In Africa there is an approximation towards its true shape; yet the Caput Viride , or Cape Verd, is placed to the north of the river Senegal, instead of between that river and the Gambia; and the sources of the Nile are brought down to lat. 15° S. at least twenty-two degrees too far to the southwards.
Asia, with India and China, are too much distorted for criticism. Calicut is placed in the peninsula of Cambaya or Guzerate. The Aurea Chersonesus and Regnum Malacha , or Malacca, are separated by a great gulf, while the latter is placed so low as 30° S. latitude. This much may suffice for an account of the incorrect yet curious specimen of cosmographical knowledge which had been acquired by the learned in Europe about 300 years ago.
To these four letters we have added a short account of several curious circumstances relative to the trade of the Europeans with India at the commencement of the sixteenth century, or three hundred years ago; which, though not very accurately expressed, contains some curious information.
SECTION I.
Letter from the Venetian Envoy in Portugal to the Republic [1].
[1] This letter is dated on the 20th of June 1501, and obviously refers to the voyage of Cabral, who had returned from India not long before. The writer is described as a native of Crete, and envoy from the lords of Venice to the king of Portugal.--E.
Most serene prince, &c. Believing that your highness has been already informed by the most excellent legate, of all the memorable things which have occurred in this place, and particularly respecting the fleet so lately dispatched for India by the king of Portugal, which, by the blessing of God, has now returned with the loss of seven ships; as it originally consisted of fourteen sail, seven of which only have come home, the other seven having been wrecked in the voyage. Their voyage was along the coasts of Mauritania and Getulia to Cape Verd, anciently called Experias ; off which the islands called the Hesperides are situated. From thence they explored lower Ethiopia towards the east, beyond which the ancients never penetrated. They sailed along this eastern coast of Ethiopia to a line corresponding with the meridian of Sicily, about five or six degrees within the equinoctial, the gold mines belonging to the king of Portugal being about the middle of that coast.[2] Beyond that coast of the gold mines, and nine degrees to the south of the winter tropic ,[3] they came to a great promontory called the Cape of Good Hope, which is almost 5000 miles distant from our country. From thence they came to the cape anciently called Prasum , which was considered by Ptolemy as the extremity of the southern regions, all beyond being unknown to the ancients. After that they reached the country of the Troglodites , now called Zaphala , or Sofala, which our ancestors affirm to have abounded in gold, infinitely more than any other part of the earth. Stretching from Sofala across the Barbaric Gulf ,[4] they came into the Indian Ocean, and at length to the city of Calicut. Such was their voyage, which carefully calculated, as following the coasts of the ocean, extends to the prodigious length of 15,000 miles; but which, if the lands and mountains would allow in a direct line, were greatly shorter.
[2] The strange geographical language here used is inexplicable, probably because the ideas of the writer were confused. He seems to mean the Mina in Guinea, which is five or six degrees within the equator, or to the north; but is at least 18º west from the meridian of Sicily. --E.
[3] Meaning the tropic of Capricorn, on which the sun is during our winter solstice--E.
[4] The recession of the coast inwards from Cape Delgado to Melinda, which may be called the Bay of Zanzibar.--E.