Freiburger historische Bestände - digital

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Pereira of the Bibliotheca Nacional for valuable information
, but none bearing upon Behaim's scientific labours.

It seems that the only official document discovered up
till now which contains the name of Behaim is a Letter of
Pardon—Carta de Perdao—of November 16, 1501, which
King Manuel addressed to Fernao d'Evora, whom Joz
d'Utra, jun., the Captain donatory, had sent in chains to
Lisbon because he had " found him with one of his sisters,
the wife of one Martin de Boeme."1

It is of course quite possible that documents referring
to Martin Behaim may have existed formerly in the
' Casa da Mina e India,' but like other documents of
even greater interest they were either destroyed by fire
or during the great earthquake of 1755, a loss now quite
irreparable.

Not a single contemporary Portuguese writer mentions
the name of Martin Behaim, not even Ruy de Pina2 or
Garcia de Resende, the authors of' Chronicas 'of Joao II.,
who must have known him personally, if not intimately,
if he really was such a persona grata with the King as is
claimed on his behalf by all his biographers and by
members of his own family.*

Valentin Fernandes, or Ferdinand,4 the German printer,
who settled at Lisbon before 1490, and acted as interpreter
to Hieronymus Monetarius during his visit to Portugal
in 1494, must have had personal knowledge of his countryman
Martin Behaim, and heard about his African voyage
and his supposed scientific attainments. Yet in the
valuable accounts of Portuguese explorations which he
collected up to the year 1540, the name of Behaim is not
to be found.

1 Published by E. do Canto, 'Arch, dos Acores,' IX., p. 195.

J Ruy de Pina's 1 Chroniqua do Rey D. Joham EL' was first published
in the ' Colleccao de Livros ineditos,' t. II. (Lisbon, 1792). The author
was Chronista mor of Portugal and Chief Keeper of the Torre do Tombo.
He enjoyed the confidence of Kings John II., Manuel and John III., and
died 1521. Garcia de Resende's 'Chronica do Rey Dom loam o II.' was
printed at Evora in 1554. Both chroniclers were present at the King's
death.

3 His brother Michael wrote to J. Pock on November 12, 1518, that
Martin Behaim, " when young, was much liked by the old King
(John II.), but how his affairs ended when he grew old you may know
better than I " (Ghillany, p. 112).

* Valentin Ferdinand was at first associated with Nicholas of Saxony.
Among other works he printed a ' Livro das Viagens de Marco Polo '
(1502). His accounts of Portuguese explorations are now in the Royal
Library of Munich (Cod. Hisp., CI. I., 27). The more interesting of the
accounts referred to have been published by J. A. Schmeller, F. Kunst-
mann, Gabriel Pereira, and S. Ruge (' Abh. d. phil. CI. d. Akad. d. Wiss.,'
Munich, IV., VIII., IX.; 1 Bol. da Soc. de Geographia,' Lisbon, XVII.;
' Revista Portug. Col. e Maritima,' Lisbon, 1900, Nos. 32-36 ; ' 27 Jahresb.
d. Vereins f. Erdk.,' Dresden, 1901). A letter, describing a rhinoceros
which Garcia de Noronha had brought from India in 1513, was written
by Ferdinand to his "friends" at Nuremberg and is published by Count
Angelo de Gubernatis ('Storia dei Viaggiatori Italiani,' Livorna, 1875,
p. 389). An engraving of this rhinoceros by Albert Dtirer is to be found
at the British Museum (Add. MSS. 5220, f. 19). Ferdinand was a
squire (escudeiro) of Queen Leonor and (since 1503) official broker
(corretor) of the German merchants.

Duarte Pacheco Pereira,5 another contemporary, the
" Achilles Lusitano " of Camoens (Canto x., 12), and author
of an' Esmeraldo de Situ Orbis,' a sailing directory for the
coast of Africa as far as the Rio de Infante, occasionally
refers to Cao and other explorers, but not once mentions
the name of Behaim.

As to Behaim's " correspondence with numerous men
of learning," it only existed in the imagination of Carlo
Amoretti,6 the editor of Pigafetta's account of Magelhaes'
voyage. Some of these letters would surely have come
to light had they ever been in existence.

Joachim Lelewel, one of the foremost authorities on
the history of maps, would have us believe that " Behaim's
renown was great in Germany, even in his lifetime," and
that, though ignored in Portugal, " his name, in Germany,
was in every mouth, occupied numerous pens, and the
echoes of his glory resounded in Italy and in Spain."7
These assumptions are not supported by a single fact.
Except in Schedel's ' Chronicle,' already referred to, his
name will be sought in vain in the writings of his
contemporaries. Conrad Celtes,8 who visited Nuremberg
repeatedly between 1490 and 149.3, that is during
Behaim's stay in his native town, in his delightful book
describing the Imperial city and its inhabitants, makes
no reference either to the now famous globe or its
author.

Even Dr. Hieronymus Miintzer or Monetarius, who
gave Behaim a letter of recommendation to King
John, in 1493, and who during a visit to Lisbon in
1494 was actually the guest of Behaim's father-in-law,
does not mention the name of his old acquaintance,
either in his ' Itinerarium' or in his ' De inventione
Africae.'9

5 Duarte Pacheco Pereira was born at Lisbon in 1450, served on the
Guinea coast, 1482-83, went out to India with Cabral in 1500, and again
with Affonso de Albuquerque in 1503 ; returned to Lisbon in July, 1505 ;
was governor of S. Jorge da Mina, 1520-22, and died 1533. He wrote
his ' Esmeraldo de Situ Orbis ' after 1505. It was published only in 1892
with an introduction by Raphael Eduardo de Azevedo Basto, Keeper of
Records at the Torre do Tombo.

6 Carlo Amoretti, a learned priest, was born at Oneglia in 1741, was
appointed head of the Ambrosian Library at Milan, and died in 1816.
The 1 Primo viaggio intorno al globo terraqueo' was published in 1800.

' 'Geographic du moyen age.'t. II., p. 137 (Brussels, 1852). Lelewel
was born at Warsaw in 1786, had to fly Poland after the insurrection of
1830, and died in Paris in 1864.

8 Conrad Celtes, or Pickel, a peasant's son, was born at Wipfeld in
1459, won fame as a poet, patriot, geographer, and champion of Humanism.
He died 1508. His ' De origine, situ, moribus et institutis Norimbergae
libellus' (1495) was dedicated to the City Council, who awarded him 8
gulden (£4) as an honorarium, which he returned in disgust, whereupon
the Council in 1502 sent him 20 gulden. On Celtes see B. Hartmann,
<Konrad Celtes in Nurnberg' (Numb., 1889), and L. Gallois, 'Les
Geographes allemands de la Renaissance ' (Paris, 1890), pp. 173-180, where
his merits as a geographer are dealt with.

9 Hieronymus Muntzer was a native of Feldkirch in Vorarlberg,
studied medicine at Pa via, and settled at Nuremberg in 1478. When
Nuremberg was invaded by the plague in August, 1494, he fled the town
and started upon a tour which, in November, brought him to Portugal.
At Evora (November 16-26) he was introduced to King John and dined