James E. Wadsworth - Columbus and His First Voyage: A History in Documents

Columbus
and His
First Voyage

To my students who embark with me on a new voyage
of discovery every semester.

Columbus
and His
First Voyage

A History in Documents

Edited by
James E. Wadsworth

Bloomsbury Academic

An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

Contents

Statue of Liberty, New York Harbor

Columbus Takes Possession of the New World by Vittorio Bianchini (17971880)

Columbus Memorial at Union Station in Washington D.C., dedicated in 1912

Columbus Day Protest, Sunday, October 12, 2014, in Los Angeles

Statue of Columbus with Protest Sign, Columbus Day Protest, Sunday, October 12, 2014, in Los Angeles

Columbus Day Protesters, Sunday, October 12, 2014, in Los Angeles

Map of the World, c. 1490 by Henricus Martellus Germanus

Toscanellis Theoretical Map of the Atlantic, 1474, with the Western Hemisphere

The Path of Columbuss First Voyage

Christopher Columbuss Coat of Arms

Probable Route of Columbuss First Voyage through the Caribbean

Columbuss Flag from the First Voyage

Tainos at Work

Taino Dwellings and Hammock

Atlantic Coast of Andalusia

Sometimes the best history is taught when the historian gets out of the way and lets the sources inform the nature, depth, and direction of historical understanding. I am not suggesting that the special skills and insights historians bring to the table are unimportantfar from it. I would argue that they are crucial, even irreplaceable. But once we have done our jobs by providing the context and raising the questions, sometimes we just need to let the record be its own advocate for understanding.

The conclusions that students of history will reach when left to their own devices can sometimes range from the disturbing to the hilarious, as all history teachers know. But they can also illuminate the past in ways that can surprise and even enlighten us. And the understanding that can blossom from that contact with the real historical record is irreplaceable and unattainable in any other way.

When teaching or studying Christopher Columbus and his first voyage, it is easy to get lost in the labyrinth of competing narratives, stereotypes, and myths. Perhaps the only way to cut through this tangle of ideas and emotions is to dive into the actual sources.

Documentary histories, however, have a bad habit of being so large or wide-ranging that they lose all sense of focus and so remain unread. And no person in the historical record has become more submerged in the ocean of documents, biographies, and myths than Christopher Columbus. Consequently, this collection focuses only on the first voyage and on sources produced by Columbus himself and, as much as possible, on the testimony of those who accompanied him. I have not included the famous secondary accounts produced by his contemporaries because, ultimately, they had their information from Columbus and they do more to reveal individual agendas than to deepen our understanding of those first encounters.

We have become so accustomed to the Columbus version of events that we have failed to remember that competing narratives existed and struggled for dominance even in his own lifetime. In so doing, we unconsciously oversimplify the first voyage and deny our students the privilege of understanding the nature of history and of historical memory. We also

In the documents that follow, I have included the core historical documents related to the first voyage. I have tried to include the relevant background for the documents and to provide discussion questions without constraining you or your students freedom to engage these historical texts. To that end, I have tried to include only those pedagogical tools that would help support an examination of the texts without getting in the way of that examination. These include maps, a glossary, a timeline, and a bibliography.

Though I have tried to provide the relevant context for the first voyage and each document, you will undoubtedly have different approaches and different methods for examining Columbus and the world that produced him. I recognize this and I applaud it.

My focus on the first voyage is, in part, a surrender to the constricted historical narrative presented in our schools. Whether we historians like it or not, this is the voyage that interests students the most, this is the one most frequently taught and so has to carry the burden of informing the public about Columbus, his motives, his goals, his ideas, and how all of this would later affect the native peoples of the Americas, and even the world. The first voyage is also the source of many of the myths that swirl around Columbus and so deserves more attention as we seek to correct and complicate the real historical record for our students.

It must be said, however, that Columbuss other voyages were also important, and a study of them would do much to fill out his evolving character and opinions for those who wish a more comprehensive understanding of the man. Other documentary histories already do a good job at providing a more holistic view of Columbuss life and voyages. What they do not do is provide a sufficiently detailed analysis of the first voyage itself that would allow students and readers to grapple with the big questions that the voyage stimulated. Everything Columbus did afterward was tied to that voyage. It is the key to a historical understanding of this man and the earth-shattering events he set in motion.

And so it is time to get out of the way. Let our students discover Columbus and his first voyage for themselves.

1200: The Taino emerge as a distinct ethnic group in the Caribbean Islands.

140533: The Chinese Admiral Zheng He sails from China to Arabia, East Africa, India, and Indonesia.

141569: Dom Henrique, prince of Portugal and sometimes falsely called the navigator, actively exploits the Atlantic islands and the coast of West Africa.

1420s: Portugal discovers the Madeira Islands.

1448: The Portuguese establish their first trading post on the coast of Africa 700 kilometers south of Cape Bojador.

1453: Ottoman Turks seize Constantinople and the Hundred Years War between England and France ends without a formal treaty.

1455: Johann Gutenberg prints the Gutenberg Bible using metal type in a screw-type press.

1479: Spain concedes Portuguese monopoly of the West African trade in return for the Canary Islands.

1488: Bartolomeu Dias rounds the Cape of Good Hope.

1492: Columbus sails on his first journey.

1493: Columbus sails on his second journey with 1,500 male adventurers. He begins the conquest of the New World.

149394: The Pope settles a dispute between Portugal and Spain in what is called the Treaty of Tordesillas which draws a line in the ocean dividing the world between Portuguese areas of influence from Africa to India and Spanish influence over most of the Western Hemisphere.

1496: Columbuss brother, Bartolom Coln, founds the city of Santo Domingo on Hispaola.

1497: John Cabot lands on Newfoundland.

1498: Vasco da Gama sails to India.

1498: Columbus sails on his third voyage.

1500: The Portuguese captain, Pedro lvares Cabral, lands on what will become the coast of Brazil while on his way to India.

1502: Columbus sails on his fourth and final voyage.

1506: Columbus dies in Valladolid, Spain.

1451: Columbus born in Genoa, Italy.

1476: Columbus is shipwrecked off the coast of Portugal.