Volume 1

A new general collection of voyages and travels. Consisting of the most esteemed relations, which have been hitherto published in any language; comprehending everything remarkable in its kind, in Europe, Asia, Africa, and America.

Date:: 1745-1747

Credit: A new general collection of voyages and travels. Consisting of the most esteemed relations, which have been hitherto published in any language; comprehending everything remarkable in its kind, in Europe, Asia, Africa, and America. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$and that without any previous Knowledge of the Countries he went to find out •, yet it mu ft be confefied, that they firft fet on Foot the Navi¬ gation of the Ocean, and put it into the Heads of other Nations, to go on the Difcovery of di- ftant Regions. Backward- Other Nations were fo far from being even nefi of other as early as the Portuguese in Attempts of this Kind, Nations. thefe latter had been carrying on their Enter- prizes, near fourfcore Years, before any of their Neighbours feem to have thought of foreign Dif¬ coveries; the Endeavours towards which, they confidered as downright Knight Errantry, and the Effedt of a diftempered Imagination, as well in the firft Promoter, as thofe who profecuted his Scheme. Put the feveral Events {hewed, that the Defigns were the Refults of folid Reafoning, and formed on the moft rational Grounds. In a Word, the Account of thefe Difcoveries makes one of the moft curious Parts of Modern Hijlory, as comprizing a Multitude of the moft remarkable Tranfadlions that ever happened in any Period of Time. For this Reafon, we have been the more particular in reciting them, well know¬ ing, that the Curious will be defirous to be ac¬ quainted with every Step that was made in fuch grand Proceedings, and by what Degrees fuch vaft Undertakings came to be accomplifhed : Befides, as this Intercourfe of Europeans wrought a very great Change in the feveral Countries and their Inhabitants wherever they came, and both appear in a different Light to what they did before, there¬ fore every Circumftance, relating to fuch Trans¬ actions, feems to deferve Notice, and even claim our Regard. Portugueze I n the Year of the Hejrah 93, and of Chrift Affairspre- y j Spain was Subjected to Walid ibn Abdolmalek, rDA clerics h (the fixth Ommiyan Kbalifah of Baghdad) by Tank and Mufa ; who were brought in by Count ''Julian, Governor of the Coafts of Andalufia, to revenge himfelf on Roderic, laft of the Gothijh Kings, for deflowering his Daughter Cava. The Arabs, in a very fhort Space, erected feveral little Monarchies, whofe Kings quarrelling among them- felves, gave Don Pelayo (or Peladius) Prince of Ajlurias, an Opportunity, in 718, of making Head againft them. His Succeflors continued the War for above 300 Years with goodSuccefs; and in 1085, Alfonfo VI. of CaJlilean&Leon, took Toledo from them. To requite Henry of Lorain, (by a fome called Earl of Limbourg) who had been very Serviceable to him in his Wars, he gave him his elder Daughter Terefa, with the Country of Portugal in Dowry, and whatever elfe he Should take from the Moors, or old Inhabitants of Mau- ritania, who had, a little before this, conquered both the Weft Part of Africa and Spain from the Arabs. Don Alphonfo, Son of Henry, was the firft King of Portugal, newly eredted into a Monarchy, on the Slaughter of the Moors in thofe Parts; who, b in the Time of John I. were quite driven out. This Prince, purfuing that hereditary Quarrel, paffed the Sea in 1415, and took Ceuta aforefaid. fje and his Pofterity made Africa the Seat of War, till they were diverted by their Enterprizes by Sea ; which, of the two, proved more benefi¬ cial, and lefs hazardous. This3 Conqueft of Ceuta, or Seat, is men¬ tioned by Walfinghatn, who lived in thofe Times, and tells us, That the King of Portugal, relying on c the Almans [or Germans] but mojl of all, on the Merchants 96 England, overcame the Agarens [or Arabs] in the Land of the King of the Betinarins b, [Bani Marins] many Tlsoufands of them (fays our Author, according to the charitable Cuftom of his Church) being fent to Hell-, and took their City called Sunt, feated on the Sea, being very large, and fur rounded with a Wall, twenty Miles, ’tis fa id, in Compafs. King John had fome Claim to this Afliftance from the Englijh, as having married d Philippa (Daughter of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancajler, and Sifter to Henry IV. c) whofe third Son Henry, was the firft who fet on Foot foreign Difcoveries. C H A P. I. Voyages and Difcoveries of the Portugueze along the Coajl of Africa, as far as Cape Verde: Collected from de Faria y Soufa, Juan de Barros, Antonio Galvam, and other Authors. IN the Year 1415, Prince Henry accompanied 1415 his Father in the taking of Ceuta, and had aL^WS confiderable Share in the Honour of that Fff^ Vidlory d, wherein he fignalized both his Courage^y\Z\u and Conduct; which was the more to be admired, in Regard, at that Time, he was but in the 21ft Year of his Age. At his Return from Africa, he brought back with him fo ftrong an Inclina¬ tion to difeover new Lands and Oceans, that he 3 See Walfing.Hift. Angl. Ann. 1415. b Thefe Bani Marins, were a Tribe of Moors, or Africans, who, under Yakub Abdallah, in 1299, outed the Moahedun, or a’Mohades, as the Spaniards call them. c Long before this, in the Time of Henry II. the Englijh, in Conjunction with other Northern Pilgrims, defwned for the Holy Land Expedition, failing from Dartmouth in about twenty-feven Ships, touched at Lijbon, where the King of Portugal befought their Aid againft the Moors of Sylvia, or Sylois, proffering them the Spoils of that City in Recompence. Having undertaken the Enterprize, on the third Day of the Siege, they broke into the Suburbs, and forced Alkhad the Prince, to yield the City, in which there were above 60,000 Moors, whereof 47,000 were flain. d He was Governor of the Military Order of Chrift, which had been inftituted for maintaining War againft the Moors. fpent$