THE SOURCE OF THE NILE. 119 



In 1475, and this is confirmed by Ludolf ; and, on all hands, 

 it is allowed he reigned 1 7 years, which would have brought 

 the laft year of his reign to 1492. It feems alfo to be agreed 

 by the generality of them, that Covillan faw and converfed 

 with this prince, Ifcander, fome time before his death : this 

 he very well might have done, if that prince lived to the 

 1492, and Peter Covillan came into Abyffinia in 1490, as 

 Galvan fays in his father's memoirs. But then Tellez in- 

 forms us exprefsly, that Ifcander was dead 6 months before 

 the arrival of Peter Covillan in that country : If Peter Co- 

 villan arrived 6 months after the death of Ifcander, it muib 

 have been in the end of his fon's reign, Amda Sion, whcv 

 was an infant, and reigned only 7 months. 



Alvarez omits this king, Amda Sion, altogether, andfo 

 does Tellez ; and there is a heap of miftakes here that fhew 

 thefe Portuguefe hiftorians paid very little attention to the 

 chronology of thefe reigns. They call Alexander the father 

 of Naod, when he was really but his brother ; and Helena, 

 they fay, was David's mother, when, in fad, flie was his 

 grandmother, or rather his grandfather's wife ; for Helena, 

 who was Iteghe in the time of David the III. had never cither 

 fon or daughter. So that if I differ, as in fac^ I do, 4 years,. 

 or thereabout, in this account, I do not think in- thofe rcr 

 mote times, when the language and manner of accounting 

 was fo little known to thefe ftrangers, that I, therefore, 

 fliould reje<ft my own account and fcrvilely adopt theirs, and 

 the more fo, becaufc, as we lliall fee in its proper place, by 

 the examination and comparifon made by help of an eclipfc 

 of the fun in the i3thyear of Claudius' reign in the i553>and 

 counting from that downwards to my arrival in Abyffinia, 

 and backwards to Ifcander, that.that prince mud have be- 



gim 



