USA > Maine > A history of the discovery of Maine > Part 41
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The Portuguese were the first who followed the lead of the Cabots in their ideas and plans for north-western discovery. Emanuel, king of Portugal, sent out, between the years 1500 and 1503, several expeditions to the north-east of Amer- ica, under the command of Gaspar Cortereal and his brothers. These voyages were very unfortunate, resulting in the loss of men, ships, and money. Discouraged by these reverses, and becoming more and more occupied with the more fa- vored regions of Brazil and the East Indies, the Portuguese sovereigns abandoned the work of northern discovery. The Portuguese continued, however, their private enterprises ; and, following the track of the Cortereals and Cabots, they yearly visited the fishing-grounds of Newfoundland, the richest in the world. During the greater part of the sixteenth century,
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they were the most active fishermen on the banks. and gained and communicated much information concerning those re- gions, and the neighboring waters and coasts of Labrador, and Davis' and Hudson's Straits. We find these coasts and waters for the first time accurately depicted on Portuguese charts.
From these charts, as well as from other circumstances, it is quite certain, that the Portuguese visited Nova Scotia and the Bay of Fundy, and probably also the coast of Maine.
The names given by the Portuguese to these regions are " Terra de Labrador," and " Terra de Cortereal." The first is applied only to the more northern countries ; first to Green- land, and afterwards to the present Labrador. The second is more strictly applied to Newfoundland; though it was under- stood by the Portuguese to comprise all the country west of it, which was known to them. But when the Cortereals, in the course of time were forgotten, other names, given by for- eigners, were adopted instead of theirs, even by their own countrymen. The first fair delineation of Nova Scotia and the Bay of Fundy is found in a Portuguese chart of the year 1558.
The charts made by the Portuguese are a better source of information on these coasts, than their books. No full report of a Portuguese explorer to the north has been preserved. Even regarding the voyages of the Cortereals, we find in , Portuguese authors only scattered and occasional notices. Galvano, a Portuguese author, composed and published in this period a chronological survey of voyages of discovery, which contains many valuable allusions to our region.
In 1583, numerous Portuguese vessels and seamen were found on the coast of Newfoundland; but after this we do not hear much of them in that region. Soon after 1580, Portugal was conquered by Philip of Spain, and merged in
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his own kingdom. By this unhappy union with Spain, and other adverse circumstances, the maritime power of the Por- tuguese was destroyed, their colonies were subverted, and their energy and industry paralyzed. The Portuguese there- fore disappeared from our waters, and their fisheries on the banks were abandoned. They never made a permanent es- tablishment on our coasts, though in their maps they planted their banner on several countries in the vicinity of Maine.
A few geographical names on the coast of Newfoundland, and the name " Labrador," are the only remaining monu- ments of the presence in our waters of this once interesting and powerful nation.
4. AGENCY OF THE SPANIARDS. 1
Agramonte and other enterprising Spanish navigators, after the voyages of Cabot and Cortereal to the north-west, urged upon the king of Spain to undertake similar expedi- tions, but without success. The exploring voyages of that nation were commenced from its colonies in the West Indies. From this centre of their operations they advanced toward the north, along the shores of what are now the States of Florida, Georgia, and Carolina. On this track they expected soon to find an end of the northern countries ; and several of their explorers in this direction were ordered to turn west- ward as soon as possible, and sail into the Western Ocean toward the Moluccas. Cortes, the conqueror of Mexico, also proposed to make search for a western passage somewhere south of Newfoundland ; and in 1525, Estevan Gomez was directed to these latitudes. For the same purpose he surveyed a great section of the coast between 40° and 45° N., and ex- plored with much care the coast of Maine ; particularly the large bay and river of Penobscot, to which he gave the name
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. of " Rio de las Gamas." He made a chiart of the coast, which was used by the royal cosmographer Ribero for his great map of the world. But Gomez found neither a passage to the west, nor gold, nor other valuable products in the countries seen by him. His voyage was the last official Spanish expe- dition in search of a passage to the Pacific on the eastern side of America. The Spaniards, however, for a long time be- lieved in the existence of such a passage, and laid plans for its discovery, which were still prosecuted, in 1570, by their great navigator, Pedro Menendez. But after the conquest of the rich countries on the shores of the South Sea, they thought the long-sought passage might be more easily discov- ered from the western, than the eastern side of America; and therefore carried on, from the time of Cortes, a series of ex- plorations along the west coast of North America under the command of Francisco Ulloa, Juan Rodriguez de Cabrillo, and others, who extended the limits of Spanish conquest and dis- covery on that side far north, to California and the Strait of De Fuca. On the eastern side of North America, the coun- tries lying in the high latitudes where Gomez had been occu- pied, were never reached again by the Spaniards, except only by the fishermen of the Basque provinces, to whom Gomez had opened the way.
The Biscayans, always active fishermen, followed Gomez yearly to the Grand Banks, as the Portuguese had followed Cortereal; and as they probably carried their cargoes directly to Havana and other Spanish settlements in the West Indies, we may infer that they sometimes came in sight of our coast.
At the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the seven- teenth century, these Spanish fisheries on the Banks of Newfoundland gradually declined, and came to an end, like those of the Portuguese. Both these nations gave place here to the French, who were soon followed by the English.
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No regular official survey of the coast of New England was made after that of Gomez, during the period under con- sideration, nor until the explorations and surveys of the French and English, near the end of the sixteenth century ; so that nearly all the representations of our coast contained in the Spanish, as well as in the French and English maps of this time, and in the works of Mercator, Ortelius, and others, were, as far as our coast is concerned, only copies of the survey of Gomez, handed down to us by Ribero. The charts of Verrazano were eventually lost ; and the chart of Homem of 1558, which shows that some progress had been made by private adventurers in the knowledge of the coast, received no attention from these geographers. So that nearly all the names planted by Gomez on the coast of New England were transmitted, and became nearly as permanent as those left by Cortereal on the coast of Newfoundland. We always see in these works our great and beautiful Penobscot River partic- ularly conspicuous, under the name of " Rio de las Gamas," or " Rio formosa," or " Rio de Gomez," with its diverging branches, the numerous islands at its mouth, and the great cities on either bank, sometimes superadded.
The first Spanish cosmographers and map-makers gave to these coasts the name of " Tierra de Gomez," under which, together with Maine, the rest of New England and Nova Scotia were comprised. They also apply to these northern parts of " Florida," a name given to them by the French, namely, " Arambe," or "Arambec," which has so marked a similarity to the Indian name "Norumbega," that it must be regarded as having the same origin.
The historians of Spain, during this period, furnish us with important information relative to our subject; although their narratives, even that of Gomez, are neither complete nor ex- act. The Decades of Peter Martyr, the first chronicler of
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events in the new world. contain on our regions, as on the whole of America, the most full and useful information. The works of Gomara and Oviedo communicated still more ample knowledge. In 1537, Oviedo gave the best and most accu- rate description of our east coast, which has come down to us from the sixteenth century ; and Herrera's work on the history of Spanish discovery is of the highest interest. At a later date another Spanish author, Barcia, composed a special work on the history of " Florida," a name then used by the Spaniards as synonymous with North America. And in quite modern times, the well-known Navarrete published from scattered documents in the archives of Spain, a collec- tion of voyages of the highest interest relating to this coun- try .*
5. AGENCY OF THE FRENCH.
The French from Brittany and Normandy, like the Portu- guese, soon after the expeditions of Cabot and Cortereal, began to resort to the fishing-grounds on the Banks of New- . foundland, and continued their operations there during the whole of the sixteenth century, by the side, first of the Por- tuguese, and afterwards of the Spanish Biscayans, who were principal actors in this profitable employment. And, like the Portuguese, they also continued the discoveries which the great official explorers had commenced ; particularly on the west and south-west of Newfoundland, and about Cape Bre- ton, which they named "Terre des Bretons." Under this name they included, on some of their old maps, not only the
*[This work was entitled "Collection of the Voyages and Maritime Discoveries made by the Spaniards since the close of the Fifteenth Cen- tury." The first two volumes were published in Madrid in 1825, the fourth and fifth in 1837, the sixth and seventh not until after the death of the au- thor, which took place in 1814, at the age of seventy-nine .- ED. ]
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future Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, but sometimes also the territory of Maine, thus embracing this entire region. Soon after the beginning of the sixteenth century, they ap- pear also to have extended their voyages to the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and to have gained some knowledge of the great river of Canada. Our accounts of their proceedings, how- ever, are meagre ; and it is difficult to decide how much was done by them, and how much by the Portuguese.
At last in 1524, the royal French expedition under Verra- zano was sent to our coasts, of which we have full and good reports. But these reports were so long, that they were read by few persons, and did little to perpetuate the memory of this navigator and his discoveries, while his charts were gen- erally and readily examined and understood, and frequently copied. But as the charts of Verrazano were not preserved, so neither were the names nor the geographical delineations doubtless contained in them ; while the chart of Gomez, hav- ing been copied by Ribero, and often republished, perpetu- ated the names he had given, though it was not accompanied by any written report.
The voyages of Verrazano were followed by those of Jacques Cartier. This great navigator, in his remarkable voyages of 1535 and 1543, accurately surveyed the whole coast-line of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and a large section of the great river of Canada. These surveys were repeatedly copied by subsequent map-makers, and form the basis of the maps and charts of that period.
Soon after Cartier, Francis I, the patron of Verrazano and himself, died ; and his successors, Henry II, Francis II, and Henry III, were too much occupied by political and re- ligious dissensions at home, to give any attention to affairs in the new world. The same causes also operated in Germany and England, to divert their governments and people from.the
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remote and less exciting objects of discovery and colonization. It was left for the Huguenots, in seeking a place of refuge from persecution, to direct attention again to America. In their behalf, Ribault, Laudonnière, and others, soon after the middle of the sixteenth century, undertook several expe- ditions to the southern section of our east coast, which had also an important bearing on the discovery of its northern section. Among the great maritime powers of Europe, Spain was the only one which preserved tranquillity at home, and energetically pursued transatlantic conquest, enriching her- self by the spoils of the new world. The whole navigation of France and England, at the end of this period, was reduced to privateering and piracy. It was not until near the close of the sixteenth century, that great and honorable explorers and adventurers, superseding the French and English " cor- sarios," with a noble rivalry, completed the discovery of our coast, and solved the geographical questions connected with it.
After the voyages of Verrazano and Cartier, the grand name, " La Nouvelle France," was given to the countries around the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and included also the terri- tory of Maine and the rest of New England, as far down as 40° N. But this name was sometimes applied by French geog- raphers to the whole of North America ; in the same manner as the Spaniards extended their name "Florida " over the same region. The French also gave the Indian name, " No- rumbega," to a portion of New France ; and we find it applied on some old maps to the country of the Bretons and Nova Scotia. But it is generally confined to that part of the coast lying north of the fortieth degree; to which, as was conceded by the French, the Spanish " Florida " extended. The cen- tre of the region covered by this aboriginal name, how- ever, appears always to have been the Penobscot River, "the great river of Norumbega." And this name is found still
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applied to this central region, long after it had disappeared from the adjacent countries.
The French explorers of this period composed the most full and best reports of their expeditions, which, by a singular good fortune, have nearly all been preserved, and especially those of Verrazano, of Cartier, of Ribault, and of Laudonniere. They are a most important source of information on the con- dition of the east coast in the sixteenth century.
6. AGENCY OF THE ITALIANS.
The progress of discovery in America, whether considered as a whole or in its different sections, was accomplished not alone by the direct action of the great maritime powers of the day, Portugal, Spain, France, and England, but also by the indirect agency of private members of other nations, settled at a greater distance from the shores of the Western Ocean, but further advanced in the sciences of geography and astronomy, so necessary for maritime success.
Some of the exploring expeditions undertaken by the Span- ish, French, and English, we have called by their names only in a political sense ; because their commissions were given, their explorers were mostly paid, and their profits wholly en- joyed by these several governments. But with respect to the scientific principles, the leading ideas, and the whole spirit which originated and animated them, they must, partly at least, be ascribed to private individuals of other nations. Thus the enterprise of Columbus for the discovery of America is usually called a Spanish enterprise, which indeed it was, in a political sense. Columbus, however, was not only born and educated in Italy, but acquired his nautical experience in Ital- ian waters, and was imbued with the adventurous spirit of the old Italian navigators, of which the Spaniards of his time had
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very little, except what he imparted to them. The friends, too, with whom he corresponded, Toscanelli, Peter Martyr, and others, including among these the Pope of Rome, by whom he was instructed, encouraged, and applauded, were all Ital- ians. The same may be said of the voyages of the Cabots, which, though justly called English enterprises in the sense above-mentioned, may, in another sense, be justly considered Italian ; inasmuch as the Cabots, like Columbus, had their birth and education in Italy, and conducted their enterprises on the ideas and principles which they had learned from their Italian masters.
Exactly the same is true also of the expedition of Verra- zano, which is properly considered a French expedition, in so far as it was undertaken by order of the king of France, and in behalf of French interests ; but in so far as Verrazano, like Columbus and Cabot, was an Italian, educated in the Italian school of maritime science, and associated by sympa- thy and correspondence with Italian cosmographers, his expe- dition, also, must be considered, in an important sense, Ital- ian ; or more exactly, an Italian enterprise under French auspices.
But, in truth, the way to the discovery of America was pointed out to the nations of Europe by the Italians, long before the voyages of Verrazano, of the Cabots, or even of Columbus. In proof of this, it will only be necessary to remind the reader of what has been said of the voyages and charts of the brothers Zeni.
But a full discussion of the influence of Italy upon maritime discovery, would carry me beyond the allotted limits of this volume, and I shall pursue it no further.
I must not, however, omit to notice the agency of Italian authors in recording the history of what was done by their own and other nations in the discovery of America. Some
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of the very first reports on western discovery were either written, or collected and published, by Italian authors. To this class belong the invaluable reports of Peter Martyr d'An- ghiera, an Italian in the service of Spain, from whom we have obtained very important information on the voyage of Este- van Gomez to our coast. Here also may be mentioned the first collection of voyages of discovery in America ever made, which was published by some anonymous Italian author in Vicenza, in 1507.
Italy; during this period, kept a vigilant watch upon the oceanic action of Portugal and Spain. This was true espe- cially of the cities of Venice and Rome, the ambassadors of which always kept the governments at home fully and accu- rately informed of everything done by the governments to which they were sent, in relation to discovery and coloniza- tion in the west. By such means the Italians, especially in those central positions where these reports were collected and published, became better acquainted than any other nation, with the western voyages and adventures of Spain and Por- tugal, and also of England and France. These reports, pub- lished in Italy, were diffused over Europe; and thus was communicated intelligence of discoveries in America which would otherwise have been little known. Even at this day, our best information on the voyages of the Cabots, the Cor- tereals, the Verrazanos, and the Cartiers to our east coast, comes from Italian sources, and especially from the great work, · " Delle Navigationi et Viaggi," published in Venice, by Gio- vanni Battista Ramusio.
In Venice, where art and science flourished, a large school of skillful cartographers arose. Many of the first maps of the new world were made and printed there, and were usu- ally added to the numerous Italian editions of Ptolemy. It was here also that Baptista Agnese, and other Italians, com-
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posed innumerable "Portolanos,"* or sea-charts, on which the discoveries of new countries were depicted, which were dispersed through the world, to be used by explorers on their new and dangerous routes. Even foreign chart-makers, and among them the Portuguese Homem, were attracted to Ven- ice, and composed their works in that city, where they found the best assistance from artists, mathematicians, and cosmogra- phers. Copies of several of these Italian, or more strictly Venetian charts, which throw much light on the history of " western discoveries," are placed in this volume.
But near the end of the sixteenth century, when France and England entered with new spirit upon a new career of American discovery and colonization, the learned men of those countries took into their own hands the business of col- lecting, preserving, and publishing narratives and charts of maritime adventure; and, meanwhile, the Italians lost that literary preeminence which they had gained by their early publications on the history of American discovery.
7. AGENCY OF THE GERMANS.
The Germans also may be mentioned among those nations who, in many ways, assisted the work of discovery in the new world. German soldiers and seamen are often men- tioned as making part of the crews of the great navigators, and especially of Magellan on his first navigation round the globe. And was not that companion of the old Northman Leif, the good-natured Tyrker, a German? And did not this Ger- man, by his discovery of grapes in the woods of New Eng- land, and by the satisfaction he exhibited in this discovery, give occasion for applying to this country the name of " Vin-
* Portolano means " a coast-pilot;" also, "a book in which ports or hat- bors are described."
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land the good," the first name under which it became known to the civilized world? And was not that man a German. who, in 1037, having paid a high price for a rare piece of wood from the forests of New England, made it an article of com- . merce, commending it at the same time in a report of the country from which it came ? And was it not a German au- thor, Adam of Bremen, who first published an account of the discovery of Vinland, at a time when little interest was felt in such tidings, even if they could have been at all compre- hended, either by his own countrymen, or by the rest of Europe ?
If not great navigators themselves, the Germans were emi- nent in those sciences and arts which are necessary to navi- gation. The earliest of modern astronomers were Germans ; and distinguished among these was John Müller, better known under his Latin name, " Regiomontanus,"* who, from Nu- remberg, his place of residence, in the interior of Germany, guided and regulated the routes of navigators and explorers on the trackless ocean. His astronomical Ephemerides, in which he had calculated in advance the movements of the moon and stars from 1475 to 1506 f was used by Bartholo- mew Diaz, Vasco de Gama, Columbus, and Vespucci, on the coasts of Africa and America, as they themselves have stated. In Nuremberg there flourished, after Regiomontanus, a large school of skillful mathematicians and astronomers.
From the same town there sprang another great German geographer, the famous Martin Behaim, a contemporary and personal friend of Columbus, who, like him, resided for several years in Portugal,-that part of the European continent which stretches furthest toward the west. Behaim also, like
* So called from his birth-place "Königsberg," in Latin " Regiomon- tinm."
t See Humboldt, Kritische Untersuchungen, vol. 1, p. 232.
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Columbus, studied cosmography, composed charts, and like him also, made voyages to the Azores and the western coast of Africa, then the outposts of Portuguese discovery. And, still following the example of Columbus, he married the daughter of one of the principal residents of these islands ; so that both Behaim and Columbus may be said to have be- come connected with the ocean by marriage. By these ante- cedents, and by the high esteem in which he was held by the king of Portugal, it would seem as if Behaim was qualified, like Columbus, to become a practical navigator, and himself an explorer in the west. He contented himself, however, with the more modest fame of constructing an improved astro- labium, which the Portuguese and Spanish navigators hung up on the masts of their vessels .*
As in mathematics and astronomy, so also in the arts of typography, wood-cutting and engraving, the Germans, in the time of Columbus, occupied a high place. This was the epochi of Albrecht Dürer and his school. . German printers were dispersed throughout Europe. They printed in Seville, among other reports on America, the first letter written by Columbus from the new world. German engravers, who often were also good mathematicians, engraved many of the first maps of America, not only in Germany, but in Italy, and wherever else their science and skill had procured for them employment ; the German Ruysch, for instance, who engraved in Rome a map of America, a copy of which is supplied in this volume. Composing maps of the world from materials furnished by navigators of other nations, seems to have been a passion with these Germans. Of the twenty- one editions of Ptolemy, issued in the first half of the six- teenth century, nearly all of which are embellished with charts, not less than sixteen were published in Germany.
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