De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2) by Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt

T >> Trans. by Francis Augustus MacNutt >> De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2)

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[Note 2: Also called Nino; he had sailed with Columbus on his
first two voyages. Oviedo, _op. cit_., xix., I, also describes this
expedition.]

[Note 3: Nunez was poor and only found assistance from a merchant
of Seville called Guerro, on condition that the latter's brother,
Christobal, should command the one ship his loan sufficed to provide.
This vessel was only fifty tons burden, and carried a crew of
thirty-three persons.]

Upon entering this harbour he found a number of houses scattered along
the banks, but when he landed it was discovered to be a group of eight
houses; about fifty men, led by their chief, promptly came from a
populous village only three miles distant. These men, who were naked,
invited Alonzo Nunez to land on their coast, and he consented. He
distributed some needles, bracelets, rings, glass pearls, and other
pedlar's trifles amongst them, and in less than an hour he obtained
from them in exchange fifteen ounces of the pearls they wore on their
necks and arms. The natives embraced Nunez affectionately, insisting
more and more that he should come to their village, where they
promised to give him any amount of pearls he might desire. The next
day at dawn the ship drew near to the village and anchored. The entire
population assembled and begged the men to land, but Nunez, seeing
that they were very numerous and considering that he had only thirty
men, did not venture to trust himself to them. He made them understand
by signs and gestures that they should come to the ship in barques
and canoes. These barques, like the others, are dug out of a single
tree-trunk, but are less well shaped and less easy to handle than
those used by the cannibals and the natives of Hispaniola. They are
called _gallitas_. The natives all brought strings of pearls, which
are called _tenoras_, and showed themselves desirous of Spanish
merchandise.

They are amiable men; simple, innocent, and hospitable, as was made
clear after twenty days of intercourse with them. The Spaniards very
soon ceased to fear to enter their houses, which are built of wood
covered with palm leaves. Their principal food is the meat of the
shellfish from which they extract pearls, and their shores abound
with such. They likewise eat the flesh of wild animals, for deer,
wild-boar, rabbits whose hair and colour resemble our hares, doves,
and turtle-doves exist in their country. The women keep ducks and
geese about the houses, just as ours do; peacocks fly about in the
woods, but their colours are not so rich or so varied as ours and the
male bird differs little from the female. Amongst the undergrowth
in the swamps, pheasants are from time to time seen. The people of
Curiana are skilful hunters and generally with one single arrow shot
they kill beasts or birds at which they aim. The Spaniards spent
several days amongst the abundance of the country. They traded four
needles for a peacock, only two for a pheasant, and one for a dove or
a turtle-dove. The same, or a glass bead, was given for a goose.
In making their offers and bargaining and disputing, the natives
conducted their commercial affairs just about the same as do our women
when they are arguing with pedlars. As they wore no clothes, the
natives were puzzled to know the use of needles, but when the
Spaniards satisfied their naive curiosity by showing them that needles
were useful for getting thorns from beneath the skin, and for cleaning
the teeth, they conceived a great opinion of them. Another thing which
pleased them even more was the colour and sound of hawk-bells, which
they were ready to buy at good prices.

From the native houses the roaring of large animals[4] was audible
amidst the dense and lofty forest trees, but these animals are not
fierce, for, although the natives constantly wander through the
woods with no other weapons than their bows and arrows, there is no
recollection of any one being killed by these beasts. They brought the
Spaniards as many deer and wild-boar, slain with their arrows, as the
latter desired. They did not possess cattle or goats or sheep, and
they ate bread made of roots and bread made of grain the same as the
islanders of Hispaniola. Their hair is black, thick, half curly, and
long. They try to spoil the whiteness of their teeth, for almost the
entire day they chew a herb which blackens them, and when they spit it
out, they wash their mouth. It is the women who labour in the fields
rather than the men, the latter spending their time in hunting,
fighting, or leading dances and games.

[Note 4: Supposed to have been tapirs, animals unknown in Europe.]

Pitchers, cups with handles, and pots are their earthenware utensils,
which they procure from elsewhere, for they frequently hold markets,
which all the neighbouring tribes attend, each bringing the products
of his country to be exchanged for those of other places. In fact,
there is nobody who is not delighted to obtain what is not to be had
at home, because the love of novelty is an essential sentiment
of human nature. They hang little birds and other small animals,
artistically worked in base gold,[5] to their pearls. These trinkets
they obtain by trade, and the metal resembles the German gold used for
coining florins.

[Note 5: A kind of alloyed gold called by the natives _guanin_;
the Spaniards were often deceived by its glitter.]

The men either carry their private parts enclosed in a little gourd
which has been opened at the back, like our cod-piece, or they use a
seashell. The gourd hangs from a cord tied round the waist.[6] The
presence of the animals above mentioned, and many other indications
not found in any of the islands, afford evidence that this land is a
continent. The most conclusive proof[7] seems to be that the Spaniards
followed the coast of Paria for a distance of about three thousand
miles always in a westerly direction, but without discovering any
end to it. When asked whence they procured their gold, the people of
Curiana answered that it came from a country called Cauchieta situated
about six suns distant (which means six days) to the west, and that it
was the artisans of that region who worked the gold into the form in
which they saw it. The Spaniards sailed towards Cauchieta and anchored
there near the shore on the calends of November, 1500. The natives
fearlessly approached and brought them gold, which in its rough state
is not valued amongst them. The people also wore pearls round their
throats; but these came from Curiana, where they had been obtained in
exchange for gold, and none of them wanted to part with anything they
had obtained by trade. That is to say the people of Curiana kept their
gold, and the people of Cauchieta their pearls, so that very little
gold was obtained at Cauchieta.[8] The Spaniards brought away some
very pretty monkeys and a number of parrots of varied colours, from
that country.

[Note 6: The text continues: _alibi in eo tractu intra vaginam
mentularemque nervum reducunt, funiculoque praeputium alligant_.]

[Note 7: Navarrete, iii., 14.]

[Note 8: _Auri tamen parum apud Cauchietenses: lectum reperere_
meaning, doubtless, that they traded away most of their gold for
pearls.]

The temperature in the month of November was delicious, without a sign
of cold. Each evening the stars which mark the north pole disappeared,
so near is that region to the equator; but it was not possible to
calculate precisely the polar degrees. The natives are sensible and
not suspicious, and some of the people of Curiana passed the entire
night in company with our men, coming out in their barques to join
them. Pearls they call _corixas_. They are jealous, and when strangers
visit them, they make their women withdraw behind the house, from
whence the latter examine the guests as though they were prodigies.
Cotton is plentiful and grows wild in Cauchieta, just as shrubs do in
our forests, and of this they make trousers which they wear.

Continuing their course along the same coast, the Spaniards suddenly
encountered about two thousand men armed according to the fashion of
the country, who prevented them from landing. They were so barbarous
and ferocious that it was impossible to establish the smallest
relations with them or to effect any trade; so, as our men were
satisfied with the pearls they had procured, they returned by the
same course to Curiana, where they remained for another twenty days
bountifully supplied with provisions.

It seems to me neither out of place nor useless to this history, to
here narrate what happened when they arrived within sight of the
coasts of Paria. They encountered by chance a squadron of eighteen
canoes full of cannibals engaged in a man-hunt: this was near the Boca
de la Sierpe and the strait leading to the gulf of Paria, which I have
before described. The cannibals unconcernedly approached the ship,
surrounding it, and shooting flights of arrows and javelins at our
men. The Spaniards replied by a cannon shot, which promptly scattered
them. In pursuing them, the ship's boat came up with one of their
canoes, but was able to capture only a single cannibal and a bound
prisoner, the others having all escaped by swimming. This prisoner
burst into tears, and by his gestures and rolling his eyes, gave it
to be understood that six of his companions had been cruelly
disembowelled, cut into pieces, and devoured by those monsters, and
that the same fate awaited him on the morrow. They made him a present
of the cannibal, upon whom he immediately threw himself, gnashing his
teeth and belabouring him with blows of a stick and his fists and with
kicks, for he believed that the death of his companions would not be
sufficiently avenged till he beheld the cannibal insensible and beaten
black and blue. When questioned as to the customs and usages of the
cannibals when they made expeditions to other countries, he said
they always carried with them, wherever they went, sticks prepared
beforehand which they planted in the ground at the place of their
encampment, and beneath whose shelter they passed the night.

Hanging over the door of one of the chieftains in Curiana, the
Spaniards found the head of a cannibal, which was regarded as a sort
of standard or helmet captured from the enemy, and constituted a great
honour for this chief.

There is a district on the coast of Paria, called Haraia, which is
remarkable for a peculiar kind of salt found there. It is a vast plain
over which the waves of the sea are driven in heavy weather and
when the waves subside and the sun comes out, the pools of water
crystallise into masses of the whitest salt, in sufficient quantity
for the natives to load all the ships that sail, did they arrive
before it rained. The first rainfall melts the salt, which is then
absorbed by the sands and thus returns through fissures in the earth,
to the sea which produces it. Others pretend that this plain is not
inundated by the sea, but that it possesses saline springs, more
bitter than sea water, which send forth their waters when the tempest
rages. The natives set great store on these salines, and they not
only use the salt in the same way that we do, but they mould it into
brick-shaped forms and trade it to foreigners for articles which they
do not themselves possess.

The bodies of the chiefs of the country are laid upon biers under
which a slow fire is lighted which consumes the flesh, little by
little, but leaves the bones and the skin intact. These dried bodies
are then piously preserved, as though they were their _penates_. The
Spaniards say that in one district they saw a man being thus dried for
preservation and in another a woman.

When, on the eighth day of the ides of February, the Spaniards were
ready to leave the country of Curiana, they found they had ninety-six
pounds of pearls at eight ounces to the pound, which they had obtained
at an average price of five cents.

Although their return voyage was shorter than when they came from
Hispaniola, it lasted sixty-one days, because continual currents
running from east to west not only retarded their speed, but sometimes
completely stopped the ship. Finally they arrived, loaded with pearls
like other people come loaded with straw. The commander, Pedro Alonzo
Nunez, concealed an important quantity of valuable pearls, and thus
cheated the royal revenues, to which a fifth of all merchandise
belongs.[9] His fellows denounced him, and Fernando de Vega, a learned
statesman, who was Governor of Galicia where they landed, arrested
him, and he was held in prison for a long time, but was finally
released; and even to this day he still claims they robbed him of his
share of the pearls. Many of these stones are as large as nuts, and
resemble oriental pearls, but as they are badly pierced, they are less
valuable.

[Note 9: Navarrete, iii., 78. The treasure was sold in August,
1501, and the proceeds divided among the sailors.]

One day, when lunching with the illustrious Duke of Medina-Sidonia in
Seville, I saw one of these pearls which had been presented to him. It
weighed more than a hundred ounces, and I was charmed by its beauty
and brilliancy. Some people claim that Nunez did not find these pearls
at Curiana, which is more than one hundred and twenty leagues distant
from Boca de la Sierpe, but in the little districts of Cumana and
Manacapana near by the Boca and the island of Margarita. They declare
that Curiana is not rich in pearls. This question has not been
decided; so let us treat of another subject. You now perceive what, in
the course of years, may be the value of this newly discovered country
and western coasts, since after a superficial exploration they have
yielded such evidences of wealth.

BOOK IX

TO THE SAME CARDINAL LUDOVICO D'ARAGON

Vincent Yanez Pinzon and his nephew Arias, who accompanied the Admiral
Columbus on his first voyage as captains of two of the smaller vessels
which I have above described as caravels, desirous of undertaking new
expeditions and making fresh discoveries, built at their own expense
four caravels in their native port of Palos, as it is called by the
Spaniards.[1] They sought the authorisation of the King and towards
the calends of December, 1499, they left port. Now Palos is on the
western coast of Spain, situated about seventy-two miles distant from
Cadiz and sixty-four miles from Seville in Andalusia, and all the
inhabitants without exception are seafaring people, exclusively
occupied in navigation.

[Note 1: An interesting account of this expedition may be read in
Washington Irving's _Companions of Columbus_; see also Navarrete, _op.
cit_., 82, 102, 113.]

Pinzon coasted along the Fortunate Isles,[2] and first laid his course
for the Hesperides, otherwise called the islands of Cape Verde, or
still better, the Medusian Gorgons. Sailing directly south on the
ides of January, from that island of the Hesperides called by the
Portuguese San Juan, they sailed before the south-west wind for about
three hundred leagues, after which they lost sight of the north star.
As soon as it disappeared they were caught in winds and currents
and continual tempests, though in spite of these great dangers they
accomplished by the aid of this wind two hundred and forty leagues.
The north star was no longer to be seen. They are in contradiction
with the ancient poets, philosophers, and cosmographers over the
question whether that portion of the world on the equinoctial line
is or is not an inaccessible desert. The Spaniards affirm that it is
inhabited by numerous peoples,[3] while the ancient writers maintain
that it is uninhabitable because of the perpendicular rays of the sun.
I must admit, however, that even amongst ancient authorities some have
been found who sought to maintain that that part of the world was
habitable.[4] When I asked the sailors of the Pinzons if they had seen
the polar star to the south, they said that they had seen no star
resembling the polar star of our hemisphere, but they did see entirely
different stars,[5] and hanging on the higher horizon a thick sort of
vapour which shut off the view. They believe that the middle part
of the globe rises to a ridge,[6] and that the antarctic star is
perceptible after that elevation is passed. At all events they have
seen constellations entirely different from those of our hemisphere.
Such is their story, which I give you as they told it. _Davi sunt, non
Oedipi_.[7]

[Note 2: Meaning the Canaries in which the ancients placed the
Garden of the Hesperides. From them Ptolemy began to reckon longitude.
The names Hesperia, Hesperides, Hesperus, etc., were used to indicate
the west; thus Italy is spoken of by Macrobius: _illi nam scilicet
Graeci a stella Hespero dicunt Venus et Hesperia Italia quae occasui
sit_; Saturnalium, lib. i., cap. iii. Ptolemy likewise says: _Italia
Hesperia ab Hespero Stella quod illius occasui subjecta sit_, and
again in his _Historia tripartita_, lib. viii: _Quum Valentinianus
Imperator as oras Hesperias navigaret, id est ad Italiam, et
Hispaniam_. Elsewhere the same author mentions the islands off the
west coast of Africa, of which he received some vague information as:
_Incognitam terram qui communi vocabulo Hesperi appellantur Ethiopes_.
Pliny, Strabo, in the last chapter _De Situ Orbis_, Diodorus, and
others make similar usage of the terms. St. Anselm, _De Imagine
Mundi_, lib. i., cap. xx., _Juxta has, scilicet Gorgonas Hesperidum
ortus_; Pomponius Mela, lib. iii. cap. ix., x., xi.]

[Note 3: The sub-equatorial regions of Africa had already been
visited by numerous navigators since the time of Prince Henry of
Portugal, and the fact that they were inhabited was well known to the
Spaniards.]

[Note 4: Plato, Cicero, Aristotle, Anaxagoras, Mela, and others
were amongst those who believed in the existence of the Antipodes.]

[Note 5: Aristotle, _De Caelo et Terra_, ii., 14. The constellation
of the Southern Cross was known from the writings of the Arab
geographers.]

[Note 6: First noted by Columbus in a letter written from
Hispaniola in October, 1498.]

[Note 7: _Davus sum non Oedipus_, Andria, Act I, Scene II. The
quotation, transposed by Martyr from the singular into the plural
number, is from Terrence, Davus being a comic character in the comedy
of _Andria_.]

On the seventh day of the calends of February, land was finally
discovered on the horizon.[8] As the sea was troubled, soundings were
taken and the bottom found at sixteen fathoms. Approaching the coast
they landed at a place where they remained two entire days without
seeing a single inhabitant, though some traces of human beings were
found on the banks. After writing their names and the name of the
King, with some details of their landing, on the trees and rocks, the
Spaniards departed. Guiding themselves by some fires they saw during
the night, they encountered not far from their first landing-place
a tribe encamped and sleeping in the open air. They decided not to
disturb them until daybreak and when the sun rose forty men, carrying
arms, marched towards the natives. Upon seeing them, thirty-two
savages, armed with bows and javelins, advanced, followed by the rest
of the troop armed in like manner. Our men relate that these natives
were larger than Germans or Hungarians. With frowning eyes and
menacing looks they scanned our compatriots, who thought it unwise to
use their arms against them. Whether they acted thus out of fear or to
prevent them running away, I am ignorant, but at any rate, they sought
to attract the natives by gentle words and by offering them presents;
but the natives showed themselves determined to have no relation with
the Spaniards, refusing to trade and holding themselves ready to
fight. They limited themselves to listening to the Spaniards' speech
and watching their gestures, after which both parties separated.
The natives fled the following night at midnight, abandoning their
encampment.

[Note 8: The present Cape San Augustin; it was sighted Jan. 28,
1500, and named Santa Maria de la Consolacion.]

The Spaniards describe these people as a vagabond race similar to the
Scythians, who had no fixed abode but wandered with their wives and
children from one country to another at the harvest seasons. They
swear that the footprints left upon the sand show them to have feet
twice as large as those of a medium-sized man.[9] Continuing their
voyage, the Spaniards arrived at the mouth of another river, which
was, however, too shallow for the caravels to enter. Four shallops of
soldiers were therefore sent to land and reconnoitre. They observed
on a hillock near the bank a group of natives, to whom they sent a
messenger to invite them to trade. It is thought the natives wanted to
capture one of the Spaniards and take him with them, for, in exchange
for a hawk's-bell which he had offered them as an attraction, they
threw a golden wedge of a cubit's length towards the messenger, and
when the Spaniard stooped to take up the piece of gold, the natives
surrounded him in less time than it takes to tell it, and tried to
drag him off. He managed to defend himself against his assailants,
using his sword and buckler until such time as his companions in the
boats could come to his assistance. To conclude in a few words, since
you spoke to me so urgently of your approaching departure, the natives
killed eight of the Spaniards and wounded several others with their
arrows and javelins. They attacked the barques with great daring from
the river banks, seeking to drag the boats ashore; although they were
killed like sheep by sword strokes and lance thrusts (for they were
naked); they did not on that account yield. They even succeeded in
carrying off one of the barques, which was empty, and whose pilot had
been struck by an arrow and killed. The other barques succeeded in
escaping, and thus the Spaniards left these barbarous natives.

[Note 9: One of the numerous tales of giants in America, which
circulated and for a long time obtained credence.]

Much saddened by the loss of their companions, the Spaniards followed
the same coast in a north-westerly direction and, after proceeding
some forty leagues, they arrived at a sea whose waters are
sufficiently fresh to admit of their replenishing their supply of
drinking water. Seeking the cause of this phenomenon they discovered
that several swift rivers which pour down from the mountains came
together at that point, and flowed into the sea.[10] A number of
islands dotted this sea, which are described as remarkable for
their fertility and numerous population. The natives are gentle and
sociable, but these qualities are of little use to them because they
do not possess the gold or precious stones which the Spaniards seek.
Thirty-six of them were taken prisoners. The natives call that entire
region Mariatambal. The country to the east of this great river is
called Canomora, and that on the west Paricora. The natives gave it
to be understood by signs that in the interior of the country gold of
good quality was found. Continuing their march, directly north, but
always following the windings of the coast, the Spaniards again
sighted the polar star. All this coast is a part of Paria, that land
so rich in pearls which Columbus himself discovered, as we have
related; he being the real author of these discoveries. The coast
reconnoitred by the Pinzons continues past the Boca de la Sierpe,
already described, and the districts of Cumana, Manacapana, Curiana,
Cauchieta, and Cauchibachoa, and it is thought that it extends to the
continent of India.[11] It is evident that this coast is too extended
to belong to an island, and yet, if one takes it altogether, the whole
universe may be called an island.[12]

[Note 10: Possibly the estuary of the Amazon.]

[Note 11: _Propterea Gangetidis Indiae continentem putans_. The
Ruysch map (1516) shows the junction of the American continent with
Asia.]

[Note 12: _Licet universum terrae, orbem, large sumptum, insulam
dicere fas sit_.]

From the time when they left the land where they lost sight of the
pole star, until they reached Paria, the Spaniards report that
they proceeded towards the west for a distance of three hundred
uninterrupted leagues. Midway they discovered a large river called
Maragnon, so large in fact that I suspect them of exaggerating; for
when I asked them on their return from their voyage if this river was
not more likely a sea separating two continents, they said that the
water at its mouth was fresh, and that this quality increased the
farther one mounted the river. It is dotted with islands and full
of fish. They above all declare that is it more than thirty leagues
broad, and that its waters flow with such impetuosity that the sea
recedes before its current.[13]

[Note 13: The mouth of the Maragnon or Amazon is, in fact, sixty
leagues wide.]

When we recall what is told of the northern and southern mouths of
the Danube, which drive back the waters of the sea to such a great
distance and may be drunk by sailors, we cease to be astonished if the
river described be represented as still larger. What indeed hinders
nature from creating a river even larger than the Danube, or indeed
a still larger one than the Maragnon? I think it is some river[14]
already mentioned by Columbus when he explored the coasts of Paria.
But all these problems will be elucidated later, so let us now turn
our attention to the natural products of the country.

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