Encounters Unforeseen- 1492 Retold

by Andrew Rowen

  “Your loyalty and devotion have always been deeply appreciated,” the king responded. “They’ve also been handsomely rewarded—as your homes and estates attest. The queen and I urge that you and your families convert and remain as our loyal subjects. You will save your souls—although I understand you do not yet see that. You will retain your titles, offices, and privileges—and your wealth. You will also benefit the kingdom and all our people as many of your followers will convert and remain, as well.”

  “Your Majesty, we seek a solution that permits us to worship our God,” Abravanel replied. “We are wealthy and prepared to make such payment as is necessary.”

  “We may discuss payments, but your conversion is important. Your conversion and that of your families. That will serve best to guide your people at this juncture.” Fernando stared intently into Abravanel’s and Seneor’s eyes, silently communicating a threat of personal consequences to their families, belying the notion that—as for Spain’s Jewish leadership—their own choice was voluntary.

  “Your Majesty, let us determine what payment we may offer, and then we will return to discuss it again.”

  The king indicated he would continue to delay the Edict’s publication while they did so and dismissed them.

  Abravanel and Seneor promptly appealed to the sovereigns’ advisers and noblemen to intercede on the Jews’ behalf, including Cardinal Mendoza, Ponce de León, and Luis de la Cerda, but the appeals were for naught. They determined to offer the largest payment of gold they could raise to achieve the Edict’s rescission, perhaps 300,000 ducats. Fernando listened to their offer in a second audience but did not commit. A third audience arranged, Fernando rejected the offer, indicating that regardless of his views the queen had also issued the Edict.

  As a last resort, Abravanel and Seneor obtained an audience with the queen.

  “Your Majesty, expulsion of the Jews serves no purpose,” Abravanel began, believing he could talk more forcefully with a woman. “You must understand we are indomitable and God’s chosen people and can never be destroyed. You must realize that God punishes those who punish the Jews. If Your Majesty goes through with this edict, you risk God’s wrath, as well.”

  Isabel contemptuously embraced the confrontation and responded forcefully. “The Jews became a relic of history when Christ was born. I’m not seeking to destroy you or your people, but I will bring my kingdom to serve God by your conversion or removal, and God will reward me for it.”

  Abravanel and the queen, two familiar persons of absolute faith, glared at each other, astounded at the other’s inability to see truth. Abravanel also was astounded at the cruelty the queen’s faith justified.

  After a long silence, Isabel tired of the confrontation, which itself reinforced her conviction in her righteousness. “This is the king’s decision, too. I can’t compromise.” She reflected that God’s will had manifested itself in both her and Fernando’s hearts, and she softened and sought to bring her two acquaintances to her God. “Isaac and Abraham, I entreat you to be baptized and offer you the highest honor and ceremony if you do. Christ’s love and salvation awaits but your acceptance.”

  “I will never worship Christ.” Abravanel grimaced, visibly wrought with scorn that anyone—even the queen—could even suggest that he would forsake his God and people for earthly benefit. Abraham demurred.

  The Edict was broadly published at the end of April, and the Jews anguished. Centuries of heritage and wealth—homes and estates cherished, businesses built and passed through generations, farms and orchards plowed and nurtured, and revered synagogues and cemeteries—were to be lost forever. Rich and poor began to sell their properties, and prices plummeted. Homes were sold in return for an ass for transport to the coast. Vineyards were sold for cloth to bundle what could be carried. A substantial transfer of wealth from one people to another was brutally accomplished.

  The initial panic in the aljamas soon was replaced with a messianic resolve. The rich helped the poor to arrange their affairs and, when their properties were sold, to make their exodus. Some believed the sea would part to permit their emigration. They knew robberies and extortion lay ahead wherever they landed, and adolescents twelve years and older were married so each girl had a husband for protection.

  Upon its publication, Spain’s old Christian population largely rejoiced and most European princes hailed the Edict as effecting divine punishment. Jewish leaders attempted to arrange destinations that would accept their people. After negotiation, João agreed to receive them only temporarily for an entry fee per head, and perhaps half of Castile and Aragón’s Jewish population went first to Portugal. João permitted the very wealthiest to remain in Portugal permanently in return for substantial payments. England and France refused their admission. Some Christian principalities in Italy and Greece agreed to receive them permanently, the motive being an expectation that the emigrants would add to the wealth and knowledge of their new home, rather than a religious duty to love thy neighbor or enemy. Bayezid II, the emperor of the Ottoman Empire, openly welcomed the Jews, desiring to increase the number of taxpayers and economic considerations. Some Jews departed for the Islamic principalities of North Africa.

  In June in Guadalupe, Cardinal Mendoza baptized Abraham Seneor and his son-in-law in the Monastery of Santa María de Guadalupe, with Fernando and Isabel attending as sponsors. They took the name Coronel and continued to serve the Crown with distinction. Thousands followed their example to convert, gratifying the sovereigns that the edict had accomplished its objective.

  Isaac Abravanel never contemplated baptism for an instant. Fearing reprisal, his grandson was removed from Spain. Luis de Santángel repaid Isaac an outstanding loan to the Crown and Isaac made other arrangements to export some gold. On July 30, he and his family and followers sailed for the Italian peninsula and ultimately found permission to disembark in Naples.

  As July 31 approached, Spain’s roadways crowded with Jewish families, most trudging toward the sea or Portugal. The July 31 date was not rigidly enforced, and many ships sailed from Cádiz on August 2.

  But the deadline for departure was not permitted to slip much. Torquemada’s order of March 20 prohibited Christians from communicating with or assisting Jews in any way after August 9. Violators would be excommunicated or perhaps worse.

  CRISTÓBAL

  Recruiting Crews to Traverse the Sea of Darkness,

  Palos, Moguer, Huelva, Summer 1492

  On May 23, Cristóbal and Fray Pérez walked from La Rábida to the plaza outside the church of St. George overlooking the Río Tinto and delivered the sovereigns’ decree requiring the town to provide two ships by June 2. A notary read the decree aloud to the town’s mayors, councilmen, and a few citizens gathered, and the mayors consented to its terms. The sovereigns’ decree requiring carpenters, merchants, and others to assist provisioning the ships was read aloud in Moguer later that day.

  Palos requisitioned the two ships in Moguer. The first was owned by Juan Niño of Moguer and, as the town’s central cathedral, named for the town’s patron saint, Santa Clara. Sailors called it the Niña. The Niña was a three-masted caravel with lateen rigging, approximately seventy feet long on deck bow to stern and twenty-one feet at her deck beam (the widest width), able to load fifty-three tuns of wine (perhaps 250 gallons per tun) and with a draught of six feet. The second was also a three-masted caravel, slightly longer and larger, capable of bearing sixty tuns, and square-rigged except for the poop (stern) mast, which was lateen rigged. Cristóbal Quintero of Palos owned it, and sailors called it the Pinta. Cristóbal inspected the ships carefully and was satisfied.

  Cristóbal had contacted his acquaintance from Puerto de Santa María, Juan de la Cosa, who owned the third ship, and it sailed to anchor in the Río Tinto. It was a three-masted nao built in Galicia— sailors called it the Gallega—and larger than the Niña and Pinta, able to transport one hundred tuns of wine. She stretched more than seventy-five feet on deck bow to stern and approximately twenty
-six feet at the deck beam, had a draught of seven feet and, like the Pinta, was square-rigged except for the stern mast. Cristóbal appreciated she would transport more goods to trade than the caravels but would be less maneuverable in unknown waters. Unlike the Niña and Pinta, she had a sizable stern castle fit for his cabin and administration of the voyage and, above it, a small poop deck. He chose her as his flagship, where he would serve as captain general of the fleet and captain of the ship, and he invited Juan to serve as her master, directly in charge of the ship and crew at all times. Cristóbal renamed her the Santa María.

  Juan de la Cosa had enlisted a portion of the crew for the Santa María, largely Galicians and Basques of Spain’s northern coast, the ship’s and his native home. Cristóbal and Fray Pérez started visiting the plazas of Palos, Moguer, and Huelva, seeking enlistment to achieve crews for the three ships combined of about ninety men. Cristóbal explained to everyone he met that he was authorized by the king and queen to sail the Ocean Sea to Cipangu and the Indies, where the houses were roofed with gold. Those who enlisted would achieve riches and glory.

  By June 2, regardless of the sovereigns’ decree and these entreaties, not a single resident of the three villages had enlisted. Scant few had even heard of Cristóbal Colón. When word spread, people learned that he was a Genoese boarding at La Rábida, without a business or even home of his own and with no money other than that which the sovereigns had awarded him. When he departed the plazas, those whom he had buttonholed murmured that there was no land to the west because the Portuguese had searched many times and failed. Some exclaimed that it would take two years to sail to the Indies, others that it would be impossible to return, and many warned those who sailed would never return. Most concluded Colón was a talker, boaster, and dreamer—nothing more.

  Cristóbal grew more aggressive with his promises of gold, but to no avail. He reintroduced himself to Pedro de Vásquez, the aged mariner who had sailed for Diogo de Teive forty years earlier, and Pedro remained supportive and joined in the plazas to promote enlistment. But fathers advised sons and sons-in-law not to be deceived by the promises, warning that the Genoese was crazy and the voyage futile. Residents began to jest about Colón and scorn him to his face. Juan Cabezudo, who had rented a mule to Friar Pérez for his journey to Santa Fe, was ridiculed for having done so. Cristóbal Quintero, the owner of the Pinta, made no secret that he thought the voyage vain and doomed to fail. Alonso Pardo, the public scribe in Moguer who embargoed the Niña and Pinta for the voyage, recognized that many villagers held it to be death for Colón and all those who went.

  Frays Marchena and Pérez advised Cristóbal to focus his efforts on convincing a leading mariner to sail so others would see validation and endorsement. They vouched that the villages’ most reputed mariner was Martín Alonso Pinzón and promised an introduction when his ships returned from Rome, where he was delivering a shipment of sardines.

  Martín Alonso Pinzón was a few years older than Cristóbal and one of the wealthiest men in Palos. He and his younger brothers and two sons and the husband of one of his three daughters were all accomplished mariners. Martín regularly sailed the Mediterranean and the European and African coasts of the Ocean Sea, including to the Canaries, and owned ships. He had been widowed and remarried and was esteemed by his neighbors for great skill, judgment, energy, and courage as a mariner and for having fought valiantly against the Portuguese. His younger brother Vicente Yáñez Pinzón, then about thirty, also had a growing reputation as a sea captain.

  When he returned from Rome, Martín heard the news of the Genoese soliciting a voyage west into the unknown on behalf of the queen and was amused by the promises of gold booty. But Martín would not lightly dismiss a royally sponsored voyage and, when Fray Marchena inquired, Martín readily agreed to meet Colón in Pedro de Vásquez’s home to hear the proposal.

  Cristóbal arrived bearing a pouch containing the sovereigns’ letter of introduction to the Grand Khan, the passport, and Bartolomé’s map, and Pedro invited the two men to sit at his kitchen table. Cristóbal greeted Martín warmly, commending that he had heard much of the Pinzón reputation from Pedro and Fray Marchena.

  “I understand you’ve just returned from Rome. Did you sail by the Barbary Coast to Sardinia and return by Catalonia?”

  “Yes.” Martín realized that Cristóbal understood the mariner’s route for the voyage in summer. “The winds were favorable.”

  “Is the pope as frail as they say?”

  “They say he’s waning—but I understand they’ve said that for some years. Speculation abounded as to his successor. Do you have a Ligurian insight?”

  Cristóbal smiled. “I’m just a merchant and an observant Catholic—I wouldn’t know.”

  “I’ve heard you are more.” Martín smiled in return. “They say you’ve convinced the queen to command us to provide two ships to sail into the unknown.”

  “Yes, I have. And I come today because I want to convince you to sail with me, to explain how it can be done, and the wealth attainable upon reaching the Indies.”

  “Good. I’m honored to serve my king and queen. I’m also interested in wealth.” Martín raised his eyebrows. “I’m also interested in my life.”

  “For some years, I’ve sought a sovereign to sponsor a voyage west to the Indies. I have sailed to the Orient at Scio, to the northern seas at Thule, and to the equator at Guinea, as well as the Canaries, the Azores, and other islands—in fact, I lived on Porto Santo for a spell. I know the Ocean Sea as well as most men—save perhaps you and your family—and each of King João and King Fernando and Queen Isabel have considered my plans. I left João when it became clear he would pursue the circumvention of Guinea. Fernando and Isabel have agreed to sponsor three ships. I have the letter of introduction they gave me to deliver to the Grand Khan—the ruler of the Indies—and the passport I may present to persons I meet.” Cristóbal laid the two documents on the table before Pinzón and Vásquez.

  Martín picked them up and studied them. He had never held a document signed by the king and queen, no less met them. He handed the documents to Pedro and hid his surprise that a foreigner—apparently but a seafaring merchant—had dealt personally with his own king and queen.

  “It’s now almost certain that João will achieve Cathay by circumventing Guinea—it’s only a matter of time,” Cristóbal continued. “The first sovereign to reach Cathay will have the opportunity to seek a monopoly on the trade, and Fernando and Isabel want to be first by sailing west, beating João. Have you read Marco Polo or Sir John Mandeville?”

  Pinzón and Vásquez shook their heads.

  “The wealth of the Grand Khan’s kingdoms is incredible. The houses are roofed with gold, and the cities are more splendid than you’ve ever seen or could imagine—the greatest in the world. One’s named Quinsay, which is a hundred miles round with twelve thousand bridges. Another’s Zaiton, the world’s largest port, filled with thousands of vessels departing to all directions filled with pepper and other spices. The island of Cipangu lies off the coast and overflows with gold, gems, and pearls. The Ophir of King Solomon will be found somewhere. The king and queen will find riches if they reach these places first—and so will their mariners.”

  There was silence. Cristóbal asked, “Martín, may I ask where you have sailed?”

  “To all parts where you have sailed, I suspect. I’ve been to Guinea and to the north, not as far as Thule, but to Flanders. I’ve sailed the Mediterranean, as well, not as far as Scio. I’ve sailed the Canaries many times. I’ve fought the Portuguese at sea.”

  “That’s a lot of experience. I assume you believe as I that the Ocean Sea is navigable at every zone and hour,3 weather permitting?”

  “Yes. The Ocean Sea is navigable that way.” Pinzón reflected for a moment, realizing that Colón did have the experience to pose the central question debated by mariners in his lifetime, succinctly. “Why do you think the Indies are achievable sailing west? The distance is said to be over 10
,000 miles. Isn’t that impossible? Aren’t you relying on islands to be found in route?”

  Cristóbal removed Bartolomeo’s map from the sack and laid it on the table. He watched Pinzón and Vásquez comprehend it.

  “Where did you get this?” Pedro asked.

  “My brother and I painted it.”

  Martín was startled by the map’s quality and accuracy as to the European, African, and Mediterranean coasts and that Colón had the ability and knowledge to produce it. “Is this what you presented to the king and queen?”

  “Yes. Let me explain. The distance from Cape St. Vincent to the Indies is sometimes estimated to be more than 8,000 miles. On the basis of the scriptures and geographers, I believe that estimate is substantially exaggerated. It also doesn’t account for either the Canaries or Cipangu. The distance between the Canaries and Cipangu is much, much shorter—perhaps 2,700 miles or 750 leagues.4 To respond to your question, I don’t rely on finding Antillia in between the Canaries and Cipangu. But that’s possible. I believe there also are islands east of Cipangu making the open sail even shorter.”

  Cristóbal let Martín and Pedro study the map for a moment and then drew his hand to the map to slowly trace the coast of the Indies with his forefinger, north to south. “The Grand Khan lives here in Cathay, inland a bit. Quinsay is near the coast in Mangi. To the south is Zaiton.” He pointed to Cipangu. “Cipangu lies perhaps 1,500 miles east of the coast. I don’t know the latitudes north or south to which it extends, but it does straddle 28 degrees north, the zone where the Canaries lie.” Colón slowly moved his finger east to the Canaries. “I will sail from Gomera, after provisioning the ships for a year—far more than necessary.”