Evening star., 1934-10-12
COLUMBUS DATE.
MAY PROVE 1474|
Material in Catholic U. Ii
brary Indicates 18-Year
Discrepancy.
BY THOMAS r.. HENRY.

/ navigator discover ana map Lne
. northeast coast of South America as
! early as 1448?
Did Christopher Columbus reach
the coast of Labrador in l474-lS
years before his credited discovery OF
the New World?
Both these questions are raised
and neither can be answered definite
ly in the negatively rare material
now in the Lima Library of the Cath
olic University of America. They
have been given intensive considera-
ton by Latin American scholars
close to the original Spanish and
Portuguese sources.
The first question arises from the
Interpretation of the BraZlian-Por-
tuguese scholar j. Batalha- Refs, con-
tained in rare pamphlet in the Lima
Library, of the nautical map of An
drea Blanche made in l448. At the
lower end of an extensive piece of
vellum is represented an extensive
land with the general contour of the
northeast coast of South America.
1t is represented. on the scale Of the
map, as only about 200 miles south
west Of the Cape Verde Islands, but
it bears the notation, which the Por-
tuguese geographer claims is very
difficult to decipher and interpret, of
1880" The distinct probability is
that he meant to signify his de-
parture from the scale at this point
and to say that the land, which he
labeled authentic island" was ! 500
miles away This would be about the
correct distance to the Brazilian
coast.
Purpose ProblematicaL
z He took. the trouble to label it as
<"authentic," apparently intending to
{ distinguish it from purely legend
ary land Copies of Bfancho's maps
of later date in the Catholic Univer-
sity Library do not contain this "au-
thentie island" Why he dropped it
is unknown.
Refs, in his argument, attempts to
meet the objection that II Portuguese
navigators had actually seen such a
land and its existence was so much
common knowledge as to be placed
on a map. then the discovery would
have been heralded by Portuguese
historians of the day as a major event.
Actually the best known of them do
not mention it at all. Their narra-
tives are almost entirely concerned
with the wars and statecraft of the
day, chiefly with the great exploits
of the Portuguese Kings. Reiz main
tains that they were employees OF
the monarchs, hired to glorify them,
and stuck to their jobs. They received
their'pay for telling of the valor of the
King and the beauty of the King, and
the exploits of an obscure sailor were
beneath their notice.
The greatest of them, Gomez Eanes
de Azurara, mentions only casually
the authentic Portuguese discoveries Of
the Canaries and Medeira Islands
with apologies for inserting such trivial
events beside accounts of the Kings
battles. The one historian of the thir-s
teenth century who was not Official"
Refs points out, was one Antonio CAL
vac. He was man of his time, how
ever. and wrote history largely accord
ing to the current pattern.
One Paragraph Significant.
His work contains one significant
paragraph:
1T is, moreover, told that in the
meantime, a Portuguese ship coming
out of the Straits of Gibraltar, was
carried West by storm much further
than was contemplated and arrived
at an island where there were cities
and people that spoke our language.
The master of the ship is said to
have brought some sand which was
sold to a jeweler in Lisbon, from
which a good quantity of gold was OBJ
tanned. This, having been made
known to the Infante Dom Pedro, who
was then governing, he had 1t written
in the royal archives"
But the outstanding evidence ad-
duced by Refs comes from private let
tiers of the period, which still constt-
tute an unexplored and difficult field
of research. Thus in 1900 there is a
letter to Dom Manuel of Portugal
from one Master Joao, bachiller in
arts and phisisian and cosmographer"
of the fleet OF Pedro Alvarez Cabral,
the Portuguese sailor who actually
discovered Brazil in that year. He
wrote that the feet has arrived at
''the land which the King might see
represented on the mappamundi which
Pero Vaz Bisagudo had made" Refs
adduces much internal evidence to
prove that this could not have been
the land discovered by Columbus.
Upon somewhat more tangible, but
yet very Shaky. evidence rests the con-
tention that Columbus had discovered
America as early as 1474, and that he
was granted the aid of Ferdinand and
Isabella not for a long chance, but to
rediscover what he assured them he
already had found.
Thus in his petition to the Spanish
monarchs he speaks of having in the