The European Discovery of America: Vol 2, The Southern Voyages A.D. 1492-1616 [Paperback]

Samuel Eliot Morison (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 19, 1993

The late Samuel Eliot Morison, a former U.S. Navy admiral, was also one of America's premier historians. Combining a first-hand knowledge of the sea and transatlantic travel with a brilliantly readable narrative style, he produced what has become nothing less than the definitive account of the great age of European exploration. In his riveting and richly illustrated saga, Morison offers a comprehensive account of all the known voyages by Europeans to the New World from 500 A.D. to the seventeenth century. Together, the two volumes of The European Discovery of America tell the compelling stories of the many intrepid explorers who made what was then a journey frought with danger--figures as diverse as Leif Ericsson, Columbus, John Cabot, Jacques Cartier, Martin Frobisher, Magellan, Sir Walter Raleigh, and Sir Francis Drake to name but a few. They also follow the adventures of lesser-known but no less interesting mariners and offer a detailed look at those who set them forth on their travels. In the first volume, The Northern Voyages--winner of the prestigious Bancroft Prize for History--Morison re-creates the lives and perilous times of those who claimed to have seen the shores of North America in the 600 years after the Norsemen first landed. He brings to his account a rare immediacy, making the drama and unpredictability of their voyages as significant in relation to the people of their era as the astronauts' journeys have been for our own times. Morison also offers a fascinating look at the imaginary lands reported by early travelers (such mythical places as Antilia and the Seven Cities, the glorious Kingdoms of Norumbega and Saguenay, and Hy-Brasil the Isle of the Blest) and examines as well the alleged discoverers of these lands. With warmth and wit he distinguishes fact from fiction, and imaginary explorers and their exploits from actual men and events. In the second volume, Morison turns his attention to the navigators who negotiated the waters of the Caribbean and the treacherous coasts of South America, even following them as they ventured ashore to the dark inland of the southern continent. The Southern Voyages begins with the events leading up to Columbus's arrival in San Salvador in 1492 and concludes with the discovery of the southernmost bit of land, Cape Horn, by Dutch explorers in 1616. In between, Morison retraces the routes of all the great mariners, including a step-by-step account of Magellan's voyage that would take him around the world. Morison has enlivened his narrative with a wide range of source material from Italy, Spain, Portugal, and South America, in the process shedding new light on questions that have divided scholars througout history: Did Sir Francis Drake discover San Francisco Bay? Was Amerigo Vespucci a great explorer or a fraud--or a little of both? What role did the French have in the European discovery of Brazil? Each volume brims with contemporary illustrations, maps (many of them specially drawn for this history) and photographs (often taken by Morison himself as he flew at low altitude along the coastal routes of explorers), which together identify virtually every allusion to land and sea made by the great European navigators in their ship logs and their later accounts. With the 500th anniversary of the European arrival in America came much controversy over Columbus's true legacy. With its lively and engaging style, and with its unsurpassed understanding of the age, The European Discovery of America helps put the era of exploration in much-needed perspective. Anyone interested in the history of America, indeed, in the history of Western Civilization, will find these volumes absolutely essential.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Exuberant....Plenty of meticulous research and inspired labor went into this true and exciting yarn of the early European voyages to America. But there's more than that. He has added to his research by physically retacing many of the explorers' routes, gaining his descriptive color firsthand. He offers a hearty fare mixed with oakum, salt spray and sea biscuit."--The Christian Science Monitor

"Now [Morison] has united the latest findings of modern scholarship, American and European, to his own zestful explorations by land, sea and air, to produce a comprehensive and, for our day and age, definitive account of the process by which Europe substituted fact for fable and knowledge for ignorance about the New World across the Western Ocean....[A] unique combination of scholarship and fieldwork....Into these volumes is distilled a lifetime of experience--of sailing, of learning and of the sadly neglected art of historical narration. They are a joy and a treasure house."--Economist

About the Author

The late Samuel Eliot Morison, twice winner of the Pulitzer Prize, was the author of numerous books including The Oxford History of the American People, The Growth of the American Republic, and Admiral of the Ocean, a biography of Columbus.

Product Details

• Paperback: 758 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press (August 19, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195082729
• ISBN-13: 978-0195082722
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 1.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,373,691 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Columbus, Magellan, and others, April 11, 2005

By 

Smallchief - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The European Discovery of America: The Southern Voyages, A.D. 1492-1616 (Hardcover)

There's not much doubt that Samuel Eliot Morison's two volume history of the European discovery of America is the best around. The first of the volumes, "The Northern Voyages," is probably of more interest to North Americans, delving as it does into the Vikings and speculative pre-Columbian discoveries of America.

"The Southern Voyages" begins with Columbus, covering his four voyages in about 200 pages, proceeds onward to Magellan and his circumnavigation of the globe, "the most remarkable voyage in recorded history," and finishes with the English voyages of Sir Francis Drake and Thomas Cavendish. Along the way, Morison also discusses the voyages of many "minor" explorers including the enigmatic Amerigo Vespucci, a man of modest accomplishments who saw his name applied to two continents. Sebastian Cabot rates a chapter as does the Dutch discovery of Cape Horn and the French and Portuguese in Brazil.

Morison was a sailor himself, a student of the sea, a naval historian, a biographer of Columbus, and a fine storyteller. He brings a wealth of insight to the voyages and even undertook expeditions of his own to visit the places where the voyagers called. His admiration for Columbus' seamanship is unbounded. "Never was a title more justly bestowed than...Admiral of the Ocean Sea." This admiration is a bit old-fashioned today, as latter-day historians talk more about Columbus's faults on land than his skill at sea. Morison follows each chapter in his book with notes and a bibliography in which he discusses, often with some humor, the controversies, old maps, and speculations so beloved by armchair theorists and explorers. Numerous photographs and outstanding maps dot the text.

To my mind any reading about the European discoverers of America should begin with Morison's two volumes -- and it can end there in most cases unless the reader's thirst for knowledge is unquenchable. This is an outstanding book and nothing comparable has been written to my knowledge since its publication 30 years ago.

Smallchief

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An invaluable work. Highly Recommended., July 11, 2002

By 

James Kasprzak (Darkest New Jersey) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The European Discovery of America: The Northern Voyages, A.D. 500-1600 (Hardcover)

Morrison's monumental chronicle of the European expeditions to America still holds its place as the best work in the field after three decades. Although quite lengthy (two volumes weigh in at more than 800 pages each), the books are quite readable and the writing manages to be both scholarly and entertaining.

This history doesn't deal with the explorations in a vacuum. Every voyage to America was prompted and influenced by a variety of social, economic, political, and technological factors in its country of origin, and Morrison gives a thorough view of the background of the explorers and their home country before treating the expeditions themselves. This book will not only tell you what the explorers discovered, but what they were looking for and why.

For all of those interested in the Viking expeditions to North America, this book tells the definitive story. The exact site of the first Viking settlement has been identified, and the archaeological evidence is discussed here. There is also a thorough debunking of several spurious "Viking stones" in places like Minnesota and New Hampshire.

Other explorations of North America are covered in fascinating detail, including the seasonal but very active sixteenth-century fishing outposts in Newfoundland, and the many attempts to discover the elusive Northwest Passage.

As a naval historian, Morrison devoted a fair number of pages in this book to technical descriptions of ships and sailing. The uninterested reader can safely skim over these parts without detracting from the historical saga, but this landlubber found it interesting to trace the technological development of the vessels that crossed the Atlantic.

In short, if you have any interest in who explored the Americas, why they went there, and what they experienced, then this is absolutely the best book you can read on the subject.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Best Maritime History book ever!!, October 16, 2010

By 

natlite - See all my reviews

This review is from: The European Discovery of America: The Southern Voyages, A.D. 1492-1616 (Hardcover)

I've read countless modern books about the Age of Discovery but it took finding this series by Samual E Morison, written in the early 1970's to knock the socks off every history book on the subject. The best!!!! Very readable, and Morison adds his little wit and flare like no one else can.