THE EUROPEAN BACKGROUND 19 



little is now known of their methods or of the weapons and 

 vessels which they employed. 



At least one indirect and incidental reference, however, 

 seems to justify the belief that some method of capturing the 

 right whale was in vogue among the Northmen at least as 

 early as 850 a. d. About 885 a. d. to 890 a. d. one Octher, a 

 Northman, gave the English King Alfred an account of his 

 discoveries along the coast of Norway. These explorations had 

 been made while engaged in the search for whales; and, added 

 the narrator proudly, he had "sailed along the Norway coast, 

 so far north as commonly the whale-hunters used to travel." 

 Such a statement can leave little doubt that whales had been 

 hunted in Norwegian waters for several preceding decades, at 

 least; but unfortunately King Alfred did not urge his traveler- 

 guest to dwell further upon the subject of whales and their 

 captors. 



Whaling on a systematic, commercialized basis was first 

 followed by the Basques along the shores of the Bay of Bis- 

 cay, where it is still possible to trace the remains of their 

 watch-towers and furnaces. Beginning well before 1000 a. d., 

 these mediaeval whalemen brought their industry to its apogee 

 as early as the twelfth and thirteenth centuries — although 

 they continued to capture whales, in gradually diminishing 

 numbers, until the close of the seventeenth century. 



During this long period the Basques were eminently success- 

 ful both in the capture of their game and in the sale of their 

 products. At first they remained cautiously near the shore. 

 Then, with more experience, came voyages which grew cour- 

 ageously longer, until at length they were accustomed to 

 cover great distances on the open sea. Long before Columbus 

 discovered America they were making frequent trips to Ice- 

 land; and the middle of the sixteenth century saw them often 

 in the vicinity of Newfoundland. Their captures became so 

 tempting, in fact, that they soon fell under the sway of the 

 ubiquitous feudal tax-gatherers. In 1261, for instance, they 

 were paying a tithe on all whales' tongues sold in Bayonne; 

 and in 1388 Edward III was collecting a duty of six pounds 

 sterling for every whale brought into Biarritz. 



The mediaeval Basques seem to have built up, too, an im- 



