History of Central America, Volume 1, 1501-1530: The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft, Volume 6Bancroft, Hubert Howe
History
History of Central America, Volume 1, 1501-1530: The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft, Volume 6
Bancroft, Hubert Howe
Central America -- History
[1291.] Doria and Vivaldi, Genoese, undertook a voyage down the African
coast with a view of reaching India, and were last heard of at a place
called Gozora. On this voyage, which rests on several authorities,
has been founded a claim that the Italians preceded the Portuguese in
passing Cape Bojador. Major, _Prince Henry_, pp. 99-110, concludes
from an examination of all the documents that there are no grounds
for this claim, although admitting the voyage and its purpose, in fact
everything but its success. Gozora was probably Cape Non. Kohl regards
this expedition as uncertain. One of the documents gives the date as
1281; from which circumstance Kohl and Humboldt erroneously make of it
two voyages. D'Avesac, in _Nouvelles Annales des Voyages_, 1845, tom.
cviii. p. 45, has the date 1285. Muñoz, _Hist. Nuevo Mundo_, pp. 30-1,
speaks of Genoese expeditions and the rediscovery of the Canaries during
this century.
[1306.] On a map made by the Venetian Sanuto in 1306, Africa is
represented as surrounded by the sea, but there is no evidence that the
geography of that region is derived from any actual observations. The
map simply shows one of the two theories then held respecting the shape
of southern Africa.
[1332 et seq.] Sir John Mandeville, an English physician, between 1332
and 1366, travelled in eastern parts, including the Holy Land, India,
and China. On his return he wrote in three languages an account of his
adventures, with descriptions of the countries visited. See _Hakluyt
Soc._, _Divers Voy._, Introd. p. xliii. His work corroborates that of
Marco Polo, and although full of exaggerations, and probably tampered
with by copyists in respect to adventures and anecdotes, "yet," says
Irving, "his accounts of the countries which he visited have been found
far more veracious than had been imagined." _Purchas_, _His Pilgrimes_,
vol. iii. pp. 128-38; _Travels of Sir John Mandeville_, London, 1725.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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