AMERICUS VESPUCIUS' ACCOUNT OF HIS
FIRST VOYAGE

AMERICUS VESPUCIUS was a Florentine naval astronomer, forty pears of age at the time Columbus sailed on his first voyage of discovery. He was sent to Spain in 1496 by one of the commercial houses of the Medici and spent several years in Seville where he became acquainted with Columbus, in f act assisted the Admiral in fitting out his second expedition.

Vespucius was one of the first explorers to touch the mainland ( 1497) and if his dates are correct he reached the Continent of North America a fen, days before the Cabots touched the mainland farther north. This is conceding that in this letter relating the experiences of his first voyage he is not describing the "Pearl Coast" of South America but the southern shores of the present United States. And it is not at all improbable that "the finest harbor in the world" in which he spent 37 days repairing his ships and from which he sailed on his return to Spain, was our beautiful Hampton Roads.

KING DON FERRANDO of Castile being about to despatch four ships to discover new lands towards the West, I was chosen by His Highness to go in that Feet to aid in making discovery : and we set out from the port of Cadiz on the 10 day of May 1497, and took our route through the great gulf of the Ocean-sea: in which voyage we were eighteen months (engaged) : and discovered much continental land and innumerable islands, and great part of them inhabited.

As I said above, we left the port of Cadiz four consort ships : and began our voyage in direct course to the Fortunate Isles, which are called today the Grand Canaria, which are situated in the Ocean-sea at the extremity of the inhabited west. . . . There we remained eight days, taking in provision of water, and wood and other necessary things : and from here, having said our prayers, we weighed anchor, and gave the sails to the wind, beginning our course to westward, taking one quarter by south-west: and so we sailed on till at the end of 37 days we reached a land which we deemed to be a continent: which is distant westwardly from the isles of Canary about a thousand leagues beyond the inhabited region within the torrid zone : . . . whereat we anchored with our ships a league and a half from land: and we put out our boats freighted with men and arms: we made towards the land, and before we reached it, had sight of a great number of people who were going along the shore: by which we were much rejoiced: and we observed that they were a naked race: they showed themselves to stand to fear of us: I believe (it was) because they saw us clothed and of other appearance (than their own) : they all withdrew to a hill, and for whatsoever signals we made to them of peace and of friendliness, they would not come to parley with us : so that, as the night was now coming on, and as the ships were anchored in a dangerous place, being on a rough and shelterless coast, we decided to remove from there the next day, and to go in search of some harbor or bay, where we might place our ships in safety: and we sailed with the maestrale wind, thus running along the coast with the land ever in sight, continually in our course observing people along the shore : till after having navigated for two days, we found a place sufficiently secure for the ships, and anchored half a league from land, on which we saw a very great number of people. This same day we put to land with the boats, and sprang on shore full 40 men in good trim: and still the land's people appeared shy of converse with us, and we were unable to encourage them so much as to make them come to speak with us: and this day we labored so greatly in giving them of our wares, such as rattles and mirrors, beads, spalline, and other trifles, that some of them took confidence and came to discourse with us: and after having made good friends with them, the night coming on, we took our leave of them and returned to the ships : and the next day when the dawn appeared we saw that there were infinite numbers of people upon the beach, and they had their women and children with them: we went ashore, and found that they were all laden with their worldly goods which are suchlike as, in its (proper) place, shall be related: and before we reached the land, many of them jumped into the sea and came swimming to receive us at a bowshot's length (from the shore) for they are very great swimmers, with as much confidence as if they had for a long time been acquainted with us: and we were pleased with this their confidence.

For so much as we learned of their manner of life and customs, it was that they go entirely naked, as well the men as the women. . . . They are of medium stature, very well proportioned: their flesh is of a color that verges into red like a lion's mane: and I believe that if they went clothed, they would be as white as we: they have not any hair upon the body, except the hair of the head which is long and black, and especially in the women, whom it renders handsome: in aspect they are not very good-looking, because they have broad faces, so that they would seem Tartar-like: they let no hair grow on their eyebrows, nor on their eyelids, nor elsewhere, except the hair of the head: for they hold hairiness to be a filthy thing: they are very light footed in walking and in running, as well the men as the women : so that a woman reeks nothing of running a league or two, as many times we saw them do: and herein they have a very great advantage over us Christians : they swim (with an expertness) beyond all belief, and the women better than the men : for we have many times found and seen them swimming two leagues out at sea without anything to rest upon.

Their arms are bows and arrows very well made, save that (the arrows) are not (tipped) with iron nor any other kind of hard metal: and instead of iron they put animals' or fishes' teeth, or a spike of tough wood, with the point hardened by fire : they are sure marksmen, for they hit whatever they aim at: and in some places the women use these bows : they have other weapons, such as fire-hardened spears, and also clubs with knobs, beautifully carved. Warfare is used among them, which they carry on against people not of their own language, very cruelly, without granting life to any one, except (to reserve him) for greater suffering.

When they go to war, they take their women with them, not that these may fight, but because they carry behind them their worldly goods, for a woman carries on her back for thirty or forty leagues a load which no man could bear: as we have many times seen them do. They are not accustomed to have any captain, nor do they go in any ordered array, for every one is lord of himself : and the cause of their wars is not for lust of dominion, nor of extending their frontiers, nor for inordinate covetousness, but for some ancient enmity which in by-gone times arose among them: and when asked why they made war, they knew not any other reason to give than that they did so to avenge the death of their ancestors, or of their parents: these people have neither king, nor lord, nor do they yield obedience to any one, for they live in their own liberty: and how they be stirred up to go to war is (this) that when the enemies have slain or captured any of them, his oldest kinsman rises up and goes about the highways haranguing them to go with him and avenge the death of such his kinsman: and so are they stirred up by fellow-feeling: they have no judicial system, nor do they punish the ill-doer: nor does the father, nor the mother chastise the children: and marvelously (seldom) or never did we see any dispute among them : in their conversation they appear simple, and they are very cunning and acute in that which concerns them : they speak little and in a low tone: they use the same articulations as we, since they form their utterances either with the palate, or with the teeth, or on the lips: except that they give different names to things. Many are the varieties of tongues: for in every 100 leagues we found a change of language, so that they are not understandable each to the other.

The manner of their living is very barbarous, for they do not eat at certain hours, and as oftentimes as they will: and it is not much of a boon to them that the will may come more at midnight than by day, for they eat at all hours: and they eat upon the ground without a table-cloth or any other cover, for they have their meats either in earthen basins which they make themselves, or in the halves of pumpkins: they sleep in certain very large nettings made of cotton, suspended in the air: and although this their (fashion of) sleeping may seem uncomfortable, I say that it is sweet to sleep in those (nettings) : and we slept better in them than in the counterpanes. They are a people smooth and clean of body, because of so continually washing themselves as they do.

Among those people we did not learn that they had any law, nor can they be called Moors nor Jews, and (they are) worse than pagans: because we did not observe that they offered any sacrifice: nor even had they a house of prayer: their manner of living I judge to be Epicurean.

Their dwellings are in common: and their houses (are) made in the style of huts, but strongly made, and constructed with very large trees, and covered over with palm-leaves, secure against storms and winds: and in some places (they are) of so great breadth and length, that in one single house we found there were 600 souls: and we saw a village of only thirteen houses where there were four thousand souls; every eight or ten years they change their habitations: and when asked why they did so: (they said it was) because of the soil which, from its filthiness, was already unhealthy and corrupted, and that it bred aches in their bodies, which seemed to us a good reason: their riches consist of birds' plumes of many colors, or of rosaries which they make from fishbones, or of white or green stones which they put in their cheeks and in their lips and ears, and of many other things which we in no wise value: they use no trade, they neither buy nor sell. In fine, they live and are contented with that which nature gives them. The wealth that we enjoy in this our Europe and elsewhere, such as gold, jewels, pearls, and other riches, they hold as nothing: and although they have them in their own lands, they do not labor to obtain them, nor do they value them. They are liberal in giving, for it is rarely they deny you anything: and on the other hand, liberal in asking, when they show themselves your friends.