Encounters Unforeseen- 1492 Retold

by Andrew Rowen

  The men were silent for some moments, studying the map closely.

  “I would’ve thought you sailed from the Azores,” Pedro remarked. “They lie much farther west than Gomera. That’s where I sailed from. We found weed in the sea to the west, and it was only winter’s approach that caused us to turn back. Land must have been close.”

  “The winds at Corvo and Flores blow east, sometimes strongly,” Cristóbal responded. “After I left King João, he sent an expedition of Portuguese west from the Azores to find the mainland of the Indies, but they were blown back—as I would have predicted. In the Canaries, the wind and current flow southwest across the sea.”

  Martín again was startled. Colón had more than a map. He had a mariner’s sailing plan. “You didn’t tell João you’d sail from the Canaries?”

  “They are Castilian, of course. If I had sailed for him, I probably would’ve departed from the Cape Verde islands, where the conditions are similar to the Canaries. But João’s mathematicians never believed my estimation of the distance.”

  Martín reflected on his own sailing experience. “You’re correct that the wind at the Canaries blows southwest often. I’ve seen it myself. But does it always? Are you sure about the current?”

  “The wind never blows just one direction—at least anywhere that I’ve been. But the wind in the Canaries does regularly blow southwest in all seasons and the current, as well, and the current doesn’t shift—as far as I’ve seen.”

  “How do you know these winds and currents will take you all the way to your Cipangu?”

  Cristóbal stared into Martín’s eyes. “I don’t know that. That’s the unknown here. That’s why I need an experienced captain such as yourself.”

  “The unknown is also the distance, no matter how favorable the winds and current.” There was silence as each man thought to himself.

  “Cristóbal, are you a sailor or a merchant or a mapmaker?” Martín refrained from adding “dreamer.”

  “I’m a merchant expert in the sea and mapmaking. I need a captain more expert than I to sail this voyage under my command.”

  “Are you a geographer?”

  “I’ve studied geography to the extent necessary to arrive at this map. I’ve studied Ptolemy, Aristotle, Seneca, Cardinal d’Ailly, and Pliny, among others.”

  Martín had heard of some of them, read none of them, and wasn’t impressed the slightest. He reflected for a moment. “How many days do you think it’ll take to cross? How many to return?”

  “Aristotle, Seneca, and Cardinal d’Ailly said the sail is but a few days. I know that to be wrong—if that were the case, mariners would have crossed centuries ago. But, assuming the wind and current remain favorable, I suspect three to four weeks, which is easily achievable. To return, it may be necessary to tack substantially to the north to find more variable winds if possible. But that remains to be determined in light of the winds and seas found. I can’t predict the route back.”

  Martín reflected that the last answer was honest. He sought to learn more about Colón, to engage in conversation to discern mettle and actual experience. The three men drank sherry together, Colón sparingly. They swapped stories of ports visited in the Ocean Sea and the Mediterranean, of storms, shipwrecks, and pirates, and of commerce in gold, spices, and slaves. Martín determined that Cristóbal’s knowledge of the Ocean Sea was genuine, not boast. Cristóbal understood Martín’s objective. As the afternoon waned, they began to respect each other. It was too soon for friendship. Martín ended the conversation by thanking Cristóbal for the explanation and indicating he would consider the voyage.

  In the following days, the two men met a number of times, usually walking together in the streets of Palos or on the road to La Rábida. They met once in Martín’s home, where Martín introduced Cristóbal to his brother Vicente, and the three men reviewed the map together and discussed the calculation of the distance involved.

  Neither Pinzón brother was convinced by the map or Colón’s calculations or Marchena’s or Vásquez’s endorsements or the views of Aristotle, Seneca, or any other authority. But the brothers had been on the Ocean Sea and, as Colón, seen carved driftwood and abandoned boats and heard stories of Antillia and other islands to the west. For them, it was obvious that unknown islands might be discovered in the Ocean Sea regardless of the distance to Colón’s Cipangu. The brothers were confident they had the know-how and wherewithal to decide when to turn back and safely return if neither islands nor Cipangu were found. The king and queen would pay them regardless.

  One day, as Cristóbal and Martín strolled toward La Rábida, Cristóbal pressed for an answer whether Martín would captain the Pinta and Vicente the Niña.

  “What will you do if you fail to achieve landfall as you expect?” Martín asked. “If I accept, what should I tell the sailors I recruit?”

  Cristóbal reflected carefully, with a fleeting remembrance that Bartolomeu Dias’s crew had forced his return. “Before we answer that together, what is your own commitment in this regard?”

  “If Vicente and I sail, we will sail west so long as the men are healthy and the provisions are sufficient to return.” He paused for emphasis. “And so long as they don’t throw us overboard.”

  Cristóbal was satisfied. “We should tell recruits the approximate distance and an expectation of some weeks’ duration. You may say that I expect landfall in about 750 leagues’ sail, but make no firm promise.”

  “Courage and faith in this scheme will be tested well before you achieve 750 leagues. It’s sailable, but you will have to deal with the men’s terror when it boils.”

  The two men halted to face each other. Each man knew not a single seaman had enlisted since Pinzón’s return from Rome and that his imprimatur was essential for recruitment. Each knew the crew recruited would look to Pinzón, not Colón, for when to turn back if landfall was not attained when promised.

  “If I accept, what’s in it for me?” Martín asked.

  Cristóbal had long awaited this moment, despairing it would be necessary to offer a portion of his financial entitlement. “Martín, I’ve already negotiated the arrangements with the king and queen—as you know. There’s wealth beyond comprehension to be found. We must find it, and when the sovereigns behold it and are astounded, their gratitude will lead them to compensate you grandly for your contribution. I will support you heartily.”

  Martín grimaced, staring into Colón’s eyes, clearly expressing dissatisfaction, but silent.

  Cristóbal stared back and, sensing Martín had already decided to sail, firmed the tenor of his voice. “There are no more participations to be awarded. You must trust me.”

  Martín paused, not to think, but for emphasis. He had already concluded that the adventure would profit him in stature, if not gold, regardless of a direct participation, and he extended his hand. “Colón, I will rely on that promise.”

  The men continued to La Rábida silently, overcome by the recognition that they would explore the unknown in union. When they arrived, Diego was sitting in the trees outside the monastery, waiting for his father. Martín met him for the first time and reflected that Colón did have a reason to live other than his voyage.

  With that agreement, Martín and Vicente Pinzón visited the plazas of Palos, Moguer, and Huelva to recruit their friends and neighbors, promising to take them out of their misery and achieve gold and glory in the Indies. Juan Niño, owner of the Niña, agreed to serve as her master, his younger brother Pero Alonso agreed to serve as the pilot of the Santa María, and a younger Niño agreed to serve as a ship’s boy on the Niña, as well. Cristóbal Quintero, owner of the Pinta, reluctantly agreed to accompany the ship as seaman and a relative agreed to serve as its boatswain. A third Pinzón brother agreed to serve as the Pinta’s master. There were other brothers, in-laws, and cousins. A surgeon was recruited for each ship. Notwithstanding the suspension of criminal proceedings against recruits, Cristóbal enlisted only four criminals—Bartolomé de Torres, who ha
d murdered a town crier, and Juan de Moguer, Pedro Yzquierdo, and Alonso Clavijo, who had sprung Bartolomé from jail and been sentenced to death, as well. Almost all of the crews were Spanish, with a handful of Portuguese and Italians, including a Genoese seaman, Jácome el Rico, beholden to Francesco Pinelo and the other Italian financier.

  Each ship had a few lombards (cannons) and falconets (swivel guns), but soldiers were neither provided by the Crown nor recruited. Cristóbal enlisted an interpreter to sail on the Santa María, Luis de Torres, a converso knowledgeable in Arabic, Caldaean, and Hebrew—the Arabic potentially useful with the Grand Khan. The Crown sent Pedro Gutiérrez as its observer, Rodrigo Sánchez de Segovia as comptroller of the fleet to monitor the trade, and Rodrigo de Escobedo as notary and clerk. In addition to selecting Diego de Arana as quartermaster, Cristóbal also brought three personal attendants: Pedro de Terreros, his domestic; Pedro de Salcedo, his young page; and Juan Portugués, a black servant sold by the Portuguese on the Canaries. When enlistment was complete, the Santa María had a crew of about forty, including the sovereigns’ representatives and Cristóbal’s attendants, the Pinta over twenty-five, and the Niña short of twenty-five.

  In July, Cristóbal and the Pinzón brothers provisioned the ships. The Santa María stored most of the goods they expected to interest the Grand Khan, principally wool cloth. Trinkets, beads, and hawks bells were stowed to trade with less advanced peoples encountered en route, perhaps on Cipangu’s outer islands. The ships’ sails were painted with crosses. Cristóbal arranged banners for the expedition to be emblazoned with a common mark—a green cross bearing a crown at the end of each arm, one crown overlaying an F for Fernando and another overlaying a Y for Isabel.

  As July waned, the roads to Cádiz and Puerto de Santa María teemed with the exodus of Jewish families forced to sail by the month’s end. Eight thousand households departed from Cádiz alone. It was this exodus—the Jews’ suffering, the ships they departed on, and the property they left behind—that captured the region’s and the kingdom’s attention, not the Santa María, the Pinta, and the Niña or the ninety men that would sail them.

  No preparations were more important than the Virgin’s blessing of the voyage. On August 2, Fray Marchena led La Rábida’s annual celebration of its patron the Virgin of Miracles, Santa María de La Rábida. The crews of the three ships, their families, and their friends, neighbors, and other pilgrims worshipped the monastery’s small statue of the Virgin and her baby Jesus, said to have been carved on behalf of St. Luke and given by the bishop of Jerusalem to the parish of Palos. The sailors confessed their sins, received the Eucharist, and prayed that the Virgin protect their ships. All realized this was no ordinary voyage. To their understanding, the Sea of Darkness had never been traversed by one who had lived to tell it.

  That afternoon, the sailors and their families returned to the intimacy of their homes to part and, after dinner, gathered before St. George’s church to board the ships.

  Cristóbal ate supper with Diego at La Rábida. He reflected that he had good ships and crews and that, with a handful of exceptions, the crews would be loyal to Pinzón and Juan de la Cosa first. It would take time before the crews trusted him, and many never would relinquish their jealousy of the Genoese. While he held the royal authorization, not Pinzón, it would be treacherous to make any significant decision affecting the voyage’s safety that Pinzón opposed. Cristóbal’s wariness of the crews’ loyalty to the Pinzóns rivaled his respect for the ferocity of the Sea of Darkness.

  Santa María de la Rábida, with an altarpiece rendition of the three ships at her feet.

  BAKAKO’S SENTRY DUTY

  Guanahaní (San Salvador?, Bahamas)

  Twelve years old, Bakako typically assisted Father fishing unless ordered by the village cacique to do sentry duty on Guanahaní’s southern shore, a chore that rotated among older boys every few days. Until recently, Bakako had much preferred fishing. While not yet a man, he now was an accomplished fisher, and Father trusted him with all aspects of the daily routine except he was not old or strong enough to handle the barrier reef or open ocean without an adult. He felt maturity and accomplishment when fishing and looked forward to the day he and his brother Yuni fished the barrier alone. Sentry duty was monotonous in comparison. Friendly traders canoed routinely between Guanahaní and neighboring islands and, less frequently, islands farther south. There had not been a Caribe raid in his lifetime.

  But, in the past few weeks, a girl from another village had visited a number of times to flirt as he stood guard, and they had become friends. Bakako had invited her to visit again and, to his satisfaction this morning, the village cacique ordered him to serve. Mother gave him a pouch filled with fish wrapped in wet leaves and a gourd of water, and he retrieved his spear and shell trumpet. With a wave to Father and Mother, he set off southward more than three miles to spend the day at a knoll on Guanahaní’s southernmost point, hiking first along the long beach astride his village and then on a beaten trail winding up and down a gentle bluff.

  Bakako began his assignment as he strode, studying the ocean southward and sighting fishermen already at sea and a large canoe departing Guanahaní south, presumably to trade on Samoete (Crooked, Fortune, and Acklins Islands). He now well understood the safety provided by the neighboring islands to the southwest and had sheltered once with Father on Yuma (Long Island), when a sudden, northeasterly squall had driven them from Guanahaní when hunting shark beyond the barrier. His remembrance of the day and night he and Father had spent in the ocean, engulfed in storm at the precipice of death, still terrified him and—he understood—had made him a more prudent fisherman.

  Bakako soon passed the last village on his route and walked alone, wondering as always why he bothered to bring the spear. He had never used it, and he had never seen an adult Guanahanían use one other than in a ceremony. People from other islands rarely attacked Guanahaníans. He had been taught of the danger of attack by Caribes from Cuba, Bohío,5 or Carib itself. People said their appearance, ferocity, and brutality were atrocious—they had but one eye and an animal’s snout, and they beheaded and drank the blood of their enemies. But neither Father nor Grandfather had ever seen one.

  By midmorning, Bakako arrived at the watch post at the island’s southern tip and spied a large cloud bank on the eastern horizon, canoes approaching from the southeast—probably from Samana (Samana Cay), and fishermen all about. Canoes never approached from the east, as there were no islands there, only ocean, and that was the direction of hurricanes. Bakako sensed the tremendous expanses of the heavens and the ocean about him, the enormity of the distance to the horizon in all directions, and the glow of the sun that enveloped Guanahaní. He reflected on his solitude and the peacefulness and warmth about him. If Kamana came, it would be in the afternoon. The canoes in the ocean before him were Lucayan, and he lay down in grass under a grove of trees to shade his naked body from the sun and fell asleep.

  As the sun reached its highest point, a flock of green and red parrots flew overhead and alighted in the trees, and their caws awoke him. The great cloudbank had advanced toward Guanahaní, and a dark thunderhead rose at its core to a colossal height, presaging a storm but not a hurricane. Bakako marveled at Guabancex’s power. He mused that his spear, and the spears of an army of Lucayans, and even the spears of an invasion of Caribes, were utterly inconsequential in comparison to Guabancex’s power. The devastation she could unleash vastly exceeded the harm men could do to other men.

  Bakako realized the fishermen and traders at sea soon would distrust the weather and make for shore, and he ate lunch, wondering if Kamana would visit in advance of a storm. She lived in a small village on the eastern coast and was a farmer’s child, slightly younger than him. Her smile and slender body were pleasing, and she would become a beautiful woman. She was beautiful already. She was humorous and clever in thought and conversation. Bakako knew she wanted to see him because she came. He wondered whether he had been direct enough that he
wanted her to come, too. He gazed at the path leading from the knoll toward her village and it was empty. He decided to slumber again, not because he was tired, but because he preferred that to the empty path.

  Shortly, he caught the sound of children running toward the knoll, and he stood and grasped his spear, as if he had been alert on duty. The children burst into view—Kamana’s two younger brothers—and Kamana soon followed, bearing a little sister on her hip, smiling and waving, and accompanied by her cousin, who was helping with the child care. Bakako greeted the boys as they swarmed onto the knoll and then Kamana and the cousin.

  “I thought you’d come,” Bakako said.

  “We come almost every day because I don’t know when you’ll be here,” Kamana replied. “We don’t talk with the other sentries. We just go swimming.”

  “We shouldn’t swim today. There’s a storm coming and the current is ripping, even within the barrier.”

  “My father said we couldn’t swim, but I can take them to the beach.”

  “Let’s go. It’ll be out of the wind.”

  Bakako led his visitors off the knoll to a small beach close by on the western shore. Kamana warned her brothers to go no further than ankle deep into the sea and placed the little girl on the sand, handing her a shell to dig with.

  “We brought you some cazabi we baked with our mothers yesterday,” Kamana said, unwrapping a cloth and offering Bakako a piece. “Our village is preparing for our cousin’s wedding tomorrow, and the mothers and aunts are bickering over the preparations.” The two girls laughed.

  “Are you going to be in the ceremony?”

  “Yes,” Kamana answered. “We’ve been included in an areíto as birds.” Both girls laughed again. “We get to coo every few verses. Occasionally, we get to say words like people, as well.”