The same year, 1587, again in Paris, he published, also dedicated to Raleigh, and accompanied by a rare map, a revised edition in Latin of De Orbe Novo, the work of the Italian historian, Peter Martyr, giving the history of the first thirty years of American discovery.
Next, in 1589, appeared the first volume of the magnum opus of our author, under the general title of The Principall Navigations, Voiages, and Discoueries of the English Nation made by Sea or over Land to the most remote and farthest distant Quarters of the Earth at any time within the compasse of these 1500 years—an elaborate work of which the Divers Voyages was the germ, having the same direct object in view. Its scheme embraced a collection, in three volumes, of narratives and records, in the original, of voyages and discoveries made by Englishmen from earliest times to the compiler’s day, sprinkled with accounts of the more important explorations for foreign nations having relation to those for England. The initial volume opened with an extended “Epistle Dedicatorie” addressed to Sir Francis Walsingham, the queen’s chief secretary, and a more detailed “Preface to the Favourable Reader.” It included the main part of the Divers Voyages.
Nine years later, in 1598, the first volume of a second edition, revised and enlarged, to include voyages made “within the compasse of these 1600 yeares,” instead of fifteen hundred, made its appearance. The second volume of this edition followed the next year, 1599, and the last in 1600. They were of large size, fools-cap folio, and contained altogether the impressive number of five hundred and seventeen separate narratives of adventures by Englishmen from the time of King Arthur to and through Elizabeth’s reign.
Extended “Epistles Dedicatorie” were also prefixed to each of these volumes. That to the first was addressed to Charles Howard, the vanquisher of the Spanish Armada, 1588. Both of those to the second and third were to Sir Robert Cecil, Walsingham’s successor in the chief secretaryship, and afterward the Earl of Salisbury.
With the completion of the third volume Hakluyt’s work of research by no means ended. It was continued untiringly till the close of his life, and sufficient material was left by him in manuscript to constitute a fourth volume. This material passed to the hands of Samuel Purchas, the author of Purchas his Pilgrimages, or Relations of the World, etc., 1613, who utilized it, together with matter from the Principall Navigations, in a work of four volumes, published in 1625, under the title of Hakluytus Posthumus, or Purchas his Pilgrimes: containing a History of the World in Sea Voyages and Land Travels by Englishmen and Others. Afterward the Purchas his Pilgrimages was added as a fifth volume to the set. The combined work became most popularly known as Purchas’s Pilgrims, and was treated by some of the early historians as the first source of American history.
Nor did Hakluyt’s publications of an important nature and with the same general object—the fostering of naval enterprise generally and of American colonization in particular—end with the issue of his magnum opus. In 1601 he brought out, under the title of The Discoveries of the World, an English translation of a treatise by a Portuguese, Antonio Galvano. After that came an English version of Peter Martyr under this taking title: The Historie of the West Indies: Containing the Actes and Aduentures of the Spaniards, which have conquered and peopled those Countries, inriched with varietie of pleasant relation of the Manners, Ceremonies, Lawes, Governments, and Warres of the Indians: Published in Latin by Mr. Hakluyt and translated into English by M. Lok, Gent. This appeared a short time before the permanent colonization was effected, and was evidently timed to stimulate that movement.
Next, in 1609, he produced a translation from the Portuguese of an account of De Soto’s discoveries in 1539–1543, with a description of Florida and its riches, designed to encourage and foster the Virginia colony. To this Hakluyt gave the English title Virginia Richly Valued by the description of the mainland of Florida her next neighbour. The dedication was addressed to the “Right Worshipfull Counsellors and others the cheerefull aduenturors for the aduancement of that Christian and noble plantation of Virginia,” and the booklet was commended to them as a “worke ... though small in shew yet great in substance,” yielding much light to the enterprise in which they were with him concerned, whether it was desired “to know the present and future commodities of our countrie, or the qualities and conditions of the Inhabitants, or what course is best to be taken with them.”
Two years later, in 1611, he issued a second edition, for the combined purpose of buoying up the spirits of the young colony, now disheartened by much suffering, and of procuring additional aid for it at home. This appeared with a new and more alluring title, in which particular stress was laid upon the wealth of gold, silver, and other precious things supposed to exist in the region, then believed to be the richest in the world: The worthie and famous historie of the travails, discovery and conquest of that great continent of Terra Florida being lively paralleled with that of our own now inhabited Virginia. As also the commodities of said country with divers and excellent and rich mynes of golde, silver, and other metals etc. which cannot but give us a great and exceeding hope for our Virginia being so neere to one continent etc.
This was fittingly Hakluyt’s last published work.