ORIGINAL NARRATIVES OF THE VOYAGES OF JOHN CABOT
INTRODUCTION
John Cabot, the Venetian sailor who took the first English ship across the Atlantic, was not a writer like Columbus, and consequently our knowledge of his projects and his achievements is limited to what is derived from the reports of other men who knew him or his son and from certain official documents. In general our material may be classified into: (a) English official documents, (b) reports derived from John Cabot himself, and (c) reports or records derived more or less directly from Sebastian Cabot. The materials in a and b are harmonious; those in classes b and c, on the other hand, are practically irreconcilable. The result of this conflict of testimony has been to discredit Sebastian Cabot and to lead many scholars to believe that he tried to ascribe to himself what his father did. Other critics reluctant to bring so serious a charge against a man who held honorable positions in Spain and later in England believe that the material in class c relates to the second voyage—that of 1498, and that by a mistake it was in the minds of the narrators confused with the voyage of 1497. For a presentation of all the original material the reader may be referred to H. Harrisse, John Cabot the Discoverer of North America, and Sebastian his Son (London, 1896), and to G. E. Weare, Cabot’s Discovery of North America (London, 1897). G. P. Winship, Cabot Bibliography (London, 1900), gives a complete guide to the Cabot literature. For a brief account of the voyages and of the Cabot question see E. G. Bourne, Spain in America (New York, 1904), pp. 54-63. The most important recent monograph is H. P. Biggar, The Voyages of the Cabots and of the Corte-Reals, in Revue Hispanique, tome X. (Paris, 1903).
The material presented here consists of the private letters of two Italians sojourning in London in 1497-1498, and the official despatch of the junior Spanish ambassador at the English court.
E. G. B.