THE LETTER OF DR. DIEGO ALVAREZ CHANCE, DATED 
i404, RELATING TO THE\SECOND- VOYAGE, OFICG= 
LUMBUS TO AMERICA (BEING THE First WRITTEN 
DocUMENT ON THE NATURAL History, ETHNOG- 
RAPHY, AND ETHNOLOGY OF AMERICA) 
(Translated from Spanish original, as spoken and written in the fifteenth 
century, with explanatory notes, geograplucal and historical remarks.)* 
By A. M. FERNANDEZ DE YBARRA, A.B., M.D. 
MEMBER OF THE NEW YorK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, MEDICAL BIOGRAPHER OF 
CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS. 
[This document is a letter addressed to the Municipal Council, or 
Cabildo,? of the city of Seville, Spain, by Dr. Diego Alvarez Chanca, 
a native of that city and physician to the fleet of Columbus on his 
second voyage of discovery to America,* dated at the port of Isa- 
*A lecture delivered before the Biological Section of the New York Acad- 
emy of Sciences, at the American Museum of-Natural History, March 5, 1900. 
This important historical document, written not by any means with the 
idea of specially treating of the flora, the fauna, the ethnology, and the 
anthropology of America, yet speaking familiarly about those subjects, was 
translated into English by Mr. R. H. Major, of the British Museum, and 
published in London for the Hakluyt Society in 1847; but as it was penned 
by its author in the old Spanish of the fifteenth century, its translation into 
English, by a foreigner of the nineteenth century, naturally contains several 
almost unavoidable inaccuracies, and lacks appreciation of the many fine and 
subtle meanings in phraseology, deviating from the rules of grammar, which - 
the original letter possesses. Besides, Dr. Chanca was an Andalusian, who 
had all the ready wit and quick perception of the humorous side of events, 
combined’ with the hyperbolic way of expressing their thoughts, so pe- 
culiar to the natives of Southern Spain, and almost impossible to appreciate 
in their full significance by foreigners. All other publications of this docu- 
ment by the English and American press, have been, I believe, repetitions 
of Mr. Major’s version. 
* This .is the name then given to the corporation of a town in all the: 
Spanish dominions, equivalent to Chapter, after the chapter of a cathedral 
or collegiate church. It is now called the Ayuntamiento, and is composed 
of a Corregidor or Alcalde, and several Regidores; the first corresponding 
to Mayor, and the latter to Aldermen. 
*This physician was a distinguished practitioner of much learning and 
professional skill, who held the position of Physician-in-Ordinary to the 
King and Queen of Castile and Aragon, and had attended their first-born 
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