have a good sale here without sending it to Spain, but to the great cities of the Gran Can, which will be discovered without doubt, and many others ruled over by other lords, who will be pleased to serve your Highnesses, and whither will be brought other commodities of Spain and of the Eastern lands; but these are to the west as regards us. There is also here a great yield of aloes, though this is not a commodity that will yield great profit. The mastick, however, is important, for it is only obtained from the said island of Chios, and I believe the harvest is worth 50,000 ducats, if I remember right. There is here, in the mouth of the river, the best port I have seen up to this time, wide, deep, and clear of rocks. It is an excellent site for a town and fort, for any ship could come close up to the walls; the land is high, with a temperate climate, and very good water.
“Yesterday a canoe came alongside the ship, with six youths in it. Five came on board, and I ordered them to be detained. They are now here. I afterwards sent to a house on the western side of the river, and seized seven women, old and young, and three children. I did this because the men would behave better in Spain if they had women of their own land, than without them. For on many occasions the men of Guinea have been brought to learn the language in Portugal, and afterwards, when they returned, and it was expected that they would be useful in their land, owing to the good company they had enjoyed and the gifts they had received, they never appeared after arriving. Others may not act thus. But, having women, they have the wish to perform what they are required to do; besides, the women would teach our people their language, which is the same in all these islands, so that those who make voyages in their canoes are understood everywhere. On the other hand, there are a thousand different languages in Guinea, and one native does not understand another.
“The same night the husband of one of the women came alongside in a canoe, who was father of the three children—one boy and two girls. He asked me to let him come with them, and besought me much. They are now all consoled at being with one who is a relation of them all. He is a man of about 45 years of age.” All these are the words of the Admiral. He also says that he had felt some cold, and that it would not be wise to continue discoveries in a northerly direction in the winter. On this Monday, until sunset, he steered a course E. b. S., making 18 leagues, and reaching a cape, to which he gave the name of Cabo de Cuba.
Tuesday, 13th of November
This night the ships were on a bowline, as the sailors say, beating to windward without making any progress. At sunset they began to see an opening in the mountains, where two very high peaks were visible. It appeared that here was the division between the land of Cuba and that of Bohio, and this was affirmed by signs, by the Indians who were on board. As soon as the day had dawned, the Admiral made sail towards the land, passing a point which appeared at night to be distant two leagues. He then entered a large gulf, 5 leagues to the S.S.E., and there remained 5 more, to arrive at the point where, between two great mountains, there appeared to be an opening; but it could not be made out whether it was an inlet of the sea. As he desired to go to the island called Babeque, where, according to the information he had received, there was much gold; and as it bore east, and as no large town was in sight, the wind freshening more than ever, he resolved to put out to sea, and work to the east with a northerly wind. The ship made 8 miles an hour, and from ten in the forenoon, when that course was taken, until sunset, 56 miles, which is 14 leagues to the eastward from the Cabo de Cuba. The other land of Bohio was left to leeward. Commencing from the cape of the said gulf, he discovered, according to his reckoning, 80 miles, equal to 20 leagues, all that coast running E.S.E. and W.N.W.
Wednesday, 14th of November
All last night the Admiral was boating to windward (he said that it would be unreasonable to navigate among those islands during the night, until they had been explored), for the Indians said yesterday that it would take three days to go from Rio de Mares to the island of Babeque, by which should be understood days’ journeys in their canoes equal to about 7 leagues. The wind fell, and, the course being east, she could not lay her course nearer than S.E., and, owing to other mischances, he was detained until the morning. At sunrise he determined to go in search of a port, because the wind had shifted from north to N.E., and, if a port could not be found, it would be necessary to go back to the ports in the island of Cuba, whence they came. The Admiral approached the shore, having gone over 28 miles E.S.E. that night. He steered south ….. miles to the land, where he saw many islets and openings. As the wind was high and the sea rough, he did not dare to risk an attempt to enter, but ran along the coast W.N.W., looking out for a port, and saw many, but none very clear of rocks. After having proceeded for 64 miles, he found a very deep opening, a quarter of a mile wide, with a good port and river. He ran in with her head S.S.W., afterwards south to S.E. The port was spacious and very deep, and he saw so many islands that he could not count them all, with very high land covered with trees of many kinds, and an infinite number of palms. He was much astonished to see so many lofty islands; and assured the Sovereigns that the mountains and isles he had seen since yesterday seemed to him to be second to none in the world; so high and clear of clouds and snow, with the sea at their bases so deep. He believes that these islands are those innumerable ones that are depicted on the maps of the world in the Far East. He believed that they yielded very great riches in precious stones and spices, and that they extend much further to the south, widening out in all directions. He gave the name of La Mar de Nuestra Señora, and to the haven, which is near the mouth of the entrance to these islands, Puerto del Principe. He did not enter it, but examined it from outside, until another time, on Saturday of the next week, as will there appear. He speaks highly of the fertility, beauty, and height of the islands which he found in this gulf, and he tells the Sovereigns not to wonder at his praise of them, for that he has not told them the hundredth part. Some of them seemed to reach to heaven, running up into peaks like diamonds. Others have a flat top like a table. At their bases the sea is of a great depth, with enough water for a very large carrack. All are covered with foliage and without rocks.
Thursday, 15th of November
The Admiral went to examine these islands in the ships’ boats, and speaks marvels of them, how he found mastick, and aloes without end. Some of them were cultivated with the roots of which the Indians make bread; and he found that fires had been lighted in several places. He saw no fresh water. There were some natives, but they fled. In all parts of the sea where the vessels were navigated he found a depth of 15 or 16 fathoms, and all basa, by which he means that the ground is sand, and not rocks; a thing much desired by sailors, for the rocks cut their anchor cables.
Friday, 16th of November
As in all parts, whether islands or mainlands, that he visited, the Admiral always left a cross; so, on this occasion, he went in a boat to the entrance of these havens, and found two very large trees on a point of land, one longer than the other. One being placed over the other, made a cross, and he said that a carpenter could not have made it better. He ordered a very large and high cross to be made out of these timbers. He found canes on the beach, and did not know where they had grown, but thought they must have been brought down by some river, and washed up on the beach (in which opinion he had reason). He went to a creek on the south-east side of the entrance to the port. Here, under a height of rock and stone like a cape, there was depth enough for the largest carrack in the world close in shore, and there was a corner where six ships might lie without anchors as in a room. It seemed to the Admiral that a fortress might be built here at small cost, if at any time any famous trade should arise in that sea of islands.
Returning to the ship, he found that the Indians who were on board had fished up very large shells found in those seas. He made the people examine them, to see if there was mother-o’-pearl, which is in the shells where pearls grow. They found a great deal, but no pearls, and their absence was attributed to its not being the season, which is May and June. The sailors found an animal which seemed to be a taso, or taxor. They also fished with nets, and, among many others, caught a fish which was exactly like a pig, not like a tunny, but all covered with a very hard shell, without a soft place except the eyes. It was ordered to be salted, to bring home for the Sovereigns to see.
Saturday, 17th of November
The Admiral got into the boat, and went to visit the islands he had not yet seen to the S.W. He saw many more very fertile and pleasant islands, with a great depth between them. Some of them had springs of fresh water, and he believed that the water of those streams came from some sources at the summits of the mountains. He went on, and found a beach bordering on very sweet water, which was very cold. There was a beautiful meadow, and many very tall palms. They found a large nut of the kind belonging to India, great rats, and enormous crabs. He saw many birds, and there was a strong smell of musk, which made him think it must be there. This day the two eldest of the six youths brought from the Rio de Mares, who were on board the caravel Niña, made their escape.
Sunday, 18th of November
The Admiral again went away with the boats, accompanied by many of the sailors, to set up the cross which he had ordered to be made out of the two large trees at the entrance to the Puerto del Principe, on a fair site cleared of trees, whence there was an extensive and very beautiful view. He says that there is a greater rise and fall there than in any other port he has seen, and that this is no marvel, considering the numerous islands. The tide is the reverse of ours, because here, when the moon is S.S.W., it is low water in the port. He did not get under weigh, because it was Sunday.
Monday, 19th of November
The Admiral Qt under weigh before sunrise, in a calm. In the afternoon there was some wind from the east, and lie shaped a N.N.E. course. At sunset the Puerto del Principe bore S.S.W. 7 leagues. He saw the island of Babeque bearing due east about 60 miles. He steered N.E. all that night, making 60 miles, and up to ten o’clock of Tuesday another dozen; altogether 18 leagues N.E. b. W.
Tuesday, 20th of November
They left Babeque, or the islands of Babeque, to the E.S.E., the wind being contrary; and, seeing that no progress was being made, and the sea was getting rough, the Admiral determined to return to the Puerto del Principe, whence he had started, which was 25 leagues distant. He did not wish to go to the island he had called Isabella, which was twelve leagues off, and where he might have anchored that night, for two reasons: one was that he had seen two islands to the south which he wished to explore; the other, because the Indians he brought with him, whom he had taken at the island of Guanahani, which he named San Salvador, eight leagues from Isabella, might get away, and he said that he wanted them to take to Spain. They thought that, when the Admiral had found gold, he would let them return to their homes. He came near the Puerto del Principe, but could not reach it, because it was night, and because the current drifted them to the N.W. He turned her head to N.E. with a light wind. At three o’clock in the morning the wind changed, and a course was shaped E.N.E., the wind being S.S.W., and changing at dawn to south and S.E. At sunset Puerto del Principe bore nearly S.W. by W. 48 miles, which are 12 leagues.
Wednesday, 21st of November
At sunrise the Admiral steered cast, with a southerly wind, but made little progress, owing to a contrary sea. At vespers he had gone 24 miles. Afterwards the wind changed to east, and he steered S. b. E., at sunset having gone 12 miles. Here he found himself forty-two degrees north of the equinoctial line, as in the port of Mares, but he says that he kept the result from the quadrant in suspense until he reached the shore, that it might be adjusted (as it would seem that he thought this distance was too great, and he had reason, it not being possible, as these islands are only in . . . degrees).
This day Martin Alonso Pinzon parted company with the caravel Pinta, in disobedience to and against the wish of the Admiral, and out of avarice, thinking that an Indian who had been put on board his caravel could show him where there was much gold. So he parted company, not owing to bad weather, but because he chose. Here the Admiral says: “He had done and said many other things to me.”
Thursday, 22nd of November
On Wednesday night the Admiral steered S.S.E., with the wind east, but it was nearly calm. At 3 it began to blow from N.N.E.; and he continued to steer south to see the land he had seen in that quarter. When the sun rose he was as far off as the day before, owing to adverse currents, the land being 40 miles off. This night Martin Alonso shaped a course to the east, to go to the island of Babeque, where the Indians say there is much gold. He did this in sight of the Admiral, from whom he was distant 16 miles. The Admiral stood towards the land all night. He shortened sail, and showed a lantern, because Pinzon would thus have an opportunity of joining him, the night being very clear, and the wind fair to come, if he had wished to do so.
Friday, 23rd of November
The Admiral stood towards the land all day, always steering south with little wind, but the current would never let them reach it, being as far off at sunset as in the morning. The wind was E.N.E., and they could shape a southerly course, but there was little of it. Beyond this cape there stretched out another land or cape, also trending east, which the Indians on board called Bohio. They said that it was very large, and that there were people in it who had one eye in their foreheads, and others who were cannibals, and of whom they were much afraid. When they saw that this course was taken, they said that they could not talk to these people because they would be eaten, and that they were very well armed. The Admiral says that he well believes that there were such people, and that if they are armed they must have some ability. He thought that they may have captured some of the Indians, and because they did not return to their homes, the others believed that they had been eaten. They thought the same of the Christians and of the Admiral when some of them first saw the strangers.
Saturday, 24th of November
They navigated all night, and at 3 they reached the island at the very same point they had come to the week before, when they started for the island of Babeque. At first the Admiral did not dare to approach the shore, because it seemed that there would be a great surf in that mountain-girded bay. Finally he reached the sea of Nuestra Señora, where there are many islands, and entered a port near the mouth of the opening to the islands. He says that if he had known of this port before he need not have occupied himself in exploring the islands, and it would not have been necessary to go back. He, however, considered that the time was well spent in examining the islands. On nearing the land he sent in the boat to sound; finding a good sandy bottom in 6 to 20 fathoms. He entered the haven, pointing the ship’s head S.W. and then west, the flat island bearing north. This, with another island near it, forms a harbour which would hold all the ships of Spain safe from all winds. This entrance on the S.W. side is passed by steering S.S.W., the outlet being to the west very deep and wide. Thus a vessel can pass amidst these islands, and he who approaches from the north, with a knowledge of them, can pass along the coast. These islands are at the foot of a great mountain-chain running east and west, which is longer and higher than any others on this coast, where there are many. A reef of rocks outside runs parallel with the said mountains, like a bench, extending to the entrance. On the side of the flat island, and also to the S.E., there is another small reef, but between them there is great width and depth. Within the port, near the S.E. side of the entrance, they saw a large and very fine river, with more volume than any they had yet met with, and fresh water could be taken from it as far as the sea. At the entrance there is a bar, but within it is very deep, 19 fathoms. The banks are lined with palms and many other trees.
Sunday, 25th of November
Before sunrise the Admiral got into the boat, and went to see a cape or point of land to the S.E. of the flat island, about a league and a half distant, because there appeared to be a good river there. Presently, near to S.E. side of the cape, at a distance of two cross-bow shots, he saw a large stream of beautiful water falling from the mountains above, with a loud noise. He went to it, and saw some stones shining in its bed like gold. He remembered that in the river Tejo, near its junction with the sea, there was gold; so it seemed to him that this should contain gold, and he ordered some of these stones to be collected, to be brought to the Sovereigns. Just then the sailor boys called out that they had found large pines. The Admiral looked up the hill, and saw that they were so wonderfully large that he could not exaggerate their height and straightness, like stout yet fine spindles. He perceived that here there was material for great store of planks and masts for the largest ships in Spain. He saw oaks and arbutus trees, with a good river, and the means of making water-power. The climate was temperate, owing to the height of the mountains. On the beach he saw many other stones of the colour of iron, and others that some said were like silver ore, all brought down by the river. Here he obtained a new mast and yard for the mizen of the caravel Niña. He came to the mouth of the river, and entered a creek which was deep and wide, at the foot of that S.E. part of the cape, which would accommodate a hundred ships without any anchor or hawsers. Eyes never beheld a better harbour. The mountains are very high, whence descend many limpid streams, and all the hills are covered with pines, and an infinity of diverse and beautiful trees. Two or three other rivers were not visited.
The Admiral described all this, in much detail, to the Sovereigns, and declared that he had derived unspeakable joy and pleasure at seeing it, more especially the pines, because they enable as many ships as is desired to be built here, bringing out the rigging, but finding here abundant supplies of wood and provisions. He affirms that he has not enumerated a hundredth part of what there is here, and that it pleased our Lord always to show him one thing better than another, as well on the ground and among the trees, herbs, fruits, and flowers, as in the people, and always something different in each place. It had been the same as regards the havens and the waters. Finally, he says that if it caused him who saw it so much wonder, how much more will it affect those who hear about it; yet no one can believe until he sees it.
Monday, 26th of November
At sunrise the Admiral weighed the anchors in the haven of Santa Catalina, where he was behind the flat island, and steered along the coast in the direction of Cabo del Pico, which was S.E. He reached the cape late, because the wind failed, and then saw another cape, S.E. b. E. 60 miles, which, when 20 miles off, was named Cabo de Campana, but it could not be reached that day. They made good 32 miles during the day, which is 8 leagues. During this time the Admiral noted nine remarkable ports, which all the sailors thought wonderfully good, and five large rivers; for they sailed close along the land, so as to see everything. All along the coast there are very high and beautiful mountains, not arid or rocky, but all accessible, and very lovely. The valleys, like the mountains, were full of tall and fine trees, so that it was a glory to look upon them, and there seemed to be many pines. Also, beyond the said Cabo de Pico to the S.E. there are two islets, each about two leagues round, and inside them three excellent havens and two large rivers. Along the whole coast no inhabited places were visible from the sea. There may have been some, and there were indications of them, for, when the men landed, they found signs of people and numerous remains of fires. The Admiral conjectured that the land he saw to-day S.E. of the Cabo de Campana was the island called by the Indians Bohio: it looked as if this cape was separated from the mainland. The Admiral says that all the people he has hitherto met with have very great fear of those of Caniba or Canima. They affirm that they live in the island of Bohio, which must be very large, according to all accounts. The Admiral understood that those of Caniba come to take people from their homes, they being very cowardly, and without knowledge of arms. For this cause it appears that these Indians do not settle on the sea-coast, owing to being near the land of Caniba. When the natives who were on board saw a course shaped for that land, they feared to speak, thinking they were going to be eaten; nor could they rid themselves of their fear. They declared that the Canibas had only one eye and dogs’ faces. The Admiral thought they lied, and was inclined to believe that it was people from the dominions of the Gran Can who took them into captivity.
Tuesday, 27th of November
Yesterday, at sunset, they arrived near a cape named Campana by the Admiral; and, as the sky was clear and the wind light, he did not wish to run in close to the land and anchor, although he had five or six singularly good havens under his lee. The Admiral was attracted on the one hand by the longing and delight he felt to gaze upon the beauty and freshness of those lands, and on the other by a desire to complete the work he had undertaken. For these reasons he remained close hauled, and stood off and on during the night. But, as the currents had set him more than 5 or 6 leagues to the S.E. beyond where he had been at nightfall, passing the land of Campana, he came in sight of a great opening beyond that cape, which seemed to divide one land from another, leaving an island between them. He decided to go back, with the wind S.E., steering to the point where the opening had appeared, where he found that it was only a large bay; and at the end of it, on the S.E. side, there was a point of land on which was a high and square-cut hill, which had looked like an island. A breeze sprang up from the north, and the Admiral continued on a S.E. course, to explore the coast and discover all that was there. Presently he saw, at the foot of the Cabo de Campana a wonderfully good port, and a large river, and, a quarter of a league on, another river, and a third, and a fourth to a seventh at similar distances, from the furthest one to Cabo de Campana being 20 miles S.E. Most of these rivers have wide and deep mouths, with excellent havens for large ships, without sandbanks or sunken rocks. Proceeding onwards from the last of these rivers, on a S.E, course, they came to the largest inhabited place they had yet seen, and a vast concourse of people came down to the beach with loud shouts, all naked, with their darts in their hands. The Admiral desired to have speech with them, so he furled sails and anchored. The boats of the ship and the caravel were sent on shore, with orders to do no harm whatever to the Indians, but to give them presents. The Indians made as if they would resist the landing, but, seeing that the boats of the Spaniards continued to advance without fear, they retired from the beach. Thinking that they would not be terrified if only two or three landed, three Christians were put on shore, who told them not to be afraid, in their own language, for they had been able to learn a little from the natives who were on board. But all ran away, neither great nor small remaining. The Christians went to the houses, which were of straw, and built like the others they had seen, but found no one in any of them. They returned to the ships, and made sail at noon in the direction of a fine cape to the eastward, about 8 leagues distant. Having gone about half a league, the Admiral saw, on the south side of the same bay, a very remarkable harbour, and to the S.E. some wonderfully beautiful country like a valley among the mountains, whence much smoke arose, indicating a large population, with signs of much cultivation. So he resolved to stop at this port, and see if he could have any speech or intercourse with the inhabitants. It was so that, if the Admiral had praised the other havens, he must praise this still more for its lands, climate, and people. He tells marvels of the beauty of the country and of the trees, there being palms and pine trees; and also of the great valley, which is not flat, but diversified by hill and dale, the most lovely scene in the world. Many streams flow from it, which fall from the mountains.
As soon as the ship was at anchor the Admiral jumped into the boat, to get soundings in the port, which is the shape of a hammer. When he was facing the entrance he found the mouth of a river on the south side of sufficient width for a galley to enter it, but so concealed that it is not visible until close to. Entering it for the length of the boat, there was a depth of from 5 to 8 fathoms. In passing up it the freshness and beauty of the trees, the clearness of the water, and the birds, made it all so delightful that he wished never to leave them. He said to the men who were with him that to give a true relation to the Sovereigns of the things they had seen, a thousand tongues would not suffice, nor his hand to write it, for that it was like a scene of enchantment. He desired that many other prudent and credible witnesses might see it, and he was sure that they would be as unable to exaggerate the scene as he was.
The Admiral also says:—“How great the benefit that is to be derived from this country would be, I cannot say. It is certain that where there are such lands there must be an infinite number of things that would be profitable. But I did not remain long in one port, because I wished to see as much of the country as possible, in order to make a report upon it to your Highnesses; and besides, I do not know the language, and these people neither understand me nor any other in my company; while the Indians I have on board often misunderstand. Moreover, I have not been able to see much of the natives, because they often take to flight. But now, if our Lord pleases, I will see as much as possible, and will proceed by little and little, learning and comprehending; and I will make some of my followers learn the language. For I have perceived that there is only one language up to this point. After they understand the advantages, I shall labour to make all these people Christians. They will become so readily, because they have no religion nor idolatry, and your Highnesses will send orders to build a city and fortress, and to convert the people. I assure your Highnesses that it does not appear to me that there can be a more fertile country nor a better climate under the sun, with abundant supplies of water. This is not like the rivers of Guinea, which are all pestilential. I thank our Lord that, up to this time, there has not been a person of my company who has so much as had a headache, or been in bed from illness, except an old man who has suffered from the stone all his life, and he was well again in two days. I speak of all three vessels. If it will please God that your Highnesses should send learned men out here, they will see the truth of all I have said. I have related already how good a place Rio de Mares would be for a town and fortress, and this is perfectly true; but it bears no comparison with this place, nor with the Mar de Nuestra Señora. For here there must be a large population, and very valuable productions, which I hope to discover before I return to Castille. I say that if Christendom will find profit among these people, how much more will Spain, to whom the whole country should be subject. Your Highnesses ought not to consent that any stranger should trade here, or put his foot in the country, except Catholic Christians, for this was the beginning and end of the undertaking; namely, the increase and glory of the Christian religion, and that no one should come to these parts who was not a good Christian.”
All the above are the Admiral’s words. He ascended the river for some distance, examined some branches of it, and, returning to the mouth, he found some pleasant groves of trees, like a delightful orchard. Here he came upon a canoe, dug out of one tree, as big as a galley of twelve, benches, fastened under a boat-house made of wood, and thatched with palm-leaves, so that it could be neither injured by sun nor by the water. He says that here would be the proper site for a town and fort, by reason of the good port, good water, good land, and abundance of fuel.
Wednesday, 28th of November
The Admiral remained during this day, in consequence of the rain and thick weather, though he might have run along the coast, the wind being S.W., but he did not weigh, because he was unacquainted with the coast beyond, and did not know what danger there might be for the vessels. The sailors of the two vessels went on shore to wash their clothes, and some of them walked inland for a short distance. They found indications of a large population, but the houses were all empty, everyone having fled. They returned by the banks of another river, larger than that which they knew of, at the port.
Thursday, 29th of November
The rain and thick weather continuing, the Admiral did not get under weigh. Some of the Christians went to another village to the N.W., but found no one, and nothing in the houses. On the road they met an old man who could not run away, and caught him. They told him they did not wish to do him any harm, gave him a few presents, and let him go. The Admiral would have liked to have had speech with him, for he was exceedingly satisfied with the delights of that land, and wished that a settlement might be formed there, judging that it must support a large population. In one house they found a cake of wax, which was taken to the Sovereigns, the Admiral saying that where there was wax there were also a thousand other good things. The sailors also found, in one house, the head of a man in a basket, covered with another basket, and fastened to a post of the house. They found the same things in another village. The Admiral believed that they must be the heads of some founder, or principal ancestor of a lineage, for the houses are built to contain a great number of people in each; and these should be relations, and descendants of a common ancestor.
Friday, 30th of November
They could not get under weigh to-day because the wind was cast, and dead against them. The Admiral sent 8 men well armed, accompanied by two of the Indians he had on board, to examine the villages inland, and get speech with the people. They came to many houses, but found no one and nothing, all having fled. They saw four youths who were digging in their fields, but, as soon as they saw the Christians, they ran away, and could not be overtaken. They marched a long distance, and saw many villages and a most fertile land, with much cultivation and many streams of water. Near one river they saw a canoe dug out of a single tree, 95 palmos long, and capable of carrying 150 persons.
Saturday, 1st of December
They did not depart, because there was still a foul wind, with much rain. The Admiral set up a cross at the entrance of this port, which he called Puerto Santo on some bare rocks. The point is that which is on the S.E. side of the entrance; but he who has to enter should make more over to the N.W.; for at the foot of both, near the rock, there are 12 fathoms and a very clean bottom. At the entrance of the port, towards the S.E. point, there is a reef of rocks above water, sufficiently far from the shore to be able to pass between if it is necessary; for both on the side of the rock and the shore there is a depth of 12 to 15 fathoms: and, on entering, a ship’s head should be turned S.W.
Sunday, 2nd of December
The wind was still contrary, and they could not depart. Every night the wind blows on the land, but no vessel need be alarmed at all the gales in the world, for they cannot blow home by reason of a reef of rocks at the opening to the haven. A sailor-boy found, at the mouth of the river, some stones which looked as if they contained gold; so they were taken to be shown to the Sovereigns. The Admiral says that there are great rivers at the distance of a lombard shot.
Monday, 3rd of December
By reason of the continuance of an easterly wind the Admiral did not leave this port. He arranged to visit a very beautiful headland a quarter of a league to the S.E. of the anchorage. He went with the boats and some armed men. At the foot of the cape there was the mouth of a fair river, and on entering it they found the width to be a hundred paces, with a depth of one fathom. Inside they found 12, 5, 4, and 2 fathoms, so that it would hold all the ships there are in Spain. Leaving the river, they came to a cove in which were five very large canoes, so well constructed that it was a pleasure to look at them. They were under spreading trees, and a path led from them to a very well-built boat-house, so thatched that neither sun nor rain could do any harm. Within it there was another canoe made out of a single tree like the others, like a galley with 17 benches. It was a pleasant sight to look upon such goodly work. The Admiral ascended a mountain, and afterwards found the country level, and cultivated with many things of that land, including such calabashes, as it was a glory to look upon them. In the middle there was a large village, and they came upon the people suddenly; but, as soon as they were seen, men and women took to flight. The Indian from on board, who was with the Admiral, cried out to them that they need not be afraid, as the strangers were good people. The Admiral made him give them bells, copper ornaments, and glass beads, green and yellow, with which they were well content. He saw that they had no gold nor any other precious thing, and that it would suffice to leave them in peace. The whole district was well peopled, the rest having fled from fear. The Admiral assures the Sovereigns that ten thousand of these men would run from ten, so cowardly and timid are they. No arms are carried by them, except wands, on the point of which a short piece of wood is fixed, hardened by fire, and these they are very ready to exchange. Returning to where he had left the boats, he sent back some men up the hill, because he fancied he had seen a large apiary. Before those he had sent could return, they were joined by many Indians, and they went to the boats, where the Admiral was waiting with all his people. One of the natives advanced into the river near the stern of the boat, and made a long speech, which the Admiral did not understand. At intervals the other Indians raised their hands to heaven, and shouted. The Admiral thought he was assuring him that he was pleased at his arrival; but he saw the Indian who came from the ship change the colour of his face, and turn as yellow as wax, trembling much, and letting the Admiral know by signs that he should leave the river, as they were going to kill him. He pointed to a cross-bow which one of the Spaniards had, and showed it to the Indians, and the Admiral let it be understood that they would all be slain, because that cross-bow carried far and killed people. He also took a sword and drew it out of the sheath, showing it to them, and saying the same, which, when they had heard, they all took to flight; while the Indian from the ship still trembled from cowardice, though he was a tall, strong man. The Admiral did not want to leave the river, but pulled towards the place where the natives had assembled in great numbers, all painted, and as naked as when their mothers bore them. Some had tufts of feathers on their heads, and all had their bundles of darts.
The Admiral says: “I came to them, and gave them some mouthfuls of bread, asking for the darts, for which I gave in exchange copper ornaments, bells, and glass beads. This made them peaceable, so that they came to the boats again, and gave us what they had. The sailors had killed a turtle, and the shell was in the boat in pieces. The sailor-boys gave them some in exchange for a bundle of darts. These are like the other people we have seen, and with the same belief that we came from heaven. They are ready to give whatever thing they have in exchange for any trifle without saying it is little; and I believe they would do the same with gold and spices if they had any. I saw a fine house, not very large, and with two doors, as all the rest have. On entering, I saw a marvellous work, there being rooms made in a peculiar way, that I scarcely know how to describe it. Shells and other things were fastened to the ceiling. I thought it was a temple, and I called them and asked, by signs, whether prayers were offered up there. They said that they were not, and one of them climbed up and offered me all the things that were there, of which I took some.”
Tuesday, 4th of December
The Admiral made sail with little wind, and left that port, which he called Puerto Santo. After going two leagues, he saw the great river of which he spoke yesterday. Passing along the land, and beating to windward on S.E. and W.N.W. courses, they reached Cabo Lindo, which is E.S.E. 5 leagues from Cabo del Monte. A league and a half from Cabo del Monte there is an important but rather narrow river, which seemed to have a good entrance, andvto be deep. Three-quarters of a league further on, the Admiral saw another very large river, and he thought it must have its source at a great distance. It had a hundred paces at its mouth, and no bar, with a depth of 8 fathoms. The Admiral sent the boat in, to take soundings, and they found the water fresh until it enters the sea.
This river had great volume, and must have a large population on its banks. Beyond Cabo Lindo there is a great bay, which would be open for navigation to E.N.E. and S.E. and S.S.W.
Wednesday, 5th of December
All this night they were beating to windward off Cape Lindo, to reach the land to the east, and at sunrise the Admiral sighted another cape, two and a half leagues to the east. Having passed it, he saw that the land trended S. and S.W., and presently saw a fine high cape in that direction, 7 leagues distant. He would have wished to go there, but his object was to reach the island of Babeque, which, according to the Indians, bore N.E.; so he gave up the intention. He could not go to Babeque either, because the wind was N.E. Looking to the S.E., he saw land, which was a very large island, according to the information of the Indians, well peopled, and called by them Bohio. The Admiral say that the inhabitants of Cuba, or Juana, and of all the other islands, are much afraid of the inhabitants of Bohio, because they say that they eat people.
The Indians relate other things, by signs, which are very wonderful; but the Admiral did not believe them. He only inferred that those of Bohio must have more cleverness and cunning to be able to capture the others, who, however, are very poor-spirited. The wind veered from N.E. to North, so the Admiral determined to leave Cuba, or Juana, which, up to this time, he had supposed to be the mainland, on account of its size, having coasted along it for 120 leagues. He shaped a course S.E. b. E., the land he had sighted hearing S.E.; taking this precaution because the wind always veered from N. to N.E. again, and thence to East and S.E. The wind increased, and he made all sail, the current helping them; so that they were making 8 miles an hour from the morning until one in the afternoon (which is barely 6 hours, for they say that the nights were nearly 15 hours). Afterwards they went 10 miles an hour, making good 88 miles by sunset, equal to 22 leagues, all to the S.E. As night was coming on, the Admiral ordered the caravel Niña, being a good sailer, to proceed ahead, so as to sight a harbour at daylight. Arriving at the entrance of a port which was like the Bay of Cadiz, while it was still dark, a boat was sent in to take soundings, which showed a light from a lantern. Before the Admiral could beat up to where the caravel was, hoping that the boat would show a leading-mark for entering the port, the candle in the lantern went out. The caravel, not seeing the light, showed a light to the Admiral, and, running down to him, related what had happened. The boat’s crew then showed another light, and the caravel made for it; but the Admiral could not do so, and was standing off and on all night.
Thursday, 6th of December
When daylight arrived the Admiral found himself four leagues from the port, to which he gave the name of Puerto Maria and to a fine cape bearing S.S.W, he gave the name of Cabo del Estrella. It seemed to be the furthest point of the island towards the south, distant 28 miles. Another point of land, like an island, appeared about 40 miles to the east. To another fine point, 54 miles to the east, he gave the name of Cabo del Elefante, and he called another, 28 miles to the S.E., Cabo de Cinquin. There was a great opening or bay, which might be the mouth of a river, distant 20 miles. It seemed that between Cabo del Elefante and that of Cinquin there was a great opening, and some of the sailors said that it formed an island, to which the name of Isla de la Tortuga was given. The island appeared to be very high land, not closed in with mountains, but with beautiful valleys, well cultivated, the crops appearing like the wheat on the plain of Cordova in May. That night they saw many fires, and much smoke, as if from workshops, in the day time; it appeared to be a signal made by people who were at war. All the coast of this land trends to the cast.
At the hour of vespers the Admiral reached this port, to which he gave the name of Puerto de San Nicolas, in honour of St. Nicholas, whose day it was; and on entering it he was astonished at its beauty and excellence. Although he had given great praise to the ports of Cuba, he had no doubt that this one not only equalled, but excelled them, and none of them are like it. At the entrance it is a league and a half wide, and a vessel’s head should be turned S.S.E., though, owing to the great width, she may be steered on any bearing that is convenient; proceeding on this course for two leagues. On the south side of the entrance the coast forms a cape, and thence the course is almost the same as far as a point where there is a fine beach, and a plain covered with fruit-bearing trees of many kinds; so that the Admiral thought there must be nutmegs and other spices among them, but he did not know them, and they were not ripe. There is a river falling into the harbour, near the middle of the beach. The depth of this port is surprising, for, until reaching the land, for a distance ofthe lead did not reach the bottom at 40 fathoms; and up to this length there are 15 fathoms with a very clean bottom. Throughout the port there is a depth of 1 5 fathoms, with a clean bottom, at a short distance from the shore; and all along the coast there are soundings with clean bottom, and not a single sunken rock. Inside, at the length of a boat’s oar from the land, there are 5 fathoms. Beyond the limit of the port to the S.S.E. a thousand carracks could beat up. One branch of the port to the N.E. runs into the land for a long half league, and always the same width, as if it had been measured with a cord. Being in this creek, which is 25 paces wide, the principal entrance to the harbour is not in sight, so that it appears land-locked. The depth of this creek is 11 fathoms throughout, all with clean bottom; and close to the land, where one might put the gangboards on the grass, there are eight fathoms.
The whole port is open to the air, and clear of trees. All the island appeared to be more rocky than any that had been discovered. The trees are smaller, and many of them of the same kinds as are found in Spain, such as the ilex, the arbutus, and others, and it is the same with the herbs. It is a very high country, all open and clear, with a very fine air, and no such cold has been met with elsewhere, though it cannot be called cold except by comparison. Towards the front of the haven there is a beautiful valley, watered by a river; and in that district there must be many inhabitants, judging from the number of large canoes, like galleys, with 15 benches. All the natives fled as soon as they saw the ships. The Indians who were on board had such a longing to return to their homes that the Admiral considered whether he should not take them back when he should depart from here. They were already suspicious, because he did not shape a course towards their country; whence he neither believed what they said, nor could he understand them, nor they him, properly. The Indians on board had the greatest fear in the world of the people of this island. In order to get speech of the people it would be necessary to remain some days in harbour; but the Admiral did not do so, because he had to continue his discoveries, and because he could not tell how long he might be detained. He trusted in our Lord that the Indians he brought with him would understand the language of the people of this island; and afterwards he would communicate with them, trusting that it might please God’s Majesty that he might find trade in gold before he returned.
Friday, 7th of December
At daybreak the Admiral got under weigh, made sail, and left the port of St. Nicholas. He went on with the wind in the west for two leagues, until he reached the point which forms the Carenero, when the angle in the coast bore S.E., and the Cabo de la Estrella was 24 miles to the S.W. Thence he steered along the coast eastward to Cabo Cinquin about 48 miles, 20 of them being on an E.N.E. coast. All the coast is very high, with a deep sea. Close in shore there are 20 to 30 fathoms, and at the distance of a lombard-shot there is no bottom; all which the Admiral discovered that day, as he sailed along the coast with the wind S.W., much to his satisfaction. The cape, which runs out in the port of St. Nicholas the length of a shot from a lombard, could be made an island by cutting across it, while to sail round it is a circuit of 3 or 4 miles. All that land is very high, not clothed with very high trees, but with ilex, arbutus, and others proper to the land of Castille. Before reaching Cape Cinquin by two leagues, the Admiral discovered an opening in the mountains, through which he could see a very large valley, covered with crops like barley, and he therefore judged that it must sustain a large population. Behind there was a high range of mountains. On reaching Cabo Cinquin, the Cabo de la Tortuga bore N.E. 32 miles. Off Cabo Cinquin, at the distance of a lombard-shot, there is a high rock, which is a good landmark. The Admiral being there, he took the bearing of Cabo del Elefante, which was E.S.E. about 70 miles, the intervening land being very high. At a distance of 6 leagues there was a conspicuous cape, and he saw many large valleys and plains, and high mountains inland, all reminding him of Spain. After 8 leagues he came to a very deep but narrow river, though a carrack might easily enter it, and the mouth without bar or rocks. After 16 miles there was a wide and deep harbour, with no bottom at the entrance, nor, at 3 paces from the shore, less than 15 fathoms; and it runs inland a quarter of a league. It being yet very early, only one o’clock in the afternoon, and the wind being aft and blowing fresh, yet, as the sky threatened much rain, and it was very thick, which is dangerous even on a known coast, how much more in an unknown country, the
Admiral resolved to enter the port, which he called Puerto de la Concepcion. He landed near a small river at the point of the haven, flowing from valleys and plains, the beauty of which was a marvel to behold. He took fishing-nets with him; and, before he landed, a skate, like those of Spain, jumped into the boat, this being the first time they had seen fish resembling the fish of Castille. The sailors caught and killed others. Walking a short distance inland, the Admiral found much land under cultivation, and heard the singing of nightingales and other birds of Castille. Five men were seen, but they would not stop, running away. The Admiral found myrtles and other Spanish plants, while land and mountains were like those of Castille.
Saturday, 8th of December
In this port there was heavy rain, with a fresh breeze from the north. The harbour is protected from all winds except the north; but even this can do no harm whatever, because there is a great surf outside, which prevents such a sea within the river as would make a ship work on her cables. After midnight the wind veered to N.E., and then to East, from which winds this port is well sheltered by the island of Tortuga, distant 36 miles.
Sunday, 9th of December
To-day it rained, and the weather was wintry, like October in Castille. No habitations had been seen except a very beautiful house in the Puerto de S. Nicolas, which was better built than any that had been in other parts. “The island is very large,” says the Admiral: “it would not be much if it has a circumference of 200 leagues. All the parts he had seen were well cultivated. He believed that the villages must be at a distance from the sea, whither they went when the ships arrived; for they all took to flight, taking everything with them, and they made smoke-signals, like a people at war.” This port has a width of a thousand paces at its entrance, equal to a quarter of a league. There is neither bank nor reef within, and there are scarcely soundings close in shore. Its length, running inland, is 3,000 paces, all clean, and with a sandy bottom; so that any ship may anchor in it without fear, and enter it without precaution. At the upper end there are the mouths of two rivers, with the most beautiful campaign country, almost like the lands of Spain: these even have the advantage; for which reasons the Admiral gave the name of the said island Isla Española
Monday, 10th of December
It blew hard from the N.E., which made them drag their anchors half a cable’s length. This surprised the Admiral, who had seen that the anchors had taken good hold of the ground. As he saw that the wind was foul for the direction in which he wanted to steer, he sent six men on shore, well armed, to go two or three leagues inland, and endeavour to open communications with the natives. They came and returned without having seen either people or houses. But they found some hovels, wide roads, and some places where many fires had been made. They saw excellent lands, and many mastick trees, some specimens of which they took; but this is not the time for collecting it, as it does not coagulate.
Tuesday, 11th of December
The Admiral did not depart, because the wind was still east and S.E. In front of this port, as has been said, is the island of La Tortuga. It appears to be a large island, with the coast almost like that of Española, and the distance between them is about ten leagues. It is well to know that from the Cabo de Cinquin, opposite Tortuga, the coast trends to the south. The Admiral had a great desire to see that channel between these two islands, and to examine the island of Española, which is the most beautiful thing in the world. According to what the Indians said who were on board, he would have to go to the island of Babeque. They declared that it was very large, with great mountains, rivers, and valleys; and that the island of Bohio was larger than Juana, which they call Cuba, and that it is not surrounded by water. They seem to imply that there is mainland behind Española, and they call it Caritaba, and say it is of vast extent. They have reason in saying that the inhabitants are a clever race, for all the people of these islands arc in great fear of those of Caniba. So the Admiral repeats, what he has said before, that Caniba is nothing else but the Gran Can, who ought now to be very near. He sends ships to capture the islanders; and as they do not return, their countrymen believe that they have been eaten. Each day we understand better what the Indians say, and they us, so that very often we are intelligible to each other. The Admiral sent people on shore, who found a great deal of mastick, but did not gather it. He says that the rains make it, and that in Chios they collect it in March. In these lands, being warmer, they might take it in January. They caught many fish like those of Castille—dace, salmon, hake, dory, gilt heads, skates, corbinas, shrimps, and they saw sardines. They found many aloes.
Wednesday, 12th of December
The Admiral did not leave the port to-day, for the same reason: a contrary wind. He set up a great cross on the west side of the entrance, on a very picturesque height, “in sign”, he says, “that your Highnesses hold this land for your own, but chiefly as a sign of our Lord Jesus Christ.” This being done, three sailors strolled into the woods to see the trees and bushes. Suddenly they came upon a crowd of people, all naked like the rest. They called to them, and went towards them, but they ran away. At last they caught a woman; for I had ordered that some should be caught, that they might be treated well, and made to lose their fear. This would be a useful event, for it could scarcely be otherwise, considering the beauty of the country. So they took the woman, who was very young and beautiful, to the ship, where she talked to the Indians on board; for they all speak the same language. The Admiral caused her to be dressed, and gave her glass beads, hawks’ bells, and brass ornaments; then he sent her back to the shore very courteously, according to his custom. He sent three of the crew with her, and three of the Indians he had on board, that they might open communications with her people. The sailors in the boat, who took her on shore, told the Admiral that she did not want to leave the ship, but would rather remain with the other women he had seized at the port of Mares, in the island of Juana or Cuba. The Indians who went to put the woman on shore said that the natives came in a canoe, which is their caravel, in which they navigate from one place to another; but when they came to the entrance of the harbour, and saw the ships, they turned back, left the canoe, and took the road to the village. The woman pointed out the position of the village. She had a piece of gold in her nose, which showed that there was gold in that island.
Thursday, 13th of December
The three men who had been sent by the Admiral with the woman returned at 3 o’clock in the morning, not having gone with her to the village, because the distance appeared to be long, or because they were afraid. They said that next day many people would come to the ships, as they would have been reassured by the news brought them by the woman. The Admiral, with the desire of ascertaining whether there were any profitable commodities in that land, being so beautiful and fertile, and of having some speech with the people, and being desirous of serving the Sovereigns, determined to send again to the village, trusting in the news brought by the woman that the Christians were good people. For this service he selected nine men well armed, and suited for such an enterprise, with whom an Indian went from those who were on board. They reached the village, which is 4 1/2 leagues to the S.E., and found that it was situated in a very large and open valley. As soon as the inhabitants saw the Christians coming they all fled inland, leaving all their goods behind them. The village consisted of a thousand houses, with over three thousand inhabitants. The Indian whom the Christians had brought with them ran after the fugitives, saying that they should have no fear, for the Christians did not come from Cariba, but were from heaven, and that they gave many beautiful things to all the people they met. They were so impressed with what he said, that upwards of two thousand came close up to the Christians, putting their hands on their heads, which was a sign of great reverence and friendship; and they were all trembling until they were reassured. The Christians related that, as soon as the natives had cast off their fear, they all went to the houses, and each one brought what he had to eat, consisting of yams, which are roots like large radishes, which they sow and cultivate in all their lands, and is their staple food. They make bread of it, and roast it. The yam has the smell of a chesnut, and anyone would think he was eating chesnuts. They gave their guests bread and fish, and all they had. As the Indians who came in the ship had understood that the Admiral wanted to have some parrots, one of those who accompanied the Spaniards mentioned this, and the natives brought out parrots, and gave them as many as they wanted, without asking anything for them. The natives asked the Spaniards not to go that night, and that they would give them many other things that they had in the mountains. While all these people were with the Spaniards, a great multitude was seen to come, with the husband of the woman whom the Admiral had honoured and sent away. They wore hair over their shoulders, and came to give thanks to the Christians for the honour the Admiral had done them, and for the gifts. The Christians reported to the Admiral that this was a handsomer and finer people than any that had hitherto been met with. But the Admiral says that he does not see how they can be a finer people than the others, giving to understand that all those he had found in the other islands were very well conditioned. As regards beauty, the Christians said there was no comparison, both men and women, and that their skins are whiter than the others. They saw two girls whose skins were as white as any that could be seen in Spain. They also said, with regard to the beauty of the country they saw, that the best land in Castille could not be compared with it. The Admiral also, comparing the lands they had seen before with these, said that there was no comparison between them, nor did the plain of Cordova come near them, the difference being as great as between night and day. They said that all these lands were cultivated, and that a very wide and large river passed through the centre of the valley, and could irrigate all the fields. All the trees were green and full of fruit, and the plants tall and covered with flowers. The roads were broad and good. The climate was like April in Castille; the nightingale and other birds sang as they do in Spain during that month, and it was the most pleasant place in the world. Some birds sing sweetly at night. The crickets and frogs are heard a good deal. The fish are like those of Spain. They saw much aloe and mastick, and cotton-fields. Gold was not found, and it is not wonderful that it should not have been found in so short a time.
Here the Admiral calculated the number of hours in the day and night, and from sunrise to sunset. He found that twenty half-hour glasses passed, though he says that here there may be a mistake, either because they were not turned with equal quickness, or because some sand may not have passed. He also observed with a quadrant, and found that he was 34 degrees from the equinoctial line.
Friday, 14th of December
The Admiral left the Puerto de la Concepcion with the land-breeze, but soon afterwards it fell calm (and this is experienced every day by those who are on this coast). Later an east wind sprang up, so he steered N.N.E., and arrived at the island of Tortuga. He sighted a point which he named Punta Pierna, E.N.E. of the end of the island 12 miles; and from thence another point was seen and named Punta Lanzada, in the same N.E. direction 16 miles. Thus from the end of Tortuga to Punta Aguda the distance is 44 miles, which is 11 leagues E.N.E. Along this route there are several long stretches of beach. The island of Tortuga is very high, but not mountainous, and is very beautiful and populous, like Española, and the land is cultivated, so that it looked like the plain of Cordova. Seeing that the wind was foul, and that he could not steer for the island of Baneque, he determined to return to the Puerto de la Concepcion whence he had come; but he could not fetch a river which is two leagues to the east of that port.
Saturday, 15th of December
Once more the Admiral left the Puerto de la Concepcion, but, on leaving the port, he was again met by a contrary east wind. He stood over to Tortuga, and then steered with the object of exploring the river he had been unable to reach yesterday; nor was he able to fetch the river this time, but he anchored half a league to leeward of it, where there was clean and good anchoring ground. As soon as the vessels were secured, he went with the boats to the river, entering an arm of the sea, which proved not to be the river. Returning, he found the mouth, there being only one, and the current very strong. He went in with the boats to find the villagers that had been seen the day before. He ordered a tow-rope to be got out and manned by the sailors, who hauled the boats up for a distance of two lombard-shots. They could not get further owing to the strength of the current. He saw some houses, and the large valley where the villages were, and he said that a more beautiful valley he had never seen, this river flowing through the centre of it. He also saw people at the entrance, but they all took to flight. He further says that these people must be much hunted, for they live in such a state of fear. When the ships arrived at any port, they presently made smoke signals throughout the country; and this is done more in this island of Española and in Tortuga, which is also a large island, than in the others that were visited before. He called this valley Valle del Paraiso, and the river Guadalquivir; because he says that it is the size of the Guadalquivir at Cordova. The banks consist of shingle, suitable for walking.
Sunday, 16th of December
At midnight the Admiral made sail with the land-breeze to get clear of that gulf. Passing along the coast of Española on a bowline, for the wind had veered to the cast, he met a canoe in the middle of the gulf, with a single Indian in it. The Admiral was surprised how he could have kept afloat with such a gale blowing. Both the Indian and his canoe were taken on board, and he was given glass beads, bells, and brass trinkets, and taken in the ship, until she was off a village 17 miles from the former anchorage, where the Admiral came to again. The village appeared to have been lately built, for all the houses were new. The Indian then went on shore in his canoe, bringing the news that the Admiral and his companions were good people; although the intelligence had already been conveyed to the village from the place where the natives had their interview with the six Spaniards. Presently more than five hundred natives with their king came to the shore opposite the ships, which were anchored very close to the land. Presently one by one, then many by many, came to the ship without bringing anything with them, except that some had a few grains of very fine gold in their ears and noses, which they readily gave away. The Admiral ordered them all to be well treated; and he says: “for they are the best people in the world, and the gentlest; and above all I entertain the hope in our Lord that your Highnesses will make them all Christians, and that they will be all your subjects, for as yours I hold them.” He also saw that they all treated the king with respect, who was on the sea-shore. The Admiral sent him a present, which he received in great state. He was a youth of about 21 years of age, and he had with him an aged tutor, and other councillors who advised and answered him, but he uttered very few words. One of the Indians who had come in the Admiral’s ship spoke to him, telling him how the Christians had come from heaven, and how they came in search of gold, and wished to find the island of Baneque. He said that it was well, and that there was much gold in the said island. He explained to the alguazil of the Admiral that the way they were going was the right way, and that in two days they would be there; adding, that if they wanted anything from the shore he would give it them with great pleasure. This king, and all the others, go naked as their mothers bore them, as do the women without any covering, and these were the most beautiful men and women that had yet been met with. They are fairly white, and if they were clothed and protected from the sun and air, they would be almost as fair as people in Spain. This land is cool, and the best that words can describe. It is very high, yet the top of the highest mountain could be ploughed with bullocks; and all is diversified with plains and valleys. In all Castille there is no land that can be compared with this for beauty and fertility. All this island, as well as the island of Tortuga, is cultivated like the plain of Cordova. They raise on these lands crops of yams, which are small branches, at the foot of which grow roots like carrots, which serve as bread. They powder and knead them, and make them into bread; then they plant the same branch in another part, which again sends out four or five of the same roots, which are very nutritious, with the taste of chesnuts. Here they have the largest the Admiral had seen in any part of the world, for he says that they have the same plant in Guinea. At this place they were as thick as a man’s leg. All the people were stout and lusty, not thin, like the natives that had been seen before, and of a very pleasant manner, without religious belief. The trees were so luxuriant that the leaves left off being green, and were dark coloured with verdure. It was a wonderful thing to see those valleys, and rivers of sweet water, and the cultivated fields, and land fit for cattle, though they have none, for orchards, and for anything in the world that a man could seek for.
In the afternoon the king came on board the ship, where the Admiral received him in due form, and caused him to be told that the ships belonged to the Sovereigns of Castille, who were the greatest Princes in the world. But neither the Indians who were on board, who acted as interpreters, nor the king, believed a word of it. They maintained that the Spaniards came from heaven, and that the Sovereigns of Castille must be in heaven, and not in this world. They placed Spanish food before the king to eat, and he ate a mouthful, and gave the rest to his councillors and tutor, and to the rest who came with him.
“Your Highnesses may believe that these lands are so good and fertile, especially these of the island of Española, that there is no one who would know how to describe them, and no one who could believe if he had not seen them. And your Highnesses may believe that this island, and all the others, are as much yours as Castille. Here there is only wanting a settlement and the order to the people to do what is required. For I, with the force I have under me, which is not large, could march over all these islands without opposition. I have seen only three sailors land, without wishing to do harm, and a multitude of Indians fled before them. They have no arms, and are without warlike instincts; they all go naked, and are so timid that a thousand would not stand before three of our men. So that they are good to be ordered about, to work and sow, and do all that may be necessary, and to build towns, and they should be taught to go about clothed and to adopt our customs.”
Monday, 17th of December
It blew very hard during the night from E.N.E., but there was not much sea, as this part of the coast is enclosed and sheltered by the island of Tortuga. The sailors were sent away to fish with nets. They had much intercourse with the natives, who brought them certain arrows of the Caribas or Canibales. They are made of reeds, pointed with sharp bits of wood hardened by fire, and are very long. They pointed out two men who wanted certain pieces of flesh on their bodies, giving to understand that the Canibales had eaten them by mouthfuls. The Admiral did not believe it. Some Christians were again sent to the village, and, in exchange for glass beads, obtained some pieces of gold beaten out into fine leaf. They saw one man, whom the Admiral supposed to be Governor of that province, called by them Cacique, with a piece of gold leaf as large as a hand, and it appears that he wanted to barter with it. He went into his house, and the other remained in the open space outside. He cut the leaf into small pieces, and each time he came out he brought a piece and exchanged it. When he had no more left, he said by signs that he had sent for more, and that he would bring it another day. The Admiral says that all these things, and the manner of doing them, with their gentleness and the information they gave, showed these people to be more lively and intelligent than any that had hitherto been met with. In the afternoon a canoe arrived from the island of Tortuga with a crew of forty men; and when they arrived on the beach, all the people of the village sat down in sign of peace, and nearly all the crew came on shore. The Cacique rose by himself, and, with words that appeared to be of a menacing character, made them go back to the canoe and shove off. He took up stones from the beach and threw them into the water, all having obediently gone back into the canoe. He also took a stone and put it in the hands of my Alguazil, that he might throw it. He had been sent on shore with the Secretary to see if the canoe had brought anything of value. The Alguazil did not wish to throw the stone. That Cacique showed that he was well disposed to the Admiral. Presently the canoe departed, and afterwards they said to the Admiral that there was more gold in Tortuga than in Española, because it is nearer to Baneque. The Admiral did not think that there were gold mines either in Española or Tortuga, but that the gold was brought from Baneque in small quantities, there being nothing to give in return. That land is so rich that there is no necessity to work much to sustain life, nor to clothe themselves, as they go naked. He believed that they were very near the source, and that our Lord would point out where the gold has its origin. He had information that from here to Baneque was four days’ journey, about 34 leagues, which might be traversed with a fair wind in a single day.
Tuesday, 18th of December
The Admiral remained at the same anchorage, because there was no wind, and also because the Cacique had said that he had sent for gold. The Admiral did not expect much from what might be brought, but he wanted to understand better whence it came. Presently he ordered the ship and caravel to be adorned with arms and dressed with flags, in honour of the feast of Santa Maria de la O, or commemoration of the Annunciation, which was on that day, and many rounds were fired from the lombards. The king of that island of Española had got up very early and left his house, which is about five leagues away, reaching the village at three in the morning.
There were several men from the ship in the village, who had been sent by the Admiral to see if any gold had arrived. They said that the king came with two hundred men; that he was carried in a litter by four men; and that he was a youth, as has already been said. To-day, when the Admiral was dining under the poop, the king came on board with all his people.
The Admiral says to the Sovereigns: “Without doubt, his state, and the reverence with which he is treated by all his people, would appear good to your Highnesses, though they all go naked. When he came on board, he found that I was dining at a table under the poop, and, at a quick walk, he came to sit down by me, and did not wish that I should give place by coming to receive him or rising from the table, but that I should go on with my dinner. I thought that he would like to eat of our viands, and ordered them to be brought for him to eat. When he came under the poop, he made signs with his hand that all the rest should remain outside, and so they did, with the greatest possible promptitude and reverence. They all sat on the deck, except the men of mature age, whom I believe to be his councillors and tutor, who came and sat at his feet. Of the viands which I put before him, he took of each as much as would serve to taste it, sending the rest to his people, who all partook of the dishes. The same thing in drinking: he just touched with his lips, giving the rest to his followers. They were all of fine presence and very few words. What they did say, so far as I could make out, was very clear and intelligent. The two at his feet watched his mouth, speaking to him and for him, and with much reverence. After dinner, an attendant brought a girdle, made like those of Castille, but of different material, which he took and gave to me, with pieces of worked gold, very thin. I believe they get very little here, but they say that they are very near the place where it is found, and where there is plenty. I saw that he was pleased with some drapery I had over my bed, so I gave it him, with some very good amber beads I wore on my neck, some coloured shoes, and a bottle of orange-flower water. He was marvellously well content, and both he and his tutor and councillors were very sorry that they could not understand me, nor I them. However, I knew that they said that, if I wanted anything, the whole island was at my disposal. I sent for some beads of mine, with which, as a charm, I had a gold excelente, on which your Highnesses were stamped. I showed it to him, and said, as I had done yesterday, that your Highnesses ruled the best part of the world, and that there were no Princes so great. I also showed him the royal standards, and the others with a cross, of which he thought much. He said to his councillors what great lords your Highnesses must be to have sent me from so far, even from heaven to this country, without fear. Many other things passed between them which I did not understand, except that it was easy to see that they held everything to be very wonderful.”
When it got late, and the king wanted to go, the Admiral sent him on shore in his boat very honourably, and saluted him with many guns. Having landed, he got into his litter, and departed with his 200 men, his son being carried behind on the shoulders of an Indian, a man highly respected. All the sailors and people from the ships were given to eat, and treated with much honour wherever they liked to stop. One sailor said that he had stopped in the road and seen all the things given by the Admiral. A man carried each one before the king, and these men appeared to be among those who were most respected. His son came a good distance behind the king, with a similar number of attendants, and the same with a brother of the king, except that the brother went on foot, supported under the arms by two honoured attendants. This brother came to the ship after the king, and the Admiral presented him with some of the things used for barter. It was then that the Admiral learnt that a king was called Cacique in their language. This day little gold was got by barter, but the Admiral heard from an old man that there were many neighbouring islands, at a distance of a hundred leagues or more, as he understood, in which much gold is found; and there is even one island that was all gold. In the others there was so much that it was said they gather it with sieves, and they fuse it and make bars, and work it in a thousand ways. They explained the work by signs. This old man pointed out to the Admiral the direction and position, and he determined to go there, saying that if the old man had not been a principal councillor of the king he would detain him, and make him go, too; or if he knew the language he would ask him, and he believed, as the old man was friendly with him and the other Christians, that he would go of his own accord. But as these people were now subjects of the King of Castille, and it would not be right to injure them, he decided upon leaving him. The Admiral set up a very large cross in the centre of the square of that village, the Indians giving much help; they made prayers and worshipped it, and, from the feeling they show, the Admiral trusted in our Lord that all the people of those islands would become Christians.
Wednesday, 19th of December
This night the Admiral got under weigh to leave the gulf formed between the islands of Tortuga and Española, but at dawn of day a breeze sprang up from the cast, against which he was unable to get clear of the strait between the two islands during the whole day. At night he was unable to reach a port which was in sight. He made out four points of land, and a great bay with a river, and beyond he saw a large bay, where there was a village, with a valley behind it among high mountains covered with trees, which appeared to be pines. Over the Two Brothers there is a very high mountain-range running N.E. and S.W., and E.S.E. from the Cabo de Torres is a small island to which the Admiral gave the name of Santo Tomas, because to-morrow was his vigil. The whole circuit of this island alternates with capes and excellent harbours, so far as could be judged from the sea. Before coming to the island on the west side, there is a cape which runs far into the sea, in part high, the rest low; and for this reason the Admiral named it Cabo Alto y Bajo. From the road of Torres to E.S.E. 60 miles, there is a mountain higher than any that reaches the sea, and from a distance it looks like an island, owing to a depression on the land side. It was named Monte Caribata, because that province was called Caribata. It is very beautiful, and covered with green trees, without snow or clouds. The weather was then, as regards the air and temperature, like March in Castille, and as regards vegetation, like May. The nights lasted 14 hours.
Thursday, 20th of December
At sunrise they entered a port between the island of Santo Tomas and the Cabo de Caribata, and anchored. This port is very beautiful, and would hold all the ships in Christendom. The entrance appears impossible from the sea to those who have never entered, owing to some reefs of rocks which run from the mountainous cape almost to the island. They are not placed in a row, but one here, another there, some towards the sea, others near the land. It is therefore necessary to keep a good look-out for the entrances, which are wide and with a depth of 7 fathoms, so that they can be used without fear. Inside the reefs there is a depth of 12 fathoms. A ship can lie with a cable made fast, against any wind that blows. At the entrance of this port there is a channel on the west side of a sandy islet with 7 fathoms, and many trees on its shore. But there are many sunken rocks in that direction, and a look-out should be kept up until the port is reached. Afterwards there is no need to fear the greatest storm in the world. From this port a very beautiful cultivated valley is in sight, descending from the S.E., surrounded by such lofty mountains that they appear to reach the sky, and covered with green trees. Without doubt there are mountains here which are higher than the island of Tenerife in the Canaries, which is held to be the highest yet known. On this side of the island of Santo Tomas, at a distance of a league, there is another islet, and beyond it another, forming wonderful harbours; though a good lookout must be kept for sunken rocks. The Admiral also saw villages, and smoke made by them.
Friday, 21st of December
To-day the Admiral went with the ship’s boats to examine this port, which he found to be such that it could not be equalled by any he had yet seen; but, having praised the others so much, he knew not how to express himself, fearing that he will be looked upon as one who goes beyond the truth. He therefore contents himself with saying that he had old sailors with him who say the same. All the praises he has bestowed on the other ports are true, and that this is better than any of them is equally true. He further says: “I have traversed the sea for 23 years, without leaving it for any time worth counting, and I saw all in the east and the west, going on the route of the north, which is England, and I have been to Guinea, but in all those parts there will not be found perfection of harbours. . . . always foundbetter than another, that I, with good care, saw written; and I again affirm it was well written, that this one is better than all others, and will hold all the ships of the world, secured with the oldest cables.” From the entrance to the end is a distance of five leagues. The Admiral saw some very well cultivated lands, although they are all so, and he sent two of the boat’s crew to the top of a hill to see if any village was near, for none could be seen from the sea. At about ten o’clock that night, certain Indians came in a canoe to see the Admiral and the Christians, and they were given presents, with which they were much pleased. The two men returned, and reported that they had seen a very large village at a short distance from the sea. The Admiral ordered the boat to row towards the place where the village was until they came near the land, when he saw two Indians, who came to the shore apparently in a state of fear. So he ordered the boats to stop, and the Indians that were with the Admiral were told to assure the two natives that no harm whatever was intended to them. Then they came nearer the sea, and the Admiral nearer the land. As soon as the natives had got rid of their fear, so many came that they covered the ground, with women and children, giving a thousand thanks. They ran hither and thither to bring us bread made of yams, which they call ajes, which is very white and good, and water in calabashes, and in earthen jars made like those of Spain, and everything else they had and that they thought the Admiral could want, and all so willingly and cheerfully that it was wonderful. “It cannot be said that, because what they gave was worth little, therefore they gave liberally, because those who had pieces of gold gave as freely as those who had a calabash of water; and it is easy to know when a thing is given with a hearty desire to give.” These are the Admiral’s words. “These people have no spears nor any other arms, nor have any of the inhabitants of the whole island, which I believe to be very large. They go naked as when their mothers bore them, both men and women. In Cuba and the other islands the women wear a small clout of cotton in front, as well as the men, as soon as they have passed the age of twelve years, but here neither old nor young do so. Also, the men in the other islands jealously hide their women from the Christians, but here they do not.” The women have very beautiful bodies, and they were the first to come and give thanks to heaven, and to bring what they had, especially things to eat, such as bread of ajes (yams), nuts, and four or five kinds of fruits, some of which the Admiral ordered to be preserved, to be taken to the Sovereigns. He says that the women did not do less in other ports before they were hidden; and he always gave orders that none of his people should annoy them; that nothing should be taken against their wills, and that everything that was taken should be paid for. Finally, he says that no one could believe that there could be such good-hearted people, so free to give, anxious to let the Christians have all they wanted, and, when visitors arrived, running to bring everything to them.
Afterwards the Admiral sent six Christians to the village to see what it was like, and the natives showed them all the honour they could devise, and gave them all they had; for no doubt was any longer entertained that the Admiral and all his people had come from heaven; and the same was believed by the Indians who were brought from the other islands, although they had now been told what they ought to think. When the six Christians had gone, some canoes came with people to ask the Admiral to come to their village when he left the place where he was. Canoa is a boat in which they navigate, some large and others small. Seeing that this village of the Chief was on the road, and that many people were waiting there for him, the Admiral went there; but, before he could depart, an enormous crowd came to the shore, men, women, and children, crying out to him not to go, but to stay with them. The messengers from the other Chief, who had come to invite him, were waiting with their canoes, that he might not go away, but come to see their Chief, and so he did. On arriving where the Chief was waiting for him with many things to eat, he ordered that all the people should sit down, and that the food should be taken to the boats, where the Admiral was, on the sea-shore. When he saw that the Admiral had received what he sent, all or most of the Indians ran to the village, which was near, to bring more food, parrots, and other things they had, with such frankness of heart that it was marvellous. The Admiral gave them glass beads, brass trinkets, and bells: not because they asked for anything in return, but because it seemed right, and, above all, because he now looked upon them as future Christians, and subjects of the Sovereigns, as much as the people of Castille. He further says that they want nothing except to know the language and be under governance; for all they may be told to do will be done without any contradiction. The Admiral left this place to go to the ships, and the people, men, women, and children, cried out to him not to go, but remain with them. After the boats departed, several canoes full of people followed after them to the ship, who were received with much honour, and given to eat. There had also come before another Chief from the west, and many people even came swimming, the ship being over a good half-league from the shore. I sent certain persons to the Chief, who had gone back, to ask him about these islands. He received them very well, and took them to his village, to give them some large pieces of gold. They arrived at a large river, which the Indians crossed by swimming. The Christians were unable, so they turned back. In all this district there are very high mountains which seem to reach the sky, so that the mountain in the island of Tenerife appears as nothing in height and beauty, and they are all green with trees. Between them there are very delicious valleys, and at the end of this port, to the south, there is a valley so large that the end of it is not visible, though no mountains intervene, so that it seems to be 15 or 20 leagues long. A river flows through it, and it is all inhabited and cultivated and as green as Castille in May or June; but the night contains 14 hours, the land being so far north. This port is very good for all the winds that can blow, being enclosed and deep, and the shores peopled by a good and gentle race without arms or evil designs. Any ship may lie within it without fear that other ships will enter at night to attack her, because, although the entrance is over two leagues wide, it is protected by reefs of rocks which are barely awash; and there is only a very narrow channel through the reef, which looks as if it had been artificially made, leaving an open door by which ships may enter. In the entrance there are 7 fathoms of depth up to the shore of a small flat island, which has a beach fringed with trees.
The entrance is on the west side, and a ship can come without fear until she is close to the rock. On the N.W. side there are three islands, and a great river a league from the cape on one side of the port. It is the best harbour in the world, and the Admiral gave it the name of Puerto de la mar de Santo Tomas, because to-day it was that Saint’s day. The Admiral called it a sea, owing to its size.
Saturday, 22nd of December
At dawn the Admiral made sail to shape a course in search of the islands which the Indians had told him contained much gold, some of them having more gold than earth. But the weather was not favourable, so he anchored again, and sent away the boat to fish with a net. The Lord of that land, who had a place near there, sent a large canoe full of people, including one of his principal attendants, to invite the Admiral to come with the ships to his land, where he would give him all he wanted. The Chief sent, by this servant, a girdle which, instead of a bag, had attached to it a mask with two large ears made of beaten gold, the tongue, and the nose. These people are very open-hearted, and whatever they are asked for they give most willingly; while, when they themselves ask for anything, they do so as if receiving a great favour. So says the Admiral. They brought the canoe alongside the boat, and gave the girdle to a boy; then they came on board with their mission. It took a good part of the day before they could be understood. Not even the Indians who were on board understood them well, because they have some differences of words for the names of things. At last their invitation was understood by signs. The Admiral determined to start to-morrow, although he did not usually sail on a Sunday, owing to a devout feeling, and not on account of any superstition whatever. But in the hope that these people would become Christians through the willingness they show, and that they will be subjects of the Sovereigns of Castille, and because he now holds them to be so, and that they may serve with love, he wished and endeavoured to please them. Before leaving, to-day, the Admiral sent six men to a large village three leagues to the westward, because the Chief had come the day before and said that he had some pieces of gold. When the Christians arrived, the Secretary of the Admiral, who was one of them, took the Chief by the hand. The Admiral had sent him, to prevent the others from imposing upon the Indians. As the Indians are so simple, and the Spaniards so avaricious and grasping, it does not suffice that the Indians should give them all they want in exchange for a bead or a bit of glass, but the Spaniards would take everything without any return at all. The Admiral always prohibits this, although, with the exception of gold, the things given by the Indians are of little value. But the Admiral, seeing the simplicity of the Indians, and that they will give a piece of gold in exchange for six beads, gave the order that nothing should be received from them unless something had been given in exchange. Thus the Chief took the Secretary by the hand and led him to his house, followed by the whole village, which was very large. He made his guests eat, and the Indians brought them many cotton fabrics, and spun-cotton in skeins. In the afternoon the Chief gave them three very fat geese and some small pieces of gold. A great number of people went back with them, carrying all the things they had got by barter, and they also carried the Spaniards themselves across streams and muddy places. The Admiral ordered some things to be given to the Chief, and both he and his people were very well satisfied, truly believing that the Christians had come from heaven, so that they considered themselves fortunate in beholding them. On this day more than 120 canoes came to the ships, all full of people, and all bringing something, especially their bread and fish, and fresh water in earthen jars. They also brought seeds of good kinds, and there was a grain which they put into a porringer of water and drank it. The Indians who were on board said that this was very wholesome.
Sunday, 23rd of December
The Admiral could not go with the ships to that land whither he had been invited by the Chief, because there was no wind. But he sent, with the three messengers who were waiting for the boats, some people, including the Secretary. While they were gone, he sent two of the Indians he had on board with him to the villages which were near the anchorage. They returned to the ship with a chief, who brought the news that there was a great quantity of gold in that island of Española, and that people from other parts came to buy it. They said that here the Admiral would find as much as he wanted. Others came, who confirmed the statement that there was much gold in the island, and explained the way it was collected. The Admiral understood all this with much difficulty; nevertheless, he concluded that there was a very great quantity in those parts, and that, if he could find the place whence it was got, there would be abundance; and, if not, there would be nothing. He believed there must be a great deal, because, during the three days that he had been in that port, he had got several pieces of gold, and he could not believe that it was brought from another land. “Our Lord, who holds all things in his hands, look upon me, and grant what shall be for his service.” These are the Admiral’s words. He says that, according to his reckoning, a thousand people had visited the ship, all of them bringing something. Before they come alongside, at a distance of a crossbow-shot, they stand up in the canoe with what they bring in their hands, crying out, “Take it! take it!” He also reckoned that 500 came to the ship swimming, because they had no canoes, the ship being near a league from the shore. Among the visitors, five chiefs had come, sons of chiefs, with all their families of wives and children, to see the Christians. The Admiral ordered something to be given to all, because such gifts were all well employed. “May our Lord favour me by his clemency, that I may find this gold, I mean the mine of gold, which I hold to be here, many saying that they know it.” These are his words. The boats arrived at night, and said that there was a grand road as far as they went, and they found many canoes, with people who went to see the Admiral and the Christians, at the mountain of Caribatan. They held it for certain that, if the Christmas festival was kept in that port, all the people of the island would come, which they calculated to be larger than England. All the people went with them to the village which they said was the largest, and the best laid out with streets, of any they had seen. The Admiral says it is part of the Punta Santa, almost three leagues S.E. The canoes go very fast with paddles; so they went ahead to apprise the Cacique, as they call the chief. They also have another greater name—Nitayno; but it was not clear whether they used it for lord, or governor, or judge. At last the Cacique came to them, and joined them in the square, which was clean-swept, as was all the village. The population numbered over 2,000 men. This king did great honour to the people from the ship, and every inhabitant brought them something to eat and drink. Afterwards the king gave each of them cotton cloths such as women wear, with parrots for the Admiral, and some pieces of gold. The people also gave cloths and other things from their houses to the sailors; and as for the trifles they got in return, they seemed to look upon them as relics. When they wanted to return in the afternoon, he asked them to stay until the next day, and all the people did the same. When they saw that the Spaniards were determined to go, they accompanied them most of the way, carrying the gifts of the Cacique on their backs as far as the boats, which had been left at the mouth of the river.
Monday, 24th of December
Before sunrise the Admiral got under weigh with the land-breeze. Among the numerous Indians who had come to the ship yesterday, and had made signs that there was gold in the island, naming the places whence it was collected, the Admiral noticed one who seemed more fully informed, or who spoke with more willingness, so he asked him to come with the Christians and show them the position of the gold mines. This Indian has a companion or relation with him, and among other places they mentioned where gold was found, they named Cipango, which they called Civao. Here they said that there was a great quantity of gold, and that the Cacique carried banners of beaten gold. But they added that it was very far off to the eastward.
Here the Admiral addresses the following words to the Sovereigns: “Your Highnesses may believe that there is no better nor gentler people in the world. Your Highnesses ought to rejoice that they will soon become Christians, and that they will be taught the good customs of your kingdom. A better race there cannot be, and both the people and the lands are in such quantity that I know not how to write it. I have spoken in the superlative degree of the country and people of Juana, which they call Cuba, but there is as much difference between them and this island and people as between day and night. I believe that no one who should see them could say less than I have said, and I repeat that the things and the great villages of this island of Española, which they call Bohio, are wonderful. All here have a loving manner and gentle speech, unlike the others, who seem to be menacing when they speak. Both men and women are of good stature, and not black. It is true that they all paint, some with black, others with other colours, but most with red. I know that they are tanned by the sun, but this does not affect them much. Their houses and villages are pretty, each with a chief, who acts as their judge, and who is obeyed by them. All these lords use few words, and have excellent manners. Most of their orders are given by a sign with the hand, which is understood with surprising quickness.” All these are the words of the Admiral.
He who would enter the sea of Santo Tomé ought to stand for a good league across the mouth to a flat island in the middle, which was named La Amiga, pointing her head towards it. When the ship is within a stone’s-throw of it the course should be altered to make for the eastern shore, leaving the west side, and this shore, and not the other, should be kept on board, because a great reef runs out from the west, and even beyond that there are three sunken rocks. This reef comes within a lombard-shot of the Amiga island. Between them there are seven fathoms at least, with a gravelly bottom. Within, a harbour will be found large enough for all the ships in the world, which would be there without need of cables. There is another reef, with sunken rocks, on the east side of the island of Amiga, which are extensive and run out to sea, reaching within two leagues of the cape. But it appeared that between them there was an entrance, within two lombard-shots of Amiga, on the west side of Monte Caribatan, where there was a good and very large port.
Tuesday, 25th of December. Christmas
Navigating yesterday, with little wind, from Santo Tomé to Punta Santa, and being a league from it, at about eleven o’clock at night the Admiral went down to get some sleep, for he had not had any rest for two days and a night. As it was calm, the sailor who steered the ship thought he would go to sleep, leaving the tiller in charge of a boy. The Admiral had forbidden this throughout the voyage, whether it was blowing or whether it was calm. The boys were never to be entrusted with the helm. The Admiral had no anxiety respecting sand-banks and rocks, because, when he sent the boats to that king on Sunday, they had passed to the east of Punta Santa at least three leagues and a half, and the sailors had seen all the coast, and the rocks there arc from Punta Santa, for a distance of three leagues to the E.S.E. They saw the course that should be taken, which had not been the case before, during this voyage. It pleased our Lord that, at twelve o’clock at night, when the Admiral had retired to rest, and when all had fallen asleep, seeing that it was a dead calm and the sea like glass, the tiller being in the hands of a boy, the current carried the ship on one of the sand-banks. If it had not been night the bank could have been seen, and the surf on it could be heard for a good league. But the ship ran upon it so gently that it could scarcely be felt. The boy, who felt the helm and heard the rush of the sea, cried out. The Admiral at once came up, and so quickly that no one had felt that the ship was aground. Presently the master of the ship, whose watch it was, came on deck. The Admiral ordered him and others to launch the boat, which was on the poop, and lay out an anchor astern. The master, with several others, got into the boat, and the Admiral thought that they did so with the object of obeying his orders. But they did so in order to take refuge with the caravel, which was half a league to leeward. The caravel would not allow them to come on board, acting judiciously, and they therefore returned to the ship; but the caravel’s boat arrived first. When the Admiral saw that his own people fled in this way, the water rising and the ship being across the sea, seeing no other course, he ordered the masts to be cut away and the ship to be lightened as much as possible, to see if she would come off. But, as the water continued to rise, nothing more could be done. Her side fell over across the sea, but it was nearly calm. Then the timbers opened, and the ship was lost. The Admiral went to the caravel to arrange about the reception of the ship’s crew, and as a light breeze was blowing from the land, and continued during the greater part of the night, while it was unknown how far the bank extended, he hove her to until daylight. He then went back to the ship, inside the reef; first having sent a boat on shore with Diego de Arana of Cordova, Alguazil of the Fleet, and Pedro Gutierrez, Gentleman of the King’s Bed-chamber, to inform the king, who had invited the ships to come on the previous Saturday. His town was about a league and a half from the sand-bank. They reported that he wept when he heard the news, and he sent all his people with large canoes to unload the ship. This was done, and they landed all there was between decks in a very short time. Such was the great promptitude and diligence shown by that king. He himself, with brothers and relations, were actively assisting as well in the ship as in the care of the property when it was landed, that all might be properly guarded. Now and then he sent one of his relations weeping to the Admiral, to console him, saying that he must not feel sorrow or annoyance, for he would supply all that was needed. The Admiral assured the Sovereigns that there could not have been such good watch kept in any part of Castille, for that there was not even a needle missing. He ordered that all the property should be placed by some houses which the king placed at his disposal, until they were emptied, when everything would be stowed and guarded in them. Armed men were placed round the stores to watch all night. “The king and all his people wept. They are a loving people, without covetousness, and fit for anything; and I assure your Highnesses that there is no better land nor people. They love their neighbours as themselves, and their speech is the sweetest and gentlest in the world, and always with a smile. Men and women go as naked as when their mothers bore them. Your Highnesses should believe that they have very good customs among themselves. The king is a man of remarkable presence, and with a certain self-contained manner that is a pleasure to see. They have good memories, wish to see everything, and ask the use of what they see.” All this is written by the Admiral.
Wednesday, 26th of December
To-day, at sunrise, the king of that land came to the caravel Niña, where the Admiral was, and said to him, almost weeping, that he need not be sorry, for that he would give him all he had; that he had placed two large houses at the disposal of the Christians who were on shore, and that he would give more if they were required, and as many canoes as could load from the ship and discharge on shore, with as many people as were wanted. This had all been done yesterday, without so much as a needle being missed. “So honest are they,” says the Admiral, “without any covetousness for the goods of others, and so above all was that virtuous king.” While the Admiral was talking to him, another canoe arrived from a different place, bringing some pieces of gold, which the people in the canoe wanted to exchange for a hawk’s bell; for there was nothing they desired more than these bells. They had scarcely come alongside when they called and held up the gold, saying Chuq chuq for the bells, for they are quite mad about them. After the king had seen this, and when the canoes which came from other places had departed, he called the Admiral and asked him to give orders that one of the bells was to be kept for another day, when he would bring four pieces of gold the size of a man’s hand. The Admiral rejoiced to hear this, and afterwards a sailor, who came from the shore, told him that it was wonderful what pieces of gold the men on shore were getting in exchange for next to nothing. For a needle they got a piece of gold worth two castellanos and that this was nothing to what it would be within a month. The king rejoiced much when he saw that the Admiral was pleased. He understood that his friend wanted much gold, and he said, by signs, that he knew where there was, in the vicinity, a very large quantity; so that he must be in good heart, for he should have as much as he wanted. He gave some account of it, especially saying that in Cipango, which they call Cibao, it is so abundant that it is of no value, and that they will bring it, although there is also much more in the island of Española which they call Bohio, and in the province of Caritaba. The king dined on board the caravel with the Admiral and afterwards went on shore, where he received the Admiral with much honour. He gave him a collation consisting of three or four kinds of yams, with shellfish and game, and other viands they have, besides the bread they call cazavi. He then took the Admiral to see some groves of trees near the houses, and they were accompanied by at least a thousand people, all naked. The Lord had on a shirt and a pair of gloves, given to him by the Admiral, and he was more delighted with the gloves than with anything else. In his manner of eating, both as regards the high-bred air and the peculiar cleanliness he clearly showed his nobility. After he had eaten, he remained some time at table, and they brought him certain herbs, with which he rubbed his hands. The Admiral thought that this was done to make them soft, and they also gave him water for his hands. After the meal he took the Admiral to the beach. The Admiral then sent for a Turkish bow and a quiver of arrows, and took a shot at a man of his company, who had been warned. The chief, who knew nothing about arms, as they neither have them nor use them, thought this a wonderful thing. He, however, began to talk of those of Caniba, whom they call Caribes. They come to capture the natives, and have bows and arrows without iron, of which there is no memory in any of these lands, nor of steel, nor any other metal except gold and copper. Of copper the Admiral had only seen very little. The Admiral said, by signs, that the Sovereigns of Castille would order the Caribs to be destroyed, and that all should be taken with their heads tied together. He ordered a lombard and a hand-gun to be fired off, and seeing the effect caused by its force and what the shots penetrated, the king was astonished. When his people heard the explosion they all fell on the ground. They brought the Admiral a large mask, which had pieces of gold for the eyes and ears and in other parts, and this they gave, with other trinkets of gold that the same king had put on the head and round the neck of the Admiral, and of other Christians, to whom they also gave many pieces. The Admiral received much pleasure and consolation from these things, which tempered the anxiety and sorrow he felt at the loss of the ship. He knew our Lord had caused the ship to stop here, that a settlement might be formed. “From this”, he says, “originated so many things that, in truth, the disaster was really a piece of good fortune. For it is certain that, if I had not lost the ship, I should have gone on without anchoring in this place, which is within a great bay, having two or three reefs of rock. I should not have left people in the country during this voyage, nor even, if I had desired to leave them, should I have been able to obtain so much information, nor such supplies and provisions for a fortress. And true it is that many people had asked me to give them leave to remain. Now I have given orders for a tower and a fort, both well built, and a large cellar, not because I believe that such defences will be necessary. I believe that with the force I have with me I could subjugate the whole island, which I believe to be larger than Portugal, and the population double. But they are naked and without arms, and hopelessly timid. Still, it is advisable to build this tower, being so far from your Highnesses. The people may thus know the skill of the subjects of your Highnesses, and what they can do; and will obey them with love and fear. So they make preparations to build the fortress, with provision of bread and wine for more than a year, with seeds for sowing, the ship’s boat, a caulker and carpenter, a gunner and cooper. Many among these men have a great desire to serve your Highnesses and to please me, by finding out where the mine is whence the gold is brought. Thus everything is got in readiness to begin the work. Above all, it was so calm that there was scarcely wind nor wave when the ship ran aground.” This is what the Admiral says; and he adds more to show that it was great good luck, and the settled design of God, that the ship should be lost in order that people might be left behind. If it had not been for the treachery of the master and his boat’s crew, who were all or mostly his countrymen, in neglecting to lay out the anchor so as to haul the ship off in obedience to the Admiral’s orders, she would have been saved. In that case, the same knowledge of the land as has been gained in these days would not have been secured, for the Admiral always proceeded with the object of discovering, and never intended to stop more than a day at any one place, unless he was detained by the wind. Still, the ship was very heavy and unsuited for discovery. It was the people of Palos who obliged him to take such a ship, by not complying “with what they had promised to the King and Queen, namely, to supply suitable vessels for this expedition. This they did not do. Of all that there was on board the ship, not a needle, nor a board, nor a nail was lost, for she remained as whole as when she sailed, except that it was necessary to cut away and level down in order to get out the jars and merchandise, which were landed and carefully guarded.” He trusted in God that, when he returned from Spain, according to his intention, he would find a ton of gold collected by barter by those he was to leave behind, and that they would have found the mine, and spices in such quantities that the Sovereigns would, in three years, be able to undertake and fit out an expedition to go and conquer the Holy Sepulchre. “Thus”, he says, “I protest to your Highnesses that all the profits of this my enterprise may be spent in the conquest of Jerusalem. Your Highnesses may laugh, and say that it is pleasing to you, and that, without this, you entertain that desire.” These are the Admiral’s words.
Thursday, 27th of December
The king of that land came alongside the caravel at sunrise, and said that he had sent for gold, and that he would collect all he could before the Admiral departed; but he begged him not to go. The king and one of his brothers, with another very intimate relation, dined with the Admiral, and the two latter said they wished to go to Castille with him. At this time the news came that the caravel Pinta was in a river at the end of this island. Presently the Cacique sent a canoe there, and the Admiral sent a sailor in it. For it was wonderful how devoted the Cacique was to the Admiral. The necessity was now evident of hurrying on preparations for the return to Castille.
Friday, 28th of December
The Admiral went on shore to give orders and hurry on the work of building the fort, and to settle what men should remain behind. The king, it would seem, had watched him getting into the boat, and quickly went into his house, dissimulating, sending one of his brothers to receive the Admiral, and conduct him to one of the houses that had been set aside for the Spaniards, which was the largest and best in the town. In it there was a couch made of palm matting, where they sat down. Afterwards the brother sent an attendant to say that the Admiral was there, as if the king did not know that he had come. The Admiral, however, believed that this was a feint in order to do him more honour. The attendant gave the message, and the Cacique came in great haste, and put a large soft piece of gold he had in his hand round the Admiral’s neck. They remained together until the evening, arranging what had to be done.
Saturday, 29th of December
A very youthful nephew of the king came to the caravel at sunrise, who showed a good understanding and disposition. As the Admiral was always working to find out the origin of the gold, he asked everyone, for he could now understand somewhat by signs. This youth told him that, at a distance of four days’ journey, there was an island to the eastward called Guarionex, and others called Macorix, Mayonic, Fuma, Cibao, and Coroay, in which there was plenty of gold. The Admiral wrote these names down, and now understood what had been said by a brother of the king, who was annoyed with him, as the Admiral understood. At other times the Admiral had suspected that the king had worked against his knowing where the gold had its origin and was collected, that he might not go away to barter in another part of the island. For there are such a number of places in this same island that it is wonderful. After nightfall the king sent a large mask of gold, and asked for a washhand basin and jug. The Admiral thought he wanted them for patterns to copy from, and therefore sent them.
Sunday, 30th of December
The Admiral went on shore to dinner, and came at a time when five kings had arrived, all with their crowns, who were subject to this king, named Guacanagari. They represented a very good state of affairs, and the Admiral says to the Sovereigns that it would have given them pleasure to see the manner of their arrival. On landing, the Admiral was received by the king, who led him by the arms to the same house where he was yesterday, where there were chairs, and a couch on which the Admiral sat. Presently the king took the crown off his head and put it on the Admiral’s head, and the Admiral took from his neck a collar of beautiful beads of several different colours, which looked very well in all its parts, and put it on the king. He also took off a cloak of fine material, in which he had dressed himself that day, and dressed the king in it, and sent for some coloured boots, which he put on his feet, and he put a large silver ring on his finger, because he had heard that he had admired greatly a silver ornament worn by one of the sailors. The king was highly delighted and well satisfied, and two of those kings who were with him came with him to where the Admiral was, and each gave him a large piece of gold. At this time an Indian came and reported that it was two days since he left the caravel Pinta in a port to the eastward. The Admiral returned to the caravel, and Vicente Anes, the captain, said that he had seen the rhubarb plant, and that they had it on the island Amiga, which is at the entrance of the sea of Santo Tomé, six leagues off, and that he had recognised the branches and roots. They say that rhubarb forms small branches above ground, and fruit like green mulberries, almost dry, and the stalk, near the root, is as yellow and delicate as the best colour for painting, and underground the root grows like a large pear.
Monday, 31st of December
To-day the Admiral was occupied in seeing that water and fuel were taken on board for the voyage to Spain, to give early notice to the Sovereigns, that they might despatch ships to complete the discoveries. For now the business appeared to be so great and important that the Admiral was astonished. He did not wish to go until he had examined all the land to the eastward, and explored the coast, so as to know the route to Castille, with a view to sending sheep and cattle. But as he had been left with only a single vessel, it did not appear prudent to encounter the dangers that are inevitable in making discoveries. He complained that all this inconvenience had been caused by the caravel Pinta having parted company.
Tuesday, 1st of January 1493
At midnight the Admiral sent a boat to the island Amiga to bring the rhubarb. It returned at vespers with a bundle of it. They did not bring more because they had no spade to dig it up with; it was taken to be shown to the Sovereigns. The king of that land said that he had sent many canoes for gold. The canoe returned that had been sent for tidings of the Pinta, without having found her. The sailor who went in the canoe said that twenty leagues from there he had seen a king who wore two large plates of gold on his head, but when the Indians in the canoe spoke to him he took them off. He also saw much gold on other people. The Admiral considered that the King Guacanagari ought to have prohibited his people from selling gold to the Christians, in order that it might all pass through his hands. But the king knew the places, as before stated, where there was such a quantity that it was not valued. The spicery also is extensive, and is worth more than pepper or manegueta. He left instructions to those who wished to remain that they were to collect as much as they could.
Wednesday, 2nd of January
In the morning the Admiral went on shore to take leave of the King Guacanagari, and to depart from him in the name of the Lord. He gave him one of his shirts. In order to show him the force of the lombards, and what effect they had, he ordered one to be loaded and fired into the side of the ship that was on shore, for this was apposite to the conversation respecting the Caribs, with whom Guacanagari was at war. The king saw whence the lombard-shot came, and how it passed through the side of the ship and went far away over the sea. The Admiral also ordered a skirmish of the crews of the ships, fully armed, saying to the Cacique that he need have no fear of the Caribs even if they should come. All this was done that the king might look upon the men who were left behind as friends, and that he might also have a proper fear of them. The king took the Admiral to dinner at the house where he was established, and the others who came with him. The Admiral strongly recommended to his friendship Diego de Arana, Pedro Gutierrez, and Rodrigo Escovedo, whom he left jointly as his lieutenants over the people who remained behind, that all might be well regulated and governed for the service of their Highnesses. The Cacique showed much love for the Admiral, and great sorrow at his departure, especially when he saw him go on board. A relation of that king said to the Admiral that he had ordered a statue of pure gold to be made, as big as the Admiral, and that it would be brought within ten days. The Admiral embarked with the intention of sailing presently, but there was no wind.
He left on that island of Española, which the Indians called Bohio, 39 men with the fortress, and he says that they were great friends of Guacanagari. The lieutenants placed over them were Diego de Arana of Cordova, Pedro Gutierrez, Gentleman of the King’s Bedchamber, and Rodrigo de Escovedo, a native of Seogvia, nephew of Fray Rodrigo Perez, with all the powers he himself received from the Sovereigns. He left behind all the merchandise which had been provided for bartering, which was much, that they might trade for gold. He also left bread for a year’s supply, wine, and much artillery. He also left the ship’s boat, that they, most of them being sailors, might go, when the time seemed convenient, to discover the gold mine, in order that the Admiral, on his return, might find much gold. They were also to find a good site for a town, for this was not altogether a desirable port; especially as the gold the natives brought came from the east; also, the farther to the east the nearer to Spain. He also left seeds for sowing, and his officers, the Alguazil and Secretary, as well as a ship’s carpenter, a caulker, a good gunner well acquainted with artillery, a cooper, a physician, and a tailor, all being seamen as well.
Thursday, 3rd of January
The Admiral did not go to-day, because three of the Indians whom he had brought from the islands, and who had staid behind, arrived, and said that the others with their women would be there at sunrise. The sea also was rather rough, so that they could not land from the boat. He determined to depart to-morrow, with the grace of God. The Admiral said that if he had the caravel Pinta with him he could make sure of shipping a ton of gold, because he could then follow the coasts of these islands, which he would not do alone, for fear some accident might impede his return to Castille, and prevent him from reporting all he had discovered to the Sovereigns. If it was certain that the caravel Pinta would arrive safely in Spain with Martin Alonso Pinzon, he would not hesitate to act as he desired; but as he had no certain tidings of him, and as he might return and tell lies to the Sovereigns, that he might not receive the punishment he deserved for having done so much harm in having parted company without permission, and impeded the good service that might have been done; the Admiral could only trust in our Lord that he would grant favourable weather, and remedy all things.
Friday, 4th of January
At sunrise the Admiral weighed the anchor, with little wind, and turned her head N.W. to get clear of the reef, by another channel wider than the one by which he entered, which, with others, is very good for coming in front of the Villa de la Navidad, in all which the least depth is from 3 to 9 fathoms. These two channels run N.W. and S.E., and the reefs are long, extending from the Cabo Santo to the Cabo de Sierpe for more than six leagues, and then a good three leagues out to sea. At a league outside Cabo Santo there arc not more than 8 fathoms of depth, and inside that cape, on the east side, there are many sunken rocks, and channels to enter between them. All this coast trends N.W. and S.E., and it is all beach, with the land very level for about a quarter of a league inland. After that distance there are very high mountains, and the whole is peopled with a very good race, as they showed themselves to the Christians. Thus the Admiral navigated to the east, shaping a course for a very high mountain, which looked like an island, but is not one, being joined to the mainland by a very low neck. The mountain has the shape of a very beautiful tent. He gave it the name of Monte Cristi. It is due east of Cabo Santo, at a distance of 18 leagues. That day, owing to the light wind, they could not reach within six leagues of Monte Cristi. He discovered four very low and sandy islets, with a reef extending N.W. and S.E. Inside, there is a large gulf, which extends from this mountain to the S.E. at least twenty leagues, which must all be shallow, with many sand-banks, and inside numerous rivers which are not navigable. At the same time the sailor who was sent in the canoe to get tidings of the Pinta reported that he saw a river into which ships might enter. The Admiral anchored at a distance of six leagues from Monte Cristi, in 19 fathoms, and so kept clear of many rocks and reefs. Here he remained for the night. The Admiral gives notice to those who would go to the Villa de la Navidad that, to make Monte Cristi, he should stand off the land two leagues, etc. (But as the coast is now known it is not given here.) The Admiral concluded that Cipango was in that island, and that it contained much gold, spices, mastick, and rhubarb.
Saturday, 5th of January
At sunrise the Admiral made sail with the land-breeze, and saw that to the S.S.E. of Monte Cristi, between it and an island, there seemed to be a good port to anchor in that night. He shaped an E.S.E. course, afterwards S.S.E., for six leagues round the high land, and found a depth of 17 fathoms, with a very clean bottom, going on for three leagues with the same soundings. Afterwards it shallowed to 12 fathoms up to the morro of the mountain, and off the morro, at one league, the depth of 9 fathoms was found, the bottom clean, and all fine sand. The Admiral followed the same course until he came between the mountain and the island, where he found 3 1/2 fathoms at low water, a very good port, and here he anchored. He went in the boat to the islet, where he found remains of fire and footmarks, showing that fishermen had been there. Here they saw many stones painted in colours, or a quarry of such stones, very beautifully worked by nature, suited for the building of a church or other public work, like those he found on the island of San Salvador. On this islet he also found many plants of mastick. He says that this Monte Cristi is very fine and high, but accessible, and of a very beautiful shape, all the land round it being low, a very fine plain, from which the height rises, looking at a distance like an island disunited from other land. Beyond the mountain, to the east, he saw a cape at a distance of 24 miles, which he named Cabo del Becerro whence to the mountain for two leagues there are reefs of rocks, though it appeared as if there were navigable channels between them. It would, however, be advisable to approach in daylight, and to send a boat ahead to sound. From the mountain eastward to Cabo del Becerro, for four leagues, there is a beach, and the land is low, but the rest is very high, with beautiful mountains and some cultivation. Inland, a chain of mountains runs N.E. and S.W., the most beautiful he had seen, appearing like the hills of Cordova. Some other very lofty mountains appear in the distance towards the south and S.E., and very extensive green valleys with large rivers: all this in such quantity that he did not believe he had exaggerated a thousandth part. Afterwards he saw, to the eastward of the mountain, a land which appeared like that of Monte Cristi in size and beauty. Further to the east and N.E. there is land which is not so high, extending for some hundred miles or near it.
Sunday, 6th of January
That port is sheltered from all winds, except north and N.W., and these winds seldom blow in this region. Even when the wind is from those quarters, shelter may be found near the islet in 3 or 4 fathoms. At sunset the Admiral made sail to proceed along the coast, the course being cast, except that it is necessary to look out for several reefs of stone and sand, within which there are good anchorages, with channels leading to them. After noon it blew fresh from the east. The Admiral ordered a sailor to go to the mast-head to look out for reefs, and he saw the caravel Pinta coming, with the wind aft, and she joined the Admiral. As there was no place to anchor, owing to the rocky bottom, the Admiral returned for ten leagues to Monte Cristi, with the Pinta in company. Martin Alonso Pinzon came on board the caravel Niña where the Admiral was, and excused himself by saying that he had parted company against his will, giving reasons for it. But the Admiral says that they were all false; and that on the night when Pinzon parted company he was influenced by pride and covetousness. He could not understand whence had come the insolence and disloyalty with which Pinzon had treated him during the voyage. The Admiral had taken no notice, because he did not wish to give place to the evil works of Satan, who desired to impede the voyage. It appeared that one of the Indians, who had been put on board the caravel by the Admiral with others, had said that there was much gold in an island called Baneque, and, as Pinzon’s vessel was light and swift, he determined to go there, parting company with the Admiral, who wished to remain and explore the coasts of Juana and Espanola, with an easterly course. When Martin Alonso arrived at the island of Baneque he found no gold. He then went to the coast of Española, on information from the Indians that there was a great quantity of gold and many mines in that island of Española, which the Indians call Bohio. He thus arrived near the Villa de Navidad about 15 leagues from it, having then been absent more than twenty days, so that the news brought by the Indians was correct, on account of which the King Guacanagari sent a canoe, and the Admiral put a sailor on board; but the Pinta must have gone before the canoe arrived. The Admiral says that the Pinta obtained much gold by barter, receiving large pieces the size of two fingers in exchange for a needle. Martin Alonso took half, dividing the other half among the crew. The Admiral then says: “Thus I am convinced that our Lord miraculously caused that vessel to remain here, this being the best place in the whole island to form a settlement, and the nearest to the gold mines.” He also says that he knew “of another great island, to the south of the island of Juana, in which there is more gold than in this island, so that they collect it in bits the size of beans, while in Española they find the pieces the size of grains of corn. They call that island Yamaye. The Admiral also heard of an island further east, in which there were only women, having been told this by many people. He was also informed that Yamaye and the island of Española were ten days’ journey in a canoe from the mainland, which would be about 70 or 80 leagues, and that there the people wore clothes.
Monday, 7th of January
This day the Admiral took the opportunity of caulking the caravel, and the sailors were sent to cut wood. They found mastick and aloes in abundance.
Tuesday, 8th of January
As the wind was blowing fresh from the east and S.E., the Admiral did not get under weigh this morning. He ordered the caravel to be filled up with wood and water and with all other necessaries for the voyage. He wished to explore all the coast of Española in this direction. But those he appointed to the caravels as captains were brothers, namely, Martin Alonso Pinzon and Vicente Anes. They also had followers who were filled with pride and avarice, considering that all now belonged to them, and unmindful of the honour the Admiral had done them. They had not and did not obey his orders, but did and said many unworthy things against him; while Martin Alonso had deserted him from the 21st of November until the 6th of January without cause or reason, but from disaffection. All these things had been endured in silence by the Admiral in order to secure a good end to the voyage. He determined to return as quickly as possible, to get rid of such an evil company, with whom he thought it necessary to dissimulate, although they were a mutinous set, and though he also had with him many good men; for it was not a fitting time for dealing out punishment.
The Admiral got into the boat and went up the river which is near, towards the S.S.W. of Monte Cristi, a good league. This is where the sailors went to get fresh water for the ships. He found that the sand at the mouth of the river, which is very large and deep, was full of very fine gold, and in astonishing quantity. The Admiral thought that it was pulverized in the drift down the river, but in a short time he found many grains as large as horse-beans, while there was a great deal of the fine powder.
As the fresh water mixed with the salt when it entered the sea, he ordered the boat to go up for the distance of a stone’s-throw. They filled the casks from the boat, and when they went back to the caravel they found small bits of gold sticking to the hoops of the casks and of the barrel. The Admiral gave the name of Rio del Oro to the river. Inside the bar it is very deep, though the mouth is shallow and very wide. The distance to the Villa de la Navidad is 17 leagues, and there are several large rivers on the intervening coast, especially three which probably contain much more gold than this one, because they are larger. This river is nearly the size of the Guadalquivir at Cordova, and from it to the gold mines the distance is not more than 20 leagues. The Admiral further says that he did not care to take the sand containing gold, because their Highnesses would have it all as their property at their town of Navidad; and because his first object was now to bring the news and to get rid of the evil company that was with him, whom he had always said were a mutinous set.
Wednesday, 9th of January
The Admiral made sail at midnight, with the wind S.E., and shaped an E.N.E. course, arriving at a point named Punta Roja, which is 60 miles east of Monte Cristi, and anchored under its lee three hours before nightfall. He did not venture to go out at night, because there are many reefs, until they are known. Afterwards, if, as will probably be the case, channels are found between them, the anchorage, which is good and well sheltered, will be profitable. The country between Monte Cristi and this point where the Admiral anchored is very high land, with beautiful plains, the range running east and west, all green and cultivated, with numerous streams of water, so that it is wonderful to see such beauty. In all this country there are many turtles, and the sailors took several when they came on shore to lay their eggs at Monte Cristi as large as a great wooden buckler.
On the previous day, when the Admiral went to the Rio del Oro he saw three mermaids, which rose well out of the sea; but they are not so beautiful as they are painted, though to some extent they have the form of a human face. The Admiral says that he had seen some, at other times, in Guinea, on the coast of the Manequeta.
The Admiral says that this night, in the name of our Lord, he would set out on his homeward voyage without any further delay whatever, for he had found what he sought, and he did not wish to have further cause of offence with Martin Alonso until their Highnesses should know the news of the voyage and what had been done. Afterwards he says, “I will not suffer the deeds of evil-disposed persons, with little worth, who, without respect for him to whom they owe their positions, presume to set up their own wills with little ceremony.”
Thursday, 10th of January
He departed from the place where he had anchored, and at sunset he reached a river, to which he gave the name of Rio de Gracia, three leagues to the S.E. He came to at the mouth, where there is good anchorage on the east side. There is a bar with no more than two fathoms of water, and very narrow across the entrance. It is a good and well-sheltered port, except that there it is often misty, owing to which the caravel Pinta, under Martin Alonso, received a good deal of damage. He had been here bartering for 16 days, and got much gold, which was what Martin Alonso wanted. As soon as he heard from the Indians that the Admiral was on the coast of the same island of Española, and that he could not avoid him, Pinzon came to him. He wanted all the people of the ship to swear that he had not been there more than six days. But his treachery was so public that it could not be concealed. He had made a law that half of all the gold that was collected was his. When he left this port he took four men and two girls by force. But the Admiral ordered that they should be clothed and put on shore to return to their homes. “This”, the Admiral says, “is a service of your Highnesses. For all the men and women are subjects of your Highnesses, as well in this island as in the others. Here, where your Highnesses already have a settlement, the people ought to be treated with honour and favour, seeing that this island has so much gold and such good spice-yielding lands.”
Friday, 11th of January
At midnight the Admiral left the Rio de Gracia with the land-breeze, and steered eastward until he came to a cape named Belprado, at a distance of four leagues. To the S.E. is the mountain to which he gave the name of Monte de Plata, eight leagues distant. Thence from the cape Belprado to E.S.E. is the point named Angel, eighteen leagues distant; and from this point to the Monte de Plata there is a gulf, with the most beautiful lands in the world, all high and fine lands which extend far inland. Beyond there is a range of high mountains running east and west, very grand and beautiful. At the foot of this mountain there is a very good port, with 14 fathoms in the entrance. The mountain is very high and beautiful, and all the country is well peopled. The Admiral believed there must be fine rivers and much gold. At a distance of 4 leagues E.S.E. of Cabo del Angel there is a cape named Punta del Hierro, and on the same course, 4 more leagues, a point is reached named Punta Seca. Thence, 6 leagues further on, is Cabo Redondo, and further on Cabo Frances, where a large bay is formed, but there did not appear to be anchorage in it. A league further on is Cabo del Buen Tiempo, and thence, a good league S.S.E., is Cabo Tajado. Thence, to the south, another cape was sighted at a distance of about 15 leagues. To-day great progress was made, as wind and tide were favourable. The Admiral did not venture to anchor for fear of the rocks, so he was hove-to all night.
Saturday, 12th of January
Towards dawn the Admiral filled and shaped a course to the east with a fresh wind, running 20 miles before daylight, and in two hours afterwards 24 miles. Thence he saw land to the south, and steered towards it, distant 48 miles. During the night he must have run 28 miles N.N.E., to keep the vessels out of danger. When he saw the land, he named one cape that he saw Cabo de Padre y Hijo, because at the east point there are two rocks, one larger than the other. Afterwards, at two leagues to the eastward, he saw a very fine bay between two grand mountains. He saw that it was a very large port with a very good approach; but, as it was very early in the morning, and as the greater part of the time it was blowing from the east, and then they had a N.N.W. breeze, he did not wish to delay any more. He continued his course to the east as far as a very high and beautiful cape, all of scarped rock, to which he gave the name of Cabo del Enamorado, which was 32 miles to the east of the port named Puerto Sacro. On rounding the cape, another finer and loftier point came in sight, like Cape St. Vincent in Portugal, 12 miles east of Cabo del Enamorado. As soon as he was abreast of the Cabo del Enamorado, the Admiral saw that there was a great bay between this and the next point, three leagues across, and in the middle of it a small island. The depth is great at the entrance close to the land. He anchored here in twelve fathoms, and sent the boat on shore for water, and to see if intercourse could be opened with the natives, but they all fled. He also anchored to ascertain whether this was all one land with the island of Española, and to make sure that this was a gulf, and not a channel, forming another island. He remained astonished at the great size of Española.
Sunday, 13th of January
The Admiral did not leave the port, because there was no land-breeze with which to go out. He wished to shift to another better port, because this was rather exposed. He also wanted to wait, in that haven, the conjunction of the sun and moon, which would take place on the 17th of this month, and their opposition with Jupiter and conjunction with Mercury, the sun being in opposition to Jupiter, which is the cause of high winds. He sent the boat on shore to a beautiful beach to obtain yams for food. They found some men with bows and arrows, with whom they stopped to speak, buying two bows and many arrows from them. They asked one of them to come on board the caravel and see the Admiral; who says that he was very wanting in reverence, more so than any native he had yet seen. His face was all stained with charcoal, but in all parts there is the custom of painting the body different colours. He wore his hair very long, brought together and fastened behind, and put into a small net of parrots’ feathers. He was naked, like all the others. The Admiral supposed that he belonged to the Caribs, who eat men, and that the gulf he had seen yesterday formed this part of the land into an island by itself. The Admiral asked about the Caribs, and he pointed to the east, near at hand, which means that he saw the Admiral yesterday before he entered the bay. The Indian said there was much gold to the east, pointing to the poop of the caravel, which was a good size, meaning that there were pieces as large. He called gold tuob, and did not understand caona, as they call it in the first part of the island that was visited, nor nozay, the name in San Salvador and the other islands. Copper is called tuob in Española. He also spoke of the island of Goanin where there was much tuob. The Admiral says that he had received notices of these islands from many persons; that in the other islands the natives were in great fear of the Caribs, called by some of them Caniba, but in Española Carib. He thought they must be an audacious race, for they go to all these islands and eat the people they can capture. He understood a few words, and the Indians who were on board comprehended more, there being a difference in the languages owing to the great distance between the various islands. The Admiral ordered that the Indian should be fed, and given pieces of green and red cloth, and glass beads, which they like very much, and then sent on shore. He was told to bring gold if he had any, and it was believed that he had, from some small things he brought with him. When the boat reached the shore there were fifty-five men behind the trees, naked, and with very long hair, as the women wear it in Castille. Behind the head they wore plumes of feathers of parrots and other birds, and each man carried a bow. The Indian landed, and signed to the others to put down their bows and arrows, and a piece of a staff, which is like . . . very heavy, carried instead of a sword. As soon as they came to the boat the crew landed, and began to buy the bows and arrows and other arms, in accordance with an order of the Admiral. Having sold two bows, they did not want to give more, but began to attack the Spaniards, and to take hold of them. They were running back to pick up their bows and arrows where they had laid them aside, and took cords in their hands to bind the boat’s crew. Seeing them rushing down, and being prepared—for the Admiral always warned them to be on their guard—the Spaniards attacked the Indians, and gave one a stab with a knife in the buttocks, wounding another in the breast with an arrow. Seeing that they could gain little, although the Christians were only seven and they numbered over fifty, they fled, so that none were left, throwing bows and arrows away. The Christians would have killed many, if the pilot, who was in command, had not prevented them. The Spaniards presently returned to the caravel with the boat. The Admiral regretted the affair for one reason, and was pleased for another. They would have fear of the Christians, and they were no doubt an ill-conditioned people, probably Caribs, who eat men. But the Admiral felt alarm lest they should do some harm to the 39 men left in the fortress and town of Navidad, in the event of their coming here in their boat. Even if they are not Caribs, they are a neighbouring people, with similar habits, and fearless, unlike the other inhabitants of the island, who are timid, and without arms. The Admiral says all this, and adds that he would have liked to have captured some of them. He says that they lighted many smoke signals, as is the custom in this island of Española.
Monday, 14th of January
This evening the Admiral wished to find the houses of the Indians and to capture some of them, believing them to be Caribs. For, owing to the strong east and north-east winds and the heavy sea, he had remained during the day. Many Indians were seen on shore. The Admiral, therefore, ordered the boat to be sent on shore, with the crew well armed. Presently the Indians came to the stern of the boat, including the man who had been on board the day before, and had received presents from the Admiral. With him there came a king, who had given to the said Indian some beads in token of safety and peace for the boat’s crew. This king, with three of his followers, went on board the boat and came to the caravel. The Admiral ordered them to be given biscuit and treacle to eat, and gave the chief a red cap, some beads, and a piece of red cloth. The others were also given pieces of cloth. The chief said that next day he would bring a mask made of gold, affirming that there was much here, and in Carib and Matinino. They afterwards went on shore well satisfied.
The Admiral here says that the caravels were making much water, which entered by the keel; and he complains of the caulkers at Palos, who caulked the vessels very badly, and ran away when they saw that the Admiral had detected the badness of their work, and intended to oblige them to repair the defect. But, notwithstanding that the caravels were making much water, he trusted in the favour and mercy of our Lord, for his high Majesty well knew how much controversy there was before the expedition could be despatched from Castille, that no one was in the Admiral’s favour save Him alone who knew his heart, and after God came your Highnesses, while all others were against him without any reason. He further says: “And this has been the cause that the royal crown of your Highnesses has not a hundred cuentos of revenue more than after I entered your service, which is seven years ago in this very month, the 20th of January. The increase will take place from now onwards. For the almighty God will remedy all things.” These are his words.
Tuesday, 15th of January
The Admiral now wished to depart, for there was nothing to be gained by further delay, after these occurrences and the tumult with the Indians. To-day he had heard that all the gold was in the district of the town of Navidad, belonging to their Highnesses; and that in the island of Carib there was much copper, as well as in Matinino. The intercourse at Carib would, however, be difficult, because the natives are said to eat human flesh. Their island would be in sight from thence, and the Admiral determined to go there, as it was on the route, and thence to Matinino, which was said to be entirely peopled by women, without men. He would thus see both islands, and might take some of the natives. The Admiral sent the boat on shore, but the king of that district had not come, for his village was distant. He, however, sent his crown of gold, as he had promised; and many other natives came with cotton, and bread made from yams, all with their bows and arrows. After the bartering was finished, four youths came to the caravel. They appeared to the Admiral to give such a clear account of the islands to the eastward, on the same route as the Admiral would have to take, that he determined to take them to Castille with him. He says that they had no iron nor other metals; at least none was seen, but it was impossible to know much of the land in so short a time, owing to the difficulty with the language, which the Admiral could not understand except by guessing, nor could they know what was said to them, in such a few days. The bows of these people are as large as those of France or England. The arrows are similar to the darts of the natives who have been met with previously, which are made of young canes, which grow very straight, and a vara and a half or two varas in length. They point them with a piece of sharp wood, a palmo and a half long, and at the end some of them fix a fish’s tooth, but most of them anoint it with an herb. They do not shoot as in other parts, but in a certain way which cannot do much harm. Here they have a great deal of fine and long cotton, and plenty of mastick. The bows appeared to be of yew, and there is gold and copper. There is also plenty of aji, which is their pepper, which is more valuable than pepper, and all the people cat nothing else, it being very wholesome. Fifty caravels might be annually loaded with it from Española. The Admiral says that he found a great deal of weed in this bay, the same as was met with at sea when he came on this discovery. He therefore supposed that there were islands to the eastward, in the direction of the position where he began to meet with it; for he considers it certain that this weed has its origin in shallow water near the land, and, if this is the case, these Indies must be very near the Canary Islands. For this reason he thought the distance must be less than 400 leagues.
Wednesday, 16th of January
They got under weigh three hours before daylight, and left the gulf, which was named Golfo de las Flechas with the land-breeze. Afterwards there was a west wind, which was fair to go to the island of Carib on an E.N.E. course. This was where the people live of whom all the natives of the other islands are so frightened, because they roam over the sea in canoes without number, and eat the men they can capture. The Admiral steered the course indicated by one of the four Indians he took yesterday in the Puerto de las Flechas. After having sailed about 64 miles, the Indians made signs that the island was to the S.E. The Admiral ordered the sails to be trimmed for that course, but, after having proceeded on it for two leagues, the wind freshened from a quarter which was very favourable for the voyage to Spain. The Admiral had noticed that the crew were downhearted when he deviated from the direct route home, reflecting that both caravels were leaking badly, and that there was no help but in God. He therefore gave up the course leading to the islands, and shaped a direct course for Spain E.N.E. He sailed on this course, making 48 miles, which is 12 leagues, by sunset. The Indians said that by that route they would fall in with the island of Matinino, peopled entirely by women without men, and the Admiral wanted very much to take five or six of them to the Sovereigns. But he doubted whether the Indians understood the route well, and he could not afford to delay, by reason of the leaky condition of the caravels. He, however, believed the story, and that, at certain seasons, men came to them from the island of Carib, distant ten or twelve leagues. If males were born, they were sent to the island of the men; and if females, they remained with their mothers. The Admiral says that these two islands cannot have been more than 1 5 or 20 leagues to the S.E. from where he altered course, the Indians not understanding how to point out the direction. After losing sight of the cape, which was named San Theramo, which was left 16 leagues to the west, they went for 12 leagues E.N.E. The weather was very fine.
Thursday, 17th of January
The wind went down at sunset yesterday, the caravels having sailed 14 glasses, each a little less than half-anhour, at 4 miles an hour, making 28 miles. Afterwards the wind freshened, and they ran all that watch, which was 10 glasses. Then another six until sunrise at 8 miles an hour, thus making altogether 84 miles, equal to 21 leagues, to the E.N.E., and until sunset 44 miles, or 11 leagues, to the east. Here a booby came to the caravel, and afterwards another. The Admiral saw a great deal of gulf-weed.
Friday, 18th of January
During the night they steered E.S.E., with little wind, for 40 miles, equal to 10 leagues, and then 30 miles, or 7 1/2 leagues, until sunrise. All day they proceeded with little wind to E.N.E. and N.E. by E., more or less, her head being sometimes north and at others N.N.E., and, counting one with the other, they made 60 miles, or 15 leagues. There was little weed, but yesterday and to-day the sea appeared to be full of tunnies. The Admiral believed that they were on their way to the tunny-fisheries of the Duke, at Conil and Cádiz. He also thought they were near some islands, because a frigate-bird flew round the caravel, and afterwards went away to the S.S.E. He said that to the S.E. of the island of Española were the islands of Carib, Matinino, and many others.
Saturday, 19th of January
During the night they made good 56 miles N.N.E., and 64 N.E. by N. After sunrise they steered N.E. with the wind fresh from S.W., and afterwards W.S.W. 84 miles, equal to 21 leagues. The sea was again full of small tunnies. There were boobies, frigate-birds, and terns.
Sunday, 20th of January
It was calm during the night, with occasional slants of wind, and they only made 20 miles to the N.E. After sunrise they went 11 miles S.E., and then 36 miles N.N.E., equal to 9 leagues. They saw an immense quantity of small tunnies, the air very soft and pleasant, like Seville in April or May, and the sea, for which God be given many thanks, always very smooth. Frigatebirds, sandpipers, and other birds were seen.
Monday, 21st of January
Yesterday, before sunset, they steered N.E. b. E., with the wind east, at the rate of 8 miles an hour until midnight, equal to 56 miles. Afterwards they steered N.N.E 8 miles an hour, so that they made 104 miles, or 26 leagues, during the night N.E. by N. After sunrise they steered N.N.E. with the same wind, which at times veered to N.E., and they made good 88 miles in the eleven hours of daylight, or 21 leagues: except one that was lost by delay caused by closing with the Pinta to communicate. The air was colder, and it seemed to get colder as they went further north, and also that the nights grew longer owing to the narrowing of the sphere. Many boatswain-birds and terns were seen, as well as other birds, but not so many fish, perhaps owing to the water being colder. Much weed was seen.
Tuesday, 22nd of January
Yesterday, after sunset, they steered N.N.E. with an east wind. They made 8 miles an hour during five glasses, and three before the watch began, making eight glasses, equal to 72 miles, or 18 leagues. Afterwards they went N.E. by N. for six glasses, which would be another 18 miles. Then, during four glasses of the second watch N.E. at six miles an hour, or three leagues. From that time to sunset, for eleven glasses, E.N.E. at 6 leagues an hour, equal to seven leagues. Then E.N.E. until 11 o’clock, 32 miles. Then the wind fell, and they made no more during that day. The Indians swam about. They saw boatswain-birds and much weed.
Wednesday, 23rd of January
To-night the wind was very changeable, but, making the allowances applied by good sailors, they made 84 miles, or 21 leagues, N.E. by N. Many times the caravel Niña had to wait for the Pinta, because she sailed badly when on a bowline, the mizen being of little use owing to the weakness of the mast. If her captain, Martin Alonso Pinzon, had taken the precaution to provide her with a good mast in the Indies, where there are so many and such excellent spars, instead of deserting his commander from motives of avarice, he would have done better. They saw many boatswain-birds and much weed. The heavens have been clouded over during these last days, but there has been no rain. The sea has been as smooth as a river, for which many thanks be given to God. After sunrise they went free, and made 30 miles, or 7 1/2 leagues N.E. During the rest of the day E.N.E. another 30 miles.
Thursday, 24th of January
They made 44 miles, or 11 leagues, during the night, allowing for many changes in the wind, which was generally N.E. After sunrise until sunset E.N.E. 14 leagues.
Friday, 25th of January
They steered during part of the night E.N.E. for 13 glasses, making 9 1/2 leagues. Then N.N.E. 6 miles. The wind fell, and during the day they only made 28 miles E.N.E., or 7 leagues. The sailors killed a tunny and a very large shark, which was very welcome, as they now had nothing but bread and wine, and some yams from the Indies.
Saturday, 26th of January
This night they made 56 miles, or 14 leagues, E.S.E. After sunrise they steered E.S.E., and sometimes S.E., making 40 miles up to 11 o’clock. Afterwards they went on another tack, and then on a bowline, 24 miles, or 6 leagues, to the north, until night.
Sunday, 27th of January
Yesterday, after sunset, they steered N.E. and N.E. by N. at the rate of five miles an hour, which in thirteen hours would be 65 miles, or 16 1/2 leagues. After sunrise they steered N.E. 24 miles, or 6 leagues, until noon, and from that time until sunset 3 leagues E.N.E.
Monday, 28th of January
All night they steered E.N.E. 36 miles, or 9 leagues. After sunrise until sunset E.N.E. 20 miles, or 5 leagues. The weather was temperate and pleasant. They saw boatswain-birds, sandpipers, and much weed.
Tuesday, 29th of January
They steered E.N.E. 39 miles, or 9 1/2 leagues, and during the whole day 8 leagues. The air was very pleasant, like April in Castille, the sea smooth, and fish they call dorados came on board.
Wednesday, 30th of January
All this night they made 6 leagues E.N.E., and in the day S.E. by S. 13 1/2 leagues. Boatswain-birds, much weed, and many tunnies.
Thursday, 31st of January
This night they steered N.E. by N. 30 miles, and afterwards N.E. 35 miles, or 16 leagues. From sunrise to night E.N.E. 13 1/2 leagues. They saw boatswain-birds and terns.
Friday, 1st of February
They made 16 1/2 leagues E.N.E. during the night, and went on the same course during the day 29 1/4 leagues. The sea very smooth, thanks be to God.
Saturday, 2nd of February
They made 40 miles, or 10 leagues, E.N.E. this night. In the daytime, with the same wind aft, they went 7 miles an hour, so that in eleven hours they had gone 77 miles, or 9 1/4 leagues. The sea was very smooth, thanks be to God, and the air very soft. They saw the sea so covered with weed that, if they had not known about it before, they would have been fearful of sunken rocks. They saw terns.
Sunday, 3rd of February
This night, the wind being aft and the sea very smooth, thanks be to God, they made 29 leagues. The North Star appeared very high, as it docs off Cape St. Vincent. The Admiral was unable to take the altitude, either with the astrolabe or with the quadrant, because the rolling caused by the waves prevented it. That day he steered his course E.N.E., going 10 miles an hour, so that in eleven hours he made 27 leagues.
Monday, 4th of February
During the night the course was N.E. by E., going twelve miles an hour part of the time, and the rest ten miles. Thus they made 130 miles, or 32 leagues and a half. The sky was very threatening and rainy, and it was rather cold, by which they knew that they had not yet reached the Azores. After sunrise the course was altered to east. During the whole day they made 77 miles, or 19 1/4 leagues.
Tuesday, 5th of February
This night they steered east, and made 55 miles, or 13 1/2 leagues. In the day they were going ten miles an hour, and in eleven hours made 110 miles, or 27 1/2 leagues. They saw sandpipers, and some small sticks, a sign that they were near land.
Wednesday, 6th of February
They steered east during the night, going at the rate of eleven miles an hour, so that in the thirteen hours of the night they made 143 miles, or 35 1/4 leagues. They saw many birds. In the day they went 14 miles an hour, and made 154 miles, or 38 1/2 leagues; so that, including night and day, they made 74 leagues, more or less. Vicente Anes said that they had left the island of Flores to the north and Madeira to the cast. Roldan said that the island of Fayal, or San Gregorio, was to the N.N.E. and Puerto Santo to east. There was much weed.
Thursday, 7th of February
This night they steered east, going ten miles an hour, so that in thirteen hours they made 130 miles, or 32 1/2 leagues. In the daytime the rate was eight miles an hour, in eleven hours 88 miles, or 22 leagues. This morning the Admiral found himself 65 leagues south of the island of Flores, and the pilot Pedro Alonso, being further north, according to his reckoning, passed between Terceira and Santa Maria to the east, passing to windward of the island of Madeira, twelve leagues further north. The sailors saw a new kind of weed, of which there is plenty in the islands of the Azores.
Friday, 8th of February
They went three miles an hour to the eastward for some time during the night, and afterwards E.S.E., going twelve miles an hour. From sunrise to noon they made 27 miles, and the same distance from noon till sunset, equal to 13 leagues S.S.E.
Saturday, 9th of February
For part of this night they went 3 leagues S.S.E., and afterwards S. by E., then N.E. 5 leagues until ten o’clock in the forenoon, then 9 leagues east until dark.
Sunday, 10th of February
From sunset they steered east all night, making 130 miles, or 32 1/2 leagues. During the day they went at the rate of nine miles an hour, making 99 miles, or 24 1/2 leagues, in eleven hours.
In the caravel of the Admiral, Vicente Yañez and the two pilots, Sancho Ruiz and Pedro Alonso Niño, and Roldan, made charts and plotted the route. They all made the position a good deal beyond the islands of the Azores to the east, and, navigating to the north, none of them touched Santa Maria, which is the last of all the Azores. They made the position five leagues beyond it, and were in the vicinity of the islands of Madeira and Puerto Santo. But the Admiral was very different from them in his reckoning, finding the position very much in rear of theirs. This night he found the island of Flores to the north, and to the east he made the direction to be towards Nafe in Africa, passing to leeward of the island of Madeira to the north.leagues. So that the pilots were nearer to Castille than the Admiral by 150 leagues. The Admiral says that, with the grace of God, when they reach the land they will find out whose reckoning was most correct. He also says that he went 263 leagues from the island of Hierro to the place where he first saw the gulf-weed.
Monday, 11th of February
This night they went twelve miles an hour on their course, and during the day they ran 16 1/2 leagues. They saw many birds, from which they judged that land was near.
Tuesday, 12th of February
They went six miles an hour on an east course during the night, altogether 73 miles, or 18 1/4 leagues. At this time they began to encounter bad weather with a heavy sea; and, if the caravel had not been very well managed, she must have been lost. During the day they made 11 or 12 leagues with much difficulty and danger.
Wednesday, 13th of February
From sunset until daylight there was great trouble with the wind, and the high and tempestuous sea. There was lightning three times to the N.N.E.—a sign of a great storm coming either from that quarter or its opposite. They were lying-to most of the night, afterwards showing a little sail, and made 52 miles, which is 13 leagues. In the day the wind moderated a little, but it soon increased again. The sea was terrific, the waves crossing each other, and straining the vessels. They made 55 miles more, equal to 13 1/2 leagues.
Thursday, 14th of February
This night the wind increased, and the waves were terrible, rising against each other, and so shaking and straining the vessel that she could make no headway, and was in danger of being stove in. They carried the mainsail very closely reefed, so as just to give her steerageway, and proceeded thus for three hours, making 20 miles. Meanwhile, the wind and sea increased, and, seeing the great danger, the Admiral began to run before it, there being nothing else to be done. The caravel Pinta began to run before the wind at the same time, and Martin Alonso ran her out of sight, although the Admiral kept showing lanterns all night, and the other answered. It would seem that she could do no more, owing to the force of the tempest, and she was taken far from the route of the Admiral. He steered that night E.N.E., and made 54 miles, equal to 13 leagues. At sunrise the wind blew still harder, and the cross sea was terrific. They continued to show the closely-reefed mainsail, to enable her to rise from between the waves, or she would otherwise have been swamped. An E.N.E. course was steered, and afterwards N.E. by E. for six hours, making 7 1/2 leagues. The Admiral ordered that a pilgrimage should be made to Our Lady of Guadaloupe, carrying a candle of 6 lbs. of weight in wax, and that all the crew should take an oath that the pilgrimage should be made by the man on whom the lot fell. As many beans were got as there were persons on board, and on one a cross was cut with a knife. They were then put into a cap and shaken up. The first who put in his hand was the Admiral, and he drew out the bean with a cross, so the lot fell on him; and he was bound to go on the pilgrimage and fulfil the vow. Another lot was drawn, to go on pilgrimage to Our Lady of Loreto, which is in the march of Ancona, in the Papal territory, a house where Our Lady works many and great miracles. The lot fell on a sailor of the port of Santa Maria, named Pedro dc Villa, and the Admiral promised to pay his travelling expenses. Another pilgrimage was agreed upon, to watch for one night in Santa Clara at Moguer, and have a Mass said, for which they again used the beans, including the one with a cross. The lot again fell on the Admiral. After this the Admiral and all the crew made a vow that, on arriving at the first land, they would all go in procession, in their shirts, to say their prayers in a church dedicated to Our Lady.
Besides these general vows made in common, each sailor made a special vow; for no one expected to escape, holding themselves for lost, owing to the fearful weather from which they were suffering. The want of ballast increased the danger of the ship, which had become light, owing to the consumption of the provisions and water. On account of the favourable weather enjoyed among the islands, the Admiral had omitted to make provision for this need, thinking that ballast might be taken on board at the island inhabited by women, which he had intended to visit. The only thing to do was to fill the barrels that had contained wine or fresh water with water from the sea, and this supplied a remedy.
Here the Admiral writes of the causes which made him fear that he would perish, and of others that gave him hope that God would work his salvation, in order that such news as he was bringing to the Sovereigns might not be lost. It seemed to him that the strong desire he felt to bring such great news, and to show that all he had said and offered to discover had turned out true, suggested the fear that he would not be able to do so, and that each stinging insect would be able to thwart and impede the work. He attributes this fear to his little faith, and to his want of confidence in Divine Providence. He was comforted, on the other hand, by the mercies of God in having vouchsafed him such a victory, in the discoveries he had made, and in that God had complied with all his desires in Castille, after much adversity and many misfortunes. As he had before put all his trust in God, who had heard him and granted all he sought, he ought now to believe that God would permit the completion of what had been begun, and ordain that he should be saved. Especially as he had freed him on the voyage out, when he had still greater reason to fear, from the trouble caused by the sailors and people of his company, who all with one voice declared their intention to return, and protested that they would rise against him. But the eternal God gave him force and valour to withstand them all, and in many other marvellous ways had God shown his will in this voyage besides those known to their Highnesses. Thus he ought not to fear the present tempest, though his weakness and anxiety prevent him from giving tranquillity to his mind. He says further that it gave him great sorrow to think of the two sons he had left at their studies in Cordova, who would be left orphans, without father or mother, in a strange land; while the Sovereigns would not know of the services he had performed in this voyage, nor would they receive the prosperous news which would move them to help the orphans. To remedy this, and that their Highnesses might know how our Lord had granted a victory in all that could be desired respecting the Indies, and that they might understand that there were no storms in those parts, which may be known by the herbs and trees which grow even within the sea; also that the Sovereigns might still have information, even if he perished in the storm, he took a parchment and wrote on it as good an account as he could of all he had discovered, entreating anyone who might pick it up to deliver it to the Sovereigns. He rolled this parchment up in waxed cloth, fastened it very securely, ordered a large wooden barrel to be brought, and put it inside, so that no one else knew what it was. They thought that it was some act of devotion, and so he ordered the barrel to be thrown into the sea. Afterwards, in the showers and squalls, the wind veered to the west, and they went before it, only with the foresail, in a very confused sea, for five hours. They made 2 1/2 leagues N.E. They had taken in the reefed mainsail, for fear some wave of the sea should carry all away.
Friday, 15th of February
Last night, after sunset, the sky began to clear towards the west, showing that the wind was inclined to come from that quarter. The Admiral added the bonnet to the mainsail. The sea was still very high, although it had gone down slightly. They steered E.N.E., and went four miles an hour, which made 13 leagues during the eleven hours of the night. After sunrise they sighted land. It appeared from the bows to bear E.N.E. Some said it was the island of Madeira, others that it was the rock of Cintra, in Portugal, near Lisbon. Presently the wind headed to E.N.E., and a heavy sea came from the west, the caravel being 5 leagues from the land. The Admiral found by his reckoning that he was close to the Azores, and believed that this was one of them. The pilots and sailors thought it was the land of Castille.
Saturday, 16th of February
All that night the Admiral was standing off and on to keep clear of the land, which they now knew to be an island, sometimes standing N.E., at others N.N.E., until sunrise, when they tacked to the south to reach the island, which was now concealed by a great mist. Another island was in sight from the poop, at a distance of eight leagues. Afterwards, from sunrise until dark, they were tacking to reach the land against a strong wind and head-sea. At the time of repeating the Salve, which is just before dark, some of the men saw a light to leeward, and it seemed that it must be on the island they first saw yesterday. All night they were beating to windward, and going as near as they could, so as to see some way to the island at sunrise. That night the Admiral got a little rest, for he had not slept nor been able to sleep since Wednesday, and his legs were very sore from long exposure to the wet and cold. At sunrise he steered S.S.W., and reached the island at night, but could not make out what island it was, owing to the thick weather.
Monday, 18th of February
Yesterday, after sunset, the Admiral was sailing round the island, to see where he could anchor and open communications. He let go one anchor, which he presently lost, and then stood off and on all night. After sunrise he again reached the north side of the island, where he anchored, and sent the boat on shore. They had speech with the people, and found that it was the island of Santa Maria, one of the Azores. They pointed out the port to which the caravel should go. They said that they had never seen such stormy weather as there had been for the last fifteen days, and they wondered how the caravel could have escaped. They gave many thanks to God, and showed great joy at the news that the Admiral had discovered the Indies. The Admiral says that his navigation had been very certain, and that he had laid the discoveries down on the chart. Many thanks were due to our Lord, although there had been some delay. But he was sure that he was in the region of the Azores, and that this was one of them. He pretended to have gone over more ground, to mislead the pilots and mariners who pricked off the charts, in order that he might remain master of that route to the Indies, as, in fact, he did. For none of the others kept an accurate reckoning, so that no one but himself could be sure of the route to the Indies.
Tuesday, 19th of February
After sunset three natives of the island came to the beach and hailed. The Admiral sent the boat, which returned with fowls and fresh bread. It was carnival time, and they brought other things which were sent by the captain of the island, named Juan de Castañeda, saying that he knew the Admiral very well, and that he did not come to see him because it was night, but that at dawn he would come with more refreshments, bringing with him three men of the boat’s crew, whom he did not send back owing to the great pleasure he derived from hearing their account of the voyage. The Admiral ordered much respect to be shown to the messengers, and that they should be given beds to sleep in that night, because it was late, and the town was far off. As on the previous Thursday, when they were in the midst of the storm, they had made a vow to go in procession to a church of Our Lady as soon as they came to land, the Admiral arranged that half the crew should go to comply with their obligation to a small chapel, like a hermitage, near the shore; and that he would himself go afterwards with the rest. Believing that it was a peaceful land, and confiding in the offers of the captain of the island, and in the peace that existed between Spain and Portugal, he asked the three men to go to the town and arrange for a priest to come and say Mass. The half of the crew then went in their shirts, in compliance with their vow. While they were at their prayers, all the people of the town, horse and foot, with the captain at their head, came and took them all prisoners. The Admiral, suspecting nothing, was waiting for the boat to take him and the rest to accomplish the vow. At 11 o’clock, seeing that they did not come back, he feared that they had been detained, or that the boat had been swamped, all the island being surrounded by high rocks. He could not see what had taken place, because the hermitage was round a point. He got up the anchor, and made sail until he was in full view of the hermitage, and he saw many of the horsemen dismount and get into the boat with arms. They came to the caravel to seize the Admiral. The captain stood up in the boat, and asked for an assurance of safety from the Admiral, who replied that he granted it; but, what outrage was this, that he saw none of his people in the boat? The Admiral added that they might come on board, and that he would do all that might be proper. The Admiral tried, with fair words, to get hold of this captain, that he might recover his own people, not considering that he broke faith by giving him security, because he had offered peace and security, and had then broken his word. The captain, as he came with an evil intention, would not come on board. Seeing that he did not come alongside, the Admiral asked that he might be told the reason for the detention of his men, an act which would displease the King of Portugal, because the Portuguese received much honour in the territories of the King of Castille, and were as safe as if they were in Lisbon. He further said that the Sovereigns had given him letters of recommendation to all the Lords and Princes of the world, which he would show the captain if he would come on board; that he was the Admiral of the Ocean Sea, and Viceroy of the Indies, which belonged to their Highnesses, and that he would show the commissions signed with their signatures, and attested by their seals, which he held up from a distance. He added that his Sovereigns were in friendship and amity with the King of Portugal, and had ordered that all honour should be shown to ships that came from Portugal. Further, that if the captain did not surrender his people, he would still go on to Castille, as he had quite sufficient to navigate as far as Seville, in which case the captain and his followers would be severely punished for their offence. Then the captain and those with him replied that they did not know the King and Queen of Castille there, nor their letters, nor were they afraid of them, and they would give the Admiral to understand that this was Portugal, almost menacing him. On hearing this the Admiral was much moved, thinking that some cause of disagreement might have arisen between the two kingdoms during his absence, yet he could not endure that they should not be answered reasonably. Afterwards he turned to the captain, and said that he should go to the port with the caravel, and that all that had been done would be reported to the King his Lord. The Admiral made those who were in the caravel bear witness to what he said, calling to the captain and all the others, and promising that he would not leave the caravel until a hundred Portuguese had been taken to Castille, and all that island had been laid waste. He then returned to anchor in the port where he was first, the wind being very unfavourable for doing anything else.
Wednesday, 20th of February
The Admiral ordered the ship to be repaired, and the casks to be filled alongside for ballast. This was a very bad port, and he feared he might have to cut the cables. This was so, and he made sail for the island of San Miguel; but there is no good port in any of the Azores for the weather they then experienced, and there was no other remedy but to go to sea.
Thursday, 21st of February
Yesterday the Admiral left that island of Santa Maria for that of San Miguel, to see if a port could be found to shelter his vessel from the bad weather. There was much wind and a high sea, and he was sailing until night without being able to see either one land or the other, owing to the thick weather caused by wind and sea. The Admiral says he was in much anxiety, because he only had three sailors who knew their business, the rest knowing nothing of seamanship. He was lying-to all that night, in great danger and trouble. Our Lord showed him mercy in that the waves came in one direction, for if there had been a cross sea they would have suffered much more. After sunrise the island of San Miguel was not in sight, so the Admiral determined to return to Santa Maria, to see if he could recover his people and boat, and the anchors and cables he had left there.
The Admiral says that he was astonished at the bad weather he encountered in the region of these islands. In the Indies he had navigated throughout the winter without the necessity for anchoring, and always had fine weather, never having seen the sea for a single hour in such a state that it could not be navigated easily. But among these islands he had suffered from such terrible storms. The same had happened in going out as far as the Canary Islands, but as soon as they were passed there was always fine weather, both in sea and air. In concluding these remarks, he observes that the sacred theologians and wise men said well when they placed the terrestrial paradise in the Far East, because it is a most temperate region. Hence these lands that he had now discovered must, he says, be in the extreme East.
Friday, 22nd of February
Yesterday the Admiral came-to off Santa Maria, in the place or port where he had first anchored. Presently a man came down to some rocks at the edge of the beach, hailing that they were not to remain there. Soon afterwards the boat came with five sailors, two priests, and a scrivener. They asked for safety, and when it was granted by the Admiral, they came on board, and, as it was night they slept on board, the Admiral showing them all the civility he could. In the morning they asked to be shown the authority of the Sovereigns of Castille, by which the voyage had been made. The Admiral felt that they did this to give some colour of right to what they had done, and to show that they had right on their side. As they were unable to secure the person of the Admiral, whom they intended to get into their power when they came with the boat armed, they now feared that their game might not turn out so well, thinking, with some fear, of what the Admiral had threatened, and which he proposed to put into execution. In order to get his people released, the Admiral displayed the general letter of the Sovereigns to all Princes and Lords, and other documents, and having given them of what he had, the Portuguese went on shore contented, and presently released all the crew and the boat. The Admiral heard from them that if he had been captured also, they never would have been released, for the captain said that those were the orders of the King his Lord.
Saturday, 23rd of February
Yesterday the weather began to improve, and the Admiral got under weigh to seek a better anchorage, where he could take in wood and stones for ballast; but he did not find one until late.
Sunday, 24th of February
He anchored yesterday in the afternoon, to take in wood and stones, but the sea was so rough that they could not land from the boat, and during the first watch it came on to blow from the west and S.W. He ordered sail to be made, owing to the great danger there is off these islands in being at anchor with a southerly gale, and as the wind was S.W. it would go round to south. As it was a good wind for Castille, he gave up his intention of taking in wood and stones, and shaped an easterly course until sunset, going seven miles an hour for six hours and a half, equal to 45 1/2 miles. After sunset he made six miles an hour, or 66 miles in eleven hours, altogether 111 miles, equal to 28 leagues.
Monday, 25th of February
Yesterday, after sunset, the caravel went at the rate ot five miles an hour on an easterly course, and in the eleven hours of the night she made 65 miles, equal to 16 1/4 leagues. From sunrise to sunset they made another 16 1/2 leagues with a smooth sea, thanks be to God. A very large bird, like an eagle, came to the caravel.
Tuesday, 26th of February
Yesterday night the caravel steered her course in a smooth sea, thanks be to God. Most of the time she was going eight miles an hour, and made a hundred miles, equal to 25 leagues. After sunrise there was little wind and some rain-showers. They made about 8 leagues E.N.E.
Wednesday, 27th of February
During the night and day she was off her course, owing to contrary winds and a heavy sea. She was found to be 125 leagues from Cape St. Vincent, and 80 from the island of Madeira, 106 from Santa Maria. It was very troublesome to have such bad weather just when they were at the very door of their home.
Thursday, 28th of February
The same weather during the night, with the wind from south and S.E., sometimes shifting to N.E. and E.N.E., and it was the same all day.
Friday, 1st of March
To-night the course was E.N.E., and they made twelve leagues. During the day, 23 1/2 leagues on the same course.
Saturday, 2nd of March
The course was E.N.E., and distance made good 28 leagues during the night, and 20 in the day.
Sunday, 3rd of March
After sunset the course was east; but a squall came down, split all the sails, and the vessel was in great danger; but God was pleased to deliver them. They drew lots for sending a pilgrim in a shirt to Santa Maria de la Cinta at Huelva, and the lot fell on the Admiral. The whole crew also made a vow to fast on bread and water during the first Saturday after their arrival in port. They had made 60 miles before the sails were split. Afterwards they ran under bare poles, owing to the force of the gale and the heavy sea. They saw signs of the neighbourhood of land, finding themselves near Lisbon.
Monday, 4th of March
During the night they were exposed to a terrible storm, expecting to be overwhelmed by the cross seas, while the wind seemed to raise the caravel into the air, and there was rain and lightning in several directions. The Admiral prayed to our Lord to preserve them, and in the first watch it pleased our Lord to show land, which was reported by the sailors. As it was advisable not to reach it before it was known whether there was any port to which he could run for shelter, the Admiral set the mainsail, as there was no other course but to proceed, though in great danger. Thus God preserved them until daylight, though all the time they were in infinite fear and trouble. When it was light, the Admiral knew the land, which was the rock of Cintra, near the river of Lisbon, and he resolved to run in because there was nothing else to be done. So terrible was the storm, that in the village of Cascaes, at the mouth of the river, the people were praying for the little vessel all that morning. After they were inside, the people came off, looking upon their escape as a miracle. At the third hour they passed Rastelo, within the river of Lisbon, where they were told that such a winter, with so many storms, had never before been known, and that 25 ships had been lost in Flanders, while others had been wind-bound in the river for four months. Presently the Admiral wrote to the King of Portugal, who was then at a distance of nine leagues, to state that the Sovereigns of Castille had ordered him to enter the ports of his Highness, and ask for what he required for payment, and requesting that the King would give permission for the caravel to come to Lisbon, because some ruffians, hearing that he had much gold on board, might attempt a robbery in an unfrequented port, knowing that they did not come from Guinea, but from the Indies.
Tuesday, 5th of March
To-day the great ship of the King of Portugal was also at anchor off Rastelo, with the best provision of artillery and arms that the Admiral had ever seen. The master of her, named Bartolomé Diaz, of Lisbon, came in an armed boat to the caravel, and ordered the Admiral to get into the boat, to go and give an account of himself to the agents of the king and to the captain of that ship. The Admiral replied that he was the Admiral of the Sovereigns of Castille, and that he would not give an account to any such persons, nor would he leave the ship except by force, as he had not the power to resist. The master replied that he must then send the master of the caravel. The Admiral answered that neither the master nor any other person should go except by force, for if he allowed anyone to go, it would be as if he went himself; and that such was the custom of the Admirals of the Sovereigns of Castille, rather to die than to submit, or to let any of their people submit. The master then moderated his tone, and told the Admiral that if that was his determination he might do as he pleased. He, however, requested that he might be shown the letters of the Kings of Castille, if they were on board. The Admiral readily showed them, and the master returned to the ship and reported what had happened to the captain, named Alvaro Dama. That officer, making great festival with trumpets and drums, came to the caravel to visit the Admiral, and offered to do all that he might require.
Wednesday, 6th of March
As soon as it was known that the Admiral came from the Indies, it was wonderful how many people came from Lisbon to see him and the Indians, giving thanks to our Lord, and saying that the heavenly Majesty had given all this to the Sovereigns of Castille as a reward for their faith and their great desire to serve God.
Thursday, 7th of March
To-day an immense number of people came to the caravel, including many knights, and amongst them the agents of the king, and all gave infinite thanks to our Lord for so wide an increase of Christianity granted by our Lord to the Sovereigns of Castille; and they said that they received it because their Highnesses had worked and laboured for the increase of the religion of Christ.
Friday, 8th of March
To-day the Admiral received a letter from the King of Portugal brought by Don Martin de Noroña, asking him to visit him where he was, as the weather was not suitable for the departure of the caravel. He complied, to prevent suspicion, although he did not wish to go, and went to pass the night at Sacanben. The king had given orders to his officers that all that the Admiral, his crew, and the caravel were in need of should be given without payment, and that all the Admiral wanted should be complied with.
Saturday, 9th of March
To-day the Admiral left Sacanben, to go where the king was residing, which was at Valparaiso, nine leagues from Lisbon. Owing to the rain, he did not arrive until night. The king caused him to be received very honourably by the principal officers of his household; and the king himself received the Admiral with great favour, making him sit down, and talking very pleasantly. He offered to give orders that everything should be done for the service of the Sovereigns of Castille, and said that the successful termination of the voyage had given him great pleasure. He said further that he understood that, in the capitulation between the Sovereigns and himself, that conquest belonged to him. The Admiral replied that he had not seen the capitulation, nor knew more than that the Sovereigns had ordered him not to go either to Lamina or to any other port of Guinea, and that this had been ordered to be proclaimed in all the ports of Andalusia before he sailed. The king graciously replied that he held it for certain that there would be no necessity for any arbitrators. The Admiral was assigned as a guest to the Prior of Crato, who was the principal person present, and from whom he received many favours and civilities.
Sunday, 10th of March
To-day, after Mass, the king repeated that if the Admiral wanted anything he should have it. He conversed much with the Admiral respecting his voyage, always ordering him to sit down, and treating him with great favour.
Monday, 11th of March
To-day the Admiral took leave of the king, who entrusted him with some messages to the Sovereigns, and always treating him with much friendliness. He departed after dinner, Don Martin de Noroña being sent with him, and all the knights set out with him, and went with him some distance, to do him honour. Afterwards he came to a monastery of San Antonio, near a place called Villafranca, where the Queen was residing. The Admiral went to do her reverence and to kiss her hand, because she had sent to say that he was not to go without seeing her. The Duke and the Marquis were with her, and the Admiral was received with much honour. He departed at night, and went to sleep at Llandra.
Tuesday, 12th of March
To-day, as he was leaving Llandra to return to the caravel, an esquire of the king arrived, with an offer that if he desired to go to Castille by land, that he should be supplied with lodgings, and beasts, and all that was necessary. When the Admiral took leave of him, he ordered a mule to be supplied to him, and another for his pilot, who was with him, and he says that the pilot received a present of twenty espadines. He said this that the Sovereigns might know all that was done. He arrived on board the caravel that night.
Wednesday, 13th of March
To-day, at 8 o’clock, with the flood tide, and the wind N.N.W., the Admiral got under weigh and made sail for Seville.
Thursday, 14th of March
Yesterday, after sunset, a southerly course was steered, and before sunrise they were off Cape St. Vincent, which is in Portugal. Afterwards he shaped a course to the east for Saltes, and went on all day with little wind, “until now that the ship is off Furon.”
Friday, 15th of March
Yesterday, after sunset, she went on her course with little wind, and at sunrise she was off Saltes. At noon, with the tide rising, they crossed the bar of Saltes, and reached the port which they had left on the 3rd of August of the year before. The Admiral says that so ends this journal, unless it becomes necessary to go to Barcelona by sea, having received news that their Highnesses are in that city, to give an account of all his voyage which our Lord had permitted him to make, and saw fit to set forth in him. For, assuredly, he held with a firm and strong knowledge that his high Majesty made all things good, and that all is good except sin. Nor can he value or think of anything being done without His consent. “I know respecting this voyage”, says the Admiral, “that he has miraculously shown his will, as may be seen from this journal, setting forth the numerous miracles that have been displayed in the voyage, and in me who was so long at the court of your Highnesses, working in opposition to and against the opinions of so many chief persons of your household, who were all against me, looking upon this enterprise as folly. But I hope, in our Lord, that it will be a great benefit to Christianity, for so it has ever appeared.” These are the final words of the Admiral Don Cristoval Colon respecting his first voyage to the Indies and their discovery.
11.6.2 The First Letter of Christopher Columbus to the Noble Lord raphael Sanchez Announcing the Discovery of America
Christopher Columbus, translated by Henry W. Haynes
License: Public Domain
Rome, April 1493
Letter from Christopher Colom [Columbus]: to whom our age owes much; on the recently discovered Islands of India beyond the Ganges. In the search for which he had been sent out eight months earlier under the auspices and at the expense of the most invincible Ferdinand and Helisabet [Isabella], rulers of Spain: addressed to the magnificent Lord Gabriel Sanchis [Sanchez] treasurer of these most serene highnesses; which the noble and learned man Leander de Cosco translated from the Spanish into Latin on the third day before the calends of May [i.e., 29 April] 1493, in the first year of the pontificate of Alexander VI.
AS I know that it will afford you pleasure that I have brought my undertaking to a successful result, I have determined to write you this letter to inform you of everything that has been done and discovered in this voyage of mine.
On the thirty-third day after leaving Cadiz I came into the Indian Sea, where I discovered many islands inhabited by numerous people. I took possession of all of them for our most fortunate King by making public proclamation and unfurling his standard, no one making any resistance. To the first of them I have given the name of our blessed Saviour, whose aid I have reached this and all the rest; but the Indians call it Guanahani. To each of the others also I gave a new name, ordering one to be called Sancta Maria de Concepcion, another Fernandina, another Isabella, another Juana; and so with all the rest. As soon as we reached the island which I have just said was called Juana, I sailed along its coast some considerable distance towards the West, and found it to be so large, without any apparent end, that I believed it was not an island, but a continent, a province of Cathay. But I saw neither towns nor cities lying on the seaboard, only some villages and country farms, with whose inhabitants I could not get speech, because they fled as soon as they beheld us. I continued on, supposing I should come upon some city, or country-houses. At last, finding that no discoveries rewarded our further progress, and that this course was leading us towards the North, which I was desirous of avoiding, as it was now winter in these regions, and it had always been my intention to proceed Southwards, and the winds also were favorable to such desires, I concluded not to attempt any other adventures; so, turning back, I came again to a certain harbor, which I had remarked. From there I sent two of our men into the country to learn whether there was any king or cities in that land. They journeyed for three days, and found innumerable people and habitations, but small and having no fixed government; on which account they returned. Meanwhile I had learned from some Indians, whom I had seized at this place, that this country was really an island. Consequently I continued along towards the East, as much as 322 miles, always hugging the shore. Where was the very extremity of the island, from there I saw another island to the Eastwards, distant 54 miles from this Juana, which I named Hispana; and proceeded to it, and directed my course for 564 miles East by North as it were, just as I had done at Juana.
The island called Juana, as well as the others in its neighborhood, is exceedingly fertile. It has numerous harbors on all sides, very safe and wide, above comparison with any I have ever seen. Through it flow many very broad and health-giving rivers; and there are in it numerous very lofty mountains. All these island are very beautiful, and of quite different shapes; easy to be traversed, and full of the greatest variety of trees reaching to the stars. I think these never lose their leaves, and I saw them looking as green and lovely as they are wont to be in the month of May in Spain. Some of them were in leaf, and some in fruit; each flourishing in the condition its nature required. The nightingale was singing and various other little birds, when I was rambling among them in the month of November. There are also in the island called Juana seven or eight kinds of palms, which as readily surpass ours in height and beauty as do all the other trees, herbs, and fruits. There are also wonderful pinewoods, fields, and extensive meadows; birds of various kinds, and honey; and all the different metals, except iron.
In the island, which I have said before was called Hispana, there are very lofty and beautiful mountains, great farms, groves and fields, most fertile both for cultivation and for pasturage, and well adapted for constructing buildings. The convenience of the harbors in this island, and the excellence of the rivers, in volume and salubrity, surpass human belief, unless on should see them. In it the trees, pasture-lands and fruits different much from those of Juana. Besides, this Hispana abounds in various kinds of species, gold and metals. The inhabitants of both sexes of this and of all the other island I have seen, or of which I have any knowledge, always go as naked as they came into the world, except that some of the women cover their private parts with leaves or branches, or a veil of cotton, which they prepare themselves for this purpose. They are all, as I said before, unprovided with any sort of iron, and they are destitute of arms, which are entirely unknown to them, and for which they are not adapted; not on account of any bodily deformity, for they are well made, but because they are timid and full of terror. They carry, however, canes dried in the sun in place of weapons, upon whose roots they fix a wooded shaft, dried and sharpened to a point. But they never dare to make use of these; for it has often happened, when I have sent two or three of my men to some of their villages to speak with the inhabitants, that a crowd of Indians has sallied forth; but when they saw our men approaching, they speedily took to flight, parents abandoning children, and children their parents. This happened not because any loss or injury had been inflicted upon any of them. On the contrary I gave whatever I had, cloth and many other things, to whomsoever I approached, or with whom I could get speech, without any return being made to me; but they are by nature fearful and timid. But when they see that they are safe, and all fear is banished, they are very guileless and honest, and very liberal of all they have. No one refuses the asker anything that he possesses; on the contrary they themselves invite us to ask for it. They manifest the greatest affection towards all of us, exchanging valuable things for trifles, content with the very least thing or nothing at all. But I forbade giving them a very trifling thing and of no value, such as bits of plates, dishes, or glass; also nails and straps; although it seemed to them, if they could get such, that they had acquired the most beautiful jewels in the world. For it chanced that a sailor received for a single strap as much weight of gold as three sold solidi; and so others for other things of less price, especially for new blancas, and for some gold coins, for which they gave whatever they seller asked; for instance, an ounce and a half or two ounces of gold, or thirty or forty pounds of cotton, with which they were already familiar. So too for pieces of hoops, jugs, jars, and pots they bartered cotton and gold like beasts. This I forbade, because it was plainly unjust; and I gave them many beautiful and pleasing things, which I had brought with me, for no return whatever, in order to win their affection, and that they might become Christians and inclined to love our King and Queen and Princes and all the people of Spain; and that they might be eager to search for and gather and give to us what they abound in and we greatly need.
They do not practice idolatry; on the contrary, they believe that all strength, all power, in short all blessings, are from Heaven, and I have come down from there with these ships and sailors; and in this spirit was I received everywhere, after they had got over their fear. They are neither lazy nor awkward; but, on the contrary, are of an excellent and acute understanding. Those who have sailed these seas give excellent accounts of everything; but they have never seen men wearing clothes, or ships like ours.
As soon as I had come into this sea, I took by force some Indians from the first island, in order that they might learn from us, and at the same time tell us what they knew about affairs in these regions. This succeeded admirably; for in a short time we understood them and they us both by gesture and signs and words; and they were of great service to us. They are coming now with me, and have always believed that I have come from Heaven, notwithstanding the long time they have been, and still remain, with us. They were the first who told this wherever we went, one calling to another, with a loud voice, Come, Come, you will see Men from Heaven. Whereupon both women and men, children and adults, young and old, laying aside the fear they had felt a little before, flocked eagerly to see us, a great crowd thronging about our steps, some bringing food, and others drink, with greatest love and incredible good will.
In each island are many boats made of solid wood; though narrow, yet in length and shape similar to our two-bankers, but swifter in motion, and managed by oars only. Some of them are large, some small, and some of medium size; but most are larger than a two-banker rowed by 18 oars. With these they sail to all the islands, which are innumerable; engaging in traffic and commerce with each other. I saw some of these biremes, or boats, which carried 70 or 80 rowers. In all these islands there is no difference in the appearance of the inhabitants, and none in their customs and language, so that all understand one another. This is a circumstance most favorable for what I believe our most serene King especially desires, that is, their conversion to the holy faith of Christ; for which, indeed, so far as I could understand, they are very ready and prone.
The Death of Columbus | Illustration by Louis Prang & Co., depicting Columbus on his death bed, surrounded by mournful onlookers. Author: L. Prang & Co. Source: Wikimedia Commons License: Public Domain
I have told already how I sailed in a straight course along the island of Juana from West to East 322 miles. From this voyage and the extent of my journeyings I can say that this Juana is larger than England and Scotland together. For beyond the aforesaid 322 miles, in that portion which looks towards the West, there are two more provinces, which I did not visit. One of them the Indians call Anan, and its inhabitants are born with tails. These provinces extend 180 miles, as I learned from the Indians, whom I am bringing with me, and who are well acquainted with all these islands.
The distance around Hispana is greater than all Spain from Colonia to Fontarabia; as is readily proved, because its fourth side, which I myself traversed in a straight course from West to East, stretches 540 miles. This island is to be coveted, and not to be despised when acquired. As I have already taken possession of all the others, as I have said, for our most invincible King, and the role over them is entirely committed to the said King, so in this one I have taken special possession of a certain large town, in a most convenient spot, well suited for all profit and commerce, to which I have given the name of the Nativity of our Lord; and there I ordered a fort of be built forthwith, which ought to be finished now. In it I left as many men as seemed necessary, with all kinds of arms, and provisions sufficient for more than a year; also a caravel and men to build others, skilled not only in trade but in others. I secured for them the good will and remarkable friendship of the King of the island; for these people are very affectionate and kind; so much so that the aforesaid King took a pride in my being called his brother. Although they should change their minds, and wish to harm those who have remained in the fort, they cannot; because they are without arms, go naked and are too timid; so that, in truth, those who hold the aforesaid fort can lay waste the whole of that island, without any danger to themselves, provided they do not violate the rules and instructions I have given them.
In all these islands, as I understand, every man is satisfied with only one wife, except the princes or kings, who are permitted to have 20. The women appear to work more than the men; but I could not well understand whether they have private property, or not; for I saw that what every one had was shared with the others, especially meals, provisions and such things. I found among them no monsters, as very many expected; but men of great deference and kind; nor are they black like Ethiopians; but they have long, straight hair. They do not dwell where the rays of Sun have most power, although the Sun’s heat is very great there, as this region is twenty-six degrees distant from the equinoctial line. From the summits of the mountains there comes great cold, but the Indians mitigate it by being inured to the weather, and by the help of very hot food, which they consume frequently and in immoderate quantities.
I saw no monsters, neither did I hear accounts of any such except in an island called Charis, the second as one crosses over from Spain to India, which is inhabited by a certain race regarded by their neighbors as very ferocious. They eat human flesh, and make use of several kinds of boats by which they cross over to all the Indian islands, and plunder and carry off whatever they can. But they differ in no respect from the others except in wearing their hair long after the fashion of women. They make use of bows and arrows made of reeds, having pointed shafts fastened to the thicker portion, as we have before described. For this reason they are considered to be ferocious, and the other Indians consequently are terribly afraid of them; but I consider them of no more account than the others. They have intercourse with certain women who dwell alone upon the island of Mateurin, the first as one crosses from Spain to India. These women follow none of the usual occupations of their sex; but they use bows and arrows like those of their husbands, which I have described, and protect themselves with plates of copper, which is found in the greatest abundance among them.
I was informed that there is another island larger than the aforesaid Hispana, whose inhabitants have no hair; and that there is a greater abundance of gold in it than in any of the others. Some of the inhabitants of these islands and of the others I have seen I am bringing over with me to bear testimony to what I have reported. Finally, to sum up in a few words the chief results and advantages of our departure and speedy return, I make this promise to our most invincible Sovereigns, that, if I am supported by some little assistance from them, I will give them as much gold as they have need of, and in addition spices, cotton and mastic, which is found only in Chios, and as much aloes-wood, and as many heathen slaves as their majesties may choose to demand; besides these, rhubarb and other kinds of drugs, which I think the men I left in the fort before alluded to, have already discovered, or will do so; as I have delayed nowhere longer than the winds compelled me, except while I was providing for the construction of a fort in the city of Nativity, and for making all things safe.
Although these matters are very wonderful and unheard of, they would have been much more so, if ships to a reasonable amount had been furnished me. But what has been accomplished is great and wonderful, and not at all proportionate to my deserts, but to the sacred Christian faith, and to the piety and religion of our Sovereigns. For what is the mind of man could not compass the spirit of God has granted to mortals. For God is wont and listen to his servants who love his precepts, even in impossibilities, as has happened to me in the present instance, who have accomplished what human strength has hitherto never attained. For if any one has written or told anything about these islands, all have done so either obscurely or by guesswork, so that if has almost seemed to be fabulous.
Therefore let King and Queen and Princes, and their most fortunate realms, and all other Christian provinces, let us all return thanks to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, who has bestowed so great a victory and reward upon us; let there be processions and solemn sacrifices prepared; let the churches be decked with festal boughs; let Christ rejoice upon Earth as he rejoices in Heaven, as he foresees that so many souls of so many people heretofore lost are to be saved; and let us be glad not only for the exaltation of our faith, but also for the increase of temporal prosperity, in which not only Spain but all Christendom is about to share.
As these things have been accomplished so have they been briefly narrated. Farewell.
The music of the United States is the product of peoples in motion. From the beginning the colonies that would become the United States consisted of overlapping immigrant groups who moved into territories inhabited by Native American peoples. The earliest large groups of white colonists arrived from England, Scotland, and the Netherlands in 1607. African people arrived in North America more or less continuously between 1619 and the 1850s as a result of the slave trade, the largest forced migration in world history (fig. 3.1). Depending on their origins, resources, and the freedoms granted or denied them by law and custom, these groups lived under vastly unequal conditions. The forced labor of enslaved Africans became a mainstay of the economy in the colonies, and the social relations created by slavery shaped every aspect of US society, including music-making.1 The music African Americans created in the United States has played an extraordinary role in the musical life of the Americas and the world.
The practice of slavery in the colonies that would become the United States began as indentured servitude but evolved into a hereditary, permanent caste. Early in the 1600s, servitude was based not on skin color but on religion: people who had not been Christian before coming to America were judged to be slaves. Nonetheless, the practice of slavery hardened into a system based on race—the assignment of social distinction based on color or other elements of physical appearance, in this case white citizens’ unshakable conviction that brown-skinned people were inferior—and enforced by law. The concept of race has no basis in human biology, but as an imagined fact that has affected how people interact with one another, it has shaped ideas about music and the conditions in which music is performed.2
The history of African American music is difficult to reconstruct; almost none of this music was written down until the 1800s, so scholars have relied Page 69 →on eyewitness accounts, most of them by white observers. Nonetheless, the mixture of diasporas has made the United States what it is, so scholars have tried to learn all they can about how these musics came together. This chapter describes two musical products of African diaspora in the United States—the blues and spirituals—with an eye toward the ways in which the social circumstances shaped the development of African American traditions.
Music on the Move: Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Voyages. Map by Eric Fosler-Lussier. This map depicts the transportation of enslaved people from Africa as listed in The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database in the decades between 1580 and 1860, grouped by regions where they arrived. White boxes and dashed lines indicate departures; black boxes and solid lines indicate arrivals. Voyages for which the major place of sale could not be imputed were removed from this visualization: the number of enslaved people who did not arrive at their destination (many died, but some possibly escaped) is represented by the difference in the number of persons leaving Africa and those arriving at destination ports. The excellent database at slavevoyages.org describes the research behind this map and more detailed visualizations. (See https://doi.org/10.3998/mpub.9853855.cmp.31)Source: The African Diaspora in the United States is shared under a CC BY-NC 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Danielle Fosler-Lussier via source content that was edited to the style and standards of the LibreTexts platform.
ARCHITECTURE
Architect of the Enlightenment
Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello
by Dr. Bryan Zygmont
Thomas Jefferson, Monticello, Charlottesville, Virginia, 1770–1806 (photo: Corkythehornetfan, CC BY-SA 3.0)
A gentleman architect
In an undated note, Thomas Jefferson left clear instructions about what he wanted engraved upon his burial marker:
Here was buried
Thomas Jefferson
Author of the Declaration of American Independence
of the Statute of Virginia for religious freedom
Father of the University of VirginiaJefferson’s tombstone
Jefferson explained, “because by these, as testimonials that I have lived, I wish most to be remembered.” To be certain, there are important achievements Jefferson neglected. He was also the Governor of Virginia, American minister to France, the first Secretary of State, the third president of the United States, and one of the most accomplished gentleman architects in American history. To quote William Pierson, an architectural historian, “In spite of the fact that his training and resources were those of an amateur, he was able to perform with all the insight and boldness of a high professional.”
Indeed, even had he never entered political life, Jefferson would be remembered today as one of the earliest proponents of neoclassical architecture in the United States. Jefferson believed art was a powerful tool; it could elicit social change, could inspire the public to seek education, and could bring about a general sense of enlightenment for the American public. If Cicero believed that the goals of a skilled orator were to Teach, to Delight, and To Move, Jefferson believed that the scale and public nature of architecture could fulfill these same aspirations.
Thomas Jefferson, Monticello (view from the north), Charlottesville, Virginia, 1770–1806 (photo: William Avery Hudson, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
Return to the classical
Jefferson arrived at the College of William and Mary in 1760 and took an immediate interest in the architecture of the college’s campus and of Williamsburg more broadly. A lifelong book lover, Jefferson began his architectural collection while a student. His first two purchases were James Leoni’s The Architecture of A. Palladio (1715–20) and James Gibbs’ Rules for Drawing the Several Parts of Architecture (1732).
Although never formally trained as an architect, Jefferson, both while a student and then later in life, expressed dissatisfaction with the architecture that surrounded him in Williamsburg, believing that the Wren-Baroque aesthetic common in colonial Virginia was too British for a North American audience. In an oft-quoted passage from Notes on Virginia (1782), Jefferson critically wrote of the architecture of Williamsburg:
“The College and Hospital are rude, mis-shapen piles, which, but that they have roofs, would be taken for brick-kilns. There are no other public buildings but churches and court-houses, in which no attempts are made at elegance.”
Thus, when Jefferson began to design his own home, he turned not to the architecture then in vogue around the Williamsburg area, but instead to the classically inspired architecture of Antonio Palladio and James Gibbs. Rather than place his plantation house along the bank of a river—as was the norm for Virginia’s landed gentry during the eighteenth century—Jefferson decided instead to place his home, which he named Monticello (Italian for “little mountain”) atop a solitary hill just outside Charlottesville, Virginia.
French Neo-Classicism for an American audience
Construction began in 1768 when the hilltop was first cleared and leveled, and Jefferson moved into the completed South Pavilion two years later. The early phase of Monticello’s construction was largely completed by 1771. Jefferson left both Monticello and the United States in 1784 when he accepted an appointment as America Minister to France. Over the next five years, that is, until September 1789 when Jefferson returned to the United States to serve as Secretary of State under newly elected President Washington, Jefferson had the opportunity to visit Classical and Neoclassical architecture in France.
Thomas Jefferson, Rotunda, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, 1819–26 (photo: Michael Hebb, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
This time abroad had an enormous effect on Jefferson’s architectural designs. The Virginia State Capitol (1785–89) is a modified version of the Maison Carrée (16 B.C.E.), a Roman temple Jefferson saw during a visit to Nîmes, France. And although Jefferson never went so far as Rome, the influence that the Pantheon (125 C.E.) had over his Rotunda (begun 1817) at the University of Virginia is so evident it hardly need be mentioned.
Politics largely consumed Jefferson from his return to the United States until the last day of 1793 when he formally resigned from Washington’s cabinet. From this year until 1809, Jefferson diligently redesigned and rebuilt his home, creating in time one of the most recognized private homes in the history of the United States. In it, Jefferson fully integrated the ideals of French neoclassical architecture for an American audience.
In this later construction period, Jefferson fundamentally changed the proportions of Monticello. If the early construction gave the impression of a Palladian two-story pavilion, Jefferson’s later remodeling, based in part on the Hôtel de Salm (1782–87) in Paris, gives the impression of a symmetrical single-story brick home under an austere Doric entablature. The west garden façade—the view that is once again featured on the American nickel—shows Monticello’s most recognized architectural features. The two-column deep extended portico contains Doric columns that support a triangular pediment that is decorated by a semicircular window. Although the short octagonal drum and shallow dome provide Monticello a sense of verticality, the wooden balustrade that circles the roofline provides a powerful sense of horizontality. From the bottom of the building to its top, Monticello is a striking example of French Neoclassical architecture in the United States.
Jefferson changed political parties and was a Democratic-Republican by the time he was elected president. He believed the young United States needed to forge a strong diplomatic relationship with France, a country Jefferson and his political brethren believed were our revolutionary brothers in arms. With this in mind, it is unsurprising that Jefferson designed his own home after the neoclassicism then popular in France, a mode of architecture that was distinct from the style then fashionable in Great Britain. This neoclassicism—with roots in the architecture of ancient Rome—was something Jefferson was able to visit while abroad.
Failing to live up to his own democratic ideals
By helping to introduce classical architecture to the United States, Jefferson intended to reinforce the ideals behind the classical past: democracy, education, rationality, civic responsibility. Because he detested the English, Jefferson continually rejected British architectural precedents for those from France. In doing so, Jefferson reinforced the symbolic nature of architecture. Jefferson did not just design a building; he designed a building that eloquently spoke to the democratic ideals of the United States. This is clearly seen in the Virginia State Capitol, in the Rotunda at the University of Virginia, and especially in his own home, Monticello.
In many regards, Thomas Jefferson remains an exceedingly complicated historical figure. On the one hand, we can justifiably laud his significant civic and architectural achievements, for his accomplishments in the political realm are unmatched in American history and the buildings he designed—Monticello, the Virginia State Capitol, and the Rotunda at the University of Virginia—places him at the forefront of the gentlemen architects of the early Federal period. Yet on the other hand, we need to wrestle with the truth that Jefferson was—as were the majority of the Founding Fathers from the southern colonies, men such as George Washington, James Madison, and James Monroe—a slaveholder who owned more than 600 men, women, and children during the course of his life.
So when we look at Monticello—a building in part constructed by the enslaved people Jefferson owned—we are right to feel a kind of conflict. Although he helped to introduce classical architecture to the United States and used architectural language to reinforce the ideals behind the classical past—elements such as democracy, education, rationality, civic responsibility—those very virtues were actively denied to many. Because Jefferson so detested the English, he continually rejected British architectural precedents for those from France. In doing so, Jefferson reinforced the symbolic nature of architecture. Jefferson did not just design a building; he designed a building that eloquently spoke to the democratic ideals the United States should aspire to, even if in practice these democratic ideals were intentionally withheld from the enslaved people Jefferson owned.
Rotunda, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia (photo: Brian Jeffery Beggerly, CC BY 2.0)
A joke with a kernel of truth
The College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia is the second oldest university in the United States and was founded in 1693 (only Harvard, founded in 1636, is older). There is a longstanding joke amongst graduates of this institution:
Question: Why did Thomas Jefferson found the University of Virginia?
Answer: His kids could not get into the College of William & Mary.
To be fair, there is some truth to this joke, and then again, there is some misdirection. Thomas Jefferson did, in fact, found the University of Virginia—an achievement of which he was so proud that it is mentioned on his tombstone (whereas he omitted the fact that he was the third president of the United States). But the other part of the joke—that his children could not have been admitted to his alma mater—is a bit misleading. Jefferson’s wife, Martha Wayles, died in 1782. During their ten years of marriage, she bore him six children, only two of whom lived to adulthood. Both of these were women, and as the College of William & Mary did not formally admit female students until 1918, it would have been impossible for Jefferson’s children (those who survived and were legitimate, at least) to enroll in the institution that had educated their father.
Wren building (West side), William and Mary College, 1695-1700 (photo: Smash the Iron Cage, CC BY-SA 4.0)
American universities have traditionally begun with a single building and then expanded over time. This was the case of the College of William & Mary; the so-called Wren Building (above) is the oldest surviving university building in the United States. Although originally called simply “The College” or “The Main Building,” it has subsequently come to be named after Sir Christopher Wren, the English baroque architect. In fact, Hugh Jones, the college’s first professor of mathematics wrote in 1722 that Wren himself was the architect: “the building is beautiful and commodious, being first modeled by Sir Christopher Wren…” However, architectural historians do not currently believe that the most accomplished architect in the English-speaking world at the end of the seventeenth century would have made time to design a building on the very fringes of the British Empire.
Sir Christopher Wren, Royal Hospital, Chelsea, 1692 (photo: stu smith, CC BY-ND 2.0)
A preference for the French (over the English)
Although it is unlikely that Wren designed this building at William and Mary College, there can be no doubt that whoever did was strongly influenced by Wren’s Royal Hospital at Chelsea (above). Both buildings have architectural elements that are indicative of late Renaissance and Baroque architecture in England. Both are horizontal in nature with a central pediment and cupola. Moreover, they share a similar fenestration (window) arrangement, and nearly identical dormer windows (windows that project from a sloping roof). For Thomas Jefferson, the Wren Building at the College of William & Mary was a prototype example of English architecture.
Thomas Jefferson and Charles-Louis Clérisseau, Virginia State Capitol, completed 1792 (photo: Mr.TinDC, CC BY-ND 2.0)
And if the political history of the United States tell us anything, it is that Thomas Jefferson did not much care for the English. This is but one of the reasons why his own architectural projects—notably his ancestral home at Monticello and the Virginia State Capitol (left)—were inspired not by English architectural antecedents, but instead by buildings from the classical past. Indeed, the Virginal State Capitol looks much like the Maison Carrée in Nîmes (France), an ancient Roman building Jefferson saw while serving as the American ambassador to France. His own home has a variety of classical (and neoclassical) architectural influences. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the neoclassical style was strongly linked with France—and Jefferson, a Democratic-Republican and strident Francophile, therefore approved.
University of Virginia: an “academical village”
At the conclusion of his political career, Jefferson turned his considerable energies towards two related enterprises: the founding of a university for the state of Virginia, and designing buildings for that institution. Jefferson very much believed in the crucial importance of education. Although an oft-repeated quotation—“An educated citizenry is a vital requisite for our survival as a free people.”—never seems to have come from his pen, it very much encapsulates Jefferson’s views on education. When he set in planning the University of Virginia—an institution founded in 1819 and began to instruct its first class in March 1825—he did so in a revolutionary way. Rather than begin as a single building and expand as needed, Jefferson envisioned—to use his phrase—an entire “academical village” where students and professor lived and learn side by side.
Jefferson designed the initial phase of the university on a symmetrical north-south axis. The longitudinal axes on the east and west sides contain pavilions for the professors, dormitories for the students, and expansive lawns. Indeed, the word “campus”—a word so commonly used to describe the grounds and buildings of a college or university—comes from the Latin word that means field. In this way, what Jefferson designed was one of the first true college campuses, complete with buildings and intentional exterior spaces.
The Rotunda (and the Pantheon)
Thomas Jefferson, Rotunda, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, 1817-26 (postcard c. 1930-45, Boston Public Library, CC BY 2.0)
The crowing architectural achievement of the “academical village” at the University of Virginia can be seen at the north end of the campus. Called the Rotunda, it should look immediately familiar to anyone with even a passing knowledge of Western architecture, as Jefferson designed it as a half-sized version of the ancient Roman Pantheon (below). A religious building devoted to all the Roman gods, the Pantheon demonstrates the ways in which Roman architects could take a Classical Greek idea—note the Greek temple front—and combine it with elements that were so spectacularly new that it made the Pantheon architecturally unique for nearly two millennia. Indeed, that uniqueness derives from the innovative “dome on a drum” construction that is so neatly hidden—when viewed from its ideal angle—by the Greek temple front that Roman architects so admired. Moreover, this dome, which opens into a vast interior space crowned by a singular window (or oculus) was made possible through a particularly Roman invention: concrete.
The Pantheon, Rome, c. 125 (photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Yet Jefferson knew that his Rotunda was going to serve a different function than the building on which it was based. So, although these two buildings (The Pantheon in Rome and the Rotunda at the University of Virginia) look strikingly similar if you merely look at the architectural forms, they become quite different if one moves beyond initial appearance. Whereas the Pantheon is a religious building—a temple for all the Roman gods when it was created (and subsequently a Catholic church when it was consecrated in 609), Jefferson’s Rotunda has a strictly secular nature. As a member of the Enlightenment, Jefferson’s religious views leaned towards Deism, a belief system that generally acknowledged a Divine Maker, but rejected a belief in revelation. In fact, one of the reasons why Jefferson was keen on founding the University of Virginia was to provide his home state with a secular educational option to the religiously-oriented College of William & Mary. The materials were clearly different as well. While the expansive interior space of the Pantheon was made possible through the perfection of poured concrete, Jefferson used the wood and brick that was so indicative of mid-Atlantic architecture of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Two final differences involve the plans of the building on the ways in which light works. Whereas the Pantheon is essentially one enclosed space that is illuminated by only two sources—the oculus at the peak of the dome and the door at the building’s entrance—Jefferson’s Rotunda is a multistoried building that is illuminated by windows that circle the drum of the dome.
One might wonder why an architect in nineteenth-century America would model a library after an ancient Roman temple. But Neoclassical architecture surrounds us to this day (Neoclassical means “new classicism”—this is a style that developed in Europe at the end of the 18th century). Government buildings, colleges and universities, libraries, museums, and banks have all frequently used the architecture of the classical past as a way of giving the establishments they represent a sense of gravitas. In utilizing classical (ancient Greek and Roman) architectural forms for his library, Jefferson was expressing his admiration of the ideas set forth from the classical past: democracy, learning, and permanence. And, to make it more emphatic, the Rotunda was far removed from anything that could be considered British.
Gilbert Stuart, Thomas Jefferson, c. 1821, oil on wood, 66 x 54.5 cm (National Gallery of Art)
Influence
Thomas Jefferson’s resume is unmatched in the history of American politics. He was the third president of the United States (1801-09), the second vice president of the United States (1797-1801), and the first Secretary of State of the United States (1790-93). He served as the Minister to France (1785-89), a Delegate to the Congress of the Confederation (1783-84), as the governor of Virginia (1779-81), and Delegate to the Continental Congress (1775-1776). He also wrote the State of Virginia’s A Bill for Establishing Religious Freedom (1777) and was the primary author of what many believe to be one of the most perfect political documents ever written, The Declaration of Independence (1776). And yet, had Jefferson been and written none of these things, he would still be remembered today as one of the most influential architects in the history of the United States. In many ways, the Rotunda is the cardinal architectural achievement on what Jefferson thought was one of his most profound accomplishments, the founding of the University of Virginia.
Art in American Colonies and the United States, c. 1600-1800
This chapter covers about 250 years (c. 1700–1865) of art made during a period of dramatic shifts and changes that reflect the cultural fluidity in the American colonies (and later, the United States).
by DR. BRYAN ZYGMONT
Map of part of North America in the mid-18th century showing English, French, and Spanish possessions (courtesy The Map as History)
Although this chapter covers only about 250 years (c. 1700–1865), the changes that took place on the continent of North America (and in this context, we will consider the parts of North America that are now Canada and the United States) during that time period were dramatic and far reaching. The European colonization of what is today the United States began in the sixteenth century when Spaniards founded Saint Augustine in Florida in 1565 and not long after colonized what is today New Mexico in 1598. The French colonization of Canada began in 1603, with the founding of New France on the coast of the Saint Lawrence River.
Theodor de Bry, Map showing the coast of Virginia with many islands just off the mainland, two Native territories, Secotan and Weapemeoc, and the Native community of Roanoak on an island at the mouth of a river, 1590, engraving based on the watercolor of John White, illustration in Wunderbarliche, doch warhafftige Erklärung, von der Gelegenheit vnd Sitten der Wilden in Virginia . . ., 1590, plate 2 (Library of Congress)It was only in 1605 the the British founded Roanoke Colony in what would later be named North Carolina. Although Roanoke Colony failed while still in its infancy, two years later the British colony of Jamestown—founded in 1607—managed, despite starvation and disease, to survive. It is estimated that the combined European population of North America in 1610 was approximately 350. In contrast to this, a recent study has suggested that the population of Indigenous peoples in what is now the United States and Canada approached 7 million—a number that was greatly reduced in the decades following the arrival of Europeans due to genocide and the introduction of pathogens from Europe, Asia, and Africa to which the Indigenous peoples of the Americas had no protection.European-colonized lands in the Americas c. 1750
Yet big things can have small beginnings, and this is the case of the European settlement of the eastern seaboard of North America. By c. 1700, the population of these European colonies had swelled to more than 250,000 and extended from what is the Caribbean to Newfoundland. When speaking of the lands that would become the United States, historians have referred to this region as Colonial America, scholars now generally prefer to use the phrase American Colonies. Although this may at first seem to be a subtle—and some might suggest, an unneeded—differentiation, it is crucial. Whereas the phrase Colonial America suggests something that is singular, American Colonies reinforces the diversity of these groups of settlers. By the end of the seventeenth century, France, England, Holland, and Spain had all founded settlements in North America, and the reasons for the arrival of those colonists could be as varied as the point of their embarkation. Be it for religious liberty or for the dreams of prosperity and riches, the colonists were varied and diverse groups. Over this expanse of time, the art of North America likewise went through dramatic shifts and changes, and these changes also reflect the cultural fluidity in the colonies (and later, the United States), as well.
Map of the 13 American Colonies (map adapted from Connormah, CC BY-SA 3.0)
“American” and “America” are complicated words—they are typically used in relation to the United States of America, but there are many kinds of Americans and Americas, and people from the Caribbean, Mexico, and Central and South America consider themselves American, too. The earliest art made by settlers in what is now the United States and Canada during the end of the sixteenth century, shows the profound influence of European artistic precedents. This is not surprising, given that art was made by European artists for European audiences. But as the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries progressed, not only did the audience change, so too did the art makers, transitioning from artists born and trained in European to those who were born in the Americas.
A vision of the landscape in the western part of what is now the United States commissioned by a railroad baron whose fortunes were tied up with westward expansion. Asher B. Durand, Progress (The Advance of Civilization), 1853, oil on canvas, 58 7/16 x 82 1/4 x 4 3/8 inches (Virginia Museum of Fine Arts; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Importantly, the subject of art likewise went through a shift. If the artists and architects in the decades prior to 1820 focused on portraiture, historical paintings, and classical inspired architecture, the art made during the later decades preceding the American Civil War focused on something uniquely American: the land.
In fact, the first centuries of “American” pivot around several key themes.
The intent for artists to introduce a European audience to the recently discovered lands and people of the Americas.
Colonial (and the slightly early Federal period) artists were strongly influenced by European precedents, both in style and genre.
As the nineteenth century progressed, artists shifted their focus from portraits to landscapes, giving this genre a heightened pathos by combining landscapes with the moralizing messages of history paintings.
Early Beginnings and Colonial Maturation
It was only during the final decades of the sixteenth century that European-trained artists began arriving in bigger numbers in the Americas. The purpose of their arrival in North America was to depict the land, the people, and the customs of North American peoples, and—in no small part—to assert European superiority over them to an audience in Europe.
John White was born in London around the year 1540 and came to Roanoke Island in 1585 as an artist and mapmaker. The watercolors he completed during his stay in what is now North Carolina constitutes the oldest surviving visual record by a European artist of Native Americans in what is now the United States.
Theodor de Bry, “Their sitting at meate,” engraving, 15.2 x 21.2 cm (The John Carter Brown Library), after a watercolor of John White, 1577–90, from A brief and true report of the new found land of Virginia, 1590
These watercolors became the basis for a series of mass-produced prints by the Flemish printmaker, Theodre de Bry. As a result, White—through de Bry—was able to profoundly influence the European idea of what a Native American person looked like, where they lived, and what they ate. In doing so, de Bry was also contributing to a kind of homogenization of Indigenous cultures. During the sixteenth century, there were dozens of Indigenous groups living along the eastern seaboard, all with distinct cultures, dress, and traditions. But through the lens of European artists, these numerous groups were collapsed into a singular group of Native Americans.
Freake painter, Elizabeth Clarke Freake (Mrs. John Freake) and Baby Mary, c. 1671 and 1674, oil on canvas, 42 1/2 x 36 3/4″ / 108 x 93.3 cm (Worcester Art Museum)
If the end of the sixteenth century was a kind of birth of American art, then it was in the next 150 years or so that American art reached a kind of infancy. Artists of varying levels of skill, ability, and training arrived in the American colonies during the seventeenth century. Most of these painters—such as the anonymous painter who completed the portraits of the prosperous Puritan Freake family—were relatively untrained portraitists (limners, in the parlance of the day) who would have been a second- (or third-) rate artist in most hamlets in England.
Gerardus Duyckinck I (attributed), six portraits of the Levy-Franks family (Franks Children with Bird, Franks Children with Lamb, Jacob Franks, Moses Levy, Mrs. Jacob Franks (Abigaill Levy), and Ricka Franks), c. 1735, oil on canvas (Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art)
Other artists—such as Gerardus Duyckinck—were born in the American colonies to artistically inclined families. It was not until 1729 with the arrival in Boston of John Smibert from London when North America had its first supremely talented European-trained painter. Smibert not only painted portraits of the Boston elite, he also opened what was in essence the first art gallery in the Americans and displayed his own copies of European paintings.
John Smibert, The Bermuda Group, 1728, reworked 1739, oil on canvas, 69 1/2 x 93″ / 176.5 x 236.2 cm (Yale University Art Gallery)
Maturations of the 18th century
Some of the greatest colonial-born artists who followed Smibert—Robert Feke, John Singleton Copley, John Trumbull, and Gilbert Stuart among others—acquired some of their earliest art education by seeing the paintings in Smibert’s art gallery.
John Singleton Copley, Portrait of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Mifflin (Sarah Morris), 1773, oil on ticking, 156.5 × 121.9 cm (Philadelphia Museum of Art)
Some eighteenth-century portraits painted in the colonies—from those of the Freake family to those Copley painted such as the dual portrait of Mr. and Mrs. Mifflin—all speak to a kind of dialogue between European artistic precedents and the interests of a North American audience.
Covered sugar bowl, c. 1745, silver, 11.5 x 9.1 cm (Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art)
But it is not just in painted portraits in which this conversation happens, for that same silent transcultural discussion happens between more everyday kinds of objects. For example, a silver bowl is not just a silver bowl. It is an object that speaks to wealth, power, and servitude when we consider the value of the materials, the privilege of its sweet contents, and the fact that the forced labor that created the sugar would never enjoy it.
Anishinaabe outfit, c. 1790, collected by Lieutenant Andrew Foster, Fort Michilimackinac (British), Michigan, Birchbark, cotton, linen, wool, feathers, silk, silver brooches, porcupine quills, horsehair, hide, sinew; the moccasins were likely made by the Huron–Wendat people (National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution)
Likewise, an extravagant Anishinaabe military uniform made for Lieutenant Andrew Foster’s is about more than commerce and exchange, it is also about diplomacy and cooperation. The cotton of the uniform was exported from India and then later milled in Britain. The extravagant decoration on the cotton garment contains Italian glass beads and Native American embellishments.
While the cotton in Andrew Foster’s uniform was grown in India, cotton became one of the most important crops in the American colonies and later in the United States. Cotton is a laborious crop to harvest, and the lucrative nature of cotton was made possible through the utilization of slave labor. There is a misperception that slavery existed only in the southern colonies and states, places such as Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, Mississippi, and Alabama. In fact, in 1817 New York became the first state to formally outlaw slavery, setting 4 July 1827 as the date of total emancipation of all enslaved peoples.
Rodney Leon, African Burial Ground National Monument, 2006, New York City
To put this in perspective, the Dutch founded New York—then New Amsterdam—in 1624, and the first enslaved peoples arrived in 1626, only two years later. This means that New York City has a longer history of being a slaveholding city (as of 2022, 203 years) than it does of being a city of emancipation (195 years). To acknowledge this fact, Rodney Leon designed the African Burial Ground in lower Manhattan. Using an Old Kingdom Egypt burial structure and West African iconography, the memorial brings important attention to the presence of slavery in the north while remembering the thousands who lived in bondage there.
Neoclassical Influences and the Construction of National Identity
Jean-Antoine Houdon, George Washington, 1788–92, marble, 6′ 2″ high (State Capitol, Richmond, Virginia)
The Battle of Yorktown on 19 October 1781 brought the fighting of the American War of Independence to an end, and with the Treaty of Paris—signed on 3 September 1783—Great Britain formally acknowledged the United States as a sovereign nation. In the years that followed, American artists—and the federal and state governments—sought ways to both commemorate this victory and to construct a national identity in art and architecture. Jean-Antoine Houdon—a French neoclassical sculptor—carved a monumental statue of George Washington in his military uniform.
John Trumbull, The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker’s Hill, 17 June, 1775, after 1815-before 1831, oil on canvas, 50.16 x 75.56 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
And the painter we most identify with this goal during the early Federal period is the former Revolutionary War officer John Trumbull who is most well-known today for his large-scale history paintings that chronicled this conflict with Great Britain.
Thomas Jefferson, Rotunda, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia, 1819–26One of the architects we most identify with the early Federal period developed his architectural aesthetic while living in France. His name was Thomas Jefferson, and in addition to designing his ancestral home and the Rotunda at the University of Virginia—the university he himself founded—he also had a small side hustle in politics, eventually serving as the third president of the United States.
Primary source excerpt
From 1809 to 1819, when Thomas Jefferson was developing his vision for a new form of public higher education in Virginia, he and the other men he worked with to bring the vision to reality did so in the single largest slaveholding state in the United States. All of the men involved were large slaveholders. Thomas Jefferson owned 607 people over the course of his life.
Jefferson’s architectural vision is classified as neoclassical, a style that was developed in France in the period leading up to the French Revolution, when the French people attempted to place restrictions on the power of their king. It is a style that looks back to ancient Greek and Roman architecture and is meant to signal ideals of freedom and liberty. For many years art history largely ignored the irony of Jefferson’s ideals and his reality as an enslaver. We can also consider the fact that an enslaved person named Lewis Commodore was purchased and owned by the University of Virginia directly (others who worked there were rented or borrowed), and worked to clean the rooms of the beautiful Rotunda that Jefferson designed (and he even lived there for a period).
Portraiture and history painting in the 18th century
The dominant form of art during the eighteenth century was portraiture. Indeed, if an affluent patron wanted to pay for a work of art, they generally wanted a likeness of themselves or a member of their family. But in the closing triad of this century, artists born in the American colonies began to seek out artistic instruction in Europe, and in doing so were introduced to European art first-hand.
When they arrived in Europe, American artists learned that the various art academies throughout Europe—the Académie de Peinture et de Sculpture in France amongst others—had established an unofficial hierarchy of the subjects of art. This hierarchy suggested that the most skilled, able, and intellectually engaged artists worked in the realm of large-scale “Grand Manner” history paintings (subjects from history, mythology, or the Bible). In picking such a topic, the artist was often allowed the opportunity to visually depict a written source and this provided artists the chance to engage their intellect in the purpose of providing moral or intellectual instruction to the viewer.
If history paintings were at the apex of this hierarchy, portraiture and genre paintings (small compositions depicting everyday life) were near the bottom. In both instances, artists were again allowed the opportunity to compositionally arrange a painting, but without—perhaps—the opportunity to morally instruct the viewer. The genre of landscapes was also at the lower end of the hierarchy since it was deemed less prestigious since it was understood as only a mechanical recreation of what the Great Artist—God—had already made.
John Vanderlyn, Ariadne Asleep on the Island of Naxos, 1809–14, oil on canvas, 174 x 221 cm (The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts)
Many artists who had journeyed to Europe returned to the United States with goals of creating large scale Grand Manner history paintings in the vein of the French painter Jacques-Louis David. For some—such as John Trumbull—this meant completing works that celebrated the colonial victory over Great Britain. For John Vanderlyn, the first American-born artist to enroll at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, this meant large-scale history paintings that often depicted stories from the classical (Greco-Roman) past.
Thomas Jefferson and Charles-Louis Clérisseau, Virginia State Capitol, completed 1792
But Vanderlyn was not the only American artist to be inspired by the French neoclassicism en vogue in Paris during the decades around the turn of the nineteenth century. So too was Thomas Jefferson, who, although never formally trained as an architect, brought a keen understanding of the ways in which architecture could forge a national identity. He chose classical (ancient Greek and Roman) precedents for the buildings he designed—the Rotunda at the University of Virginia harkens back to the Pantheon in Rome, and his Virginia State Capitol is similar to the Maison Carrée in Nîmes.
Born and trained in Ireland, architect James Hoban emigrated to Philadelphia in 1785 and won the design competition for the White House in 1792. It has housed every American president except George Washington. James Hoban, The White House (photo: Cezary Piwowarczyk, CC BY-SA 4.0)
The same connection can be made in regards to James Hoban’s White House and Benjamin Henry Latrobe’s Capitol Building—both of which have strong classical precedents. In making this connection between the United States and the classical world, Jefferson (and others!) aspired to connect what they saw as the longevity and benevolence of the classical governments with what they were building in the United States.
Shift towards Romanticism, the land, and a new National Identity
Washington Allston, Elijah in the Desert, 1818, oil on canvas, 125.09 x 184.78 cm / 49 1/4 x 72 3/4 inches (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
Europe had history and portrait paintings during the eighteenth century. But there were some things Europe simply did not have during this period, and one of those things was, at least from a non-Indigenous perspective, the untamed and expansive landscape of North America. And it is through this lens—that there is something here that is different (even better!) than over there—that American art of the nineteenth century can be considered. During the early nineteenth century, artists—be they born in America or imported from abroad—began to shift their focus away from the subjects that had hitherto been deemed appropriate (portraits, history paintings) towards others that had been largely ignored. One such genre was that of the landscape.
Thomas Moran, The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, 1872, oil on canvas mounted on aluminum, 213 x 266.3 cm (Smithsonian American Art Museum, Lent by the Department of the Interior Museum)
With the rising influence of Romanticism towards the end of the eighteenth and into the first quarter of the nineteenth century, the prominence of the European hierarchy of subjects (which placed history paintings at the apex) began to steadily decrease. Nowhere was this truer than in the United States, a place where portraiture had reigned supreme since colonial times. But beginning in the nineteenth century, landscapes became increasingly more popular, for America—more populated along the seaboard—was imagined as a New Eden, a kind of uncivilized wilderness, inhabited by only Indigenous cultures who, so the thinking went, could be easily displaced—and likewise disregarded the populations of areas once controlled by the Spanish Crown and which were now independent or formed part of independent Mexico. As such, American landscape artists felt they had something unique to contribute to the art world. But it was not just the land that was new; artists began to incorporate historical or allegorical elements into their landscapes, creating works of art that had both a depiction of the land and a morally instructive message.
Thomas Cole, View from Mount Holyoke, Northampton, Massachusetts, after a Thunderstorm—The Oxbow, 1836, oil on canvas, 130.8 x 193 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Thomas Cole’s 1836 masterpiece The Oxbow is but one clear example. At first view, this painting might seem to be only a composition that visually chronicles a lovely bend in the Connecticut River near Northampton, Massachusetts. But on more thorough examination, this painting has interesting and insightful things to say about a variety of historical and political happenings that were occurring in the United States during the first half of the nineteenth century. This painting is not only about the land, it speaks to the idea of Manifest Destiny (the political ideology that justified westward expansion and thus the violence against Native Americans and their removal from their lands). Thus, what Cole—and many other artists—managed to do was to create a kind of historical landscape painting, a composition that did the intellectual work of history painting but used the (American) landscape to fulfill those cerebral ends.Catlin painted this portrait of The White Cloud around 1844, twenty years after the Iowa tribes were forced by the U.S. government to move from Iowa to small reservations in Kansas and Nebraska. The displacement from their ancestral and spiritual homeland left the dwindling Iowa people in a fragile state. George Catlin, The White Cloud, Head Chief of the Iowas, 1844–45, oil on canvas, 71 x 58 cm (National Gallery of Art, Washington; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Although the phrase Manifest Destiny was first coined in 1845, it only put into words an idea that had very much been a part of the ideology of the United States during the entirely of the nineteenth century: that the entire continent was available to those of European descent who inhabited the eastern seaboard, and that it was almost a divine mandate to move westward to occupy the continent. But Manifest Destiny is a complicated historical theme, and this westward expansion caused the forced displacement of numerous Indigenous peoples, and in many instances, exposed these groups to white explorers and settlers who introduced deadly pathogens to which Native populations had no immunity. These epidemics had disastrous effects upon Native groups, reducing hitherto immense populations to the brink of extinction.
Quilled war shirt (front), c. 1800–20, Native tanned hide, porcupine quills, red trade cloth, dyes, and sinew, 34 x 43 inches (Denver Art Museum)
For example, two smallpox epidemics reduced the Great Plains Mandan Nation from a population of 15,000 to less than 200 in the span of 56 years. What Manifest Destiny helped achieve for the Mandan Nation was tragic death, terrible sorrow, and a more than 98% reduction in population—and resulted in the near elimination of Mandan visual culture. The Quilted War Shirt in the Denver Art Museum is important not only for the important narrative it suggests in its decoration, but by its very production (and survival).
The American colonies—and later the United States—were constantly changing during the centuries prior to the U.S. Civil War, and this dynamism can be seen in the artistic record. Some of the earliest efforts attempted to visually chronicle Native Americans. Successive generations of artists built upon European artistic precedents for a colonial (and later, a United States) audience. As the nineteenth century progressed, artists such as Thomas Cole focused their artistic energies on the American landscape, creating allegorical works that frequently commented on westward expansion of the continent, a process that had disastrous repercussions to the Native Americans who already occupied these lands.
Martin Johnson Heade, Approaching Thunder Storm, 1859, will on canvas, 71.1 x 111.8 cm (The Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Landscape paintings could serve many purposes. Many artists (along with just about everyone else) saw the U.S. Civil War looming on the horizon and responded, though in ways that may not always be apparent to us in the 21st century. Art historian Eleanor Harvey has described how landscape paintings were put to use by artists to express the national frame of mind during this period. For example, Martin Johnson Heade’s 1859 painting Approaching Thunderstorm, which might look like a straightforward landscape painting of a man and his dog sitting at the edge of a bay with a storm in the distance, referred to the looming crisis over slavery that would lead to the U.S. Civil War. Harvey points out that those who advocated for the abolition of slavery used the idea of a coming storm that would not be stopped by human agency to describe the impending war.
It is important to remember too that the artists who created images responding to the events leading up to the war were white and mostly lived in the northern United States. Not surprisingly, few, if any, images survive that were made or commissioned by enslaved people that address their lived experience. We are fortunate to have the beautiful pottery made by an enslaved man named David Drake. Even more remarkable, Drake signed and often inscribed his pots at a time when literacy among the enslaved (and often the broader Black population) was illegal.
Portraits of John and Elizabeth Freake (and their baby)
by Dr. Bryan Zygmont
Robert W. Weir, Embarkation of the Pilgrims, 1843, oil on canvas, 12 x 18 feet (Rotunda, U.S. Capitol)
Elementary school history books in the United States might give young students a slightly misleading impression of what the earliest Puritans in North America—those who history calls the Pilgrims—were really like. If images in these texts are to be believed, the men wore black pants and matching waistcoats that were embellished with plain rectangular lace collars. When feeling particularly formal, these Puritans would often wear a plain black hat that was only decorated with an inexplicable buckle in the front. Puritan women dressed in similarly austere attire, seldom straying from dark, somber clothing.
Unknown artist (known as Freake painter), John Freake, c. 1671 and 1674, oil on canvas, 42 x 36 3/4 inches / 108 x 93.3 cm (Worcester Art Museum)
Mr. Freake
While this may have been true for the earliest Puritans in North America, it is significantly less accurate for the Puritans who came to live in the northeast as the seventeenth century moved onwards. This fallacy is visually demonstrated by portraits completed about 1670 by an unidentified artist called the Freake Painter, an artist so named because of his most well known sitters—members of the Freake family. These two paintings, both begun in 1671, depict John Freake in the first portrait, and his wife Elizabeth and their daughter Mary in the second. In many ways, these pendant portraits eloquently speak as to what it meant to be part of the upper-middle-class elite in Colonial New England during the final decades of the seventeenth century.
We can learn much about John Freake (1631-1674), his perception of self, and his place within society through a careful analysis of his portrait. Born in England, Freake immigrated to Boston in 1658 when in his mid twenties and became a merchant and attorney of significant wealth. Indeed, before his death he owned two homes, a mill and brew house, and profitable shares in six mercantile ships. Clearly, he was a man of assets and wealth, and this is reflected in his attire. To begin, Freake wears a fine velvet coat that is dark brown in color rather than the more stereotypical black most of his Puritan brethren may have worn 50 years before. In addition, his coat is decorated with more than two-dozen silver buttons, both along the front of the jacket and atop the pocket flaps. The tailor—either one in colonial Boston or, more likely, one across the Atlantic in England—embellished each buttonhole with expensive silver thread.
Freake’s expensive coat is but one indicator of his elevated social and economic status. In addition, Freake wears a fashionable white muslin shirt with puffed sleeves and elaborate crenulated cuffs. His collar is not the plain, rectangular one we might expect on the basis of our elementary school history books, and is instead a highly decorated and elaborate lace collar imported from Europe, likely from Venice, Italy. Rather than descend from his throat to his sternum, this collar instead circles his neck and stretches across both of Freake’s shoulders. The ornate silver broach Freake touches with his left hand and the gloves he holds with his right—in addition to the ring he wears on the pinky of his left hand—all speak to his wealth and his status as a gentleman.
Roundhead or Cavalier? Look at the hair!
Thus, Freake’s clothing announces something important about his prosperity. Likewise, his hair comments on his sense of religious identity. During the end of the seventeenth century, there were two distinct hairstyles that helped identify those who wore them. If one were to wear their hair in short manner, they announced themselves to be a Roundhead, a visual representation of Puritan austerity. In contrast, long hair—or, the wearing of a wig—announced the man as one who was a morally questionable Cavalier. With these two extremes in mind—the Puritanical Roundhead and the suspicious Cavalier—John Freake comfortably resides in the middle. Neither too short nor too long, Freake’s hair—and it is that, rather than an artificial wig—announces his morality and religiosity squarely in the middle, a kind of hirsute juste milieu (middle ground).
Thus, Freake’s clothing and hair does much to identify him during the end of the seventeenth century. His attire is fashionable, but not overly extravagant. Freake was among those who believed that his prosperity in life was due to God’s blessing, and as that was the case, it was not inappropriate to dress in a way that highlighted that divine favor. Likewise, his hair identifies him as religiously moderate; neither excessively devout nor liturgically loose.
Freake painter, Elizabeth Clarke Freake (Mrs. John Freake) and Baby Mary, c. 1671 and 1674, oil on canvas, 42 1/2 x 36 3/4 inches / 108 x 93.3 cm (Worcester Art Museum)
Mrs. Freake
Similarly, the artist has depicted John’s wife, Elizabeth, in a way that highlights her appropriate wealth—and thus her favorable position within the eye’s of God—and her religious moderateness. Like her husband, Elizabeth wears unexpectedly fine attire. A small amount of blond hair is visible underneath her white lace hood. That hood, tied nearly underneath a slightly protruding chin, brings visual attention to the white collar and the striking white lace that covers most of the bodice of her silver taffeta dress. Underneath her skirt is a striking red-orange velvet underskirt that is embroidered with a gold, lace-like pattern. She wears a white blouse that features lace cuffs on the sleeves, while red and black bows provide a visual splash of color and contrast against an otherwise somewhat achromatic ensemble.
Like her husband, Elizabeth’s portrait is filled with baubles that speak to their affluence and to the family’s growth. She wears a triple-stranded string of pearls about her neck, a gold ring on her finger and a beautiful four-stranded garnet bracelet can be seen on her left thumb and wrist. She sits on a fashionable chair, and a Turkey-work rug can be seen resting on the back of the chair. Although Elizabeth currently holds her infant Mary, radiograph x-ray photography shows that she originally held a fan. That the painting has been modified—fan out, new baby who wears a fashionable dress in—tells us much about the extravagant cost of having one’s portrait commissioned in the seventeenth century. It was more practical to have your daughter painted into an old portrait than to pay for a new one.
Displays of wealth
A twenty-first-century audience might scoff at these images, thinking them, perhaps, too flat, too inanimate, and too serious for our own particular aesthetics. However, this pair of images powerfully speaks to the Freakes’ understanding of their place in their world while at the same time dismissing our mistaken stereotypes of seventeenth-century Puritans. The Freakes are not an austere couple, entirely clad in black. Instead, they display their wealth—both in dress and in accessories—in a moderate and acceptable way that suggests divine blessing. In addition, while we might dismiss this artist as an unaccomplished limner (an artist with no or little formal training), he was instead a talented portraitist who was working within a rich tradition of Elizabethan painting. His images helped situate his sitters within a distinguished and rich traditional of English court portraiture.
Big things can have small beginnings. If the “big thing” in this instance is American art, then one could argue that one of the most profound “small beginnings” was the arrival of John Smibert in Boston in 1729. Indeed, Smibert’s artistic influence in the American colonies extended far beyond the scope of his own life, and the argument can be made that he was the most important painter in the colonial period. This prominence is not for the art that he himself completed, but for the inspiration he provided to generations of artists to come.
Smibert was born in Edinburgh, Scotland; his father was a moderately successful wool dyer. Unfortunately for Smibert, Scotland had little fine arts training available. Rather than immediately pursue instruction as a portraitist, in 1702 Smibert instead began a seven-year apprenticeship with Walter Melville—a house painter and plasterer who often painted heraldic shields. This somewhat lowly form of artistic production was a common chore for painters in Scotland during the early eighteenth century. In fact, there was little need for professional portraitists in Edinburgh, as those who had the discretionary money to afford such a luxury—like members of Parliament—would have consistent cause to visit London and could seek out a skilled portrait painter there.
Edinburgh to London and back again
The ambitious Smibert completed his apprenticeship with Melville in April 1709 and departed for London less than two months later. In doing so, he moved from a town of less than 40,000 inhabitants to a thriving and bustling city of more than 500,000. As the economic, political, and cultural center of Great Britain, London teemed with talented portraitists. Many of these artists were influenced by a triad of foreign-born portraitists: the German Sir Godfrey Kneller, the Dutchman Sir Peter Lely, and the Flemish Sir Anthony van Dyck. All three were knighted by a British monarch and all three ended their career—and, in fact died—in London. Upon his arrival in London, Smibert worked for a time as a coach painter and copied paintings by the “Old Masters” for local art dealers. In 1711, he began a three-year course of study at the London Academy, an institution that Kneller headed, and that placed a particular emphasis, like the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, on drawing.
John Smibert, Portrait of Sir Francis Grant and His Family, 1718, oil on canvas, 127 x 1041.4 inches (SCAD Museum of Art)
At the end of his time studying at the London Academy, Smibert might have pursued a formal apprenticeship with a portraitist. Instead, the aspiring painter returned to Edinburgh. There he met Sir Francis Grant, Baronet of Monymusk, a well-to-do lawyer. Grant commissioned five portraits from Smibert, the most ambitious of which is Sir Francis Grant and His Family. This image contains 14 likenesses—two of which are of deceased members of the Grant family who are represented as painted portraits on the back wall—and if the 26-year-old Smibert lacked in compositional creativity, he more than made up for this in scale, the monumental group portrait measures in excess of 8 x10 feet. This painting may have been just good enough for Grant to believe Smibert could do something better. But to do something better, Smibert would need to see better art. This was an impossible chore in Scotland in the early eighteenth century, so Smibert—perhaps aided by Grant—departed for a Grand Tour of the continent in the summer of 1719.
This was a period of great learning for Smibert. He spent a month in Paris, almost a year in Florence, and more than six months in Rome. Florence in particular was fruitful for the artist. Smibert purchased more than 300 works of art while there: 45 paintings, 250 drawings, 6 pastels, and at least one cartoon (not a comic, but a full-size study for a painting). It was also in Florence that the artist met the Irish philosopher George Berkeley. In fact, this fortuitous meeting would echo throughout the majority of Smibert’s life to come.
Smibert returned to London in 1722, overflowing with confidence. His time abroad had been wonderfully fruitful; he had immersed himself in the art of Italy and had met many Britons on their own Grand Tour who would be in a position to aid his portrait career upon returning to Great Britain. For a period of six years—that is, from the summer of 1722 until fall of 1728, Smibert experienced modest success as a London portraitist. He was a moderately talented painter working in a city teeming with exceptionally talented artists. And so, hoping to be the only fish in a miniscule pond (rather than a small fish in a enormous pond), Smibert took a remarkable leap of faith. George Berkeley was there to provide the nudge that led Smibert from his London studio to the relative wilderness of the Americas.
And on to Bermuda (via Newport)
The years had been kind to Berkeley since he had first met Smibert in Florence. In 1724, Berkeley had been appointed Dean of Derry in Ireland, a religious post that provided an affluent salary of £1,500 per year (in contrast, Smibert earned £345 as a full time portraitist in 1725, and only £233 the following year). It was about this time when Berkeley began to plan on beginning a college on the island of Bermuda. In 1726 Berkeley was in London securing funding for this enterprise when he met Smibert, commissioned a portrait, and convinced the artist to join his “New World” adventure of starting a college in Bermuda. Smibert agreed, and was charged with lecturing on painting and architecture—subjects uncommon in eighteenth-century college curricula. Berkeley and Smibert departed on September 5th, 1728. They were joined by four other adventurous people: John James and Richard Dalton—who presumably were to teach and were described as “Men of Fortune” and “gentlemen of substance”—and Anne Forster (Berkeley’s new wife) and her traveling companion, a Miss Handcock.
The group arrived at their first destination, Newport, Rhode Island, in January 1729 and stayed there awaiting the £20,000 Parliament promised for the move to Bermuda and to begin the college. Unfortunately—or, perhaps, fortunately for Smibert—the funding from Parliament never came. Thus, rather than spending time in Bermuda—truly a distant outpost—Smibert instead went to Boston. Although small by European standards with a population of about 13,000, Boston was as bright and vibrant of a colonial town as there was during the first half of the eighteenth century. And Smibert was the most talented portraitist in Boston the moment he entered the city.
Finally . . . Boston and The Bermuda Group
Smibert immediately began to paint the economic and political elite of Boston, and his cosmopolitan style—particularly for a colonial audience—was unlike anything his clients had ever seen. His most famous painting—The Bermuda Group—was likely begun during his early time in the commonwealth of Massachusetts, and although it was supposed to return to England, it remained in Boston throughout Smibert’s career and served as an example of Smibert’s skill and ability as a portraitist. Although it may seem to be hyperbole to twenty-first-century readers, there was simply nothing else like it in the American colonies.
Peter Paul Rubens, The Four Philosophers, c. 1611–12, oil on canvas (Palazzo Pitti, Florence; photo: The Yorck Project)
To begin, The Bermuda Group—which is sometimes called The Berkeley Entourage—is, for colonial New England if not Europe, a composition as immense as it is ambitious, and many suggest that Smibert had Peter Paul Rubens’s The Four Philosophers in mind—a painting Smibert would have seen in Florence.
Both paintings depict a group sitting around a table. Both show books and writing implements. Both have landscape visible in the background. While it is unlikely that many of Smibert’s potential patrons would have understood this visual reference, it does indicate that Smibert was pulling out all the stops for this blockbuster work. Few (if any) limners in New England could claim the pedigree of having studied Rubens’ paintings in Florence. In doing so, Smibert clearly claimed to be different from his more provincial competition.
And how different this image is. Measuring nearly 6 x 8 feet, it contains eight nearly full-sized figures, something unseen in colonial Boston. Six of these figures are those who landed in Newport. Two others—the seated John Wainwright on the left and the infant Henry Berkeley—complete the figural group. They stand in front of a colonnade and an Arcadian landscape unseen around the Boston area. Although anachronistic—that is, this scene could have never existed in real life—this portrait was meant to commemorate a bold, although ultimately unsuccessful enterprise.
There are five men present. Dean Berkeley has been given the most prominent position in the composition. Standing to the side of the table rather than behind it, he wears the full-length black cassock of an Anglican priest, and the wide, dual-banded white clerical collar popular during the eighteenth century. He looks heavenward as if for inspiration, and his face has an expression of thoughtfulness. His right hand rests on an upright leather-bound book, a symbol for both his own education and the scholarship for which he was famous.
Whereas Berkeley wears his clerical attire, the other gentlemen wear garments of the highest London fashion—something that would have dazzled Smibert’s colonial audience. John Smibert can be seen on the opposite side of the composition. As is typical of an artist who includes their own image in a group portrait—see Raphael in The School of Athens or Diego Velázquez in Las Meninas—Smibert looks directly out of the picture at the viewer. He wears a fashionable brown jacket and white cravat, and wisps of grey hair speak to his age. He holds a rolled up sketch and paintbrush in his right hand.
The man who stands in front of him—identified as either John James or Richard Dalton—is also fashionably dressed. He wears a powdered wig, an unbuttoned grey jacket, and a white cravat. He looks downward to observe the seated John Wainwright. This figure is an interesting addition, for Wainwright was never a part of Berkeley Entourage. Instead, he was the patron who commissioned this portrait. As such, Smibert places him close to the picture plane, unobstructed by the table. He is shown in profile and seated facing Dean Berkeley, writing in an open book as if taking dictation. The fifth gentleman stands behind the two women and can be identified as either John James or Richard Dalton. He casually leans on the back of the chair and looks towards the left edge of the painting.
The artist (left) and John James or Richard Dalton (detail), John Smibert, The Bermuda Group, 1728, reworked 1739, oil on canvas, 176.5 x 236.2 cm (Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven)
The women
The two women—Berkeley’s wife Anne Foster and her companion, Miss Handcock—sit behind a table that is covered with a beautifully rendered Turkish carpet (these objects, sometimes called Turkey work, were so expensive that they were seldom placed on the floor as rugs are today). Like their male counterparts, they wear fashionable garments with—for the time, at least—scandalously plunging necklines. The yellow and blue velvets they wear shimmer and radiate light. Foster looks at the viewer while holding her infant son Henry, and Handcock gestures with her left hand to the left side of the painting, while she herself looks to the right. Indeed, the gestures and glances of all the characters in this stage-like painting leads the viewer’s eye across the composition.
John Wainwright, Anne Foster and Miss Handcock (detail), John Smibert, The Bermuda Group, 1728, reworked 1739, oil on canvas, 176.5 x 236.2 cm (Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven)
Comparing Smibert’s Bermuda Group with a near contemporary painting demonstrates why Smibert found such favor among the Boston elite. Robert Feke is most famous today for his portrait, Isaac Royall and Family, a composition that is visually indebted to Smibert’s earlier work. But whereas Smibert’s painting is lively, loose, and dynamic, Feke (an artist with little formal art instruction), can do little more than mimic a compositional device—a group gathered around a table covered with a Turkish rug. In London, Smibert’s works would have been compared with those completed by Britain’s most talented portraitists. In Boston, he was compared with artists akin to Feke.
Although this image was never intended to remain in Boston, it stayed in the artist’s Boston studio and served as the cornerstone for what many consider to be that city’s first museum. Indeed, this painting, when combined with the copies of the Old Masters Smibert painted on the continent and the works he purchased in Florence, provided people in Boston with a fine arts viewing experience unmatched in the Americas. Smibert even ran a kind of art supply store where he sold pigments, paintbrushes, and mezzotints from England and all over Europe. This brought European art into the homes of the well to do in colonial Boston. Visiting Smibert’s painting room became a kind of right of passage for aspiring painters. John Singleton Copley, John Trumbull, Charles Willson Peale, and Washington Allston were all influenced by the works they saw in Smibert’s studio long after the artist had died. In this regard, The Bermuda Group is as important for who saw it as it is for what it in fact is.
Benjamin West has always been a difficult artist to classify. American historians generally claim him as an American artist as he was born in what would become the state of Pennsylvania. West’s earliest paintings date from his fifteenth year, and if his own attempts at myth making are to be believed—they should be taken with the proverbial grain of salt—he was mostly self taught.
Detail, Benjamin West, The Death of General Wolfe, 1770, oil on canvas, 152.6 x 214.5 cm (National Gallery of Canada; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
In 1760, two wealthy Philadelphian families paid for the young artist’s passage to Italy so he could learn from the great European artistic tradition. He was only 21 years old. He arrived in the port of Livorno during the middle of April and was in Rome no later than 10 July. West remained in Italy for several years and moved to London in August of 1763. He found quick success in England and was a founding member of the Royal Academy of Art when it was established in 1768. West was clearly intoxicated by the cosmopolitan London and never returned to his native Pennsylvania. West’s fame and importance today rest on two important areas:
West as teacher
West taught two successive generations of American artists. All of these men traveled to his London studio and the most returned to the United States. Indeed, a list of those who searched out his instruction comprises a “who’s who” list of early American artists and includes names such as Charles Willson Peale, Gilbert Stuart, John Trumbull, Thomas Sully, and Samuel F. B. Morse.
West as history painter
If his role as a teacher was the first avenue to West’s fame, surely his history painting is the second. Of the many he completed, The Death of General Wolfe (1770) is certainly the most celebrated.
Benjamin West, The Death of General Wolfe, 1770, oil on canvas, 152.6 x 214.5 cm (National Gallery of Canada; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
In this painting, West departed from conventions in two important regards. Generally, history paintings were reserved for narratives from the Bible or stories from the classical past. Instead, however, West depicted a near-contemporary event, one that occurred only seven years before. The Death of General Wolfe depicts an event from the Seven Years’ War (known as the French and Indian War in North America), the moment when Major-General James Wolfe was mortally wounded on the Plains of Abraham outside Quebec.
Secondly, many—including Sir Joshua Reynolds and West’s patron, Archbishop Drummond—strongly urged West to avoid painting Wolfe and others in modern costume, which was thought to detract from the timeless heroism of the event. They urged him to instead paint the figures wearing togas. West refused, writing, “the same truth that guides the pen of the historian should govern the pencil [paintbrush] of the artist.”
Lieutenant Henry Browne holding the flag against the St. Lawrence River (detail), Benjamin West, The Death of General Wolfe, 1770, oil on canvas, 152.6 x 214.5 cm (National Gallery of Canada; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Artistic license
Yet despite West’s interest in “truth,” there is little to be found in The Death of General Wolfe. Without doubt, the dying General Wolfe is the focus of the composition. West paints Wolfe lying down at the moment of his death wearing the red uniform of a British officer. A circle of identifiable men attend to their dying commander. Historians know that only one—Lieutenant Henry Browne, who holds the British flag above Wolfe—was present at the General’s death.
Clearly, West took artistic license in creating a dramatic composition, from the theatrical clouds to the messenger approaching on the left side of the painting to announce the British victory over the Marquis de Montcalm and his French army in this decisive battle. Previous artists, such as James Barry, painted this same event in a more documentary, true-to-life style. In contrast, West deliberately painted this composition as a dramatic blockbuster.
Native American man at left (detail), Benjamin West, The Death of General Wolfe, 1770, oil on canvas, 152.6 x 214.5 cm (National Gallery of Canada; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
This sense of spectacle is also enhanced by other elements, and West was keenly interested in giving his viewers a unique view of this North American scene. This was partly achieved through landscape and architecture. The St. Lawrence River appears on the right side of the composition and the steeple represents the cathedral in the city of Quebec. In addition to the landscape, West also depicts a tattooed Native American on the left side of the painting. Shown in what is now the universal pose of contemplation, the Native American firmly situates this as an event from the New World, making the composition all the more exciting to a largely English audience.
Wolfe as Christ
Perhaps most important is the way West portrayed the painting’s protagonist as Christ-like. West was clearly influenced by the innumerable images of the dead Christ in Lamentation and Depositions paintings that he would have seen during his time in Italy. This deliberate visual association between the dying General Wolfe and the dead Christ underscores the British officer’s admirable qualities. If Christ was innocent, pure, and died for a worthwhile cause—that is, the salvation of mankind—then Wolfe too was innocent, pure, and died for a worthwhile cause; the advancement of the British position in North America. Indeed, West transforms Wolfe from a simple war hero to a deified martyr for the British cause. This message was further enhanced by the thousands of engravings that soon flooded the art market, both in England and abroad.
Detail, Benjamin West, The Death of General Wolfe, 1770, oil on canvas, 152.6 x 214.5 cm (National Gallery of Canada; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Historical significance
Benjamin West’s The Death of General Wolfe justifiably retains a position as a landmark painting in the history of American art. In it, West reinterprets the rules of what a history painting could be—both in regard to period depicted and the attire the figures wore—and at the same time followed a visual language that would have been familiar to its eighteenth-century audience. This composition set the stage for the many ‘contemporary’ history paintings that John Singleton Copley and John Trumbull painted throughout the rest of the eighteenth century.
by Monica Zimmerman, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and Dr. Beth Harris
Benjamin West, Penn’s Treaty with the Indians, 1771-72, oil on canvas, 191.8 x 273.7 cm (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts), A Seeing America video URL: https://youtu.be/aTH5WrOnDf0
A conversation with Monica Zimmerman. Vice President of Public Education and Engagement, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and Beth Harris
Source: Monica Zimmerman, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and Dr. Beth Harris, “Benjamin West, Penn’s Treaty with the Indians,” in Smarthistory, March 7, 2020, accessed July 17, 2024, https://smarthistory.org/benjamin-west-penn-treaty-indians/.
John Singleton Copley, Paul Revere
by Dr. Bryan Zygmont
John Singleton Copley, Paul Revere, 1768, oil on canvas, 89.22 x 72.39 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
The fame of Paul Revere
Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April in Seventy-Five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.
He said to his friend, –“If the British march
By land or sea from the town to-night,
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry-arch
Of the North-Church-tower, as a signal-light—
One if by land and two if by sea;
And I on the opposite shore will be,
Ready to ride and spread the alarm
Through every Middlesex village and farm,
For the country-folk to be up and to arm.
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Thus begins Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s famous poem “Paul Revere’s Ride,” a work that was first published in the January 1861 issue of The Atlantic Monthly. Although Paul Revere is now famous as one of the Massachusetts Minutemen—a local militia who would defend the colony against the British army at a moment’s notice—he was hardly a public figure during his own lifetime. History tells us that he did ride from Boston’s Old North Church to warn of the approach of the British, but he was never elected to public office and he was only tangentially involved with Revolutionary politics. Indeed, Revere’s limited fame in his own day stems from his considerable talents as a silversmith. His fame during the second half of the nineteenth century comes from his appearance in Longfellow’s poem. Revere’s fame today, however, can be attributed—in part at least—to the remarkable portrait John Singleton Copley painted of the artisan in 1768.
Copley’s beginnings
Copley had extensive access to early eighteenth century prints, and he often incorporated poses and clothing from older images into his portraits of Bostonians (his mother married Peter Pelham, an engraver who specialized in mezzotints after his father died). At the age of 15, for example, Copley painted the portrait of Mrs. Joseph Mann (Bethia Torrey). Her pose—holding a sting of pearls—and attire of a scoop-neckline dress with white trim—were directly taken from a mezzotint of Princess Anne. In today’s world, we might look at such “borrowing” as a kind of visual plagiarism. But this was the vein in which eighteenth-century artists worked and learned. It was expected that one could become great through the attentive copying of the Old Masters.
Left: Queen Anne when Princess of Denmark by Isaac Beckett, after William Wissing, mezzotint, 1683-1688, 32.6 x 25 cm (National Portrait Gallery, London); right: John Singleton Copley, Mrs. Joseph Mann (Bethia Torrey), 1753, oil on canvas, 91.44 x 71.75 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
John Singleton Copley, A Boy with a Flying Squirrel (Henry Pelham), 1765, oil on canvas, 77.15 x 63.82 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
As Copley matured as an artist, however, he became more compositionally inventive. A great example of this is an early masterpiece, Boy with a Squirrel, a portrait of the artist’s half-brother, Henry Pelham. Copley sent this portrait to London for the 1766 exhibition of the Society of Artists. Copley received feedback from his contemporary expatriate Benjamin West and Sir Joshua Reynolds—perhaps the most authoritative voice on British art at the time. Captain R.G. Bruce, Copley’s friend, took Boy with a Squirrel to London and returned with Reynolds’s assessment: “in any Collection of Painting it will pass for an excellent Picture, but considering the Disadvantages…you had labored under, that it was a very wonderfull Performance.” The “disadvantages” to which Reynolds refers to are likely those that involve Copley’s location (Boston, the very fringe of the British empire) and his opportunity for formal artistic instruction there (none).
John Singleton Copley, John Hancock, 1765, oil on canvas, 124.8 x 100 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
And yet despite these disadvantages (although some scholars of American art believe that it was because of them), Copley quickly became the most sought after portrait painter in the colonies. By the middle of the 1760s, he was painting the economic and political elite of his city, and had become a rather wealthy man himself. Before the 1760s were done, Copley had married into a wealthy family and had purchased a 20-acre farm with three houses on it. This estate placed Copley next door to John Hancock, one of the wealthiest merchants in Boston (and future president of the Continental Congress and governor of Massachusetts) when Copley painted him in 1765 (left).
But it was not only the wealthy and political elite who Copley painted. Indeed, during a politically tumultuous time, Copley painted both sides of this vitriolic divide, both Whigs (those in favor of a break with Great Britain) and Tories (those who wished to remain a part of the Empire).
It seems that Copley’s only requisite was that the sitter had the finances to pay for the likeness. It is also possible that Copley would paint a sitter for exchange for past or future goods or services. Paul Revere, a silversmith with modest if not affluent means, might just be one such case.
The portrait of Paul Revere
Copley’s portrait of Paul Revere is striking in many ways. To begin, Revere sits behind a high polished wooden table. Rather than wear his “Sunday’s Best” clothing, as sitters for portraits (and elementary school pictures) so commonly did (and still do), Revere instead wears simple working attire, a decision that underscores his artisan, middle-class status. His open collared shirt is made from plain white linen, and the lack of cravat—a kind of formal neckwear—lends to the informal nature of the portrait. What looks to be an undershirt peeks from underneath his linen shirt, and a wool (or perhaps a dull silk) waistcoat is likewise unbuttoned (although decorated with two gold buttons, features that were not likely present in Revere’s work vest). He does not wear a jacket or coat, and even his wig—something almost every male would have worn if they could to afford to do so—is missing. We can compare what Revere wears to men’s attire from the twenty-first century. Imagine a man wearing a three-piece suit (blazer, vest, buttoned white dress shirt, and a tie). If you were to remove the jacket and tie and unbutton the shirt and vest, you would have an idea of the informality present in Copley’s eighteenth-century portrait of Revere.
John Singleton Copley, Paul Revere, 1768, oil on canvas, 89.22 x 72.39 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
Indeed, comparing Copley’s portrait of the silversmith with that of Copley’s neighbor, John Hancock, makes the differences all the more obvious. Both seem to be at work in some ways—Revere on his teapot and Hancock at his ledger—but there the similarities end. Even though Hancock is not dressed as ostentatiously as he could have been, he still wears a dark blue coat that is embellished and trimmed with golden braid and buttons. White cuffs extend beyond his sleeves, and a silken cravat is tied around his neck. His breeches have golden buckles and silk stockings cover his lower legs. A modest powered wig sits upon his head. This modest attire—modest for Hancock, at least—demonstrates the uniqueness of Copley painting Revere while wearing what amounts to working clothes. Indeed, this is the only completed portrait Copley painted of an artisan wearing less than formal attire.
Face (detail), John Singleton Copley, Paul Revere, 1768, oil on canvas, 89.22 x 72.39 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
But it is not only what Revere is wearing, it is also what he is doing. The sitter looks at the viewer, as if we have momentarily distracted him from his work. The edge of the table in the foreground suggests that the table he sits behind is parallel to the picture plane. Few would claim that this table is his workbench, for the surface is far too polished and pristine to have been used in the daily activity of his trade. The surface of the table reflects Revere’s white shirt, and the tools in front of him, his engraver’s burins. With his right hand, Revere seems to support his head—and as a corollary, his brain—the source of his artistic ingenuity. His left hand holds the product of that mind, a nearly completed silver teapot, a vessel that has been polished to such a high sheen that Revere’s hand beautifully reflects on its surface.
Tabletop and teapot (detail), John Singleton Copley, Paul Revere, 1768, oil on canvas, 89.22 x 72.39 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
As a silversmith, Revere made many kinds of objects; spoons, bowls, shoe buckles, dentistry tools, beer tankards, creamers, coffee pots, and sugar tongs. That he should be shown with a teapot was an overtly political decision. By the end of the 1760s, Great Britain was nearing financial ruin after the conclusion of the Seven Years’ War (the North American component of this conflict is called the French and Indian War; the most famous depiction of this war is Benjamin West’s 1770 painting The Death of General Wolfe). In order to increase the revenue in the crown’s coffers in 1767 the British Parliament passed the Townshend Acts, which placed a tax on the colonials’ use of tea (among other imported goods). Paul Revere was clearly engaged in this political issue, for his signature appears on an October 1767 Non-importation agreement. Clearly tea was becoming a politicizing good and it is interesting that Revere chose to be shown holding an object so tied to a commodity that became a divisive symbol. Indeed, this political thread reached a climax with the so-called Boston Tea Party on 16 December 1773 when a collection of colonials—some disguised as Native Americas—raided a merchant vessel in Boston Harbor and threw the tea overboard. Interestingly, the owner of that boat was Richard Clarke, John Singleton Copley’s father-in-law.
Copley, Revere and the Boston Massacre
One other facet of the portrait of Paul Revere is worth exploring, that of its date of completion, for the artist seldom dated or signed his portraits. Copley and Revere had been acquainted since at least 1763 when Revere’s account book notes that Copley had ordered a gold bracelet. Revere also subsequently made sliver frames for Copley’s miniature portraits, and it has been suggested that this portrait might have served as a kind of payment from Copley to Revere for past services rendered and goods received. Clearly, Revere and Copley had a professional relationship. However, this relationship did not likely extend beyond the first half of 1770.
One of the most pivotal movements leading up to the American Revolutionary War was the so-called Boston Massacre. On 5 March 1770, a group of British soldiers fired at an unarmed group of protesters who were throwing snowballs (loaded with rocks) and other objects at the infantrymen. The crowd also repeatedly yelled “Fire!” at Captain Preston, the commanding officer on duty, daring him to order his soldiers to fire their muskets into the crowd. Eventually, the British army obliged their tormentors; five men were mortally wounded and another six were wounded. The soldiers were arrested and stood trial, accused of murder. Their lawyer was future President John Adams, achieved six acquittals and two reduced charges of manslaughter.
This event was instantly politically divisive, and both Whigs and Tories began to use visual propaganda as a way to bring those who were neutral in regards to declaring independence from Great Britain onto their side. In short time, Henry Pelham, Copley’s half-brother completed one such attempt at depicting the events of the Boston Massacre. Pelham finished his engraving immediately following the events of 5 March and then lent a copy to Paul Revere. The silversmith, who had been engraving political cartoons since at least 1765, and ever the entrepreneur, then faithfully copied Pelham’s print and placed an advertisement for its sale no later than 26 March, just three weeks after the event and a week prior to Pelham’s own print being available for purchase.
Left: Henry Pelham, Boston Massacre; right: Paul Revere, Boston Massacre
When seen side by side, it is clear that Revere plagiarized Pelham’s then unpublished work; the same arrangement of dead and injured bodies on the left, the same organization of the British soldiers on right, the same dog, the same framing architecture. Although the crescent moon is placed in the same part of the print—the upper left-hand corner—the biggest difference between these two images could be that Pelham’s moon is open on its right side whereas Revere’s is open to the left. This egregious affront against a family member likely brought an end to John Singleton Copley’s relationship with Paul Revere.
It is ironic that Revere is most known today because of Longfellow’s poem, a work that does not mention his more famous artisanal career. Copley’s portrait of the silversmith, likewise as famous, was hidden in a descendant’s attic for most of the nineteenth century and was not publicly displayed until 1928. Since that time, however, the image has contributed to the sitter’s prestige, and the sitter’s fame has likewise contributed to the painting’s fame.
A former orphan, Watson became a wealthy and influential man—after surviving a near-fatal shark attack.
John Singleton Copley, Watson and the Shark, 1778, oil on canvas, 182.1 x 229.7 cm (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.). Speakers: Dr. Bryan Zygmont and Dr. Beth Harris URL: https://youtu.be/x45155zjKiQ
The career of John Singleton Copley is a story that can be told in two distinct chapters. The first part, which extends until 1774, tells the story of his American career, one that primarily unfolds in Boston (with a productive side trip to New York). But when the politics of the impending American Revolution became too unpredictable for a painter who wished to remain as neutral as the situation would allow, Copley sailed from Boston to London. This departure opened the second chapter in Copley’s career, that which takes place in London after a tour of continental Europe. This change in locale, from the Americas to Europe, necessitated that Copley reassess who and what he painted.
Indeed, an examination of Copley’s oeuvre prior to his departure from Boston indicates that the overwhelming majority of his paintings were portraits. The reason for this artistic output is rather simple: the only real market for art in the American colonies was for portraiture, and Copley, ever the businessman, was willing to provide the art seekers around him exactly what they wanted. His clientele while in Boston comprises the political and economic elite of his day: powerful politicians, elite lawyers, wealthy merchants, and commanding officers amongst many others.
Once relocated to London, however, Copley began to appreciate how different the art market was in England compared to Boston. To be certain, there was a market for portraiture in London. However, the artistic elite in Britain (and elsewhere in Europe) at the end of the 18th century no longer wished to paint simple portraits—pictures that recorded what a person looked like—but instead aspired to paint large-scale history paintings. While these often-immense compositions could, of course, be filled with likenesses, there was the higher, more elevated goal of delivering a morally uplifting message to those who viewed them. Benjamin West’s The Death of General Wolfe is but one example. Painted several years before Copley arrived in London, West not only shows what people looked like—and the image is, in fact, filled with recognizable portraits—he also painted a scene that elevates a British general to a nearly Christ-like level.
Benjamin West, The Death of General Wolfe, 1770, oil on canvas, 152.6 x 214.5 cm (National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa)
There was no such market for paintings such as these when Copley lived in Boston. But when setting up his London painting studio, Copley was immediately aware that if he aspired to be a great painter, he would be required to turn his artistic talents towards historical compositions. To be certain, Copley completed the occasional portrait during the remainder of his career. When compared to historical compositions, portraits were more quickly painted and could provide the artist with quick access to funds. However, the artist preferred to focus his energies on large-scale history paintings during the remainder of his career. His 1778 masterwork Watson and the Shark is but one example of this change in his oeuvre. Painted less than three years after his arrival in London, Watson and the Shark demonstrates the ways in which Copley had quickly assimilated artistic lessons from his European Grand Tour.
John Singleton Copley, Watson and the Shark, 1778, oil on canvas, 182.1 x 229.7 cm (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Brook Watson—and the Shark
The Watson of the painting’s title was Brook Watson, a one-time orphan who eventually became Lord Mayor of London. Watson was born in 1735 in Plymouth, England. He was eventually sent to Boston, presumably after the death of his parents, to live with a merchant named Levens, a man who was likely a distant relative. Levens was actively engaged in trade around with the West Indies, and by time Watson was a teenager, he was employed as a member of the crew in one of Levens’s ships. Life changed in 1749, however, when the then fourteen-year-old Watson decided to take a swim while the ship was at anchor in Havana’s harbor. Having discarded his sailor’s woolen garments—clothing that would have been very heavy when wet and impractical when swimming—Watson entered the warm water. Shortly thereafter he was attacked by a shark. Watson’s own account, written in the third person in April of 1778 (when Copley’s painting was exhibited at the Royal Academy), stated that the shark struck three times. “In the first attack, all the flesh was stripped off the bone from the calf downwards; in the second, the foot was divided from the leg by the ancle.” Watson further stated, “at the very instant he was about to be seized the third time, the shark was struck with the boat hook and driven from his prey.” This is the precise moment Copley depicts in Watson and the Shark. Given what we know about Watson and his future life, it is a moment when we know the youth will live, but are surprised that it can be so.
The shark attacks (detail), John Singleton Copley, Watson and the Shark, 1778, oil on canvas, 182.1 x 229.7 cm (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Indeed, it is a painting filled with drama and action. The composition contains ten figures and a tiger shark, a carnivorous fish so large that its body extends beyond the confines of the painting. Clearly, the main figure of the composition is the fair-haired Watson. He passively floats in the foreground, his feet towards the edge of the painting, his head towards the middle. His left arm is alongside his body while he uses his right arm to reach towards the men in the boat who attempt to rescue him. His left leg kicks towards the surface, while the right leg—already dismembered below the knee—seems to disappear downwards in the water. He looks upwards towards the boat filled with his rescuers in the middle ground, unaware, it seems, of the imminent approach of the shark from the right.
Fighting warrior, known as the Borghese Gladiator, c. 100 B.C.E., 199 cm high (Musée du Louvre; photo: Carole Raddato, CC BY-SA 2.0)
Although subtle, the figure of Watson demonstrates the ways in which Copley was incorporating artistic references into his own compositions. If Watson were to stand up, his body would have the same overall position as that of the Borghese Gladiator—one of the most famous of classical works in the 18th century (the version Copley likely saw in the Louvre in Paris is a 1st-century Roman copy after a 3rd-century B.C.E. Greek original). It is also similar to a figure within Raphael’s The Transfiguration, a painting Copley saw at the Vatican. In a letter to his wife, Copley stated that this painting was “allowed to be the greatest picture in the world.” Moreover, Watson’s head, which Copley has painted in profile, is a nearly identical copy of the head of one of the sons in the famous Laocöon statue, a work Copley saw while visiting the Vatican. In fact, Copley so admired this famous work the he own a small cast of it.
But it is not only Watson that demonstrates Copley’s ability to cull from the famous art made before him. Indeed, this composition is filled with artistic references that his audience would have recognized—and most of these references are taken from paintings that are religious in subject. This is not surprising when one considers that one of the themes of Watson’s own life was that of the salvation that can follow a tragic event.
Raphael, The Miraculous Draught of Fishes, 1515–16, pen and sepia, washed, 22.3 x 31.75 cm (Victoria and Albert Museum, London)
Guido Reni, Saint Michael Slaying the Devil, c. 1636, oil on canvas, 293 x 202 cm (Santa Maria della Concezione, Rome)
In regards to imagery, for example, the two men on the left side of boat each extend their right arms downwards to rescue Watson. Copley seems to have borrowed this particular pose from Raphael’s The Miraculous Draught of Fishes, a large-scale preparatory drawing that was then in London (and is now in the collection the Victoria and Albert Museum). Copley seems to have liked this religious narrative, for he also owned an engraving after Peter Paul Rubens’s own Miraculous Draught of Fishes. The standing figure in the boat, the sailor who wears the naval pea coat and is set to strike the shark with the boathook, looks similar to various versions of Saint George (who kills a dragon) or Saint Michael (who casts Satan from heaven). Raphael’s Saint George and The Dragon and Guido Reni’s Saint Michael the Archangel are but two possible influences.
Clearly, Watson and the Shark is an energetic and emotional work. In order to enhance the emotional drama of this event, Copley referenced a well-known treatise of facial expressions. Charles le Brun is most remembered today for his Méthode pour apprendre à dessiner les passions, an artistic treatise posthumously published in 1698 that explored how emotions manifest upon the human visage. Even a century later, artists referred to le Brun’s work to more accurately convey ideas about human emotions.
Left: the face of the man with a boat hook (detail), John Singleton Copley, Watson and the Shark, 1778, oil on canvas, 182.1 x 229.7 cm (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0); right: Charles Le Brun, Bowles’s Passions of the soul, c. 1785 (photo: Fæ, CC BY 4.0)
When applied to Copley’s Watson and the Shark, for example, we can see that the figure at the prow of the boat with the weapon contains the facial expression that le Brun assigns to “Attention.” The sailor at the far left with his furrowed brow and downward turned mouth mirrors that for le Bruns’s “Horrour.” Likewise, the other standing figure in the boat—the man of African descent who holds the coiled rope—conveys le Bruns’s idea of “Compassion.”
Man with boat hook and African American figure (detail), John Singleton Copley, Watson and the Shark, 1778, oil on canvas, 182.1 x 229.7 cm (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Looking at the faces of the men in the boat, we can see that we have a variety of different kinds or types of people. The young are present, so too are the more elderly. We can say the same about them in regards to wealth. Some seem to be simply dressed sailors. The man standing with the boat hook, however, is dressed in a more affluent way. Note his leather shoes with metal buckles, his silk stockings, and his new navy coat.
The inclusion of the man of African descent standing next to him is an interesting inclusion. Copley has giving this figure a place of particular compositional importance, and he alone holds the rope that links the victim to the boat. Clearly, this is a sympathetic likeness, and whoever the sitter was, Copley seems to have had a particular fondness for him. Indeed, Copley painted him twice. Entitled, quite simply, Head of a Negro when it was sold after the death of Copley’s oldest son, it was described as Head of a Favourite Negro. When compared with other 18th-century (and, to be fair, 19th-century) images of Africans, Copley’s paintings seem both honest and dignified.
Watson must have approved of this depiction, for records suggest that Watson himself had commissioned the work. His will, written in 1803, stipulated that the painting was to be donated to “the Governors of Christs Hospital…as a testimony of the high estimation in which I hold that most Excellent Charity and that they will allow it to be hung up in the Hall of their Hospital as holding out a most usefull Lesson to Youth.” That lesson was clear. Watson, a former orphan himself, had not only prospered, he had become an immensely wealthy man of significant political importance. And he had done all of this on a wooden leg. His story—as pictorially represented by Copley’s painting—was to serve as a kind of visual inspiration for the orphans at Christ’s Hospital.
To this end, Watson and the Shark is similar in some ways to Benjamin West’s earlier painting The Death of General Wolfe. Both were ambitious paintings of a recent event that aspired to morally instruct by the example of a great man. And like West’s painting, Copley’s composition is part fact with some artistic invention. Indeed, although Copley took great care with this painting, it would be inaccurate to say that it depicts a kind of absolute truth. Copley, a transplanted Bostonian living in London, had never visited Cuba, and he was forced to base his depiction of the Havana harbor on engraved prints—not all of which were accurate. Likewise, he had likely never seen a tiger shark, and there are inaccuracies in the ways it is painted. But despite these shortcomings, the painting achieves its goal in requiring the viewer to emotionally respond to a (nearly) tragic event.
As such, Watson and the Shark retains a special place within the history of late 18th-century English Romanticism. In many ways, Watson and the Shark made Copley’s fame in London. Already an Associate of the Royal Academy of Arts when it was exhibited at the annual salon in the spring of 1778, he was elected to full membership less than a year later. It also represents the Copley’s “London-ification” as he moved away from the portraiture that had made his fame in Boston to ambitious historical compositions that more fully embraced the British art market.
John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, 1786–1820, oil on canvas, 20 7/8 x 31 inches / 53 x 78.7 cm (Yale University Art Gallery)
Like many artists of the early-Federal period (c. 1789-1801), the name John Trumbull is not one immediately recognized by most Americans. Yet despite this fact, the majority of Americans are well aware of many of Trumbull’s most famous paintings. Trumbull’s portrait of the first Secretary of the Treasury , Alexander Hamilton, has long graced the ten-dollar bill. Although Trumbull made a career as a portraitist, his real ambition lay in the painting of larger, more ambitious historical compositions. Without doubt, the one that is most frequently reproduced in elementary school history textbooks is The Declaration of Independence, a painting that exists in two versions. The first is smaller in size and is part of the Yale University Art Gallery (above) while the second is the monumental version currently on display in the Capitol Rotunda (below).
John Trumbull, Self-portrait, 1777, oil on canvas, 76.83 x 61.28 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
Family history
Yet to understand this composition, one must first grapple with Trumbull’s complicated history and personality. He was the sixth and youngest child of Jonathan Trumbull and Faith Robinson. If there was an aristocracy in colonial New England, Trumbull was born into it. His Harvard-educated father was a representative to the Connecticut General Assembly. Later he served as the Governor of Connecticut Colony (1769-1776) and then after the War of American Independence, as the Governor of the state of Connecticut (1776-1784). The artist’s mother was a direct descendant of John Robinson, the so-called “Pastor to the Pilgrim-Fathers” before they sailed on the Mayflower for the New World. Given his prestigious family legacy, Trumbull the Elder had little interest in allowing Trumbull the Younger to pursue a career as a painter. Instead, Governor Trumbull sent the artist-to-be to Harvard College so that his son could find a more useful vocation in either the law or the ministry.
However, in 1772, Trumbull made a social call to the artist John Singleton Copley who was then still in Boston—just a short distance from Cambridge. When writing his autobiography almost half a century later—in 1841—Trumbull still remembered this meeting with great clarity:
We found Mr. Copley dressed to receive a party of friends at dinner. I remember his dress and appearance—an elegant looking man, dressed in a fine maroon cloth, with gilt buttons—this was dazzling to my unpracticed eye!—but his paintings, the first I had ever seen deserving the name, riveted, absorbed my attention, and renewed all my desire to enter upon such a pursuit. But my destiny was fixed, and the next day I went to Cambridge, passed my examination in fro, and was readily admitted to the Junior class.
There was, of course, no art major at Harvard during the eighteenth century, so Trumbull studied art in his free time, copying and sketching works of art that hung on the college’s walls. He also learned from books he was able to borrow from the college’s library. He graduated in 1773 and became one of the few artists in the history of early American art to complete a college education.
The army
Trumbull’s graduation from Harvard took place during a tumultuous period in American history, and Trumbull wished to secure a commission as an officer in the Continental Army. His brother, Joseph, was the Commissary General of the Army, and likely suggested that his younger brother draw a plan of the British army’s position at Boston Neck to present to General Washington as a way of introduction. Shortly thereafter, Washington appointed Trumbull as an aide-de-camp (a confidential assistant to a senior officer). The following year, in the spring of 1776, Major General Horatio Gates appointed Trumbull deputy adjutant-general (military chief administrative officer) at the rank of Colonel. Alas, Trumbull resigned his commission less than a year later because of a minor squabble with Congress as to the date of the commission. Yet despite being Colonel John Trumbull for little more than a year, the artist carried the honorific title of Colonel for the remainder of his life. His 1841 autobiography, for example, was entitled—not immodestly—The Autobiography of Colonel John Trumbull.
However, it was because of his (admittedly, very limited) military experience that John Trumbull believed that he was uniquely qualified to pictorially depict the major events of the American Revolutionary War. His first step, was to seek out some artistic training, and in this endeavor, he followed in the footsteps of many artists before him (and, for that matter, after him): he sailed for London and Benjamin West’s studio (West was an American artist with a successful career in London). The year was 1780, and the War of Independence was still in full swing, although nearing its completion. It must have caused suspicion that a former officer in the Continental Army has arrived in London to study painting, particularly because Benjamin West, as the official history painter to the court, had the ear and confidence of King George.
Politics
In West’s studio, Trumbull met Gilbert Stuart, who was perhaps West’s most accomplished pupil. But Stuart and Trumbull differed in some key ways. First, Stuart always knew that portraiture would occupy most of his artistic efforts when he returned across the Atlantic Ocean, while Trumbull had the higher aspiration to paint historical compositions. More importantly, perhaps, Stuart largely kept his political beliefs during this vitriolic period to himself, while Trumbull—both in letters home and in his personal interactions about London—was decidedly anti-British. People began to notice, and on 20 November 1780, Colonel John Trumbull was arrested and charged with treason. He was imprisoned for more than 8 months and released only after powerful friends—Benjamin West and the statesman Edmund Burke among others—appealed to the Privy Council for the artist’s release. This was granted on 12 June 1781, and Trumbull was given 30 days to exit Great Britain.
Connecticut and back to London
Trumbull returned to Connecticut for two years, and during that time his father again attempted to convince him to pursue another more profitable vocation. Undeterred, Trumbull returned to London and the warmth of West’s studio in January of 1784. West set forth a rigorous course of study. Trumbull woke at five o’clock in the morning to study human anatomy. After breakfast several hours later, he painted for the rest of the day. His evening was capped by studying at the Royal Academy of Art. The aspiring artist made quick and steady progress. When writing to his brother Jonathan in September of 1784, for example, Trumbull remarked, “I have the pleasure to find that my labour is not in vain, & to hear Judges of the Art declare that I have made a more rapid progress in the few months I have been here than they have before known.”
John Trumbull, The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker’s Hill, 17 June, 1775, after 1815-before 1831, oil on canvas, 50.16 x 75.56 cm (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston)
The history of our country
Growing in confidence, Trumbull was determined to return to the newly formed United States with paintings that would commemorate the recent victory over Great Britain. Writing to his father—whose approval, it seems, he still sought—Trumbull explained in March of 1785,
the great object of my wishes…is to take up the History of Our Country, and paint the principal Events particular of the late War.
John Trumbull, The Death of General Montgomery in the Attack on Quebec, December 31, 1775, 1786, oil on canvas, 62.5 x 94 cm (Yale University Art Gallery)
By the end of the year, Trumbull had already begun work on two paintings of the series, images known to generations of American elementary school students because of their inclusion in history textbooks: The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker’s Hill, June 17, 1775 (above) and The Death of General Montgomery in the Attack on Quebec, December 31 1775 (below). In 1786, Trumbull began to plan three other Revolutionary War paintings: The Death of General Mercer at the Battle of Princeton, January 3, 1777, The Capture of the Hessians at Trenton, December 26, 1776, and The Surrender of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown, October 19, 1781. Interestingly, all five of these compositions are, essentially, scenes of battlefields.
John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, 1818 (placed 1826), oil on canvas, 12′ x 18′ (Rotunda, U.S. Capitol)
The Declaration of Independence
Thomas Jefferson, John Trumbull, First Idea of Declaration of Independence, Paris, Sept. 1786, 1786, graphite, pen, and brown ink (Yale University Art Gallery)
In July of 1786, however, Trumbull accepted Thomas Jefferson’s invitation to visit Paris, and he brought Bunker’s Hill and the Attack on Quebec with him. Jefferson, then the United States Ambassador to France, and a bit of artist himself, managed to convince Trumbull that he should turn his artistic talents towards a scene involving the Declaration of Independence. While in Paris, Trumbull began to sketch out the composition, taking into account Jefferson’s memory of the event and the diplomat’s own sketch of the Assembly Room in the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia where the Declaration of Independence was first presented to Congress and subsequently signed.
The painting that resulted from this collaboration between artist and politician has become one of the most famous images in the history of American art. It can be found on the back of the (seldom used) $2 bill, and has graced American postage stamps. And yet, what the painting depicts is often misunderstood. Trumbull himself called this painting The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776. However, this is inaccurate; this painting depicts not the signing of the document, but instead the presentation of a draft of it to Congress on 28 June 1776. Our attention begins with the five men standing in the middle of the painting, the so-called Committee of Five that was primarily responsible for the written document. They are—from left to right—John Adams of Massachusetts, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Robert R. Livingston of New York, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, and Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania. Clearly, the red-headed Jefferson is the most important, for he alone holds the document that he presents to John Hancock, the President of the Continental Congress, who sits behind the desk.
The so-called Committee of Five, from left to right—John Adams of Massachusetts, Roger Sherman of Connecticut, Robert R. Livingston of New York, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, and Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania (detail), John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, 1786–1820, oil on canvas, 20 7/8 x 31 inches / 53 x 78.7 cm (Yale University Art Gallery)
Of the five men standing, Trumbull was able to paint three of them—Adams, Jefferson, and Franklin—from life and directly onto the canvas prior to departing from Europe. When the artist returned to the United States in 1789, he spent several years traveling up and down the eastern seaboard so that he could paint portraits from life. This was not always possible, however, and in 1817—some 27 years later, Trumbull was still at work on what would become his most famous image. He wrote to Jefferson that year to inform the former president as to the progress he had made on this relatively small—21” x 31”—image:
The picture will contain Portraits of at least Forty Seven Members:—for the faithful resemblance of Thirty Six I am responsible, as they were done by myself from the Life, being all who survived in the year 1791. Of the Remainder, Nine are from Pictures done by others:—one Gen[era]l Whipple of New Hampshire is from Memory: and one Mr. Ben. Harrison of Virginia is from description, aided by memory.
To compare this image to those Trumbull began at the same time—the battle paintings of the Revolutionary War Series—is interesting, for while some of those are dynamic and filled with drama, The Declaration of Independence is, at its essence, a static—some might claim pictorially boring—image of a group of seated men looking at a group of standing men. Indeed, other artists—Jacques-Louis David comes to mind—were able to conceive a way to depict a similar event in a visually engaging way. David’s sketch for the Oath of the Tennis Court (below, depicting one of the first events of the French Revolution), for example, is far more dynamic and dramatic than is Trumbull’s painting.
Jacques Louis David, The Oath of the Tennis Court, 1791, pen and brown ink, brown wash with white highlights, 66 x 101 cm (Palace of Versailles)
But this seemed not to matter to Trumbull, nor did it bother many members of Congress, for on 17 January 1817 they approved—by an overwhelming 150-50 majority—a proposal to commission Trumbull to complete four paintings for the Great Rotunda of the as yet uncompleted Capitol Building. Increasing the size of The Declaration of Independence to 12’x18’ did little to enhance its dynamism. In 1828, for example, John Randolph of Virginia wrote,
the Declaration of Independence [ought] to be called the Shin-piece, for surely never was there before such a collection of legs submitted to the eyes of man.
Still others criticized the lack of accuracy in the room and furnishings, and, as importantly, as to who was actually present when the document was presented.
But these concerns were of little bother to Trumbull, who had become one of the most powerful voices—if not one of the more skilled paintbrushes—in American art during the first half of the nineteenth century. Indeed, Trumbull served as the President of the conservative American Academy of Fine Arts from 1817 until 1836. Without doubt, this position helped him receive the prestigious congressional commission in 1817 and allowed him to exert considerable influence over the direction of American art during the end of his career. Moreover, his autobiography—written just two years prior to his death—provided the opportunity to explain his (perhaps exaggerated) importance within American art. While the Declaration of Independence might not be the most interesting work within the history of American painting, it certainly is one of the most recognizable. Trumbull, no doubt, would approve of this.
Source: Dr. Bryan Zygmont, “John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence,” in Smarthistory, February 25, 2016, accessed July 17, 2024, https://smarthistory.org/trumbull-declaration/.
Jean-Antoine Houdon, George Washington
by Dr. Sarah Beetham, Dr. Steven Zucker and Dr. Bryan Zygmont
A conversation with Dr. Sarah Beetham and Dr. Steven Zucker in front of Jean-Antoine Houdon, George Washington, 1788–92, marble, 6′ 2″ high (State Capitol, Richmond, Virginia) URL: https://youtu.be/eoSvKRz5mIc
An American hero sculpted by a foreigner
After the successful conclusion of the American Revolutionary War, many state governments turned to public art to commemorate the occasion. Given his critical role in both Virginia and the colonial cause, it is unsurprising that the Virginia General Assembly desired a statue of George Washington for display in a public space.
And so, in 1784, the Governor of Virginia asked Thomas Jefferson (another Virginian who was then in Paris as the American Minister to France) to select an appropriate artist to sculpt Washington. Seeking a European sculptor—and for Jefferson, whose Francophile sympathies were clear, preferably one who was French—was a logical decision given the lack of artistic talent then available in the United States. Through basic necessity, this portrait of an American hero needed to be made by a foreigner.
Jean-Antoine Houdon, George Washington, 1788–92, marble, 6′ 2″ high (State Capitol, Richmond, Virginia, photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Jefferson knew just the artist for this task: Jean-Antoine Houdon. Trained at the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture and winner of the prestigious Prix de Rome in 1761 when only twenty years of age, Houdon was, by the middle of the 1780s, the most famous and accomplished Neoclassical sculptor in France.
Jefferson commissioned Houdon to complete a monumental statue of Washington. Given Houdon’s skill and ambition, the sculptor likely hoped to cast a larger-than-life-sized bronze statue of General Washington on horseback, a format appropriate for a victorious field commander. However, the final product, delivered more than a decade later, was a comparatively simple standing marble.
Evidence suggests that Houdon was supposed to remain in Paris and sculpt Washington from a drawing by Charles Willson Peale. Uncomfortable with carving in three dimensions what Peale had rendered in only two, Houdon made plans to visit Washington in person. Houdon departed for the United States in July 1785 and was joined by Benjamin Franklin—who he had sculpted in 1778—and two assistants. The group sailed into Philadelphia about seven weeks later and Houdon and his assistants arrived at Mount Vernon (Washington’s home in Virginia) by early October. There they took detailed measurements of Washington’s body and sculpted a life mask of the future president’s face.
Jean-Antoine Houdon, George Washington, 1788–92, marble, 6′ 2″ high (State Capitol, Richmond, Virginia, photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Contemporary clothing (and not a toga)
While in Virginia, Houdon created a slightly idealized and classicized bust portrait of the future first president. But Washington disliked this classicized aesthetic and insisted on being shown wearing contemporary attire rather than the garments of a hero from ancient Greece or Rome. With clear instructions from the sitter to be depicted in contemporary dress, Houdon returned to Paris in December 1785 and set to work on a standing full-length statue carved from Carrara marble. Although Houdon dated the statue 1788, he did not finish it until about four years later. The statue was delivered to the State of Virginia in May of 1796, when the Rotunda of the Virginia State Capitol was finally completed.
“Nothing in bronze or stone could be a more perfect image…”
Jean-Antoine Houdon, George Washington, 1788–92, marble, 6′ 2″ high (State Capitol, Richmond, Virginia, photo: Steven Zucker, CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
In time, this statue of George Washington has become one of the most recognized and copied images of the first president of the United States. Houdon did not just perfectly capture Washington’s likeness (John Marshal, the second Chief Justice of the Supreme Court later wrote, “Nothing in bronze or stone could be a more perfect image than this statue of the living Washington”). Houdon also captured the essential duality of Washington: the private citizen and the public soldier.
Washington stands and looks slightly to his left; his facial expression could best be described as fatherly. He wears not a toga or other classically inspired garment, but his military uniform. His stance mimics that of the contrapposto seen in Polykleitos’s classical sculpture of Doryphoros. Washington’s left leg is slightly bent and positioned half a stride forward, while his right leg is weight bearing. His right arm hangs by his side and rests atop a gentleman’s walking stick.
His left arm—bent at the elbow—rests atop a fasces: a bundle of thirteen rods that symbolize not only the power of a ruler but also the strength found through unity. This visually represents the concept of E Pluribus Unum—”Out of Many, One”—a congressionally approved motto of the United States from 1782 until 1956.
Washington’s officer’s sword, a symbol of military might and authority, benignly hangs on the outside of the fasces, just beyond his immediate grasp. This surrendering of military power is further reinforced by the presence of the plow behind him. This refers to the story of Cincinnatus, a Roman dictator who resigned his absolute power when his leadership was no longer needed so that he could return to his farm. Like this Roman, Washington resigned his power and returned to his farm to live a peaceful, civilian life.
Washington as soldier and private citizen
Horatio Greenough, George Washington, 1840, marble, 136 x 102 inches, National Museum of American History (photo: Gary Todd, public domain)
The statue, still on view in the Rotunda of the Virginia State Capitol, is a near perfect representation of the first president of the United States of America. In it, Houdon captured not only what George Washington looked like, but more importantly, who Washington was, both as a soldier and as a private citizen.
The enormously talented Houdon wisely accepted Washington’s advice. Indeed, Washington knew it was better to be subtly compared to Cincinnatus than to be overtly linked to Caesar, another Roman who, unlike Cincinnatus, did not surrender his power.
To compare Houdon’s statue to Horatio Greenough’s 1840 statue of Washington only makes this salient point more clear. With the sitter’s urging, Houdon opted for subtlety, whereas Greenough decided two generations later to fully embrace a neoclassical aesthetic. As a result, Houdon’s statue celebrates Washington the man, whereas Greenough deified Washington as a god.
Gilbert Stuart’s Lansdowne Portrait
by Dr. Bryan Zygmont
Gilbert Stuart, Lansdowne Portrait of George Washington, 1796, oil on canvas, 96 × 60″ / 243.8 × 152.4 cm (National Portrait Gallery)
A well known image
While the name Gilbert Stuart may be one unknown to most Americans, practically every American is aware of at least one of his paintings. Art historians formally call it the Athenaeum Portrait. Most everyone is familiar with it as the engraved image of George Washington that graces the front of the one-dollar bill. This is one of the dozens of portraits that Stuart painted of our first president. Another, a full-length likeness, is called the Lansdowne Portrait. Although not as famous as its bust-length counterpart, the Lansdowne Portrait retains a place of special significance within the history of American art.
Expat education
Hyacinthe Rigaud, King Louis XIV, 1702, oil on canvas, 313 x 205 cm (Versailles)
On the brink of the American Revolutionary War, Stuart decided it was time to pursue serious artistic instruction, and so, in 1775, he sailed for London and the studio of Benjamin West, whose generosity to his colonial brethren was seemingly endless.
Stuart remained in London for almost twelve years and then relocated to Ireland. He clearly had aspirations of making American versions of European Grand Manner portraits such as the likeness Hyacinthe Rigaud painted of Louis XIV in 1701. After acquiring debts sufficient to necessitate a hasty departure from the Emerald Isle, the artist told a friend about his short-term plans for Ireland and about his anticipated return to the United States:
When I can net a sum sufficient to take me to America, I shall be off to my native soil. There I expect to make a fortune by [portraits of] Washington alone. I calculate upon making a plurality of his portraits, whole lengths, what will enable me to realize; and if I should be fortunate, I will repay my English and Irish creditors. To Ireland and English I shall be adieu.
This was a task easier said than done. Stuart did not personally know the recently elected president, and the artist had been away from his homeland for 18 years.
Letter of introduction
Rather than return to Rhode Island, the state of his birth, he instead sailed for New York City, the home of John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and a close political confidant to George Washington. Stuart first met Jay in 1782 when the politician was in London negotiating the Treaty of Paris, the accord that officially ended the American Revolutionary War. Stuart arrived in New York City in early May of 1793, and a visit to Jay, one of the few people the painter could have known in Manhattan, must have been amongst Stuart’s first social calls. He painted Jay several times during the months that followed and the politician provided a letter of introduction for the relatively unknown artist to meet the president. Stuart departed New York City for Philadelphia in November 1794.
Philadephia
If painting images of George Washington was the primary reason Stuart returned to the United States, then Philadelphia was certainly the place to be. Stuart wasted little time in calling on Washington, and painted three different kinds of portraits of the president (with dozens of subsequent copies) in the years that followed. In the decades immediately preceding the invention of photography, the myriad of portraits of Washington that Stuart painted created an image Americans accepted as the portrait of their first president. The “Vaughan Type” shows Washington facing slightly to his left, the “Athenaeum Type” shows the first president facing to his right, and the “Lansdowne Type” is a full-length portrait.
Stuart painted six full-length portraits of Washington. The “Lansdowne Type” acquired its name from the owner of the first full-length portrait Stuart painted, William Petty, the first Marquis of Lansdowne. The portrait was a gift from William Bingham, a wealthy Philadelphian merchant and was intended to thank Lord Lansdowne for his financial support of the colonial cause during the American Revolutionary War.
Civilian commander
Washington (detail), Gilbert Stuart, Lansdowne Portrait of George Washington, 1796, oil on canvas, 96 × 60″ / 243.8 × 152.4 cm (National Portrait Gallery)
Given his European training, Stuart was well suited to execute a Grand Manner portrait of America’s first president. However, whereas previous artists such as John Trumbull and Charles Willson Peale emphasized Washington’s position as an officer in the Revolutionary Army, Stuart stressed Washington’s position as a civilian commander in chief. In the Lansdowne Portrait, Washington does not hold a scepter, wear a crown, or sit on a throne. Instead, Stuart filled the eight-foot tall composition with elements symbolic to the new republic. He wears an American made black velvet suit, one similar in fabric, cut, and color to one he frequently wore on public occasions. Washington raises his right arm in a classically inspired oratorical pose, while his left hand grasps a ceremonial sword. The President stands before a portico-like space, complete with two pairs of columns and a red curtain that has been pulled aside to reveal a background of open sky.
Medallion, eagles and books (detail), Gilbert Stuart, Lansdowne Portrait of George Washington, 1796, oil on canvas, 96 × 60″ / 243.8 × 152.4 cm (White House version)
In addition to the architectural setting and the sitter’s pose, other elements within the composition transform the Lansdowne Portrait from a simple likeness of Washington into an official state portrait. The Neo-Classical chair on the right side of the painting contains elements from the Great Seal of the United States. A small oval medallion on the top of the chair is divided in half. The top half contains thirteen white stars in a blue field, and thirteen alternating red and white stripes appear underneath. Two erect eagles are visible on top of the leg of the table, each of which grasps a bundle of arrows, symbols of readiness for war. Underneath the table are several books, titled, General Orders, American Revolution, and Constitution & Laws of the United States that indicate Washington’s past military and political accomplishments. More books, Federalist and Journal of Congress, stand upright on top of the table. A silver inkwell, quill, and several sheets of blank paper can be seen immediately underneath Washington’s outstretched right hand.
Representing the office of the presidency
Without question, Gilbert Stuart’s Lansdowne Portrait of George Washington is far more than a portrait of the first president of the United States of America. It is instead a painting that represents not only Washington’s likeness, but also the aesthetic and political trappings of the office of the presidency and of the New Republic. Utilizing all of the traditions of European Grand Manner portraiture, it became the standard full-length political likeness of Washington throughout the Federalist period.
Agostino Brunias, Free Women of Color with Their Children and Servants in a Landscape
by Dr. Tamara Díaz Calcaño
Agostino Brunias, Free Women of Color with Their Children and Servants in a Landscape, c. 1770–96, oil on canvas, 50.8 x 66.4 cm (Brooklyn Museum)
A group of thirteen people, of varying ages and social standing, walk through an idealized landscape accompanied by three comically miniature dogs. This scene, Free Women of Color with Their Children and Servants in a Landscape, by the Italian painter Agostino Brunias in the late 18th century is set in the Lesser Antilles. The artist lived and worked in Dominica and St. Vincent after first arriving in the Caribbean sometime in the second half of the 1760s and this scene is likely set on one of these two islands.
The representation of new colonial subjects
Three Black women toward the left side of the composition (detail), Agostino Brunias, Free Women of Color with Their Children and Servants in a Landscape, c. 1770–96, oil on canvas, 50.8 x 66.4 cm (Brooklyn Museum)
Three women of color stand in the center of the group. Each is finely dressed in tall headwraps topped with wide-brimmed hats. They may represent members of a family, two young women and their mother in the yellow petticoat. They are clearly the protagonists of this painting, especially the woman dressed all in white who points to a light-skinned boy in white and gold, likely her son. Their elegant dresses with laced bodices, the fichus over their shoulders, and hats set them apart visually from the rest of the group.
We also see three Black women toward the left side of the composition. Two of them wear striped short gowns and white headscarves without hats. They wear some jewelry; the Black woman in the green skirt is adorned with a necklace and bracelet in coral. It is possible that these women are domestic servants who work for the more elaborately dressed women in the foreground. The status of the third Black woman in the background as a domestic servant, perhaps an enslaved one, is clearer in the simplicity of her clothes. She is dressed in a modest white skirt and short gown, with a simple scarf tied under her chin to cover her head. She looks after a light-skinned child, carried on her shoulder and likely the progeny of one of the women at the front of the group.
Agostino Brunias, Free Women of Color with Their Children and Servants in a Landscape (detail), c. 1770–96, oil on canvas, 50.8 x 66.4 cm (Brooklyn Museum)
Three adult Black men accompany the women. They stand behind them and appear to be dressed in uniform (with white vests, breeches paired with stockings, hats, and blue and gold jackets). This is the same attire worn by the two Black boys on the right of the composition. The boys do not wear stockings or shoes. These men and boys appear to also be servants, and may be enslaved. A stark contrast is made between the barefooted boys and the finely dressed light-skinned boy who accompanies them and wears shoes as stockings.
This painting encapsulates some of the racial dynamics in the 18th-century Caribbean, particularly found in French and Spanish colonies where notions of racial mixing and mobility were considerably more fluid than in British colonial society. In French and Spanish Caribbean colonies free Black people were, in some circumstances, able to improve their socioeconomic standing. This included owning businesses or plantations, having servants and enslaved individuals, marrying Europeans or white Creoles.
Great Britain had come into possession of some French territories (including Tobago and the Grenadines), after the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1763, which finalized the Seven Years War between Britain and France and stipulated that the French cede several of their American territories. In 1764, a commission was created to oversee the sale of these lands in public auction. Sir William Young was appointed as its president and relocated to the Caribbean to travel and supervise the proceedings. Brunias, the artist of this painting, was part of his entourage, and accompanied Young as he traveled through the island, sketching much of what they saw there.
Left: Agostino Brunias, Linen Market, Dominica, c. 1780, oil on canvas, 49.8 × 68.6 cm (Yale Center for British Art); right: Agostino Brunias, A West Indian Flower Girl and Two other Free Women of Color, c. 1769, oil on canvas, 31.8 x 24.8 cm (Yale Center for British Art)
The people of the Lesser Antilles became Brunias’s preferred subject, and Free Women of Color with Their Children and Servants in a Landscape is representative of his work in the Caribbean. Perhaps as commissions or as a byproduct of his initial observations, the artist also produced genre scenes (images of everyday life) and paintings where he focused on particular groups. We see this in two of his other paintings, Linen Market, Dominica and A West Indian Flower Girl and Two other Free Women of Color. Here, he uses scenes set in markets and town streets to represent the interactions of social classes as opposed to the ordered hierarchy we see in Free Women of Color with Their Children.
Agostino Brunias, Free West Indian Dominicans, c. 1770, oil on canvas, 31.8 x 24.8 cm (Yale Center for British Art)
In all three of these compositions, Black and dark-skinned figures tend to be represented as servants, enslaved individuals, or vendors. Those read as of mixed ancestry are often represented likewise. In contrast white or light-skinned figures are usually represented as more affluent. This is not always the case, as we can see in Free West Indian Dominicans, where two finely dressed Black women and a Black man are represented in casual conversation. Brunias’s images serve to visualize the population in newly acquired territories, whose dynamics might blur and disrupt the social boundaries of British colonial society where racial mixing was not as prevalent as in the Spanish or French territories.
Young appears to have been Brunias’s main patron. He likely also found work among the growing British population, who had economic interests on the islands. They had a taste for the representation of these lands and the people they perceived as exotic. Brunias explores elements of the islands’ social dynamics even while offering idealized images of life in the Caribbean for his British clientele.
Much of his work centers around the representation of local women, particularly women of color. These women become avatars for the manifestation of social and racial boundaries present in colonial society. All of this can be appreciated in the painting in question, with the mixed women in the foreground accompanied by their white children in the care and company of their Black servants toward the background. Brunias deftly represents a scene that may interest and put at ease the British client, with a stratified image of Caribbean people, while alluding to the miscegenation that defined many aspects of society. This racial mixing was seen as representative of the region.
Agostino Brunias, Free Women of Color with Their Children and Servants in a Landscape (detail), c. 1770–96, oil on canvas, 50.8 x 66.4 cm (Brooklyn Museum)
Clothes also serve as important indicators of place. The fashion here is distinct from European styles popular at the time, demonstrating the adaptation of clothes to the climate. White and striped linen are abundant in the dresses, as are light materials favored in hot and humid climates. Five of the women wear headwraps to protect their hair. These could be intricate in their design and were worn by women across the socioeconomic and racial spectrum in places like Dominica. The occasional combination of the headwrap with a hat or bonnet point to the mix of European and African styles.
A Caribbean conversation piece
Brunias was an academically trained artist living in Rome when he caught the eye of English architect Robert Adams. Adams recruited him as a draftsman and brought him to London in 1758. There, he worked in Adams’s studio as a decorative painter, until a dispute over pay caused a break in their working relationship. Soon after, Brunias was presented with the opportunity to work with Young in the Caribbean.
His first trip lasted until the late 1770s, when he returned to England for a few years. By 1784 he was back working on drawings for the St. Vincent Botanical Garden. [1] He settled permanently in the Caribbean, dying in Dominica in 1796. Very little is known of the personal details of Brunias’s life, though it is speculated that after his return, he settled and established a family with a woman of color in Dominica. [2]
Brunias appealed to British taste. In Free Women of Color with Their Children and Servants in a Landscape, he borrowed from the British tradition of conversation pieces—often small, informal group portraits or interesting genre scenes that gained popularity in 18th-century England. In these group portraits or multi-figure fictional scenes, the subjects tend to be organized amid a recreational activity, like the family promenade we find here. The little dogs add levity and a certain domestic quality to the composition. An argument could be made that this painting is a family or household portrait in this tradition, though little is known of its origin.
Many of Brunias’s paintings are modest in scale and were destined to decorate domestic spaces. Few of his paintings are portraits and he often returns to the same settings, such as market scenes, dances, domestic interiors, or small landscapes like this one. It must be noted that many of Brunias’s paintings may have lost their original titles, and little is known of why, or for who, they were created. It is clear that Brunias identified a formula that worked in his market—lighthearted genre scenes where the region’s racial mixing was made palatable to a mostly British audience through its stratified representations. Even through this idealized lens, Brunias’s work stands as an important reference for the visualization of race in a British colonial context.
Notes:
[1] Mia Bagneris, “Coloring the Caribbean: Agostino Brunias and the Painting of Race British West Indies, c. 1765–1800”, PhD. diss. (Harvard University, 2009): p. 34.
[2] Mia Bagneris, “Coloring the Caribbean,” p. 33.
José Campeche, Portraitist of 18th-century Puerto Rico
by Dr. Tamara Díaz Calcaño
José Campeche, Doña María de los Dolores Gutiérrez del Mazo y Pérez, c. 1796, oil on canvas, 83 x 66 cm (without frame) (Brooklyn Museum)
As Puerto Rico’s most sought-after painter in the late 18th and early 19th century, José Campeche y Jordán holds an important and singular space in the art history of the Spanish Caribbean. Eighteenth-century Puerto Rico had few artists working on its shores and if you ordered works from other Spanish colonies or mainland Spain, they could take years to arrive. His production filled a niche in the local art market.
Campeche’s work can be divided into two genres: religious painting and portraiture. His work adorned many places of worship, and his portraits were commissioned by San Juan’s elite. His religious work was in demand from private clients and the Church, both within Puerto Rico and in other Spanish territories like Venezuela. As a portraitist he was sought after for both easel paintings and miniatures. Campeche’s skills responded to and were embraced by a clientele hungry for images of religious devotion and of themselves.
The artist’s development
Ramón Atiles, 19th-century copy of José Campeche’s Self-Portrait, oil on canvas, 122.5cm x 102.5 cm (Carmen Ana C. de Unanue Collection)
Campeche was born in San Juan in 1751, the son of a formerly enslaved Black man and a working-class white woman from the Canary Islands. He had few options for an artistic education in Puerto Rico, as there were no art schools and few professional painters offering private instruction. Campeche also never traveled abroad. It is likely he learned the basics of his profession in his father’s workshop. Tomás Campeche was a gilder and a modest painter himself, and his workshop often produced works and did repairs for the churches in the city. Other crucial resources for Campeche’s education were imported prints of European artworks, as well as the basic instruction available to him at Church and during his studies in the Santo Tomás Convent, where general studies were established as well as studies in theology and philosophy.
Luis Paret y Alcázar, Young Woman asleep in a Hammock, 1780–81, oil on copperplate, 19 x 15 cm (Prado Museum)
Campeche was already a professional painter at 26 when Spanish artist Luis Paret y Alcázar arrived, exiled to Puerto Rico by King Carlos III in 1775. While the details of the two artists’ possible acquaintance are not known, there is a marked change in Campeche’s work after Paret’s stay in the territory, which points to a possible interaction between the two. Paret studied with French artists in Madrid and was deeply familiar with the Rococo style, noticeable in his pastel color palette and subject matter, with works centered around court life, portraiture, and sensuous genres or allegorical compositions.
While very few of Paret’s works from his time in Puerto Rico survive, his painting known as Young Woman asleep in a Hammock gives us an idea of what Campeche could have seen. In this dreamy interior scene, a woman almost seems to be sliding from the hammock as she rests. The work has a jewel-like quality. The shining cloth of her dress drapes over her body, revealing one of her breasts. The interior space is carefully rendered with attention paid to the furnishing and objects, bathed in a hazy light that bounces from the sumptuous drapes and the cloths spread around the composition.
José Campeche, Maria Catalina Urrutia, 1792, oil on wood (Museo de Arte de Ponce, Puerto Rico)
José Campeche, Exvoto de la Sagrada Familia, late eighteenth century, oil on wood, 25.6 x 20.4 cm (San Juan, Puerto Rico, Colección Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña)
Many of these elements are present in Campeche’s later work, such as his attentiveness to cloth and the detailing of interior spaces. Pastel tones began to dominate the celestial realm in his religious paintings, moving away from the darker palette of his earlier works and which was stylistically connected with his counterparts throughout the Spanish viceroyalties.
These changes are also present in his portraits, especially his female portraits, such as one showing Maria Catalina de Urrutia. While mostly adhering to the compositional conventions of portraiture in continental Spanish America, here, Campeche leans toward bright and pastel colors, and elaborate detailing of the spaces and clothes that add a sense of luxury that convey more Rococo sensibilities. In his portraits, sitters often wear military uniforms and French inspired fashions, such as fine fabrics, ribbons, and lace combined with a powdered hair or wig. [1]
José Campeche, Miguel Antonio de Ustariz, 1789–92, oil on canvas, 60 x 41.5 cm (Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña)
The chronicler of San Juan society
The artist painted the who’s who of San Juan—governors, bishops, captains, mayors, colonial administrators, and their families posed before Campeche’s easel. In these portraits, he included references to their accomplishments, education, and positions. This is something common in 18th-century portraiture in colonial Latin America, where inscriptions or cartouches and coats of arms were often added to communicate the sitter’s titles and family relations.
Left: José Campeche, Bishop Francisco de la Cuerda, c. 1791–92, oil on canvas (Palacio Arzobispal de San Juan collection); right: Unidentified artist, Luis Francisco Romero, Bishop of Santiago de Chile and of Quito, 1718, oil on canvas, 88 x 56 1/3” (Museo del Carmen de Maipú, Santiago, Chile)
His 1792 portrait of Bishop Francisco de la Cuerda is not dissimilar to that of the 1718 portrait of Luis Francisco Romero, Bishop of Santiago de Chile and Quito. Both have a dark color palette, inscriptions noting when they took over their respective offices, coats of arms, and sumptuous curtains. In Cuerda’s portrait, the drape reveal shelves of books, alluding to his intellectual interests. This type of composition is inspired directly by official portraits of Spanish monarchs that were sent to and copied in the colonies.
José Campeche y Jordán, Portrait of Governor Ramón de Castro, 1800, oil on canvas, 165.1 x 228.6 cm (Museo de San Juan, San Juan; photo: Tamara Díaz Calcaño)
Campeche often opted for subtle ways to add the desired information about a sitter. Coats of arms are painted as part of objects or furniture; his cartouches, often containing the names and titles of his sitters, are pieces of paper placed on desks or on the floor. At times Campeche references the accomplishment of his sitters more directly, as seen in Governor Ramón de Castro’s portrait. Along with an inscribed plinth in the right foreground, Campeche added a view of the territory and fortress that the governor used to defend San Juan from the British in 1797.
An important and distinctive element of Campeche’s portraiture is the inclusion of images that indicate the Caribbean as the setting of the composition. These markers of place are part of a developing visual culture that seeks to identify what is distinctively Puerto Rican. For example, the artist included Puerto Rican objects, fruits, plants, or landscapes, such as we see with the inclusion of San Juan in the portraits of Miguel Antonio de Ustariz and Governor Ramón de Castro.
José Campeche, The Daughters of Governor Ramón de Castro, 1797, oil on canvas, 31.75 x 45.38 inches (Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico)
In 1797, Campeche worked on a double portrait of Governor Castro’s daughters. The girls, María Guadalupe Josefa and María del Carmen, wear matching white dresses with different colored ribbons and shoes. They inhabit an interior space with landscape paintings, gilded furnishings and frames, and rose-tone curtains. The color palette is bright and delicate, and combined with the elaborate interior Campeche creates an elegant and refined painting. A paper on the floor serves as the inscription where the artist identifies the girls, their ages, and their parents.
While both girls hold unto a bundle of flowers between them, the oldest also holds an intricately carved maraca like it was a child’s rattle, possibly made of the husk of the Higuera fruit. [2] A pineapple lays in the foreground on the lower left corner. Both the maraca and the pineapple act as indicators of place, the first being an instrument typical of local music and the latter a South American fruit, cultivated in the Caribbean and so became representative of the region.
José Campeche, Dama a Caballo, late 18th century, oil on wood, San Juan, Puerto Rico (private collection)
In one of his female equestrian portraits, Campeche also used plants and structures associated with the region. This work showcases a lady and her horse posing together outside, with a pineapple plant in the foreground and a banana tree in the middle ground. In the background are two buildings associated with plantations and the countryside, a two-story structure with a section on stilts and a sugar mill with a straw roof. Rococo influences are aplenty—the hazy landscape, the dominating pastel palette, the unknown sitter’s riding dress, and even the horse’s sweet bows. Campeche painted several of these equestrian portraits, though only three are known to survive. These are fascinating paintings, in part because equestrian portraits are rare in the Spanish Americas. Their creation alludes to the strong equestrian culture in Puerto Rico, which serves as yet another marker of cultural distinction. These details set this portrait firmly in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean.
In the late 18th century, a distinct cultural identity was manifesting itself in Puerto Rico. It would continue to grow and change in the 19th century. As small as these details may be in Campeche’s paintings, they point toward that identity or a recognition of it, of belonging in some way to that place and seeking to be associated with it through these symbols. Campeche and his sitters allow us a glimpse of this through their carefully crafted images.
Jose Campeche y Jordan, Portrait of Governor Ramon de Castro (Puerto Rico)
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