De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2): The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'AngheraAnghiera, Pietro Martire d'
History
De Orbe Novo, Volume 1 (of 2): The Eight Decades of Peter Martyr D'Anghera
Anghiera, Pietro Martire d'
America -- Early accounts to 1600
Leaving the town of Javana, the Spaniards followed the watershed for
ten miles, and entered the territory of another chief, whom they
called the "Old Man," because they were heedless of his name and took
notice only of his age. Everywhere in the country of this cacique,
both in the riverbeds and in the soil, gold was found. Streams were
abundant and the county was everywhere rich and fertile. Leaving that
place, the Spaniards marched for five days through a desert country
which they thought had been devastated by war, for though the greater
part of it was fertile, it was neither inhabited nor cultivated.
On the fifth day they perceived in the distance two heavily laden
natives, approaching them. Marching upon them, they captured the men,
and found that they were carrying sacks of maize on their shoulders.
From the answers of these men they gathered that there were two
caciques in these regions, one on the coast, called Periqueta, another
in the interior, called Totonogo; the latter being blind. These two
men were fishermen who had been sent by their cacique Totonogo, to
Periqueta, with a burden of fish, which they had traded for bread.[8]
Trade is thereabouts carried on by exchange in kind, and not by means
of gold, which claims so many victims. Led by these two natives, the
Spaniards reached the country of Totonogo, the cacique whose country
extends along the west side of the gulf of San Miguel on the south
sea. This chieftain gave them six thousand castellanos of gold, partly
in ingots and partly worked; amongst the former was one which weighed
two castellanos, proving that gold exists in abundance in this region.
[Note 8: There has evidently at some time been an error of
transcription: the cacique Totonogo, who is first mentioned as ruling
along the sea-coast, is now described as sending fish to his neighbour
Periqueta.]
Following along the western coast, the Spaniards visited the cacique
Taracuru, from whom they obtained eight thousand pesos; a peso, as we
have already said, corresponding to an unminted castellano. They next
marched into the country of his brother Pananome, who fled and was
seen no more. His subjects declared the country to be rich in gold.
The Spaniards destroyed his residence. Six leagues farther on they
came to the country of another cacique called Tabor, and then to that
of another called Cheru. The latter received the Spaniards amicably,
and offered them four thousand pesos. He possesses valuable salt
deposits, and the country is rich in gold. Twelve miles farther they
came to another cacique called Anata, from whom they obtained twelve
thousand pesos, which the cacique had captured from neighbouring
chieftains whom he had conquered. This gold was even scorched, because
it had been carried out of the burning houses of his enemies. These
caciques rob and massacre one another, and destroy their villages,
during their atrocious wars. They give no quarter, and the victors
make a clean sweep of everything.[9]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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