296 Note on Portions of the Cross or Memorial Pillar [1898. 



brought from Portugal, and planted by Bartholomew Diaz at Pedestal 

 Point in 1486." 



The pieces were put together roughly in the form of a cross, and 

 stood on the stoep at the entrance of the old Museum, and I have 

 seen a reproduction of an old photograph representing^the cross as it 

 was in those days. 



In 1865 Chevalier du Prat, one of the judges of the Mixed Com- 

 mission, appointed to decide on the validity of slavers and their 

 cargoes captured on the African coasts, and also apparently Consul 

 for Portugal at the same time, made a claim for the cross on behalf 

 of the King of Portugal. Loth to part with so interesting a relic, 

 the trustees made a compromise, and the upper part with the cross 

 piece was handed over to Chevalier du Prat to find its way to Lisbon, 

 the lower part being retained in the Museum. 



In the earlier part of the century the coasts of South Africa were 

 surveyed by Captain Owen, B.N.* He, on page 269 of vol. ii. of his 

 narrative, states that he visited Angra Pequena, and there, on the top 

 of a small granite eminence, found the remains of Diaz' cross, which 

 was said to have been thrown down some forty years previously ; 

 subsequent visitors had replaced the original basal shaft in the ground 

 again, which was then about six feet in height, and had placed other 

 broken fragments on the shaft above to roughly restore the cross. 

 The basal fragments were of marble, rounded on one side, square on 

 the other for the insertion of an inscription now illegible. From the 

 description given it does not seem to be very certain whether traces of 

 the inscription, though now illegible, were distinctly seen, or whether 

 the former existence of such an inscription was merely inferred from 

 the shape of the base. On their way down the hill, Captain Owen 

 describes his officers as having discovered the cross itself lying on the 

 ground, and as having been of the same breadth and thickness as the 

 shaft itself, also with an inscription equally illegible. It was doubtless 

 three of these pieces which were subsequently deposited in the South 

 African Museum in 1856. 



The portion of the pillar still preserved in the Museum measures 

 about 22 in. in height, 8 in. in breadth, and 5-J- in. thickness ; it 

 appears to taper very slightly from below upwards, and is composed 

 of a compact hard shelly limestone, a rock which does not seem to 

 be found near Angra Pequena but which is not uncommon in 

 Portugal. 



* Narrative of voyages to explore the shores of Africa, Arabia, and Madagascar, 

 performed by H.M.S. Levcn and Baracouta, by Captain W. F. W. Owen. London, 

 2 vols., 1833, 8vo. 





