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Vinland, and of the fisherman's adventures, as related by Zeno, or at least by Marcolino, they evidently could not have influenced him in his great enterprize. His route had no reference to them, but was a direct western course, not toward Vinland, and Estotiland, and Drogeo, but in search of Cipango, and Cathay, and the other countries described by Marco Polo, as lying at the extremity of India.

No. XIV.

CIRCUMNAVIGATION OF AFRICA BY THE ANCIENTS.

THE knowledge of the ancients with respect to the Atlantic coast of Africa is considered by modern investigators much less extensive than had been imagined; and it is doubted whether they had any practical authority for the belief that Africa was circumnavigable. The alleged voyage of Eudoxus of Cyzicus, from the Red sea to Gibraltar, though recorded by Pliny, Pomponius Mela, and others, is given entirely on the dictum of Cornelius Nepos, who does not tell from whence he derived his information. Posidonius (cited by Strabo) gives an entirely different account of this voyage and rejects it with contempt*.

The famous voyage of Hanno, the Carthagenian, is supposed to have taken place about a thousand years before the Christian era. The Periplus Hannonis, remains a brief and obscure record of this expedition, and a subject of great comment and controversy. By some, it has been pronounced a fictitious work, fabricated among the Greeks, but its authenticity has been ably vindicated. It appears to be

*Gosselin, Recherches sur la Geographie des Anciens, T. 1, p. 162, &c.

satisfactorily proved, however, that the voyage of this navigator has been greatly exaggerated, and that he never circumnavigated the extreme end of Africa. Mons. de Bougainville traces his route to a promontory which he named the West Horn, and which was supposed to be Cape Palmas, about five or six degrees north of the equinoctial line, from whence he proceeded to another promontory, under the same parallel, which he called the South Horn, supposed to be Cape de Tres Puntas. Mons. Gosselin, however, in his researches into the geography of the ancients, (Tome. 1, p. 162, &c.) after a rigid examination of the periplus of Hanno, determines that he had not sailed farther south than Cape Non Pliny, who makes Hanno range the whole coast of Africa, from the straits to the confines of Arabia, had never seen his periplus, but took his idea from the works of Xenophon of Lampsaco. The Greeks surcharged the narration of the voyager with all kinds of fables, and on their unfaithful copies, Strabo founded many of his assertions. According to M. Gosselin, the itineraries of Hanno, of Scylax, Polybius, Statiùs, Sebosus and Juba; the recitals of Plato, of Aristotle, of Pliny, of Plutarch, and the tables of Ptolemy, all bring us to the same results, and, notwithstanding their apparent contradictions, fix the limit of southern navigation about the neighbourhood of Cape Non, or Cape Bojador.

The opinion that Africa was a peninsula, which existed among the Persians, the Egyptians, and perhaps the Greeks, several centuries prior to the Christian era, was not, in his opinion, founded upon any known facts; but merely on conjecture, from considering the immensity and unity of the ocean; or perhaps on more ancient traditions;

* Memoirs de l'Acad. des Inscript. T. 26.

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or on ideas produced by the Carthaginian discoveries, beyond the straits of Gibraltar, and those of the Egyptians beyond the gulf of Arabia. He thinks that there was a very remote period, when geography was much more perfect than in the time of the Phenicians and the Greeks, whose knowledge was but confused traces of what had previously been better known.

The opinion, that the Indian sea joined the ocean was admitted among the Greeks, and in the school of Alexandria, until the time of Hipparchus. It seemed authorized by the direction which the coast of Africa took after Cape Aromata, always tending westward, as far as it had been explored by navigators.

It was supposed that the western coast of Africa rounded off to meet the eastern, and that the whole was bounded by the ocean, much to the northward of the equator. Such was the opinion of Crates, who lived in the time of Alexander, of Aratus, of Cleanthes, of Cleomede, of Strabo, of Pomponius Mela, of Macrobius, and many others.

Hipparchus proposed a different system, and led the world into an error, which for a long time retarded the maritime communication of Europe and India. He supposed that the seas were separated into distinct basins, and that the eastern shores of Africa made a circuit round the Indian sea, so as to join those of Asia beyond the mouth of the Ganges. Subsequent discoveries, instead of refuting this error, only placed the junction of the continents more remote. Marinus of Tyre, and Ptolemy, adopted this opinion in their works, and illustrated it in their maps, which for centuries controlled the general belief of mankind, and perpetuated the idea that Africa extended onward to the south pole, and that it was impossible to arrive by sea at the coasts of India. Still there were geographers

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who leaned to the more ancient idea of a communication between the Indian sea and the Atlantic ocean. It had its advocates in Spain, and was maintained by Pomponius Mela and by Isidore of Seville. It was believed also by some of the learned in Italy, in the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth centuries; and thus was kept alive until it was acted upon so vigorously by prince Henry of Portugal, and at length triumphantly demonstrated by Vasco de Gama, in his circumnavigation of the Cape of Good Hope.

No. XV.

OF THE SHIPS OF COLUMBUS.

In remarking on the smallness of the vessels with which Columbus made his first voyage, Dr. Robertson observes, that, "in the fifteenth century, the bulk and construction of vessels were accommodated to the short and easy voyages along the coast, which they were accustomed to perform." We have many proofs, however, that even anterior to the 15th century, there were large ships employed by the Spaniards, as well as by other nations. In an edict published in Barcelona, in 1354, by Pedro IV. enforcing various regulations for the security of commerce, mention is made of Catalonian merchant ships of two and three decks and from 8,000 to 12,000 quintals burthen.

In 1419, Alonzo of Arragon hired several merchant ships to transport artillery, horses, &c. from Barcelona to Italy, among which were two, each of which carried one hundred and twenty horses, which it is computed would require a vessel of at least 600 tons.

In 1463, mention is made of a Venetian ship which ar

rived at Barcelona from England, laden with wheat, and being of 700 tons burthen.

In 1497, a Castilian vessel arrived there being of 12,000 quintals burthen. These arrivals incidentally mentioned among others of similar size, as happening at one port, show that large ships were in use in those days*. Indeed, at the time of fitting out the second expedition of Columbus, there were prepared in the port of Bermeo, a Caracca of 1250 tons, and four ships, of from 150 to 450 tons burthen. Their destination, however, was altered, and they were sent to convoy Muley Boabdil, the last Moorish king of Granada, from the coast of his conquered territory to Africat.

It was not for want of large vessels in the Spanish ports, therefore, that those of Columbus were of so small a size. He considered them best adapted to voyages of discovery, as they required but little depth of water, and therefore could more easily and safely coast unknown shores, and explore bays and rivers. He had some purposely constructed of a very small size for this service; such was the caravel, which in his third voyage he despatched to look out for an opening to the sea at the upper part of the gulf of Paria, when the water grew too shallow for his vessel of one hundred tons burthen.

The most singular circumstance with respect to the ships of Columbus is that they should be open vessels for it seems difficult to believe that a voyage of such extent and peril should be attempted in barks of so frail a construction. This, however, is expressly mentioned by Peter Martyr, in his Decades written at the time, and mention is made

* Capmani Questiones Criticas. Quest. 6.

† Archives de Ind, en Sevilla.

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