page_title: 2nd Portuguese India Armada (Cabral, 1500)
section_title: Fleet
hierarchical_section_title: 2nd Portuguese India Armada (Cabral, 1500) / Fleet
caption_attribution_description: Português: Pedro Álvares Cabral, navegador e explorador português, descobridor do Brasil. English: Pedro Álvares Cabral, Portuguese maritime explorer, discoverer of Brazil. This image was first published in Retratos e elogios dos varões e donas que ilustraram a nação portuguesa, a serial work (1806–17) by the company formed by Pedro José de Figueiredo, Fr. Mariano Veloso, Canon Vilela Duarte da Cunha and Jose Taborda. The source of this reproduction is a steel engraving by the American Bank Note Company, which was used to print the 1000 cruzeiros bank notes[1] issued in 1962.
context_page_description: The Second Portuguese India Armada was assembled in 1500 on the order of King Manuel I of Portugal and placed under the command of Pedro Álvares Cabral. Cabral's armada famously discovered Brazil for the Portuguese crown along the way. By and large, the Second Armada's diplomatic mission to India failed, and provoked the opening of hostilities between the Kingdom of Portugal and the feudal city-state of Calicut. Nonetheless, it managed to establish a factory in the nearby Kingdom of Cochin, the first Portuguese factory in Asia.
context_section_description: The first India Armada, commanded by Vasco da Gama, arrived in Portugal in the summer of 1499, in rather sorry shape. Half of his ships and men had been lost thanks to battles, disease, and storms. Although Gama came back with a hefty cargo of spices that would be sold at enormous profit, he had failed in the principal objective of his mission: to negotiate a treaty with Calicut, the spice entrepôt on the Malabar Coast of India. Gama managed, however, to open the sea route to India via the Cape of Good Hope and secured good relations with the African city-state of Malindi, a critical staging post along the way.
  On King Manuel I's orders, arrangements were immediately made to begin the assembly of a second armada in Cascais.  Determined not to repeat Gama's mistakes, this one was to be a large and well-armed fleet of 13 ships and 1500 men, laden with valuable gifts and diplomatic letters to win over the potentates of the east.
  Many details of the composition of the fleet are missing. Only three ship names are known, and there is some conflict among the sources on the captains.  The following list of ships should not be regarded as authoritative, but as a tentative list compiled from various conflicting accounts.
  This list is principally in concordance with Fernão Lopes de Castanheda's Historia, João de Barros's Décadas, Damião de Góis's Chronica, the marginal gloss of the Relaçao das Naos, Diogo do Couto's list, and Manuel de Faria e Sousa's Asia Portugueza. The main conflict is with Gaspar Correia's Lendas da Índia, who omits Pêro de Ataíde and Aires Gomes da Silva, listing instead Braz Matoso and Pedro de Figueiró, and introduces André Gonçalves in addition to Lemos. Correia also identifies Simão de Miranda as vice-admiral and captain of Cabral's own flagship.  Neither of the two eyewitnesses—an anonymous Portuguese pilot and Pêro Vaz de Caminha—give a list of captains in their sources.
  The Second Armada was to be headed by the Portuguese nobleman Pedro Álvares Cabral, a master of the Order of Christ. Cabral had no notable naval or military experience; his appointment as capitão-mor (captain-major) was largely politically motivated.  The exiled Castillian nobleman Sancho de Tovar was designated vice-admiral (soto-capitão) and Cabral's successor should anything happen to him.
  Veteran pilot Pedro Escobar was given the overall technical command of the expedition. Other veterans of the first armada included captain Nicolau Coelho, pilot Pêro de Alenquer, and clerks Afonso Lopes and João de Sá.  The famed navigator Bartolomeu Dias, who was the first to double the Cape of Good Hope, and his brother Diogo Dias, who had served as clerk on Gama's ship, also served as captains.
  Most of the ships were either carracks (naus) or caravels, and at least one was a small supply ship, although details on names and tonnage are missing.  At least two ships, Cabral's flagship and Tovar's El Rei, were said to be around 240 tons, that is, about twice the size of the largest ship in the first armada three years prior.
  Ten ships were destined for Calicut (Malabar, India), while the two ships headed by the Dias brothers were destined for Sofala in East Africa and the supply ship was destined to be scuttled and burnt along the way.
  At least two ships were privately owned and outfitted: Luís Pires's ship was owned by Diogo da Silva e Meneses, Count of Portalegre, while Nuno Leitão da Cunha's Anunciada was owned by the king's cousin D. Álvaro of Braganza, and financed by an Italian consortium composed of the Florentine bankers Bartolomeo Marchionni and Girolamo Sernigi and the Genoese Antonio Salvago. The remainder belonged to the Portuguese crown.
  Accompanying the expedition as translator was Gaspar da Gama, who was a Jew captured in Angediva by Vasco Gama, as well as four Hindu hostages from Calicut taken by Gama in 1498 during negotiations. Also aboard was the ambassador of the Sultan of Malindi, who had arrived at Portugal with Gama, and was set to return to Malindi with Cabral's expedition.
  Other passengers on the expedition included Aires Cor
caption: Pedro Álvares Cabral
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