Cuba

You and your absolute certainties . I have very few certainties and this one is not certainly one of the few .

But of course it is not me that have made it up that story about Cuba and its name. Mascarenhas Barreto is the one to blame. He has dedicated the last 20 years of his life studying Cristovão Colom’s origins and secret life. He is the one that says that the name of Cuba was given in honour of his hometown:


“Muitos foram os lugares descobertos por Colom ao serviço dos Reis de Espanha ….. a primeira ilha … a que deu o nome de S. Salvador … o verdadeiro nome do navegador era Salvador.
À segunda ilha deu o nome de Santa Maria da Conceição, … À terceira ilha deu o nome de Fernandina, … Colom tinha Fernandes no seu nome verdadeiro, Salvador Fernandes Zarco.
À quarta ilha chamou Isabela, que poderia ser em homenagem à Rainha Isabel a Católica mas também em homenagem a sua mãe, Isabel da Câmara. …
E à quinta ilha o nome de Juana, admite-se que em honra do Rei D. João II, mas depois, para manter o sigilo da sua missão, trocou-o por Cuba, nome da sua terra natal no Alentejo”.

A translation:

“Many were the places discovered by Colom while in the service of the king of Spain …to the first island he has given the name of S. Salvador…the Navigator’s true name was Salvador.
To the second Island he gave the name of Fernandina…Fernandes was part of the real name of Colom, Salvador Fernandes Zarco.
To the 4th Island he called Isabela, that could be homage to the Queen of Spain (Isabel) but could also be a homage to his mother, Isabel da Câmara…
To the 5th Island he gave the name Juana, probably to honor the Portuguese King (João), but then, to hide the nature of his mission, he changed it to Cuba, the name of his hometown in Alentejo”

According to Mascarenhas Barreto the Navigator was a spy at the service of the Portuguese King João II (Juana is the feminine of João and in Portuguese the word Island is feminine therefore Juana and not João) with the secret mission to drive the Spanish away from India. And if that is true, he has succeeded .

Of course this is a theory even if well backed up with facts and, as all theories, it can be not true, even if the proofs that I have seen about the nationality of Colombo seem to be overwhelming. However this thread is not the place to discuss it and anyway I have not any wish to discuss it with someone that has so many “absolute truths”.

 

If you can read Portuguese (perhaps you can because I can read Italian) take a look at this web page:

http://amigosdacuba.no.sapo.pt/pagi...SCOBERTA POR COLOM#CUBA, DESCOBERTA POR COLOM


According to Prof. Mascaranhas Barreto, Cristovão was a portuguese spy “planted” in the Spanish court as a Genovese to mislead Spaniards from India.

The "Genovese Columbus" was the son of a poor and uncultured man, a man that worked with lambs and wool. The "Portuguese Colon" was the son of a well known Navigator, born in a Jewish family that was also known by their cartographic skills. How could a poor and uncultured man gather the knowledge that obviously Columbus, or Colon, had?

This seems paranoiac but what we know from that time is that the Portuguese had the best information and disinformation service in the world. Today we know that the ones to whom the most important discoveries, like Brazil, were attributed, were not the ones that have been there first and we know that some of the greatest navigators were let in the shadow and his discoveries maintained in absolute secrecy by the imperative need that a small country had to control information on his behalf.


About some “errors” on the maps and the intentional general misinformation see what this contemporary Spanish Pilot, Juan Gaetan (that in Portuguese ships navigated the seas to the North of Australia) said about the Portuguese and their general disinformation tactics:

He says: "I saw … all their charts. They were all cunningly falsified, with longitudes and latitudes distorted, and land-features drawn in at places and stretched out at others to suit their purposes, ….."—[In Ramusio.]

For me, the most unknown of the Navigators and probably one of the greatest if not the greatest was Cristovão de Mendonça. This one seems to be the one to who was assigned the most extreme explorations. He has explored and made cartography of the Australian east coast, (only that map has been found and that doesn’t mean that we didn’t go further) but also it is believed that he was the one that has made maps of the “Tierra del Fogo” and Antarctica. Those discoveries were never disclosed and were maintained in absolute secrecy. We only know of them because some mysterious maps have survived. Can you imagine how many were lost?

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSSYD3449720070321

http://muweb.millersville.edu/~columbus/data/art/LUNDE02.ART

 

Thanks, my darling. I think you have learned very little on this matter, as always. Kisses

 

By the way,
Cristóbal Colón has been claimed to be: spaniard (several locations), portuguese (several locations), italian (several locations), and even polish, english and french, to my knowledge.

Only because of a matter of proximity (not scientific evidence, of course), I have some heartly affection to the theory which says Colón was from Puerto Santo, Pontevedra (1432), illegitimate son of Fernán Eanes de Soutomaior and Constanza Gonçalves Colón. It has been said this Cristóbal Colón became in 1441 Pedro Álvarez de Soutomaior, the later famous 'Pedro Madruga', Count of Caminha, a fascinating figure of those times who favoured the right to the crown of Castilla of 'Juana la Beltraneja' against her aunt Isabel (from here the name of Juana to the island of Cuba?), and saved the life of the King of Portugal Alfonso V at the 'Toro' battle.
The death of Pedro Madruga in 1486 is involved in mistery, so Philippot defends in his book he didn't die, becaming again Cristóbal Colón to hide his identity.
Somewhat crazy posssibility, but fascinating indeed.

Cheers.

 

Guillermo.....

let me dream....C.C. was italian...isn't?

 

Race & Cruise to Cuba

If I remember correctly there was an annual 'unoffical' race to Cube each year up till about very late 90's. Participation was pretty good till BUSH & company regulated our foreign policy with Cuba back to the stone age (pandering to votes in Florida)

I made a trip down on a 60 catamaran about 1998 for 5 weeks. They tried to keep the tourist and the populace separated as much as possible. They wanted the tourist money and investment, but sought to try and isolate their citizens to our 'bad' influence.

Biggest pain in the a-- was clearing in and out of ports....ton of paperwork and officaldom

 

Well,you have Amerigo Vespucci. At least that one knew that America was not India. He was the one that first said that America was a big continent and in the company of Gaspar de Lemos explored a great deal of the American coast.


It seems to me very appropriated that the continent's name honor’s him and not Colombus. After all Eric the Red had already discovered America, some centuries before .

 

Amerigo V espucci was for sure from Portugal or Spain....

 

I don't know. But they are running now some ADN tests not only to what is left from the Admiral both in Sevilla (this has been already done) and Santo Domingo (I think still waiting for permission), but also to said relatives (dead and alive) in Italy, Spain and Portugal. They'll find out.
Cheers.

 

Let's see:

"Figlio di un notaio fiorentino, nel 1489 si trasferì a Siviglia su incarico del banchiere Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de' Medici. A Siviglia conobbe Cristoforo Colombo.

La figura di Amerigo Vespucci è molto controversa, a causa delle sue lettere la cui autenticità è stata spesso messa in discussione: la Mundus Novus ("Nuovo Mondo") e la Lettera (o "Il quarto viaggio"). Alcuni sostengono che Vespucci abbia esagerato il suo ruolo e romanzato gli avvenimenti, altri che abbia contraffatto gli originali di altri viaggiatori dell'epoca.

Le due lettere contestate parlano di quattro viaggi in America. Attualmente vi è una disputa tra alcuni illustri storici (Germán Arciniegas e Gabriel Camargo Perez) che sostengono che il primo viaggio di Vespucci sia avvenuto insieme a Juan de la Cosa nel giugno del 1497, con probabile comandante Juan Díaz de Solís, e altri che ritengono che questo viaggio non sia mai avvenuto.

1499 - 1500: Amerigo partecipò ad una spedizione guidata da Alonso de Hojeda. Nella spedizione vi era anche il cantabrico Juan de la Cosa, famoso pilota e cartografo.

Nel 1501 prese parte ad una spedizione comandata da Gonzalo Coelho. La spedizione si fermò alcuni giorni nelle isole di Capo Verde, e venne in contatto con le navi di Cabral, esploratore portoghese di ritorno dal suo viaggio in India.A Capo Verde Vespucci conobbe l'ebreo Gaspar da Gama che gli descrisse i popoli, la fauna e la vegetazione dell'India. Comparando questo racconto con quello che lui aveva osservato nel Nuovo Mondo, si convinse ancor di più che le terre da lui visitate non potevano fare parte dell'Asia. La spedizione, si spinse più a sud fino alla latitudine 52 sud.

Fu la rapida diffusione delle lettere circolate a suo nome che indusse il cartografo Martin Waldseemüller a usare il genere femminile (America) del suo nome latinizzato (Americus Vespucius), per indicare il nuovo continente in una carta del mondo disegnata nel 1507, contenuta nella Cosmographiae Introductio. L'idea di Waldseemüller era che l'appellativo si riferisse all'attuale America meridionale, cioè alle terre toccate da Vespucci.

Amerigo Vespucci fu nominato, nel 1508, "Piloto Mayor de Castilla", dal re Ferdinando II di Aragona. Questo titolo era importante perché era il responsabile di organizzare le spedizioni nelle nuove terre e di formare piloti e cartografi, insegnando loro l'uso del quadrante e dell'astrolabio.

Vespucci morì nel 1512 a Siviglia, in Andalusia. Non ebbe discendenza, ma lasciò i suoi beni alla moglie, l'andalusa Maria Cerezo"

So I'd say our controversial friend Amerigo was rather spaniard, or even portuguese, than italian....
(P.S.: ...and America was a name initially conceived for South America, not all of the continent. Speaking with precision, he discovered nothing, in my opinion. Discoveries were done by the spaniards and the portuguese, acting him only as navigator and cartographer. But the continent was finally called America. Lucky guy)

 

I'd have to go back to the sources to cite the details, but my recollection from student days is that Amerigo Vespucci accompanied several expeditions to the continents now known as North and South America, in a minor capacity. However, in later years he wrote an account of his travels, naming the continents after himself for his supposed "first sighting". The name stuck because he was a good promoter, better promoter than his contemporaries, who were explorers.

So not much has changed in the world. The promoters, rather than the doers, get the recognition.

 

If indeed Cristoforo Colon was a Portugese agent whose mission was to prevent Spain from establishing strongholds and influence in India, then he was the most successful secret agent in history!

 

Thanks Guillermo for the infos...I love history and you gave me a lot of informations!

 

No, no, no! Christophorus Columbus was in fact a double agent of the Great Khan of Cipango, who didn't want more ***** occidentals trying to steal his spicies and to copulate like pigs with his harem! So he sent Chin-to-fo-lus Col-um-Bush to lay a continent in the middle of the way and then 'discovering' it, creating at the same time a bloody confusion lasting till our times. A genius, the man...

 

Arh Guillermo at last the truth about the Great man, were you hiding it thinking we would not find out? and is it not true also that you descend from the mighty 'chinnee' which is why you have such a font of knowledge? (in this case most of it a piss take but never the less taken well because it indicates that pehaps you may, just may, be developing an Englishmans sense of humour........Now change your name to Drake and we'll get started - or are you claiming that the Great Dragon was a son of one don C.C. I guess if you called him dragon there may be some truth in it!!

ain't history grande

Mike