The Letters of Amerigo Vespucci Part 7

=Yaquimo=, port in Espanola, Hojeda at, 33, 80, 97, 98 =Yuca=, xxiii, x.x.x, 11, 13, 14 (see =Juca=) =Yucatan=, iii, x.x.xii

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: _Amerigo Vespucci, son caractere, ses ecrits (meme les moins authentiques), sa vie, et ses navigations._ Par F. A. de Varnhagen, Ministre du Brazil en Perou. (Lima, 1865.)]

[Footnote 2: _Vita e lettere d'Amerigo Vespucci, Gentiluomo Florentino, raccolte ed ill.u.s.trate dall' Abate Angelo Maria Bandini._ (4to, Firenze, 1745.)]

[Footnote 3: _Viaggi d'Amerigo Vespucci con la vita, l'elogio, e la dissertazione justicativa di questo celebre navigatore_, del Padre Stanislao Canovai, delle scuole pie, pubblico professore di Matematico.

Opera postuma. (Firenze, 8vo, 1817.)]

[Footnote 4: The first of these letters was published by Bandini from a ma.n.u.script found in the Riccardi Library at Florence. It is intended to describe the voyage with Hojeda in 1499. The second appeared in the edition of Marco Polo by Baldelli in 1827, and was also found in the Riccardi Library. It describes an imaginary voyage to the East Indies.

The third describes a Portuguese voyage, and was published by Bartolozzi in 1789. It was discovered in the archives of the old Secretariat of State at Florence, among papers which belonged to the Strozzi Library.

All three profess to be addressed to Lorenzo di Medici. They are reprinted by Varnhagen, pp. 69-86.]

[Footnote 5: Bandini, _Vita_, xxiv.]

[Footnote 6: There are sixty-eight letters to him, 1483-91, chiefly on business matters.]

[Footnote 7: _Nav._, iii, 316.]

[Footnote 8: Four sailed for Espanola, under the command of Aguado, on 5th August 1495. Others were probably used for the voyage of Pero Alonzo Nino, which sailed on June 15th, 1496; and for the third expedition of Columbus in 1498.]

[Footnote 9: On the authority of Munoz, quoted by Navarrete (iii, 317 _n._). More recent researches have failed to discover these entries seen by Munoz in the second book of _Gastos de las armadas de las Indias_ of the "Casa de Contratacion"; and Mr. Harrisse, therefore, a.s.sumes that they never existed. This does not follow, and the evidence of so high an authority as Munoz cannot so lightly be set aside. It is true, however, that the evidence of Munoz is not conclusive without doc.u.ments, and in that case the last date on which Vespucci is mentioned as being at Seville is January 12th, 1496.]

[Footnote 10: Pliny the elder was born thirty-one years after the death of Mecaenas.]

[Footnote 11: "The sculptures of Polycletus and the paintings of Apelles."

(Macaulay.)]

[Footnote 12: Letter to Solderini, p. 3.]

[Footnote 13: Chap. clxvi, end.]

[Footnote 14: Letter to Medici, p. 4.]

[Footnote 15: Letter to Solderini, Fourth Voyage, p. 53.]

[Footnote 16: _Ibid._, p. 56.]

[Footnote 17: _Ibid._, Second Voyage, p. 27.]

[Footnote 18: Sebastian Cabot only knew of the qualifications of Vespucci from the report of his nephew Giovanni and others. He said, in his evidence before the Badajoz Commission (13th November 1515), that Vespucci took the alt.i.tude at Cape St. Augustine, and that he was expert in taking observations. Giovanni Vespucci also said that his uncle took sights and kept a journal. Nuno Garcia gave similar evidence. (Extracts by Munoz from the _Registro de copias de cedulas de la Casa de la Contratacion_, Nav., iii, 319.)]

[Footnote 19: See p. 44.]

[Footnote 20: See pages 99 to 106.]

[Footnote 21: Las Casas thinks that the islands where the natives were kidnapped, called _Iti_ by Vespucci, were Dominica and Guadalupe. See p.

93.]

[Footnote 22: These dates make the voyage mentioned in an alleged letter of Vespucci, recently found in Holland, quite impossible. This fabulous voyage from Lisbon to Calicut covered the time from March 1500 to November 15th, 1501. The letter was printed in Dutch by Jan van Doesborch at Antwerp, on December 1st, 1508 (twelve leaves). Mr. Coote (in the _Athenaeum_, Jan. 20, 1894) has suggested that the date is a mistake, and that it should be 1505-1506, the date of the Portuguese voyage of Almeida; having found that some incidents in the spurious letter occur also in the account of the voyage of Almeida. But the suggested dates are equally impossible so far as Vespucci is concerned, for he was certainly in Spain during the whole of 1505 and 1506. The letter is clearly a fabrication.]

[Footnote 23: _Nav._, iii, 292.]

[Footnote 24: _Ibid._, 294-95, 302.]

[Footnote 25: See p. 58.]

[Footnote 26: _Nav._, iii, 299.]

[Footnote 27: _Nav._, iii, 305, 308.]

[Footnote 28: On her death, in 1524, her pension was pa.s.sed on to her sister Catalina. (_Nav._, iii, 324.)]

[Footnote 29: _Ibid._, 306.]

[Footnote 30: See page 35.]

[Footnote 31: See page 42.]

[Footnote 32: See pp. 44, 45.]

[Footnote 33: Varnhagen thought, from the places and dates of other pamphlets bound up in the same volume with his copy, that it was printed by Piero Paccini, at Pescia, in 1506.]

[Footnote 34: The Spanish _traer_ is used for the Italian _portare_ four times, _cansado_ for _stanco_ three times, _disnudi_ for _ignudi_ three times, _salir_ for _escire_ twice, _allargar_ for _allungare_ twice, _dismanparate_ for _abbandonate_ twice, _largi_ for _lontani_ twice, and _ruego_ for _priego_ twice. Other Hispanicisms occur once, namely:--

_Usado_ for _Ardito_.

_Patagna_ " _Frivolezza_.

_Circa_ " _Vecino_.

_Brava_ " _Selvaggio_.

_Dispedino_ " _Licenziano_.

_Madiana_ " _Mediocra_.

_Formosa_ " _Bella_.

_Levono_ " _Portano_.

_Vaciare_ " _Votare_.

_Scusono_ " _Ricusano_.

_Dolentia_ " _Infirmita_.

_Relato_ " _Raccontato_.

_Profito_ " _Utilita_.

_Dimostra_ " _Indizio_.

_Folgato_ " _Spa.s.sato_.

_Di ba.s.so_ " _Sotto_.