Acessibilidade / Reportar erro

This voyage is as good as any Peru-voyage. The Minion of London in Brasil (1581)

Abstracts

this papes focuses on a comercial voyage to Brazil, in 1581, by the Minion of London, organized by five London merchants, and the documents about the enterprise edited in Richard's Hakluyt's Principall Navigations. The expedition had the intention of establishing direct trade between Brazil and England, exchanging english textiles and manufactured goods for Brazilian white sugar. This voyage reflects english attempts to bypass the Portuguese and Spanish monopoly in the New World, after Drake´s voyage, and the ambiguity of brazilians colonists towards the foreigner merchants, in a particular moment of change in European geopolitics.

Brazil; England; trade; Minion of London


o artigo focaliza a viagem comercial do Minion of London ao Brasil, em 1581, organizada por cinco mercadores de Londres, e os documentos relativos a essa viagem publicados por Richard Hakluyt na coletânea Principall Navigations. A expedição pretendia estabelecer comércio direto entre o Brasil e a Inglaterra, trocando manufaturas e têxteis ingleses pelo açúcar da colônia portuguesa. A viagem reflete o propósito inglês de burlar o monopólio português e espanhol no Novo Mundo, depois da viagem de Drake, e a ambiguidade dos habitantes da colônia portuguesa diante dos mercadores estrangeiros, num momento de transição na geopolítica europeia.

Brasil; Inglaterra; Comércio; Minion of London


DOSSIÊ- DESLOCAMENTOS CULTURAIS

This voyage is as good as any Peru-voyage. The Minion of London in Brasil (1581)

Sheila Moura Hue

Professor - Department of Literature - Universidade Federal do Estado do Rio de Janeiro - UNIRIO - Av. Pasteur, Urca, CEP 22290- 240, Rio de Janeiro - RJ, Brazil. The research that resulted in this article was supported by a grant from the National Library. E-mail: sheila.hue@gmail.com

ABSTRACT

This paper focuses on a commercial voyage by the Minion of London to Brazil in 1581, organized by five London merchants, and the documents relating to the voyage, published in Richard's Hakluyt's Principall Navigations. The aim of the expedition was to establish direct trade between Brazil and England by exchanging English textiles for sugar from the Portuguese colony. The voyage reflected an English attempt to bypass the Portuguese and Spanish monopoly in the New World, in the wake of Drake's expedition. It also reflected the ambiguity felt by the inhabitants of the Portuguese colony towards the foreign merchants during a moment of geopolitical transition in Europe.

Keywords: Brazil; England; Trade; Minion of London

On June 2, 1579, the Elizabeth, one of the ships commanded by John Winter and part of Francis Drake's fleet, returned to England carrying information about Brazil. It had strayed from the other ships in the expedition during a turbulent crossing of the Strait of Magellan, following a journey in which the fleet had circumnavigated the globe and plundered the Spanish colonies. For four months, the Elizabeth drifted along the Brazilian coast in search of a port where it could restore its men and repair the damage suffered in the storm. In São Vicente, it was well received and a long repose was made to rebuild the ship and supply it with water and fresh food for the return journey. In the village, Winter made contact with an English resident, John Whithall, who was married to the daughter of a rich plantation owner from Genoa, José Adorno. Known by the Portuguese as João Leitão, Whithall became Winter's main informant on the territory. His report on the features of that stretch of coast and its potential for trade piqued the curiosity of English merchants as to the possibility of a new trade route in the New World involving the villages of São Vicente and Santos. Using John Whithall's information, Winter believed he could "understand the state of the land and the disposition of its inhabitants" (ANDREWS, 1984, p. 55).

The state and the conditions of that stretch of the São Vicente captaincy pertained to the great production of sugar, which was fetching a high price in Europe, and information about the recent discovery of precious mineral mines in its vicinity. According to the geographical knowledge of the time, the São Vicente region was situated next to the bountiful lands of Peru, the mines at Potosi and an unexplored semi-arid region, a terra incognita, that lay between the Paraná River and the coast. This area had been visited by the English in 1526 1 1 BARLOW, Roger, A brief summe of Geographie, a book written by one of the English who accompanied Cabot, includes a description of the land along the Paraná River. and was thought to be rich in undiscovered mines.

The Elizabethan imagination surrounding Brazil's southeast region and São Vicente was also illustrated in printed chronicles that were widely distributed, including the English translation of André Thevet's Singularitez de la France Antarctique (Paris, 1557), published in London in 1568 under the title The new found worlde, or Antarctike (ANDREWS, 1981, p. 5). In it, the Franciscan friar describes at length the characteristics of the province of "Morpion" (São Vicente), detailing the agricultural development of the land and the production of sugar, and confirming the discovery of mineral riches: "In the early days of colonization, much sugarcane was planted. However, this crop did not prosper after the inhabitants preferred the more lucrative exploration of silver deposits in the surrounding areas" (THEVET, 1978, p. 176).2 2 This information, which was influential in those years of speculation over Portugal's unknown colonial lands, was reinforced by Thevet in an episode that was "based on stories I heard during my return voyage, told by someone who assured me that they had taken part in this expedition [to São Vicente]": "[the voyagers] took notice of several glittering stones, including silver. They collected several samples and took them to Morpion, 18 leagues from that spot. There, they discovered, after examining the stones, that they were standing on a rich ore of silver. From that moment on, exploration of that area and the extraction of stones, which were infinite in number, produced enormous revenues for the Portuguese king" (THEVET, 1978, p. 210).

As for the local inhabitants, colonizers and Portuguese alike, John Winter's contact with the well established and well connected John Whithall, who was known by the region's 'principals' - the owners of land, plantations and farms - showed a frank and open disposition for doing business with foreigners.

After their return to England, Winters' men were interviewed by one of the key figures in the proto-history of the British Empire, Richard Hakluyt, at a time when no one knew when and how Francis Drake's fleet would return. Hakluyt would later publish a copious collection of travel tales, entitled Principall Navigations, in a single volume in 1589 and in an expanded three-volume set in 1600. Functioning as propaganda for English maritime and colonial expansion, this collection would provide the ideological bases for legitimizing England's right to explore and colonize the seas and territories that were then under the commercial and political monopoly of the Spanish and Portuguese crowns (ARMITAGE, 2000).

A prominent figure linked to Queen Elizabeth, and one of the main articulators of English colonization in North America, Hakluyt became enthused by the reports of the unknown Portuguese colony by John Winter and his crew, and as K.R. Andrews notes, "appears to have considered thefar south of the New World highly important for England's future as a trading and colonial power" (ANDREWS, 1984, p. 55). Hakluyt immediately wrote a memorandum calling for the immediate capture of the Strait of Magellan and São Vicente (ANDREWS, 1966, p. 160). His enterprise envisioned the building of a fort in Estreito to control the passage of ships and turn São Vicente into a supply base for English maritime voyages around the southern oceans:

Instalando entre eles alguns bons capitães ingleses, e mantendo nas baías dos Estreitos uma boa armada, na há dúvida de que iremos submeter à Inglaterra todas as minas de ouro do Peru e toda a costa e trato daquela terra firme da América ao largo do mar do Sul. E fazer o mesmo em regiões vizinhas àquela terra (HAKLUY apud ANDREWS, 1981, p. 14).

One year later, by which time Drake had already returned, Hakluyt would revive this idea in a letter to the queen:

A ilha de São Vicente pode ser facilmente tomada por nossos homens, visto que não tem guardas e não é fortificada, e sendo conquistada deve ser mantida por nós. Essa ilha e a região circunvizinha é tão abundantemente provida de mantimentos que pode alimentar infinita multidão de gente, como nos relataram nossos homens que lá estiveram com Drake, e que lá conseguiram vacas, porcos, galinhas, limões, laranjas e etc (HAKLUYT apud TAYLOR, 1935, p. 141).

The accounts of John Winter and his crew about John Whithall and São Vicente also attracted the interest of English merchants who were less political and more practical in relation to Hakluyt's colonial enterprises. In a letter written in January 1580, D. Bernardino de Mendoza, Felipe II's ambassador to England, tells the king that the explorer John Hawkins, one of the investors in Drake's circumnavigation of the world, was outfitting three ships to take goods to the Brazilian coast:

Aparelham três navios em Plymouth sob o nome de Juan Aquines [John Hawkins], de 100, 80 e 70 toneladas, com a desculpa de que levam mercadorias para a costa do Brasil, efetivamente carregando-os com algumas [mercadorias], o que é diretamente prejuízo para a coroa de Portugal, não obstante não estar confirmado o contrato3 3 O tratado de comércio, conhecido como "abstinência", assinado em 1576 entre Portugal e Inglaterra. que se havia feito com esta rainha por três anos e que feneceu em meados de novembro, no qual não se decidiu cabalmente proibir esta navegação e a de Berberia, havendo os ingleses concordado que não iriam a da Mina e a da costa do Brasil (RAYON e ZABALBURU, 1888a, p. 452).

In a letter dated February 20, the destination of the expedition is more specific, revealing the extent to which the coastal village in southeast Brazil had already become familiar to the English:

Aqui anseiam pelo retorno de Drake, pela falta que este tem de navios e por ser tão extensa a navegação, julgando que, se não chega dentro de dois meses, está irremediavelmente perdido. E sobre aqueles que escrevi a V.M. que se armavam para ir a São Vicente, na costa do Brasil, estão prontos para partir (RAYON e ZABALBURU, 1888a, p. 453).

A letter clearly from the same period gave William Hawkins, John's brother, permission to find new trade routes, including powers and rights, in his voyage to the south and southeast coasts of Africa and America. It also gave him permission to attack Spanish ships and ports, and serve the interests of D. Antônio, the rector of Crato and pretender to the Portuguese throne, against his enemies; that is to say the Spanish king (ANDREWS, 1966, p. 161). With the death of Cardinal D. Henrique, the succession to the Portuguese throne was divided between the supporters of Felipe II - who would conquer Portugal in the battle of Alcantara in August 1580 - and those of D. Antonio, who would take refuge in England in a bid to win the support of Queen Elizabeth against the Spanish king. A few months later in September, Drake returned and joined up with the Hawkins brothers. The trade expedition to São Vicente that John Hawkins was promoting had widened its scope not only from a geographical point of view - now including the "East Indies" - but also in terms of its political nature, as told by D. Bernardino de Mendoza on October 16, 1580:

[Drake] está tomando providencias para voltar com seis navios, e oferece aos investidores o retorno de sete para cada pound sterling em um ano. Isto teve tão grande influência sobre os ingleses que todo mundo quer ter parte na expedição. Os navios sobre os quais escrevi a V. M. que estavam indo para a costa do Brasil foram postergados pela volta de Drake, de forma a embarcar um número maior de homens em consequência das promessas feitas por Juan Rodriguez de Souza, que acaba de chegar aqui como representante de D. Antonio, e por causa das vantagens que terão se ele for com eles, não somente para a costa do Brasil mas também para as Índias portuguesas. Por esta razão seria desejável para os interesses de V.M. que sejam dadas ordens para que nenhum navio estrangeiro deva ser poupado, seja nas Índias espanholas ou portuguesas, e que todos sejam postos a pique e nenhuma alma a bordo seja mantida com vida. Esta será a única maneira de prevenir que ingleses e franceses sigam para essas partes para saquear, porque neste momento dificilmente se encontra um inglês que não esteja falando em empreender tal viagem, tão encorajados estão pelo retorno de Drake.4 4 Simancas: ‘October 1580', Calendar of State Papers, Spain (Simancas): Volume 3, 1580-1586 (1896), p. 52-63. Available at: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=87077&strquery=brazil. Accessed on October 10, 2008.

At the moment D. Antonio fled Portugal for England following his defeat by the Duke of Alba's army, England's policy was to support the Pretender to the throne, its aim being the expansion of English shipping and the possibility that, by allying with D. Antonio, it might take over part of Portugal's possessions, including the Azores, Brazil and the Indias in the East, particularly the Molucca Islands (ANDREWS, 1981, p. 16).

The voyage of the Hawkins brothers, notorious figures in Elizabethan England who combined trade with plunder and came to rely on the support of Drake and various investors, appears not to have come to fruition, nor were Richard Hawkins' strategic plans to conquer the straits and São Vicente realized.

Nevertheless, while such initiatives supported by the English crown stalled, a group of five English merchants, driven by other motivations and using other channels, successfully undertook a strictly commercial voyage to the coast of the São Vicente captaincy. They operated the Spanish Company, trading with Spain, Portugal, the Mediterranean and islands in the Atlantic. On November 3, 1580, the Minion of London left Harwich with two members of John Winter's crew on board, men who knew the route and whose curricula included a stay in São Vicente: Thomas Griggs, who had been steward of the Elizabeth, was now the treasurer, and pilot Edward Cliffe, who would take part in a curious episode in Salvador one year later.

Ten days after the ship's departure, D. Bernardino de Mendoza wrote to Felipe II. Having an excellent network of informants - as can be seen in his letters describing events in Ireland, the Lower Countries, Portugal and Brazil - he informed the king that Juan Rodriguez de Sousa, D. Antonio's emissary responsible for obtaining the support of the English crown, the Duke of Guise and the House of Orange against the Spanish king's invasion of Portugal, had not boarded the Minion as planned and had stayed on land to complete his mission:

[Sousa] deixou de ir à costa do Brasil, conforme escrevi a V.M., como havia tratado com uma nau das que se preparavam, carregando com mercadorias para lá e que já partiu, e se chama Miñona de Londres, a qual vai direto para o porto de São Vicente, encaminhada a um inglês que se chama Vintidal [Whithall], que está casado com uma filha de um Juan Bautista Malio5 5 This information is imprecise. João Batista Malio, along with two other landowners, was governor of the São Vicente captaincy in 1595. , genovês, que reside no dito porto, sendo este inglês o que instou os de aqui a fazerem a viagem, e outro que está em Pernambuco (RAYON e ZABALBURU, 1888a, p. 521-522)

The contract relied not only the expertise of the men of the Elizabeth, but also on the connection to John Whithall, the English expatriate in Santos and Winter's main interlocutor in São Vicente, who years later, would receive the English fleet commanded by Edward Fenton.

In fact, the voyage of the Minion of London had begun to be planned two years earlier, when Whithall wrote a letter from Santos to the prominent and active London merchant Richard Staper, co-founder of the Spanish Company alongside Edward Osborne (BRENNER, 2003). The letter, written in 1578, was published by Hakluyt6 6 A letter written to M. Richard Stapers by John Whithall from Brasill, in Santos the 26 of June 1578. In HAKLUYT, Richard, 1589, p. 638-640. [also in HAKLUYT, 1600, p. 701-703] in 1589, together with two documents about the voyage7 7 A letter written by five English merchants to John Whithall, sent on the Minion of London, and an account of the voyage written by treasurer Thomas Griggs. . Whithall began the letter by telling Staper that despite having written him another letter a few days earlier from Lisbon, mentioning that he would meet with him soon, he had since changed his plans. A reference to a connection with Staper via Lisbon and to a certain Mr. Holder in the same city, who would arrange a courier to deliver Staper's reply to Santos, reveals the link these two Englishmen had with Portugal. In fact, the Spanish Company, which was created in 1577 after Portugal and England signed a trade treaty in 1576,8 8 The treaty is published in its entirety in VISCONDE DE SANTAREM, 1865, p. 299. maintained close to thirty merchants and a number of assistants in Portugal and Spain (CHAPMAN, 1907, p. 161). Bartholomew Holder, who was cited in an October 1577 letter from Queen Elizabeth as being responsible for receiving financial compensation owed by the Portuguese crown to Staper's partner, Edward Osborne (VISCONDE DE SANTAREM, 1865, p. 311), was one of the Spanish Company's merchants who had been living and working in Lisbon for many years (SCAMELL, 2003, p. 297).

In the letter, Whithall informs Staper of his radical change of plans. Rather than returning to Lisbon to meet the head of the Spanish Company, as had been arranged, he stayed in Brazil to wed the only daughter of a rich plantation owner. One can infer, therefore, that Whithall was one of the company's assistants based in Lisbon and that he would probably return to Brazil to search for business prospects. It was common practice in Staper and Osborne's company to send trade researchers (BRENNER, p. 18;114), and the fact that Whithall had arranged to meet with Staper after his return from Brazil via Portugal reinforces this hypothesis.

However, destiny had other plans for the English business assistant during his time in Santos:

Veio-me a oportunidade de casar-me nesta terra, podendo eu escolher entre três ou quatro [moças], de modo que há uns três dias combinei com um senhor italiano de casar-me com sua filha dentro dos próximos quatro dias. Este meu amigo e sogro, senhor Ioffo Dore [José Adorno], nasceu na cidade de Gênova, na Itália, e sua família é bem conhecida entre os italianos vivendo em Londres. Além disso, ele tem somente esta filha, que preferiu entregar a mim do que a qualquer português desta região. Junto com ela ganho em casamento parte de um engenho que ele possui, que produz todo ano mil arrobas de açúcar. Este casamento vai render-me uns dois mil ducados, pouco mais ou menos. Além disso, meu sogro, o senhor Ioffo Dore, pretende deixar em minhas mãos todo o engenho, com sessenta ou setenta escravos, e assim fazer- me feitor dele. Agradeço a Deus por conceder-me tanta honra e tanta abundância de todas as coisas (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 638).9 9 All of the translations of documents published by Hakluyt, with respect to the voyage of the Minion of London, and cited in this article are by Vivien Kogut Lessa de Sá, whom I thank for allowing me to use them.

Whithall's letter to Staper predates the period in which John Winter's ship the Elizabeth and its crew reposed in São Vicente. The news that the happy groom recounts to his superior in London, in 1578, is probably not much different from what he reported in person to Drake's fleet commander in 1579: the province's high sugar production, the scarcity of manufactured products and other consumer items, the proximity of the area to Peru and the mineral wealth to be explored.

As a strategy for captivating the reader with the benevolence of its destination, the letter reveals the discovery of gold and silver mines in the São Vicente captaincy (probably the mines of Jaguará), information confirmed by the Purveyor and the Captain: "they are awaiting the arrival of masters at any minute, to open the said mines, which when opened, will heavily enrich this land". As a 'free citizen of the land' and with the permission of those who "govern the whole region" - that is, "the Captain, the Purveyor10 10 Jerônimo Leitão and Brás Cubas, respectively, according to Olga Pantaleão. and my father in law" - Whithall, now known by the Portuguese as João Leitão, mentions how he would be able to obtain permission to send over a ship from London, with goods that would generate "enormous profit": "For each product and item of merchandise that the good sir sends from London, it will be paid three for one and so the gains can be used to buy white sugar for four hundred reals per arroba". Stressing the opportunity to establis a new direct and profitable trade route between São Vicente and London, free of Portuguese interference, he continues: "This voyage is as good as any voyage to Peru".

In his new position as owner of a sugar plantation and partner of the region's power holders, Whithall addresses Staper as an emancipated businessman:

Se o senhor e o Sr. Orborne desejarem negociar aqui, dar- lhes-ei precedência em nome de nossa antiga e estreita amizade. [...] Meu sogro e eu (se Deus quiser) produziremos boa quantidade de açúcar a cada ano, que pretendemos embarcar para Londres de agora em diante, se pudermos contar com um amigo tão bom e leal como o senhor para negociar conosco (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 639).

Whithall sent his letter to Staper on June 26, 1578, less than two months before the battle of Ksar el-Kabir and the death of D. Sebastião. Two years earlier, on November 15, 1576, the trade treaty between Portugal and England, known as the 'abstinence', had been signed between the two crowns after years of negotiation.11 11 The entire treaty can be found in VISCONDE DE SANTAREM, 1865, p. 299. In the treaty, the kingdoms agreed to combat piracy, a practice of attacking and pillaging ships that had been intensifying and provoking a series of legal and diplomatic actions on both sides. It also established the right of English merchants to negotiate on the continent and in Madeira and the Azores, without making reference to Morocco, Guinea or Brazil. However, as Robert Brenner has noted, after Spain's annexation of Portugal in the 1580s, groups of English merchants in the Moscovy, Venice, Turkey and Spanish Companies began to accelerate their efforts to open up direct trade in Portugal and Spain's overseas domains, which included clearing the way for Portuguese colonial markets in South America:

Em 1578, na mesma época em que Richard Staper, com Edward Osborne, buscava agir pelas costas dos atravessadores ibéricos de forma a estabelecer comércio permanente com o Mediterrâneo oriental, estava também em contato com um John Whithall investigando a possibilidade de passar ao largo dos portugueses para negociar diretamente o açúcar do Brasil (BRENNER, 2003, p. 19).

The English merchants' interest in new markets, including Morocco, Russia, Persia, Turkey, Guinea, Venice and the so-called Western Indias, was motivated as much by a crisis in the export of textiles, their primary commodity, as by the periodic interruptions to their usual routes. Thus, it became viable to seek new trade routes at a time when Spain and Portugal's overseas empires were weakened, marking England's growing commercial, maritime and economic development (BRENNER, p. 5). Trade with Portugal involved imports of salt, spices and wine in return for the sale of cloth, especially coloured textiles from Kent and Sussex. In Brazil, this equation favored the colony, based on an economy of sugarcane monoculture and English manufactured products and textiles.

John Whithall's letter includes a long list of items that Staper and Osborne's company needed to send on the ship. It also recommends that several goods, such as wine, olives and hides from Cordoba (in orange, yellow, red and pitch black), be loaded in the Canary Islands, where the ship would make a call to obtain the products, in exchange for the wool from Hampshire and Devonshire that would be taken specially to be sold there. The list provides us with detailed proof of the English goods that were needed in the Portuguese colony and confirms Whithall's knowledge about English textiles and the domestic market of the village of Santos. The detail in the description of the goods is impressive, with color specifications and specific patterns for each type of textile. It also includes a request for various high quality textiles, which reveals that there was a demand not only for rudimentary work clothing, but also for refined clothes used by Santos's elite in 1578. Materials included lace, satin, velvet, taffeta, linen and fustian in various colors, and the sophisticated scarlet, a richly adorned cloth. The list also included materials for making and repairing boats, such as pitch and tow; materials for plantations, such as iron and nails for boxes; and essential manufactured goods such as knives, hooks, axes and scissors. The artistic field was represented by a single item: rope for curtains.

Here is Whithall's list:

Em primeiro lugar, quatro peças de linho holandês de qualidade média.

Também uma peça de linho holandês fino.

Quatrocentas varas de linho de Osnabruck muito fino.

Quatro dúzias de tesouras, de todo tipo.

Dezesseis quintais de breu das Canárias.

Vinte dúzias de facas grandes embrulhadas em feixes, de baixo preço.

Quatro dúzias das pequenas.

Seis peças de lã grosseira de qualidade inferior.

Uma peça de lã de boa qualidade.

Quatrocentas varas de algodão inglês, a maior parte preta, verde e alguma amarela.

Oito ou dez dúzias de chapéus, metade com a borda de tafetá, a outra simples, com as abas de madeira.

Seis dúzias de camisas grosseiras.

Três dúzias de gibões de lona.

Três dúzias de gibões de lona pespontada.

Uma peça de fino fustão italiano listrado.

Seis dúzias de fechaduras para portas e caixas.

Seis mil anzóis de todo tipo.

Quatro dúzias de resmas de papel.

Quatro dúzias de copos diversos.

Duas dúzias de copos venezianos, metade grandes, metade médios.

Duas dúzias de mantos de frisa, do preço mais baixo que exista.

Três dúzias de vestidos de frisa.

Quatrocentas libras de estanho do tipo usado em Portugal, a maioria em pequenos pratos e travessas.

Quatro libras de seda de todas as cores.

Vinte libras de especiarias: cravo, canela, pimenta e açafrão.

Dois quintais de sabão branco.

Três libras de linha branca, preta e azul.

Três libras de linha branca fina.

Idem, meia dúzia de lã inglesa grosseira de várias cores.

Quatro [peças de] sorting clothes, azul, vermelho, amarelo e verde.

Seis [peças de] dozens do Norte de diversas cores.

Um tecido fino azul de oito libras.

Uma estamenha fina de dez ou doze libras.

Um tecido fino de lã crua de doze libras.

Um tecido fino de lã inglesa, preto.

Uma peça fina de lã vermelha.

Seis jardas de veludo preto.

Três barris de pregos para caixas.

Dois barris de pregos para navios e barcos.

Seis quintais de estopa.

Duas dúzias de cintos de veludo sem alças.

Quatro jardas de tafetá vermelho, preto e azul, com algum verde.

Duas dúzias de cintos de couro.

Seis dúzias de machados, machadinhas e pequenas alabardas para cortar lenha.

Quatro conjuntos de cordas de cítara.

Quatrocentas ou quinhentas varas de algum linho que seja barato

Quatro toneladas de ferro.

[...]

Além do já mencionado envie seis jardas de skarlet e renda delicada de várias cores.

Seis jardas de veludo vermelho.

Seis jardas de cetim vermelho.

Doze jardas de tecido de lã negra.

[...]

Envie também uma dúzia de camisas para mim, se mandar a nau.

Também seis ou sete pecas de sarjas para mantos de mulher, que é a coisa mais necessária que se possa mandar.

Estes são os produtos que eu gostaria que o senhor mandasse (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 639-640).

The ship had to be dispatched in the Canary Islands under the name of João Leitão, to whom all correspondence was to be addressed.

However, Staper and Osborne did not send the ship with the requested products. Whithall wrote letters to his brother James in London and to Robert Walkaden and John Bird, two merchants who were active in trade in Lisbon, which also contained a list of goods. He promised profits of three-to-one and guaranteed that they would be well received by the local authorities ("my father in law, the Captain and the Purveyor are the rulers of this land"). He also assured them that they would be able to sell all of their products and that their ship would return to England "laden with the best, the finest and the whitest sugar, paying a maximum of 1 ducat per 32 pounds of weight".

The enterprise only came to fruition two years later when five London merchants involved in the Morocco and Spanish Companies, some of whom had experience trading with Portugal, outfitted and supplied the Minion of London. They were Christopher Hoddesdon, Anthony Garrard, Thomas Bramly, John Bird and William Elkin, who established a company specifically for South American contracts that would take on "large orders". Through the Minion, they sent Whithall a letter - also published in Richard Hakluyt's collection in 158912 12 HODSDON, Christopher; GARRARD, Anthony; BRAMLY, Thomas; BIRD, John and ELKIN, William. A copie of the letters of the Adventurers for Brasill sent to John Whithall dwelling in Santos, by the Minion of London. Ano 1580, the 24 of October in London, In HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 640-64. [also in HAKLUYT, 1600, p. 703-704] - in which they clarified their intentions, requested guarantees and established the conditions for trading.

One of the merchants' main concerns was to make it clear that the voyage was peaceful and purely commercial, as opposed to the type of trading and plundering expedition that the Hawkins brothers intended to make. As a guarantee of the "good faith and honesty" of their proposals, they sent a written declaration of intent, sealed by the "venerable city of London" and a letter in Spanish for the local "magistrates". As reinforcement, they ordered administrators (commercial agents on board who were responsible for negotiating the goods supplied by the London merchants) to leave several hostages on land. In return, they requested, "as is the practice in Galicia", a certificate signed by the Santos authorities declaring that they would be "protected and defended from any reprisal or embargo from princes or subjects for any reason or motive":

De nossa parte, com base em nosso crédito e boa fé, prometemos não cometer qualquer afronta, seja no mar ou em terra, nem permitir que qualquer membro de nossa tripulação o faça, mas sim defender e proteger todos os mercadores de paz como nós, bem como suas naus e mercadorias. [...] a justa causa da nossa vinda foi comerciar pacificamente como mercadores e não como piratas vindos para cometer qualquer ofensa (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 641).

The ship arrived loaded, according to the investors, with all of the requested merchandise and with other goods "that we believe may in all ways please them and be useful in the region". At Whithall's request, the Minion also brought copper and iron pots and other equipment for his sugar plantation, as well as English artisans charged with assembling the equipment, and a technician whose job was to search for saltpetre in the nearby areas. As a sign of friendship, the merchants sent an expensive gift to the host, a fieldbed made of walnut, with a canopy, dossal, curtains, pelmets and gold leaf knobs.

A fieldbed was a transportable bed for voyages that was used in the open air (like the metaphorical bed that appears too cold for a character in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet) or in the interiors of houses, as appears to be the case here). A fieldbed with a canopy was a refined piece of furniture, and appears in several Elizabeth plays as a desired consumer object of disgraced characters. The luxurious accessories, such as the curtains and pelmets, generally embroidered with narrative themes, as well as the precious knobs, made the gift even more refined. One can imagine the impact this piece of Elizabethan furniture had when it arrived in Santos in 1581, being the first item that was disembarked after the ship had anchored at port.

With the Minion's voyage, both Whithall and the London investors sought to begin a trading partnership that included plans to send one ship to Santos per year. Neither side appeared to have any concerns about trade restrictions on foreigners on the Brazilian coast. Nor did the authorities (captain, governor and plantation owners) who received the Minion in Santos and Salvador, to where the ship journeyed next. This was in contrast to D. Bernardino de Mendoza, who expressed frustration in letters to Felipe II in 1582, when referring to the 1576 trade treaty that had identified Guinea and Morocco as markets open to the English, but that had failed to mention Brazil:

[...] a nau Miñona chegou ao porto de São Vicente, onde contratou duzentas e tantas caixas de açúcar, partindo dali para o porto de Todos os Santos [Salvador-Bahia], no qual, por fazer água a nau, deram-lhe lugar para descarregar os bens e pô-los em franquia [...], o que foi a 19 de setembro do ano passado. [...] pelo que entendo que V.M. mandará castigar os oficiais dos dois portos por haver admitido aquela nau, coisa que é proibida pelas ordens que V.M. tem dado em vista do contrato que a coroa de Portugal no tempo Del rei D. Sebastião fez com esta [coroa] proibindo os ingleses de ir à costa do Brasil, estando no artigo quinzeno especificadas as partes onde podiam traficar os ingleses, pelo qual a dita nau Miñona podia ser presa e confiscada, e mesmo que esse contrato não fosse válido por mais de três anos, que se cumpriram a seis de dezembro de 1579, [...] não se alterou nada por ambas as partes, [...]. [...] e que de nenhum modo pensem os ingleses que hão de fazer com proveito aquela nem alguma outra navegação das Índias ou reinos proibidos por V.M., senão com risco de serem postos a pique, porque de outra maneira se farão prestos a ir armar navios com o falso propósito de comerciar e que roubariam quantos súditos de V.M. topassem pelo caminho. [1° de março de 1582] (RAYON e ZABALBURU, 1888b, p. 294-297)

After the Minion went back to London, D. Bernardino went back on the offensive in a letter written on May 4, 1582:

Entendo que informaram o Conselho sobre o caso [o retorno do Minion], e muitos outros mercadores foram a dar-lhes conta de como querem fazer aquela navegação e contratar no Brasil, o que será grande deserviço a V.M., e sendo assim, convém que V.M. seja servido remediá-la e ordenar imediatamente aos governadores daquela costa de que se chegue navio estrangeiro a ela, não somente não lhe deem comércio como que procurem de todas as maneiras pô-las a pique, sem deixar homem algum com vida, porque se lhes for dado outro tratamento não será possível, como tenho escrito a V.M. diversas vezes, impedir-lhes a navegação nem atalhar-lhes o passo, senão com manter V.M. ali de ordinário armadas, o que seria excessivamente custoso (RAYON e ZABALBURU, 1888b, p.370-371).

Despite the enthusiasm caused by the Minion's return to London, the voyage prepared by the five English merchants was not a complete success, according to the treasurer Thomas Griggs. His diary13 13 GRIGGES, Thomas, Certaine notes of the voyage to Brasill with the Minion of London aforesaid, in the yeere 1580, written Thomas Grigges Purser of the said shippe, In HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 641-643. [also in HAKLUYT, 1600, p. 704-706] relates the successes in Santos and, according to Olga Pantaleão's research in the English archives,14 14 PANTALEÃO, Olga , Um navio inglês no Brasil em 1581; a viagem do "Minion of London", also studied by WILLEN, Thomas Stuart, Studies in Elizabethan foreign trade. analyzes the period they spent in Salvador, and the process after the Minion's return to England.

The ship's arrival in Santos on February 3, 1581 received the hospitality and welcome of the "captain, the king's officials and all of the people", recounted Griggs. Relations in the beginning were so good that after news had arrived in the village that four French warships had attempted to attack Rio de Janeiro and were likely to make their way to Santos, the captain boarded the Minion and requested arms and munition from the English to organize a defense of the village, which the English commander supported immediately, strengthening the bond between the foreigners and colonials. "They borrowed twenty harquebuses and two barrels of gunpowder", wrote Griggs. In the end, the French fleet headed straight for the Strait of Magellan, according to occupants of two Portuguese canoes who were captured by the French in Rio de Janeiro and arrived in Santos some days later.

At the end of February 1581, when products had been traded for almost a month and the succession of the Portuguese crown had already entered the stage of war between Felipe II's army and the party allied with D. Antonio, news from Europe arrived in Santos: "At this time, a ship from Portugal has arrived in Pernambuco bearing news that the islands, the the Indias, and Portugal itself were being besieged and attacked by the Spanish and that the Portuguese had called the English and French to Lisbon to defend them against Spain" (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 642).

The presence of the English in Santos, therefore, in light of the new political configuration, seemed to further reinforce the bond between the English crew and the Portuguese in the colony, now allied against a common enemy, Spain. The identification shared between the English voyagers and Brazil, in Griggs' account, extends to their vision of the natives:

Essa gente [os índios] também têm guerras constantes com os espanhóis. E isto quem nos contou foi um desses índios, que mora com os portugueses há sete anos, com seu senhor que se chamava Manoel Veloso. E este sujeito teria vindo de bom grado conosco para a Inglaterra (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 641).

While in the political sphere, there was no conflict between the voyagers and the colonials, amidst a moment of instability and rapid change in power relations between the European crowns, it was reflected in the development of trade on the ground. Less than three months after the Minion's arrival, the ship and other vessels were supplied with Brazilian sugar, a testament to the successful trade taking place in the village of Santos.

Local trading conditions were perceived as being extremely advantageous, as recounted by Griggs in his diary:

Costumam definir um preço para todos os produtos e mercadorias livres de alfândega no Brasil, o que é feito pelos magistrados da vila de acordo com os decretos do seu rei.

Mas para todas as mercadorias lá sujeitas à alfândega, os mercadores devem vendê-las da forma que quiserem e que lhes traga maior lucro e ganho (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 642).

Another aspect of the land that was highly attractive and must have later influenced the English interest in trade voyages to Brazil in the 1580s - as Whithall had recounted in his letter and which Griggs confirmed in his second season on the coast of the São Vicente captaincy - lay in the geographical concept that was current at the time, and in England's fascination with Peru's riches, beckoned by the possibility of establishing a land route to its legendary (and real) treasures. As K.R. Andrews notes:

O sucesso dos espanhóis no Peru, culminando com a descoberta e a exploração das minas de Potosi, era então de conhecimento geral. Naquela época de fascínio pelas barras de metais preciosos, para a Europa o Peru significava uma montanha de prata, a mais rica fonte de metais preciosos no mundo, a chave para o enorme poder da Espanha, o definitivo argumento para a colonização do ultramar (ANDREWS, 1981, p. 4).

It is not surprising, therefore, that in Grigg's relatively short diary, in which few lines were dedicated to describing actual trade activity, the concise treasurer writes extensively on information related to this:

Em relação à província do Peru, soubemos que uma parte dela fica somente a doze dias de viagem por terra e mar da vila de Santos, e depois pode levar quatro ou cinco dias de viagem por mar até a embocadura do rio da Prata.

Da embocadura do rio da Prata e das principais vilas que lá estão faz-se comércio e trocas com o interior do Peru usando carroças, cavalos e mulas.

[...]

A mais ou menos vinte léguas de Santos há um tipo de índio selvagem que vive nas montanhas e que são aliados dos portugueses. Eles têm guerras contínuas contra alguns outros índios que moram perto da fronteira com o Peru, que fica distante de Santos umas 400 ou 500 léguas. Esses índios do Peru possuem grande quantidade de ouro e prata, mas não conhecem qualquer uso para eles (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 641-642).

According to K.R. Andrews, these observations of Griggs, who had taken part in John Winter's voyage, provided information to Hakluyt, and would later participate in other English expeditions to South America, reveal that the English were concerned not only with trade, but also with gathering intelligence so as to better understand the land and plan new actions.

The Minion's problems, which had led to its stormy departure from the port of Santos before repairs had been completed in preparation for the second leg of the voyage (men had already been sent to Bahia to prepare the land), were related to religion. Shortly after the ship's arrival in Santos, one of the members of the crew fell into the sea and drowned. This episode led to a series of events that ended up curtailing the English crew's stay at the port. The crew member was buried and his companions went on shore to accompany the burial in the Church of Santos. This incident came to the attention of Rio de Janeiro's ecclesiastical 'administrator', who sent Santos an order not to allow the English into the church:

O administrador tinha escrito do Rio de Janeiro dizendo que, como a nação inglesa nesses últimos vinte anos ou mais vinha negando a igreja de Roma e sua conduta, ele ordenava que nenhum de nós fosse à sua igreja. Os padres [de Santos] nos recomendaram paciência e boa vontade, e prometeram defender- nos, fosse por palavra dada ou por escrito, junto ao administrador e ao bispo da Bahia, e ainda pediram que nossa tripulação inglesa não pensasse mal deles (GRIGGES apud HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 642).

The testimonies that Olga Pantaleão has studied, which were collected by the High Court of Admiralty in a legal suit after the ship's return to England, reveal that the crew maintained friendly relations with Santos's priests, particularly Father João Peres, who frequented the Minion and was close to the master of the ship Stephen Hare, with whom he would share enjoyable occasions, "sometimes with excessive drinking" (PANTALEÃO, p. 64). From what can be surmised in Gregg's account, the ship departed in a hurry when the 'administrator' from Rio de Janeiro arrived in Santos. The Minion departed, leaving several men on land, who would have to travel to the island of São Sebastião, where the ship had to anchor in order to complete the necessary repairs and reunite the crew.

The second leg of the voyage, involving a season in Salvador, Bahia, is not recorded in Grigg's diary. This is probably because in occurred in a period dominated by dissension between members of the crew, especially between the master of the ship Stephen Hare (the central figure in the legal suit after the ship's return to England, accused of neglecting his duties) and the pilot Edward Cliffe. The latter, in an episode that is rather unclear, decided to stay in Bahia and join the Jesuits. He had had a misunderstanding with the crew because of certain books, likely viewed as heretic, that had been left on the Minion. The case of the English pilot who became a Jesuit in Salvador is referred to by Serafim Leite in Historia da Companhia de Jesus no Brasil as a "captain of an English merchant ship" who died in 1583 while still a novitiate (PANTALEÃO, 1963, p. 57). It reached the well informed ears of D. Bernardino de Mendoza, who recounted the fact to Felipe II in a letter dated May 4, 1582:

Com algumas de minhas [cartas] precedentes avisei a V.M. sobre a chegada da nau que veio da costa do Brasil, deixando em terra 17 homens, o que não ocorreu, segundo os próprios ingleses confessam e como eu mesmo me informei, por terem querido lhes tomar a nau, porque se tivessem querido tomá-la seria coisa facílima, porque para repará- la tiveram que colocar toda a gente e toda a artilharia em terra; mas o governador lhes havia dado salvo-conduto para comerciar, pagando os direitos, e o mesmo fez o bispo [D. Antônio Barreiros], de forma que assim puderam guardar suas mercadorias nos armazéns, e os feitores dos mercadores daqui, que tinham a seu cargo as ditas mercadorias, a eles lhes pareceu muito boa a terra, e assim quatro ou cinco deles resolveram se apropriar de mercadorias e ficar na vila, e outro se converteu à santa fé católica romana [...], e por frequentar o ofício divino e os sacramentos começaram os outros a mofar dele, de sorte que o bispo e os inquisidores lhes intimaram (RAYON e ZABALBURU, 1888a, p. 370).

The misunderstandings between crew members, and the controversy that arose between members of the Church of Salvador and the ship as a result of Cliffe's conversion and entry into the Jesuit order, were such that trade became disorganized, leading to a legal suit filed at the High Court of Admiralty and provoking various unexpected reactions from the men. This included the desertion of 17 trade agents cited by D. Bernardino, who settled in Salvador, disrupting the plans of the London investors, as a letter to Whithall explains:

Se porventura algum dos nossos marinheiros ou passageiros, movido por uma desavença a bordo ou na esperança de conseguir se casar ou outro motivo qualquer, buscar permanecer ou residir aí e abandonar suas funções, então o senhor servirá de homem da lei e enviará esses fugitivos de volta a bordo como prisioneiros (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 641).

As in Santos, the departure from Salvador was also stormy, and prompted by religious reasons. As Thomas Griggs noted in his deposition at the High Court of Admiralty, "it is very dangerous to fall into the hands of the clergy because of the religion of those lands" (PANTALEÃO, 1963, p. 69). In Bahia, a Portuguese man who traded with the English alerted the ship's master Stephen Hare about "accusations against him from the bishop regarding religious matters". In his deposition in London, Hare himself declared that he had been denounced as "such a great heretic that he dare not disembark ever again" (WILLEN, p. 5-9).

In a letter dated May 4, 1582, D. Bernardino de Mendoza gave a detailed account of the ship's departure:

Naquele momento, os que estavam na nau, vendo que os demais feitores queriam ficar na vila com as mercadorias, enviaram um barco a terra com 10 homens para admoestá-los que voltassem a bordo, e os inquisidores os prenderam para serem examinados; sabendo disso, os da nau prenderam em represália alguns marinheiros portugueses que ali estavam , em uma caravela de Lisboa, e levantaram as âncoras. Os da terra começaram a atirar canhonaços, acertando alguns dentro da nau, a qual chegou aqui em dois meses e meio (RAYON e ZABALBURU, 1888b, p. 370).

As for the amount of trade realized in Brazil by the Minion, we have the testimony of the auditor-general Martim Leitão who, in a letter dated April 15, 1584 from Pernambuco, and examined by Olga Pantaleão, stated that the ship had brought over "more than 30,000 cruzados in goods" and carried "more than 25,000 arrobas of sugar". However, Pantaleão notes that "a series of incidents occurring in Bahia prevented all of the cargo from being loaded for the return voyage, as one can deduce from the depositions made at the High Court of Admiralty" (PANTALEÃO, 1963, p. 67).

Would a trade expedition to Brazil be as advantageous as a voyage to Peru, as Whithall had suggested? For some English merchants, at least, it seemed at least possible to establish a peaceful trade route between England and Brazil. The fact is that after the Minion, other expeditions were outfitted with the same objective of establishing direct trade relations with Brazil without interference from Portugal.

In November 1582, D. Bernardino de Mendoza recounted that the Hawkins brothers and Francis Drake had prepared a fleet of four ships, armed for war and destined for the coasts of Africa and Brazil, in a society that called itself "the company of discovery" and would combine trade with plunder. However, they ended up not heading for the Brazilian coast: nearing Cape Verde, they changed their plans, after learning about a fleet of five Spanish warships that had been sent to protect the coast of Brazil. They embarked instead on a piratical voyage to the Caribbean (ANDREWS, 1984b, p. 57). The fleet was Diego Flores de Valdes's great Spanish armada, sent by Felipe II to protect the Strait of Magellan and battle foreign ships, a reposte to Drake's circumnavigation of the globe and pillages (1577-1580).

In 1582, a group of merchants from the Venice Company sent the Merchant Royal to Olinda, where the ship spent six months in a relatively successful trade mission. As they were not able to sell all of the goods, three administrators were left on land to negotiate the remaining products and receive debts valued at more than four thousand pounds. These trade agents who were established in Olinda apparently negotiated without any problems until the arrival of Flores de Valdes's fleet. Two of these English administrators had their goods confiscated and were arrested and sent "in chains to Seville" and later Lisbon (WILLEN, 1959, p. 9). The same group of Venice Company merchants, according to Andrews, was able to make trade expeditions to Olinda in 1584-85, which would be the last of the English attempts to conduct peaceful trade in Brazil (ANDREWS, 1984a, p. 165).

There was also a trade expedition planned for Guinea, São Vicente and the River Plate, outfitted in Southampton by the merchant Edward Cotton. However, the ship was wrecked on the coasts of Guinea in July 1583. Documents published by Hakluyt that relate to this voyage reveal that the English intended to sell their goods on the island of São Sebastião, where the instructions were to stay only as long as provisions lasted, perhaps to avoid the problems encountered by previous expeditions. Cotton's instructions for the ship's captain are very detailed and reveal a good knowledge of Brazil. They recommended searching for amber, sugar, ginger, cotton, peppers, parrots, monkeys, tobacco, scabious (a medicinal herb) and seeds of exotic plants and palm stems (HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 187).

The fatal blow in these attempts to establish trade relations between England and Brazil came with Edward Fenton's expedition, which occurred in 1582-83 with Drake's financial backing, and with the secret involvement and reception of John Whithall. In the introduction to his edited collection of documents relating to Fenton's voyage, Eva G.R. Taylor summarizes the episode:

Ao chegarem a São Vicente, entretanto, Fenton percebeu que os colonos haviam aceitado o anúncio de que agora estavam sob a coroa espanhola e tinham sido especialmente alertados pelo rei Felipe para não negociarem com os ingleses por causa dos saques de Drake. No entanto, torna-se evidente que os colonos estavam prontos para negociar sub-repticiamente, não fosse a proximidade da armada espanhola em seu litoral. Uma visita secreta de John Whithall [...] levantou uma esperança por parte dos ingleses, mas o súbito aparecimento de três navios espanhóis [de Diego Flores de Valdés] levou a uma batalha e a uma partida apressada (TAYLOR, 1959, p. VIII).

Fenton tried to conduct trade in Espirito Santo, where he almost signed a trade treaty with the governor, according to voyage accounts, but the arrival of a small Portuguese ship forced his fleet to leave again. In truth, Fenton behaved like a lunatic throughout the expedition - planning to make himself king of São Vicente and later of the island of St. Helena - and returned to England a ruined man (TAYLOR, 1959).

With the political situation becoming defined in Portugal; the failed plans of D. Antonio, who was to die in 1595; the expulsion of D. Bernardino de Mendoza from London in 1584; and the open war declared between Spain's Felipe II and England's Queen Elizabeth (1585-1604), English expeditions to Brazil turned into full-blown piratical voyages that aimed to capture ships loaded with Brazilian sugar (which was becoming a common practice) and direct attacks on the villages of the Portuguese colony. Among these attacks are the pillages of Salvador and Recôncavo, between April and July of 1587, by a fleet armed by the count of Cumberland, as recorded in a vivid account by John Sarracol15 15 SARRACOL, John , The voyage set out by the right honorable the Earl of Cumberland, in the yeere 1586, intended for the South Sea, but performed no farther them the latitude of 44. deg. To the south of the Equinoctiall, written by John Sarracoll Merchant in the same voyage", In HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 793-803. ; the capture of Santos in 1592 by the corsair Thomas Cavendish, who set fire to São Vicente's plantations, episodes related in a memoir by Anthony Knivet;16 16 KNIVET, Anthony, The admirable adventures and strange fortunes of master Antonie Knivet, wich went with Master Thomas Candish in his second voyage to the south sea. 1591, In PURCHAS. 1625, p. 1202-1242. and the sacking of Recife by James Lancaster in 1595, also recorded in a lively account. 17 16 KNIVET, Anthony, The admirable adventures and strange fortunes of master Antonie Knivet, wich went with Master Thomas Candish in his second voyage to the south sea. 1591, In PURCHAS. 1625, p. 1202-1242.

After the Iberian union, laws were established, prohibiting trade, mining and farming by foreigners. In 1588, the regime of the new Governor General of Brazil established several recommendations aimed at defending the territory from attack by corsairs, and prohibited foreigners' ships from conducting trade on the coast, except for those that possessed a "royal provision"18 18 GUEDES, Max Justo In Historia Naval Brasileira, tomo II, p. 496-497. O Regimento ordenava que o governador construísse, "por conta de minha fazenda", vinte e quatro galeotas para que pudessem "continuamente andar guardando a costa da bahia atee a praiba", e instava os donos de engenho a ajudarem o policiamento naval "com mantimentos necessarios para os soldados, marinheiros e chusma que ouverem de andar nestas quatro embarcaçoens". O Regimento ordenava ainda que os donatários das capitanias, ao perceberem a presença de corsários, informassem todos os dados sobre as frotas estrangeiras ao porto da Bahia para que fosse enviada uma armada para combater os invasores. Há ainda um alvará de 30 de junho de 1592 que criava a Casa e o Direito do Consulado, em Lisboa, de forma a proteger a navegação e o comércio marítimo português, devido às "muitas perdas que recebem no mar nos roubos dos corsários", . The regime's recommendations were aimed at Francisco Giraldes, Portugal's ex-ambassador to England. He had been responsible for negotiating the trade treaty that was signed in 1576, but had ended up not taking up the role. In 1591, the position went to D. Francisco de Sousa, whose government became known for making inroads into the semi-arid regions in search of precious mineral mines.

Of the 50 documents relating to English voyages to Brazil that were published by Richard Hakluyt and Samuel Purchas19 19 PURCHAS, Samuel, Hakluytus Posthumus or Purchas his pilgrimes in five bookes, the second part, 1625. , including accounts, routes, letters, diaries, instructions and news written by 33 authors and involving 19 voyages (HUE, 2009) - from Sebastian Cabot's expedition to the Panama River in 1526, in the company of the Englishman Roger Barlow, to the 1608 voyage of London barber-surgeon William Davis to the Amazon - the letters of John Whithall and the five English merchants, and the diary of trade agent Thomas Griggs, reveal a movement of approximation and commercial interest that, despite not having resulted in an effective trade link between the colony and England, show how the Elizabethans had turned their attention to the coast of the São Vicente captaincy prior to concentrating on the colonization of North America. They also show from a commercial perspective how far they were welcomed by businessmen in the region and royal functionaries such as the governor of São Vicente, Jerônimo Leitão and the purveyor of the treasury Brás Cubas, to whom John Whithall and D. Bernardino refer when they anonymously cite the main authorities of Santos's colonial administration at the time the Minion was received. The need to market the high production of sugar in the captaincy, and the demand for manufactured goods, were pressures that outweighed D. Sebastião's 1571 law, then in force, that forbade trading with foreign ships.

Felipe II's support for important forays into mineral prospecting, such as the expeditions organized by Gabriel Soares de Sousa and by the governor general D. Francisco de Sousa, as well as Spain's concern to defend the coast - measures that were contemplated in the 1588 regime - echo, in a way, the interests of the English in the undiscovered mines and the proximity to Peru, as attested in the accounts of John Winter, John Whithall, Thomas Griggs and Richard Hakluyt. Regarding the strategic motivations for Felipe II's actions in Brazil, Arno Wehling observes:

No continente americano, com o conhecimento geográfico já então disponível, era evidente que a posse do Brasil, [...], representava importante proteção para Potosi e as demais regiões do vice-reino do Peru. Chegou a ser formulada a hipótese, na historiografia brasileira, da concepção do Brasil também como "estado tampão", com o fim de proteger a retaguarda da mineração espanhola na América do sul.

[...] em materia de interesse pelo Brasil, não deve ser esquecida a possibilidade de encontrar-se ouro e prata numa região frequentemente vista, à época, como continuidade geográfica do Peru (WEHLING, 2205, p. 12).

The English trade assistant John Whithall - João Leitão to Santos's colonial elite - had good reason to tell the merchant Richard Staper what a voyage to the unknown captaincy of São Vicente would mean in 1578: "This voyage is as good as any voyage to Peru", [...] If you have the courage for such a voyage, in the name of God, arrange a good vessel of seventy or eighty tonnes and send it with a Portuguese pilot to the port of São Vicente in Brazil, on the border with Peru".

Notes

Bibliographic References

  • ANDREWS, Kenneth R. Elizabethan privateering: english privateering during the Spanish War, 1585-1603. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1966.
  • ANDREWS, Kenneth R. Beyond the equinocial: England and South America in the sixteenth century. The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, 10:1, p. 4-24, 1981.
  • ANDREWS, Kenneth R. Trade, plunder and settlement Maritime enterprise and the genesis of the British Empire. 1480-1630. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984a.
  • ANDREWS, Kenneth R. Drake in South America. In: THROWER, Norman J.W. (ed.). Sir Francis Drake and the famous voyage, 1577-1580 Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984b. p. 49-59.
  • ARMITAGE, David. The ideological origins of the Bristish Empire Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
  • BARLOW, Roger. A brief summe of Geographie Edição, introdução e notas por E. G. R. Taylor. Londres: Hakluyt Society, 1932.
  • BRENNER, Robert. Merchants and revolution: commercial change, political conflict, and London's overseas traders, 1550-1653. Londres: Verso, 2003.
  • CHAPMAN, A. B. The commercial relations of England and Portugal. 1487-1807, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 3rd series, vol. 1, p. 157-179, 1907
  • HAKLUYT, Richard. The principall Navigations, voiages and discoveries of the English nation, made by Sea or over Land, to the most remote and farthest distant Quarters of the earth at any time within the compasse of these 1500 yeeres: devided into three severall parts, according to the positions of the Regions whereunto they were divided. Londres: George Bishop e Ralph Newberie, 1589.
  • HAKLUYT, Richard. The third and last volume of the voyages, navigations, traffiques, and discoveries of the English Nation, and in some few places, where they have not been, of strangers, performed within and before the time of these hundred yeeres, to all parts of the Newfound world of America, or the West Indies, from 73. degrees of Northerly to 57. Southerly latitude Collected by Richard Hakluyt Preacher. Londres: George Bishop e Ralph Newberie, 1600.
  • HUE, Sheila Moura. Ingleses no Brasil: relatos de viagem. 1526-1608, Anais da Biblioteca Nacional, Rio de Janeiro, vol. 126 (2006), p.7-68, 2009.
  • KNIVET, Anthony. As incríveis aventuras e estranhos infortúnios de Anthony Knivet Tradução de Vivien Kogut Lessa de Sá. Rio de Janeiro: Zahar, 2007.
  • PANTALEÃO, Olga. Um navio inglês no Brasil em 1581; a viagem do 'Minion of London', Revista de Estudos Históricos, Marília, n. 1, jun. 1963, p. 45-93.
  • PURCHAS, Samuel. Hakluytus Posthumus or Purchas his pilgrimes in five books The second part. Londres: William Stansby para Henrie Fetherstone, 1625.
  • RAYON, José Sancho; ZABALBURU, Francisco de. Coleccion de documentos inéditos para la história de España. Correspondencia de Felipe II con sus embajadores en la corte de Inglaterra. 1558 á 1584. Tomo XCI. Madri: M. Ginesta Hermanos, 1888a.
  • RAYON, José Sancho; ZABALBURU, Francisco de. Coleccion de documentos inéditos para la história de España Correspondencia de Felipe II con sus embajadores en la corte de Inglaterra. 1558 á 1584. Tomo XCII. Madri: M. Ginesta Hermanos, 1888b.
  • SCAMMELL, G. V. Seafaring, sailors and trade, 1450-1750: studies in British and European maritime and imperial History. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003.
  • TAYLOR, Eva G.R. The original writings and correspondence of the two Richard Hakluyts Londres: Hakluyt Society, 1935.
  • TAYLOR, Eva G.R. (ed.) The troublesome Voyage of captain Edward Fenton 1582-1583. Narratives and documents. Londres: Hakluyt Society, 1959.
  • THEVET, André. As singularidades da França Antártica Tradução de Eugenio Amado. São Paulo: Itatiaia, 1978.
  • VISCONDE DE SANTARÉM. Quadro elementar das relações politicas e diplomáticas de Portugal com as diversas potências do mundo Tomo XV. 2. edição. Lisboa: Academia Real das Sciencias de Lisboa, 1865.
  • WEHLING, Arno. O Estado no Brasil filipino - uma perspectiva de historia institucional, Revista do Insitituto Histórico e Geográfico Brasileiro, 166, n. 426, jan./mar. 2005, p. 9-56.
  • WILLEN, Thomas Stuart. Studies in Elizabethan foreign trade Manchester: The University of Manchester Press, 1959.
  • 1
    BARLOW, Roger, A brief summe of Geographie, a book written by one of the English who accompanied Cabot, includes a description of the land along the Paraná River.
  • 2
    This information, which was influential in those years of speculation over Portugal's unknown colonial lands, was reinforced by Thevet in an episode that was "based on stories I heard during my return voyage, told by someone who assured me that they had taken part in this expedition [to São Vicente]": "[the voyagers] took notice of several glittering stones, including silver. They collected several samples and took them to Morpion, 18 leagues from that spot. There, they discovered, after examining the stones, that they were standing on a rich ore of silver. From that moment on, exploration of that area and the extraction of stones, which were infinite in number, produced enormous revenues for the Portuguese king" (THEVET, 1978, p. 210).
  • 3
    O tratado de comércio, conhecido como "abstinência", assinado em 1576 entre Portugal e Inglaterra.
  • 4
    Simancas: ‘October 1580', Calendar of State Papers, Spain (Simancas): Volume 3, 1580-1586 (1896), p. 52-63. Available at:
  • 5
    This information is imprecise. João Batista Malio, along with two other landowners, was governor of the São Vicente captaincy in 1595.
  • 6
    A letter written to M. Richard Stapers by John Whithall from Brasill, in Santos the 26 of June 1578. In HAKLUYT, Richard, 1589, p. 638-640. [also in HAKLUYT, 1600, p. 701-703]
  • 7
    A letter written by five English merchants to John Whithall, sent on the
    Minion of London, and an account of the voyage written by treasurer Thomas Griggs.
  • 8
    The treaty is published in its entirety in VISCONDE DE SANTAREM, 1865, p. 299.
  • 9
    All of the translations of documents published by Hakluyt, with respect to the voyage of the
    Minion of London, and cited in this article are by Vivien Kogut Lessa de Sá, whom I thank for allowing me to use them.
  • 10
    Jerônimo Leitão and Brás Cubas, respectively, according to Olga Pantaleão.
  • 11
    The entire treaty can be found in VISCONDE DE SANTAREM, 1865, p. 299.
  • 12
    HODSDON, Christopher; GARRARD, Anthony; BRAMLY, Thomas; BIRD, John and ELKIN, William. A copie of the letters of the Adventurers for Brasill sent to John Whithall dwelling in Santos, by the Minion of London. Ano 1580, the 24 of October in London, In HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 640-64. [also in HAKLUYT, 1600, p. 703-704]
  • 13
    GRIGGES, Thomas, Certaine notes of the voyage to Brasill with the Minion of London aforesaid, in the yeere 1580, written Thomas Grigges Purser of the said shippe, In HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 641-643. [also in HAKLUYT, 1600, p. 704-706]
  • 14
    PANTALEÃO, Olga ,
    Um navio inglês no Brasil em 1581; a viagem do "Minion of London", also studied by WILLEN, Thomas Stuart,
    Studies in Elizabethan foreign trade.
  • 15
    SARRACOL, John
    , The voyage set out by the right honorable the Earl of Cumberland, in the yeere 1586, intended for the South Sea, but performed no farther them the latitude of 44. deg. To the south of the Equinoctiall, written by John Sarracoll Merchant in the same voyage", In HAKLUYT, 1589, p. 793-803.
  • 16
    KNIVET, Anthony, The admirable adventures and strange fortunes of master Antonie Knivet, wich went with Master Thomas Candish in his second voyage to the south sea. 1591, In PURCHAS. 1625, p. 1202-1242.
  • 17
    The well governed and prosperous voyage of M. James Lancaster, begun with three ships and a galley-frigat from London in October 1594, and intended for Fernambuck, the port-towne of Olinda in Brasil, in HAKLUYT, 1600, p. 708-715.
  • 18
    GUEDES, Max Justo In
    Historia Naval Brasileira, tomo II, p. 496-497. O Regimento ordenava que o governador construísse, "por conta de minha fazenda", vinte e quatro galeotas para que pudessem "continuamente andar guardando a costa da bahia atee a praiba", e instava os donos de engenho a ajudarem o policiamento naval "com mantimentos necessarios para os soldados, marinheiros e chusma que ouverem de andar nestas quatro embarcaçoens". O Regimento ordenava ainda que os donatários das capitanias, ao perceberem a presença de corsários, informassem todos os dados sobre as frotas estrangeiras ao porto da Bahia para que fosse enviada uma armada para combater os invasores. Há ainda um alvará de 30 de junho de 1592 que criava a Casa e o Direito do Consulado, em Lisboa, de forma a proteger a navegação e o comércio marítimo português, devido às "muitas perdas que recebem no mar nos roubos dos corsários",
  • 19
    PURCHAS, Samuel, Hakluytus Posthumus or Purchas his pilgrimes in five bookes, the second part, 1625.
  • Publication Dates

    • Publication in this collection
      01 July 2013
    • Date of issue
      June 2013

    History

    • Received
      May 2013
    • Accepted
      June 2013
    Universidade Estadual Paulista Julio de Mesquita Filho Faculdade de Ciências e Letras, UNESP, Campus de Assis, 19 806-900 - Assis - São Paulo - Brasil, Tel: (55 18) 3302-5861, Faculdade de Ciências Humanas e Sociais, UNESP, Campus de Franca, 14409-160 - Franca - São Paulo - Brasil, Tel: (55 16) 3706-8700 - Assis/Franca - SP - Brazil
    E-mail: revistahistoria@unesp.br