THE NAME AMERICA, 655 



HAMERICUS IN DANTE AND AMERIGO IN MACHIAVELLI. 



My son, Dr. Philippe B. Marcou, succeeded last year (1888) in finding 

 twice the name Ilamericm and Amerigo ; tirst in Dante Allighieri, " De 

 Vulgaris eloquentia," liber secundus, caput vi, and in the Comedia di 

 Xicolo Machiavelli, in his Opere, vol. nono, Milano, ISOo, where he has, 

 as his first i^ersonage, Amerigo, veccliio Padrone, and as his last, /rate 

 Alberigo) besides he speaks at page 45 of the same V()lum3 in Novella 

 place volissima di Nicollo Machiavelli, of a " figlinola d' Amerigo Do- 

 nati." In Dante we have two provencal iioets of the name Hamericus, 

 written with an h, as a family name written in provencal or langue (Voc. 

 " Aimeric." Even now the name Emeric is a family name in Provence. 



Dante inhabited Provence for some time, and was well acquainted 

 with two Provencal poets, Emeric of Belinoi and Emeric of Peguilain; 

 and in translating the family name of Emeric into Hamericus, its Latin 

 form, it does not follow that he regarded Emeric as the Provencal name 

 of the Florentine Amerigho ; and we can not quote Dante as having 

 translated the name Amerigho or Amerigo into Hamericus. 



AMERIGO IN SPAIN IN 149.5. 



A short time after I received a letter from Don Miircos J. de la Es- 

 pada, the most learned Americanist of Spain, and who knows more 

 about the Archives de Indios than anybody else. The letter, dated 

 Madrid, 22 de Marzo de 1889, says : " Por el consta que Amerigo Ves- 

 pucci se llameba y se llamabe Amerigo en las libros de cuentes y despa- 

 chos de armadas 4 Indias perde el afio de 1495." 



The oldest document made public in Spain before this was a receipt 

 dated January 12, 1496, with only the name Vespuche, and no Christian 

 name. The first time we have the Christian name of Vespucci, in well- 

 authenticated documents, is in the two letters of Cristoforo Colombo of 

 the 5th and 25th of February, 1505, written two years after the return 

 of Colombo from his last voyage. Now since the discovery of Senor de 

 la Espada we have the C/hristian name Amerigo in 1495, consequently 

 before any of the voyages of Vespucci to the New World, and before the 

 fourth voyage of Colombo to Nicaragua and Veragua. It is most im- 

 portant, for the Libros de gastos de armadas of the archives de la casa de 

 contractation at Sevilla, are justly regarded as an excellent authority 

 for everything relating to the first voyages of discoveries of the New 

 World or Las Indias. 



AMERIGHO IN THE ARCHIVES OF MANTOVA IN 1492. 



Lately I have received from Rome a paper : " Come veramente si 

 chiamasse il Vespucci, e se dal nome di lui sia venutoqnello del Nuovo 

 Mondo, nota del socio Gilberto Govi" (Rendiconti della R. accademia 

 <lei Lincei, vol. iv, pp. 297-307, sednta del 18 nov. 1888, Homa, 4to). 

 The author, Signor G. Govi, has the good fortune to publish the only 



