170. Domestic Cal., 1547–80, p. 87.
171. Cal. Cecil MSS., i. 44.
172. A. P. C., v. 236.
173. Letters and Papers, v, Nos. 1417 and 1633.
174. English translation, 1658, p. 127.
175. Letters and Papers, viii, No. 1153.
176. Ibid. xvii, No. 893.
177. Letters and Papers, iv, No. 5101.
178. Ibid., vi, No. 1380.
179. R. O., S. P. Dom., Mary, vol. xi, No. 38.
180. Domestic Cal., Addenda, 1547–65, p. 426.
181. Royal MSS., 20 E ix.
182. R. O., S. P., Henry VIII, § 195, f. 176; digest in Letters and Papers, xix, part i, No. 85.
183. The Spaniards established a wool dépôt at Bruges: Kervyn de Lettenhove, i, p. 152.
184. R. O., S. P. Dom., Edw. VI, vol. xiii, No. 81.
185. Under Henry VIII the wool export decreased by 50 per cent. as estimated on the average number of sacks exported in the first five and last five years of the reign.
186. Add. MSS., 11716 (Letters and Papers, ii, No. 3521) contains a contrast between the treatment of merchants in France and in England, embodying many of the above details.
187. Various references in Letters and Papers, ix and x.
188. Letters and Papers, xvii, No. 555.
189. Ibid., xviii, part i, No. 33.
190. Letters and Papers, xviii, part i, No. 416.
191. Foedera, xiii. 520.
192. Letters and Papers, iv, part iii, No. 6686.
193. Venetian Cal. vi, App. 78.
194. Letters and Papers, iv, part iii, No. 6654.
195. Ibid., No. 6686.
196. Letters and Papers, xvi, No. 1126.
197. Harl. MSS., 297, f. 249. There is in the Record Office (S. P. Misc., No. 107) a manuscript volume containing transcripts of the proceedings on April 24, 1539, the Letters Patent of Henry VIII in 1530, the privileges granted by the Duke of Medina Sidonia, the complaint of the merchants on March 15, 1548, and of certain negotiations with Spain at the end of Elizabeth’s reign.
198. Letters and Papers, xiv, part i, No. 466.
199. G. F. Nott, Works of Howard and Wyatt, ii, p. xxxiv.
200. Letters and Papers, xiv, part i, No. 487.
201. Ibid, xv, No. 38.
202. Letters and Papers, xv, No. 281.
203. R. O., S. P. Hen. VIII, § 161, ff. 76–82.
204. Letters and Papers, xx, part i, Nos. 459, 494, 981, 1003; part ii, No. 874; xxi, part ii, Nos. 371, 509.
205. Cotton MSS., Vesp. C viii, f. 56.
206. A. P. C., iv, p. 138.
207. In the Parliament of 1514–15 an amendment was passed to an Act of Richard III which rendered it obligatory on all merchants bringing goods from the Mediterranean to import therewith a proportionate number of bowstaves. Certain Englishmen had been proceeded against for failing to comply with this law, and the amendment made it plain that it was henceforth only to apply to aliens. This seems to indicate that in the time of Richard III there were few or no Englishmen engaged in the Mediterranean trade, since no discrimination was thought necessary in the original Act. If Richard III’s Act had been intended to apply to both Englishmen and aliens it would most probably have been expressly so stated.
208. Hakluyt, vol. v, p. 62.
209. In Hakluyt’s pages some of these factors are mentioned by name: William Heith, factor of John Gresham at Candia; John Ratcliffe, factor of the same in Portugal; William Eyms, factor of Sir William Bowyer, the Duke of Norfolk and others at Chios; Robert Bye and Oliver Lesson, also factors at Chios.
210. Various references to this trade: Letters and Papers, i, pp. 46 and 120; xiv, part i, No. 538, &c.
211. Foedera, xiii, 353; xiv. 424, 703.
212. Letters and Papers, i, p. 186.
213. Journal of Edward VI, p. 61. The tonnage is given as there stated, but is probably exaggerated.
214. Letters and Papers, ii, Nos. 738, 811.
215. Hakluyt, v. 67–8.
216. Hakluyt, v. 71.
217. Reprinted, 1885, by Dr. E. Arber, p. 6.
218. To make Ramusio, iii, Preface, apply to 1516, it is further necessary to assume a misprint in his work, as he distinctly says that the voyage he describes took place under Henry VII.
219. For Sebastian Cabot’s career in Spain see Harrisse, John and Sebastian Cabot (1896), which contains a syllabus of documents relating to him.
220. R. O., Book of King’s Payments (T. R. Misc., Bk. 214): ‘Ann. 21 Hen. VII Aug. 7th. Item to Thoms Perte maryner in rewarde that come from the king of Castill, x sh.’
221. Letters and Papers, ii, No. 1462, and p. 875.
222. Ibid., No. 3459.
223. Exchequer T. R. Misc. Bks., vol. x. The entries relating to Spert all resemble the following: ‘The herry gce diew. Delyv’de the xxvij daye of September anno dicto [7th year of Henry VIII] to thoms spte for the herry gce diew iiij cabulls....’
‘The herry gce diew, the katryn fortune and the gabryell riall. Delyv’de to thoms spte [and the other two masters] the vijth. daye of ap’ll anno dicto [7th year of the reign] vj barells tarre.’ In no case is any other person but Spert designated as the master of the Henry Grace à Dieu.
224. His knighthood has been disputed, but two official documents speak of him as Sir Thomas Spert (Letters and Papers, vi, No. 196. xvii, No. 1258).
225. Letters and Papers, many references.
226. Wardens’ Manuscript Accounts of the Drapers’ Company, vol. vii, 86–7. Printed in extenso in Harrisse, Discovery of North America, iii. 747.
227. This passage has been regarded as fatal to the connexion of Sebastian Cabot with a voyage in 1516, and even to his claims to have made discoveries under Henry VII. As regards the former, it is quite compatible with an expedition which returned without discovering land, which is precisely what Eden hints at. On the latter point it is to be remarked that the third Cabot voyage (that of Sebastian in search of the North-West Passage) ended in failure and obscurity and was overshadowed by the expeditions of the Bristol syndicates; thus it is not surprising that the London Drapers were able to profess a very convenient ignorance of it. They could hardly do the same about John Cabot in view of the notoriety of his discovery in 1497, and the brilliance of his reception in London in that year.
228. Letters and Papers, iv, part i, p. 154.
229. Venetian Cal., iii, No. 607.
230. Agostino Giustiniani, Castigatissimi Annali, Genova, 1537, lib. vi, f. cclxxviii. Quoted by Harrisse in John and Sebastian Cabot (1896), pp. 337–8.
231. Hakluyt, ii. 159–63.
232. The Book made by Master Robert Thorne, Hakluyt, ii. 164–81.
233. This was Sebastian Cabot’s expedition, which never passed the Straits of Magellan, but turned instead into the River Plate. The two Englishmen were Roger Barlow and Henry Latimer. There is no record of their personal adventures, although the details of the voyage are well known. See Harrisse, John and Sebastian Cabot (1896).
234. Maclehose edition, 1905, xiv. 304.
235. Historia General, Madrid, 1601, Dec. II, lib. v, cap. iii, pp. 144–5.
236. 1852 ed., Bk. 19, chap. xiii, p. 611.
237. Letters and Papers, iv, No. 5082.
238. The author of an article in the English Historical Review (vol. xx, p. 115) suggests that it was the Samson and not the Mary Gilford which visited the West Indies, but there seems to be no satisfactory proof of this. The balance of evidence certainly points to the loss of the Samson in the North-West.
239. Letters and Papers, iv, No. 3213 (20).
240. Letters and Papers, i, No. 1050.
241. See his epitaph and Barrett, Antiquities of Bristol (1789), p. 683.
242. Archives of Bristol, quoted by Fox Bourne, English Merchant (London, 1866), i. 155.
243. Hakluyt, ii. 181.
245. Barrett, p. 483.
246. Hakluyt, vi. 124.
247. Letters and Papers, i, No. 5026; vii, No. 938.
248. Ibid., iv, No. 2814.
249. Robert Thorne’s will is copied in an Elizabethan hand on the back of folio 209 of Cotton MS., Vitellius A xvi, a city chronicle which was printed by C. L. Kingsford in 1905. The will is not included in the printed edition.
250. The Dictionary of National Biography states: (1) that Nicholas Thorne was the father of Robert, and the participator in Hugh Elyot’s voyage; and (2) that Robert Thorne junior died in 1527 at Seville. The latter statement is evidently due to the fact that the inventory of Thorne’s goods, drawn up by his brother, is calendared in the Letters and Papers under the date 1527. There is nothing in the document itself (R. O., S. P. Hen. VIII, § 40, f. 219) to indicate its date. On the other hand, the will (Vitellius A xvi, f. 209b) distinctly says, ‘Anno 1532 on whitsonday dyed Robart Thorn’. The grant in connexion with the Grammar School on March 2, 1532 (Letters and Papers, v, No. 909), shows that Robert Thorne junior was living at that date, and also speaks of Robert Thorne deceased. The possibility that the Robert Thorne of Seville and the Robert Thorne who died in 1532 were two different men is negatived by a comparison of the inventory with a signed letter (R. O., S. P. Hen. VIII, § 81, f. 151) by Nicholas Thorne. The handwriting of both is identical, showing that the inventory was written by Nicholas, and therefore that it referred to the goods of his brother who, as the will shows, died in 1532.
251. Letters and Papers, vi, No. 1696; xii, No. 233; xiv, part ii, No. 172.
252. Ibid., xiv, part i, No. 184.
253. Ibid., xx, part ii, No. 874.
254. Barrett, p. 483.
255. Hakluyt, viii. 3.
256. Spanish Cal. vi, No. 163.
257. Hakluyt, xi. 23.
258. See the English Historical Review, xxiv. 96, article by R. G. Marsden.
259. R. O., S. P. Hen. VIII, § 113, f. 180.
260. Spanish Cal. vi, part i, No. 148.
261. The above notes on Hawkins and Reneger are drawn from numerous references in the later volumes of Letters and Papers, and from the Acts of the Privy Council.
262. Hakluyt, vi. 136.
263. vi. 138.
264. Reprinted in Hakluyt, vi. 141–52.
265. Strype, Memorials, ii. 504. Strype says the two ships were lent to Wyndham and his associates in 1552, and were intended for the voyage in search of the North-East Passage.
266. Stanford’s Compendium (1907) says that the ‘grains’ of this coast were pepper. Eden, although he describes them as ‘a very hot fruit’, speaks of pepper as a distinct article further on.
267. Probably the Niger.
268. Eden speaks of having seen the Primrose after her return, hence it must have been the Lion which was abandoned.
269. Reprinted by Hakluyt, vi. 154–77.
270. See Towerson’s first voyage, and marginal note to Eden’s account of the present voyage.
271. Acts of the Privy Council, v. 162.
272. Venetian Cal. vi, No. 251.
273. R. O., S. P. Dom., Mary, vol. xiv, Nos. 4 and 5 (erroneously calendared under date 1558).
274. R. O., S. P. For., Mary, vol. vii, No. 448.
275. This evidently refers to John Locke’s voyage, and tallies with Eden’s account, except that the latter does not mention the offer of land for a settlement.
276. This would seem to relate to Wyndham’s visit to Benin. No other place-name is mentioned in any of the voyages which bears any resemblance to ‘Bynne’. If such is the case, it throws a fresh complexion on Eden’s story of the abandonment of the merchants.
277. R. O., S. P. For., Mary, vii, No. 449.
278. Cal. For. S. P., Mary, p. 198.
279. R. O., S. P. Dom., Mary, vi, No. 83.
280. A. P. C., v, p. 214.
281. R. O., S. P. For., Mary, vii, No. 450.
282. Venetian Cal. vi, No. 327.
283. Hakluyt, vi. 177–211.
284. A. P. C., v. 305, 315, 322, 358, 384.
285. Hakluyt, vi. 212–31.
286. The date of this voyage is given, by a misprint, in the 1598–9 editions of Hakluyt as 1577. Modern reprints have perpetuated the mistake. The date is correctly given in the 1589 Hakluyt as 1557, that is 1558 by our present style of beginning the year on January 1.
287. Kervyn de Lettenhove, Les Pays-Bas et l’Angleterre, i. 152: ‘Los navios ... eran dos de la Reyna y los mejores que Su Majestad tenian.’
288. Acts of the Privy Council, ii. 137.
289. Hakluyt, vii. 156–7. Some confusion has arisen as to the year of this patent, but it is perfectly clear. ‘The sixt day of Januarie, in the second yeere of his raigne. The yeere of our Lord 1548’ is January 6, 1549, by the present style. Edward VI succeeded to the throne on January 28, 1547.
290. Navarette, Colección de Documentos inéditos para la historia de la España, iii. 512. The letter is here dated November 15, 1554, but was probably written at least two years earlier. Northumberland was executed on August 22, 1553.
291. Charter of Philip and Mary, February 6, 1555, and Cal. S. P. Dom. Addenda, Mary, p. 439. The latter is a list of the members in May 1555. It includes the names of three women among the adventurers.
292. The authorities for these voyages are to be found, unless otherwise indicated, in Hakluyt (Maclehose ed., 1903), vol. ii.
293. Purchas, xiii. 6, thinks that Spitzbergen was the land found. The lowest point of Spitzbergen is in 76½°. It is impossible that Willoughby could have committed such a serious error in latitude.latitude. Moreover, Spitzbergen is due north of Senjen.
294. Hakluyt, iii. 74, 331.
295. The Venetian agent (Venetian Cal. vi, No. 89) says three. The error arose from the name of the Philip and Mary, which the Italian doubtless took to be two vessels. The instructions for the voyage leave no doubt that only two ships were sent. See also Henry Lane’s letter (Hakluyt, iii. 332).
296. The Venetian envoy wrongly states that they were brought home in 1555.
297. Venetian Cal. vi, No. 269.
298. These details are scattered here and there in Borough’s account of the voyage.
299. Venetian Cal. vi, No. 852.
300. Cal. Cecil MSS., i, p. 146.
301. Brussels Archives, Kervyn de Lettenhove, i, p. 61.
302. Cotton MSS., Nero, B viii, 3.
303. See Ancient and Modern Ships, by Sir G. C. V. Holmes, for an account of this model.
304. Cotton MSS., Jul., E iv. 6.
305. Oppenheim, Administration of the Navy, p. 30.
306. Ibid., Naval Accounts and Inventories, Introd., p. xxvii.
307. R. O., Warrants for Issues, 1 Hen. VIII, No. 121.
308. Oppenheim, Administration of Royal Navy, p. 53.
309. Harl. MSS., 6205.
310. Royal MSS., 20 E ix.
311. Inventory of the Sovereign: Oppenheim, Naval Accounts and Inventories, p. 210.
312. Robert Thorne’s drawing, 1527, shows a bonnet on main-topsail.
313. For information on this subject see Laird Clowes, History of the Navy, i, chap. xiii.
314. For detailed description of method of making and using an astrolabe, see Cortes, Breve Compendio de la Sphera y de la Arte de Navegar, chap. viii.
315. Naval Accounts and Inventories, Introductions, p. xxi.
316. Letters and Papers, i, No. 3591.
317. In Laird Clowes’s History of the Navy, i. 413, there is an illustration of a Genoese carrack from a drawing said to have been made in 1452; but it has every appearance of being at least a century later in date.
318. Cal. of Le Fleming MSS., p. 8.
319. See Oppenheim’s Naval Accounts and Inventories of Henry VII; inventory of the Henry Grace à Dieu in the same author’s Administration of the Navy; drawings of warships in Add. MSS., 22047; Archaeologia, vi. 208; Volpe’s picture at Hampton Court, &c.
320. Naval Accounts and Inventories, pp. 216–17. The armament here given is that mounted in 1497 when the ship was chartered for a voyage to the Levant by some merchants of London.
321. Administration of the Royal Navy, p. 35.
322. A. Spont, Letters and Papers relating to the French War, 1512–13, pp. 51, 52, 133, 140, 146. This work is a collection from all sources of original documents concerning the war.
As far as can be traced, this is the first occasion on which a ship is recorded to have been sunk by gun fire.
323. Chapter House Book xiii, printed in Administration of the Royal Navy, pp. 372–81.
324. Letters and Papers, i, No. 5108.
325. Ibid., No. 4968.
326. Pepysian MS. printed in Archaeologia, vi. 216.
327. From Add. MSS., 22047.
328. Spanish Cal. vi, part i, p. 342. July 1541.
329. Letters and Papers, iv, No. 1714.
330. Inventory.
331. A careful reading of the available inventories supports the idea that square sails were not at this period carried on the mizen-masts. The sails on fore and main are described as fitted with two sheets, while those on the mizen had but one.