West – Indianischer Historien under Theil / Praia 416

Title

West – Indianischer Historien under Theil / Praia 416

Map shows Santiago at the Cap Verden. German edition.

ca. 1628

Artist

Bry, de - Merian (1528-1598)

In 1631, Matthäus Merian and Johann Ludwig Gottfried published Historia Antipodum, a heavily abridged, single-volume version of Theodor De Bry’s 14-part America series. After De Bry’s death, his sons continued the project. Merian, a skilled engraver, later married De Bry’s daughter and collaborated with Gottfried. The Historia Antipodum reorganized numerous travel accounts into three chapters covering nature, exploration, and recent colonial developments. Merian and Gottfried significantly reworked the content, merging reports and integrating illustrations into the text. Their depiction of the natural world and Indigenous cultures—drawing in part on José de Acosta’s writings—was particularly influential. The book stands as one of the most ambitious works of early modern travel literature.

Historical Description

The uninhabited islands were circled by António Fernandes in 1445 and discovered and entered for the first time in 1456 by the Venetian Alvise Cadamosto, who was in Portuguese service (Boa Vista). Antonio da Noli, a Genoese captain who also sailed on behalf of the Portuguese Prince Henry the Navigator, continued to explore the islands from 1458 in collaboration with Diogo Gomes, discovered most of the rest of the eastern Cape Verde Islands and baptized the archipelago with the name Ilhas de Cabo Verde and began settling the islands as governor of the Portuguese crown from 1461. In fact, Diogo Gomes later claimed to be the first of the two to have seen the island of Santiago from afar and also to have been the first to set foot on it. Antonio da Noli, however, managed to return to Portugal earlier, and he was then understandably rewarded by Heinrich the Navigator with the encouragement of the discovery, which, in the words of Diogo Gomes, "I, Gomes, discovered". Because of the rivalry between the two, Diogo Gomes is considered to be the true discoverer of the main island of Santiago in Portuguese historiography. The islands were named by the Portuguese after Cabo Verde (Green Cape) on the west coast of Africa.