No. 140 The Trusty Servant
Richard Hakluyt’ s Principall Navigations
October, more than six months later. But it provided material for a long letter to his father, dated 10 th November 1579, in which he described the sea journey he had just made. There are mentions of the Canary Islands, the Cape Verde Islands, the dangers of rounding the Cape, the wildlife they encountered, such as the Ship of Guinea( Portuguese man-of-war), flying fish, albacore and many others.
Somehow, this letter from Stephens became a celebrated description of the journey to India by sea. Richard Hakluyt, the 16 th century geographer and publisher of over 25 travel books, published the letter in his most famous and influential work The Principall Navigations, first published in 1589. was posted to Rachol as part of the mission to Salcete in 1579 and remained, undertaking numerous roles in the region until his death in 1619.
Stephens narrowly avoided the Cuncolim Massacre of 1583, which took the lives of many, including five Jesuit martyrs, among which were Pietro Berno, his fellow novitiate and travelling companion from Rome, and the much-feted Father Rudolpho Acquaviva, mourned by no less a figure than the Emperor Akbar.
His numerous generous acts that endeared him to his flock are recorded by the Society of Jesus, but two chapters define his place in history. The first involved a party of four English merchants who had set out from Falmouth on 13 th February 1583, burdened with letters of introduction from the Queen to, among others, the‘ King of China’. Their object was to explore to the east but through them Stephens, unintentionally, again drew attention to India, hastening its‘ discovery’.
The merchants’ route took them via the Mediterranean to Aleppo, following the itinerary expected by the Venice and Turkey companies, which wanted to encourage English traders to explore beyond the line of Crusader castles.
being apparent pioneers, their journey emphasises the title‘ First Englishman in India’ ascribed to Stephens, who had travelled by sea. From Aleppo, a sandy crossing took them to Baghdad, whence they sailed down the Euphrates to Falluja and Basra. Their trouble started in Hormuz, an outpost controlled by the Portuguese. The Venetian consul, perhaps feeling threatened by the prospect of English traders, lobbied hard and scurrilously for their incarceration and left the Portuguese administration to administer punishment for their false crimes. That meant sending them to Goa, for their case to be heard by the Portuguese Viceroy.
Leaving aside any religious differences, European rallied on behalf of European, none working harder than Thomas Stephens and his fellow Jesuit Jan Linschoten, who between them raised bail and sprang the merchants from gaol. Of the four merchants, two names stand out: John Newbery, their leader, who had been charged by Queen Elizabeth to carry her letters abroad and encouraged by Hakluyt to send back promising reports( he was probably the brother of Ralph Newbery, publisher of Hakluyt’ s Principall Navigations); and,
Compared to the life of a Jesuit in England in the late 16 th Century, Goa offered barely fewer dangers. Stephens
By following the land-based route, which had rarely delivered Europeans, let alone Englishmen, as far as India, and
Thomas Stephens’ s Doutrina Crista
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