B E H 



165 



B E H 



Urtisius, in his Cfironicon Basiliense, written in German, 

 lib. iv. cap. ix. p. 201. fol. Basil, 1580. 



There is a little work of great rarity, entitled Lettre de 

 M. I Abbe S* * * a Mile, da G * * *, BeguinectAnvers, sur 

 rOrigine et le Progres de ton Institut. 12mo. Par. 1731, 

 from which we learn that Beguinages, as they \vere called 

 then, existed at Aix-la-Chapelle, Alost, Anderlech, An- 

 ghein, Antwerp, Arras, Arschot, Audenarde, Bethune, 

 Bruges, Brussels, Carnbray, Cologne, Courtray, Diest, Douay, 

 Ghent, Grandraont, Hasselt, Hercnthals, Hochstraten, 

 Huy, Isch, Lew, Liege, Lierre, Lille, Lovz, Louvain, Ma- 

 lines, Mons, Namur, Nivelle, Orchies, Ruremonde, Ter- 

 monde, Tirlemont, St. Trond, Tongres, Tournay, Tournhout, 

 Valenciennes, Venlo, and Vilvorden. It contains also two 

 representations of a Beguine, one in the dress worn in the 

 chapel of her house or convent, and the other in her walk- 

 ing habit. Communities of Beguines still subsist in Hol- 

 land, Belgium, and Germany. In Brussels there is a portion 

 of the town still called the Beguinage, inhabited by about a 

 thousand Beguines, governed by matrons. There are Be- 

 guinages also at Amsterdam, Ajitwerp, and Mechlin. 



BEHEADING. [See DECAPITATION.} 



BEHEM, MARTIN, was a celebrated navigator and 

 geographer of the fifteenth century. His name is written 

 by various authors in very different ways: Behem, Beham, 

 Behaim, Boehm, Bcehem, Behen, Behemira, &c. He was 

 born in the old imperial city of Nuremberg, somewhere about 

 the year 143C. His family, which was respectable, or what 

 was called 'distinguished' in those days, is said to have 

 come originally from Bohemia. His education was care- 

 fully attended to, and he is said to have enjoyed the advan- 

 tage of being instructed by the learned John Miiller, better 

 known under the Latin name of Regiomontanus. In early 

 life he followed the profession of a merchant, continuing, 

 however, to cultivate the mathematical, and particularly the 

 nautical, sciences, which may have become more interesting 

 to him from the circumstance of his having to make several 

 commercial voyages. Even at this time he is said to have 

 reflected a great deal on the subject of the antipodes, and, 

 like Columbus, to have been convinced of the existence of 

 vast tracts of land in the western hemisphere ; but already- 

 many scientific men entertained vague notions of the kind. 



Being on business at Antwerp in the year 1479, Behcm 

 became acquainted with some Flemings who were closely 

 connected with the enterprising court of Lisbon, and who 

 had formed colonies in the newly-discovered islands of the 

 Azores. At their pressing invitation, Martin went to Por- 

 tugal, where, as a skilful cosmographcr and maker of maps, 

 he was well received, that country being at the time wholly 

 given up to maritime discoveries. The many controversies 

 and contradictions concerning Behem's life begin at this 

 point, but here, at least, they are easily settled. Cellarius and 

 several other writers say that Behem was the discoverer of 

 the whole group of the A/ores, whereas there is ample evi- 

 dence to show that some of them were seen by Vanderberg, 

 n navigator of Bruges, in 1-131, when Martin could be liltle 

 more than a year old ; that Gonsavo Velho Cabral visited 

 and named the island of Santa Maria in 1432 ; and that all 

 the islands were known in 14GO, or nineteen years before 

 Behem went to Lisbon, and connected himself as a geo- 

 grapher and explorer with the Portuguese government. 

 These facts are recorded in Portuguese hifttory. Other au- 

 thors, again, merely make Behem the discoverer of the 

 island of Fayal ; and Mr. Otto, who has taken great pains to 

 advance the fame of his countryman, attaches great import- 

 ance to the following note, which he says was written in 

 German, on parchment, and preserved in the archives of 

 Nuremberg: 'Martin Behnm, Ksfj., son of Mr. Martin 

 Beham of Scopperin, lived in the reign of John II., king of 

 Portugal, on an island which he discovered himself, and 

 which he called Fayal, situated among the Azores in the 

 Western Ocean.' But there is good ground for believing 

 that the only two of the islands unknown even so early as 

 1419 (when King Alphonso of Portugal granted a license 

 to liis own uncle, Don Henry, to colonise the Azores), were 

 the comparatively small and distant islands of Corvo and 

 Flores: and its magnitude and position must of necessity 

 have made Fayal, with the group to which it belongs, known 

 s-oii after the discovery (in 1432) of St. Mary's and St. 

 Michael s. 



We no-.v come to a fact in which his biographers gene- 

 rally agree, though they differ a few months as to dato. In 

 1484, BcLem was placed as a scientific man on board the 



fleet of the celebrated navigator Diogo Cam, who was com 

 missioned to prosecute Portuguese discovery along the west 

 African coasts, which were then only known ns far as Cape 

 St. Catherine in lat. 2 30' S. "With that distinguished ;ul- 

 miral the cosmographer went to Fayal and Pico : and this 

 we believe to be the first time he ever visited the Azores. 

 Leaving that group of islands, they bound in with the African 

 continent, and, doubling Cape Verde, examined all the coast 

 from the river Gambia to the river Zaire, or Congo, the 

 mouth of which lies in lat. 6 S. Continuing their course, 

 they made Cape St. Augustine, and finally reached Cape 

 Cross, or De Padrono, in lat. 22 S., which was the limit of 

 their voyage, and no less than 1 9 oO' farther south than any 

 preceding discoverer had ventured. After an absence of 

 nineteen months, Behem returned to Lisbon, where, in re- 

 ward for his services, the king (John II.) conferred the 

 honour of knighthood upon him in a public and unusually 

 splendid manner. 



In I486 we hear of Behem at Fayal, where, and at which 

 time, he married the daughter of Job Huerter, by whom he 

 had a son. It appears to us, that, from his settlement in this 

 island, and from the care he took to colonize and cultivate it, 

 the mistake arose, in after years, of his having been the dis- 

 coverer of Fayal. Martin Behem did not (us far as we can 

 learn) accompany any other expedition for discovery either 

 to Africa or elsewhere ; but he busied himself in making 

 charts, and occasionally went from the Azores to Lisbon 

 and to Madeira, at either of which places he may have 

 formed an acquaintance with Christopher Columbus. An 

 important, but we think an unreasonable, conclusion has 

 been drawn chiefly from the assumed meeting of these two 

 great men. 



In 1492, the year in which Columbus started on the 

 expedition that ended in the discovery of the New World, 

 Martin Behem paid a visit to his native city of Nuremberg, 

 where, in the course of a year's residence, and at the earnest 

 request of his countrymen, he made a terrestrial globe, 

 some traits and guesses in which have, perhaps more than 

 anything else, contributed to an obstinately maintained 

 theory. When he returned from Germany to Portugal he 

 was employed for a short time in some diplomatic negocia- 

 tions ; but in 1494, retiring from all public business, Martin 

 repaired to his estate: in Fayal. where he lived tranquilly in 

 the bosom of his family, continuing, however, to keep his 

 attention awake to his old and darling subject, and to the 

 progress of discovery, which after Columbus's first voyage 

 was carried on more rapidly than ever. In 1506 he was 

 once more at Lisbon, and on the 29th day of July in the 

 same year, full of years and honours, he died in that city, 

 leaving no works oi'any kind behind him, except the maps 

 and charts lie had made, and his globe. A recent tourist 

 in Germany (Mrs. Jameson) mentions an interesting fact 

 the old house of Martin Behem in the city of Nuremberg is 

 to the present day occupied by a globe and mapseller. 



It is admitted on all aides that Martin Behem ought to 

 be regarded as one of the most learned geographers, and as 

 the very best chart-maker of his age. But these, his real 

 and great merits, have not satisfied certain writers, who, 

 moved by the prejudices of country, or a love of contradiction 

 :md paradox, insist that Behem, and not Columbus, was the 

 discoverer of America. Cellarius and Riccioli both say that 

 he visited the American continent and the Strait of Magal- 

 haens, but Stuvenius appears to have been the first to give 

 great importance to this doctrine ; asserting in his treatise, 

 De rero novi Orbis Inventore, that Behem had accurately 

 traced on his globe preserved at Nuremberg the islands of 

 America, and even the Strait of Magalhaens. Professor 

 Tozen combated this assertion as far back as 1 76 1 , and for a 

 quarter of a century the theory was laid aside as untenable. 

 Dr. Robertson, in his History (if America, took some pains 

 to rescue the fame of Columbus, but the task was then con- 

 sidered almost unnecessary. In 1786, however, Mr. Otto, a 

 diplomatic servant of the French government, but a German 

 by birth, again renewed the nearly forgotten dispute, and in 

 a long letter to Dr. Franklin stated his reasons for believing 

 that Martin Behcm had visited America before Columbus, 

 and that all Columbus had done after him had !>een in pur- 

 suance of Behem s instructions and advice. 



Mr. Otto does not seem to be aware that such an opinion 

 was ever started before. His letter was published in the 

 second volume of ' Transactions of the American Philoso- 

 phical Society, held at Philadelphia for promoting Useful 

 Knowledge.' After its appearance a variety of writers and 



