TITLE OF THE NEWE UNBEKANTHE LANDTE (REDUCED).
At Basle in 1521 appeared his De nuper sub D. Carolo repertis insulis, the title of which is annexed in fac-simile. Harrisse[150] has called it an extract from the Fourth Decade; and a similar statement is made in the Carter-Brown Catalogue (vol. i. no. 67). But Stevens and other authorities define it as a substitute for the lost First Letter of Cortes, touching the expedition of Grijalva and the invasion of Mexico; and it supplements, rather than overlaps, Martyr’s other narratives.[151] Mr. Deane contends that if the Fourth Decade had then been written, this might well be considered an abridgment of it.
The first complete edition (De orbe novo) of all the eight decades was published in 1530 at Complutum; and with it is usually found the map (“Tipus orbis universalis”) of Apianus, which originally appeared in Camer’s Solinus in 1520. In this new issue the map has its date changed to 1530.[152]
In 1532, at Paris, appeared an abridgment in French of the first three decades, together with an abstract of Martyr’s De insulis (Basle, 1521), followed by abridgments of the printed second and third letters of Cortes,—the whole bearing the title, Extraict ov Recveil des Isles nouuellemēt trouuees en la grand mer Oceane en temps du roy Despaigne Fernād & Elizabeth sa femme, faict premierement en latin par Pierre Martyr de Millan, & depuis translate en languaige francoys.[153]
In 1533, at Basle, in folio, we find the first three decades and the tract of 1521 (De insulis) united in De rebus oceanicis et orbe novo.[154]
At Venice, in 1534, the Summario de la generale historia de l’Indie occidentali was a joint issue of Martyr and Oviedo, under the editing of Ramusio.[155] An edition of Martyr, published at Paris in 1536, sometimes mentioned,[156] does not apparently exist;[157] but an edition of 1537 is noted by Sabin.[158] In 1555 Richard Eden’s Decades of the Newe Worlde, or West India, appeared in black-letter at London. It is made up in large part from Martyr,[159] and was the basis of Richard Willes’ edition of Eden in 1577, which included the first four decades, and an abridgment of the last four, with additions from Oviedo and others,—all under the new name, The History of Trauayle.[160]
There was an edition again at Cologne in 1574,—the one which Robertson used.[161] Three decades and the De insulis are also included in a composite folio published at Basle in 1582, containing also Benzoni and Levinus, all in German.[162] The entire eight decades, in Latin, which had not been printed together since the Basle edition of 1530, were published in Paris in 1587 under the editing of Richard Hakluyt, with the title: De orbe novo Petri Martyris Anglerii Mediolanensis, protonotarij, et Caroli quinti senatoris Decades octo, diligenti temporum obseruatione, et vtilissimis annotationibus illustratæ, suôque nitori restitutæ, labore et industria Richardi Haklvyti Oxoniensis Angli. Additus est in vsum lectoris accuratus totius operis index. Parisiis, apud Gvillelmvm Avvray, 1587. With its “F. G.” map, it is exceedingly rare.[163]