Volume 1

A collection of voyages and travels, some now first printed from original manuscripts, others now first published in English. To which is prefixed, an introductory discourse (supposed to be written by the celebrated Mr. Locke) intitled, the whole history of navigation from its original to this time / Illustrated with maps and cuts, curiously engraved.

  • Awnsham Churchill
Date:
1744-1746
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A collection of voyages and travels, some now first printed from original manuscripts, others now first published in English. To which is prefixed, an introductory discourse (supposed to be written by the celebrated Mr. Locke) intitled, the whole history of navigation from its original to this time / Illustrated with maps and cuts, curiously engraved. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    navigation. Not to fpeak therefore of what is abfolutely bibulous, or only fuppofititious, let us come to the firft failors famed in hiftory ; and touching thole times of darknefs lightly, defcend to matters of more certainty and better autho¬ rity. If we give credif to poets and poetical writers, we fhall find Nqnune covering the Mediterranean lea with his mighty fleets, as admiral under his father Saturn, fuppofed to be Noah, as Neptune is to be Japbeth •, and to him is afcribed the firft building of fhips, with fharp Items, or heads fhod with iron or brafs, to run againft other fhips, and fplit them, and with towers on them for men to fight when they came to lie board and board. Yet there are others that give the honour of inventing of fhips, Glaucus. and fleering them to Glaucus, affirming it was he that built and piloted the Ihip Argo Jafon. in Jafon’s expedition againft the Tyrrhenians; which others attribute to Argos, making him the builder and pilot. Thefe notions, or rather poetical fictions, are rejefted by Eochart. the learned Bochartus in his Geographia Sa- Geograph. cr^ p.%\<y, 820. where he {hews that the 8‘9' fhip Argo ought properly to be called Area, which in the Phoenician tongue fignifies long, a name given it becaufe it was the firft long fhip built by the Greeks, who learned it of the Phoenicians, and called it by their name, whereas all the vefiels tiled by them before that time were round. This Ihip Argo, or rather galley, he lays had fifty oars, that is twenty five on each fide, and therefore mud be fifty cubits in length. Here it ap¬ pears that the Greeks had round vefiels be¬ fore that time, and all we can reafonably conclude is, that this fhip or galley Argo, or Arco, was larger, and perhaps better built and contrived than any before it, and might perform the longer voyage, which rendered it famous, as if it had been the firft fhip. But it is certain there were many fleets, fuch as they were, before this time ; Argonauts, for the Argonauts expedition was about the year of the world 2801, which was after Semiramis. the flood 1144 years: whereas we find Semi- ramis built a fleet of two thoufand lail on the coafts of Cyprus, Syria, and Phoenicia, and had them tranfported on carriages and ca¬ mels backs to the river Indus, where they Stauro- fought and defeated the fleet of Staurobates bates de- king of India, confifting of four thoulimd f'eated. boats made of cane, as Diodorus Siculus * L 2 ;ln-writes *■ About the year of the world 2622,4 t:q u;p. i. and 965 alter the flood, Jupiter King of Crete, or Candia, with his fleet ftole away Europa the daughter of Agenor king of the Sidonians. In 2700 of the world, and af- H'e/ot?. ter the flood 1043, Ptrfeus went on the expedition by fea againft Medufa in Africk. Now to return to the Argonauts fo much 1 • celebrated by the poets, upon the ftridteft examination into truth, we fhall only find them inconfiderable coafters in the Medi¬ terranean, and fet out by the publick to fupprefs pirates, though fabulous Greece has extolled their expeditions beyond all mea- fure. Next follows the Trojan war about Troians. the year of the world 2871, and 1214 al¬ ter the flood, where we find a fleet of one thoufand one hundred and forty fail of all forts, ftill creeping along the fhores, without daring to venture out of fight of land. Now leaving the Greeks it is fit we return to the Phoenicians, who are the fame the Phoenicia feripture calls the Philiftines or Canaanites,ans- as is largely proved by Bochartus, certainly the earlieft and ableft mariners in thofe firft ages: they made the greateft dilcoveries of any nation, they planted colonies of their own in moft of thofe countries fo difeovered, and fettled trade and commerce in the moft diftant regions. There can be no greater teftimony of their wealth and naval power than what we find in holy writ, Ezek. xxvii. Ezek. where the prophet fpeaking of Tyre, fays xxvii. it is fituate at the entrance of the fea, is a merchant for many ifles, its fhip-boards are of fir-trees of Senir, their mails of cedars, their oars of oak of Bafhan, their benches of ivory, their fails of fine embroidered linen , and fo goes on through moft of the chapter, extolling its mariners, pilots, fhips, and all things belonging to them. This, though from the undeniable oracle of feripture, were no fufficient proof of - their knowledge in this art, were not all hiftories full of their many expeditions. The firft was on the coaft of Africk, where they founded the moft powerful city of Carthage, Carthage, which fo long contended with Rome for the fovereignty of the world: thence they ex¬ tended their dominions into Spain, and not fo fatisfied, coafted it round, ftill purfuing their difeoveries along the coaft of France, and even into this ifland of Great Britain, where they afterwards had a fettled trade for tin, and fuch other commodities as the country then afforded, as may be feen at large in Procopius, Strabo, Diodorus Siculus, and many other ancient authors. Pliny, p]iny, lib. lib. 2. cap. 69. with others affirms, that in 2. cap. 69. the flourifhing times of the republick of Carthage, Hanno being fent out from thence Hanno. to difeover fouthward, failed quite round Africk into the Red-fea, and returned the fame v/ay •, and that Kimilco fetting out at Kimilco, the fame time northwards, failed as far as Thule or Iceland. Both thefe relations are in part rejected by moft authors as fabulous, becaufc it does not appear that the utmoft extent of Africk was ever known till the Portuguefes in thefe latter times difeovered por(; it i and the very northern parts of Europe gude> were