PORTUGUESE DISCOVERIES 



covered it, he sent [to Portugal] a ship with men and women taken in the 

 said land, and he stayed behind with the other ship, and never returned, and 

 it is believed that he perished, and there are many masts [i.e., trees for masts]." 



On January 15, 1502, King JVIanuel gave Caspar's brother, 

 JVTiguel Cortereal, fresh letters patent as follows : ^ 



"We make known to all who may see this letter that Miguell Cortereall, 

 a nobleman of our household and our head doorkeeper [chamberlain?], now 

 tells us that, seeing how Caspar Cortereall, his brother, long ago sailed from 

 this city with three ships to discover new land, of which he had already found 

 a part, and seeing that after a lapse of time two of the said ships returned to 

 the said city [Lisbon], and five months have elapsed without his coming,^ he 

 wishes to go in search of him, and that he, the said Miguell Cortereall, had 

 many outlays and expenses of his own in the said voyage of discovery, as well 

 as in the said ships, which his said brother fitted out the first time for that 

 purpose [i.e., for the first voyage], when he found the said land, and likewise 

 for the second [i.e., the second voyage], wherefore the said Caspar Cortereall 

 in consideration of this promised to share with him the said land which he thus 

 discovered and . . . which we had granted and given to him by our deed 

 of gift, for which the said Caspar Cortereall asked us before his departure, 

 etc." Therefore Miguel claimed his share of the lands discovered by his 

 brother, which he obtained from the king by these letters patent, as well as 

 the right to all new islands and lands he might discover that year (1502), 

 besides that which his brother had found.^ 



Two legends on the anonymous Portuguese chart of about 

 1520 are also of interest. On the land, Do Lavrador,* (i.e., 

 Greenland) is written: 



" This land the Portuguese saw, but did not enter." 



1 The document, as reproduced, has 1502. As the civil year at that time be- 

 gan on March 25, the date given would correspond to January 24, 1503, ac- 

 cording to our calendar. But, according to the tradition given in later ac- 

 counts, Miguel Cortereal sailed in 1502, the year after his brother (cf. the 

 legend on the Portuguese chart of about 1520, p. 354). Either we must sup- 

 pose that the year or month in the document is an error, or the tradition is 

 incorrect. 



2 These five months are a little difficult to understand. Either they must be 

 reckoned from his departure — if we put that in May, 1501, five months will 

 take us to October, 1501, but then the other ship had returned (see pp. 347 

 f.) — or they must be reckoned from the return of the " two ships " (in Octo- 

 ber), but that takes us to March, 1502. Thus neither gives good sense. Most 

 likely, as in the case of the three ships instead of two, it is an error in the 

 document. 



3 Cf. Harrisse, 1883, p. 214. 



4 Cf. Kohl, 1869, p. 179, pi. X.; Kretschmer, 1892, pi. xii.; Bjombo, 1910, p. 

 212. 



353 



