Italian Reports on America 1493-1522: Accounts by Contemporary Observers (review)

242 Reviews Parergon 20.2 (2003) Symcox, Geoffrey and Luciano Formisano, eds, Italian Reports on America 1493-1522: Accounts by Contemporary Observers (Repertorium Columbianum Volume XII) Turnhout, Brepols, 2002; cloth; pp. xii, 292; RRP EUR70.00; ISBN 2503514030. The general editor acknowledged that this volume is largely a version of a volume of the Nuova Raccolta Colombiana published in 1996, justified here by the desire for this series to be complete and for a translation into English for a different audience. The philological introduction has been shortened and the short historical introduction by Geoffrey Symcox is new. Additions to this series are always valuable and provide new insights into the opening of the newly discovered lands. The 20 documents in this volume include a range of perspectives from mercantile to clerical. Some are first hand accounts, others second or third hand which provides an interesting focus on the reception of knowledge of the newly discovered lands by a variety of influential Italians from popes to princes. With this material the series has dropped the objective of its primary volumes on total comprehensiveness. This is well justified: a collection of passing references in correspondence or historical accounts would probably serve no purpose. It is, perhaps, a pity that certain fuller texts like the letters and cantare of Giulano Dati have been omitted because a satisfactory recent English translation is available but what we have makes illuminating reading. These are not, for the most part texts designed for public propaganda purposes (although some have a visible agenda) and so they represent a persistent image in the process of formation and one which emerges from no single source. Particularly interesting in many of them is the continuing attempt to fit the new discoveries to the accepted verities of the Greeks and Romans or at the least to endow previously unknown entities with familiar monstrous qualities, horrible, repulsive and in some ways unnatural. Indeed, in these accounts one can see, defining itself, the idea of the natural and also the definition of acceptable human behaviour and the right form of government. The behaviour of the Caribs, as described, is created as abominable, inhuman, justifying genocide. The terms evil, wicked, criminal are attached to those people whose ferocious attacks on other humans is an atrocity to be uprooted. In contrast, civilised behaviour in other tribes is defined as a harmonious, humane and hierarchical form of government, participation in mercantile activities and acknowledgement of some form of deity. Criticism of the Spanish exploitation, indeed slaughter, of the meek and mild, gentle and peaceful people, who shared Reviews 243 Parergon 20.2 (2003) all things in common except their houses and shops, comes from the clerics. The descriptions of the cities established by the Europeans, designed to attract more investment of resources and people from the merchants. The texts will bear analysis from multiple different viewpoints. The translations seem as ever impeccable although one regrets the editorial decisions that restrict footnotes to a minimum. It makes the reader work hard for understanding in many areas. To take a single example, whether for trade or exploitation, there was a widespread interest in the flora of the area. An understandable ignorance amongst the reporters of the names of the unfamiliar plants, led some to long descriptions of size, type, flowers, use and the like of the most widespread and common of the new varieties they encountered. Since the Spanish had come with samples of all the familiar European plants which they hoped to naturalise in the islands they had seized, the existing eco-system was likely to be rapidly modified by the incomers and it is frustrating to struggle to identify the native flora described. Pineapples, certainly, kapok trees probably, turpentine trees perhaps but what of the others? Not even a book on the natural history of the West Indies is recommended. There is so much incidental detail in these accounts that needs to be fitted into our knowledge of the world of Columbus: descriptions by landlubbers of maritime practices and the sights at sea of such things as St Elmo’s fire, descriptions of technology and mining beliefs, descriptions of clothing and body language, that one hopes for...