title: Santa María (ship)

text: The relationship between Columbus and de la Cosa (hereinafter referenced as "the admiral" and "the captain", as they are in the journal) was problematic. The same problem was true of the other two ships; even though all had agreed to sail voluntarily (but unwillingly and with bad grace), the complaints and the non-cooperation, now called mutiny, continued. Aboard the "Santa María", as both the admiral and the captain were in the service of the Crown, the admiral had the rank. The ship-handling, however, was supposed to be the province of the captain. This protocol had been established in the very first Roman fleet, and, like the protocols of the Roman army, had prevailed in all the fleets of the countries descending from the Roman Empire. In any fleet, or its diminutive flotilla, or squadron, the commander of all the ships reported to the central government and held the position of admiral, regardless of any other social or military rank he may have had. The commander of any one ship was its magister, or "master;" that is, the captain, or "head." He ran the ship, only providing an office for the admiral, and receiving from him the same orders as the other captains. This relationship must prevail until the ship was officially detached from the flotilla.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The journal reveals that in the first voyage these relationships were never settled. Columbus often overstepped his province and the masters with their men often disobeyed. For example, on the homeward leg, when Columbus is commanding the remaining two ships from the "Niña", he is so uncomfortable that he wishes to rush home to bring matters before the queen, reported in this quote from Columbus:


title: Santa María (ship)

text: I will not suffer the deeds of evil-disposed persons, with little worth, who, without respect for him to whom they owe their positions, presume to set up their own wills with little ceremony.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: When the ship was finally lost off Haiti, the captain refused to follow the admiral's plan for extracting the ship from the sandbank and instead sought help from the "Niña". The admiral accused him of treason and desertion in the face of danger, serious charges, for which defendants have received the death penalty. Judging by the vituperation in the journal, one might expect to read of some sort of court martial or attempted court martial at home afterward.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: There is no record of any such proceedings. Moreover, the "Life of Columbus" by his son, who surely possessed Columbus's journal, is strangely lacking in references to Juan de la Cosa by name. Even in the shipwrecking incident, the son reports only that


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Here the admiral is being portrayed as the captain of the ship, while "the master" evidently is reduced in rank to an ordinary seaman. Real captains, unless in a vessel much smaller than the nao, do not stand watch (the men on active duty), which reports to the captain (or should report). If Columbus is commanding the ship, apparently his master has nothing to do. He is not even worthy of a name. This is where the irreconcilable contradictions in the evidence begin. Columbus obliterates Juan de la Cosa from his records.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The proof of his existence and his status is given in a conciliatory letter from the crown to the man over a year later, on 28 February 1494, which is phrased in the form of a judgement at the end of an unrecorded process:


title: Santa María (ship)

text: D. Fernando and Doña Isabel ... Salutations and thanks to you Juan de la Cosa, resident () of El Puerto de Santa Maria, you have given us good service and we hope that you will help us from now on. In our service at our mandate you sailed as captain of a nao of yours to the ocean seas (). On that trip during which the lands and islands of the Indies were discovered, you lost your nao. In payment and satisfaction () we hereby give you license and faculty to take from the city of Jerez de la Frontera, or from any other city or town or province of Andalusia, two hundred cahises of wheat to be loaded and carried from Andalusia to our province of Guipúzcoa, and to our county and the lordship of Vizcaya, and not elsewhere ... Given in the town of Medina del Campo on the 28th day of the month of February, year of the birth of Our Lord Jesus Christ of one thousand four hundred and ninety and four years.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The journal portrays a mutinous shipmaster who had refused duty, had disobeyed orders, and had lost the ship. Now the admiral was on the way to seek military justice from the sovereign. However, the first account of the sovereign's response gives no hint of any such violations. Pery says:


title: Santa María (ship)

text: ... the Royal Decree of February 28, 1494, does not seem made for anyone disgraced ... (it) has no turning point: a man who disgraces himself by losing a ship ... cannot be paid for the ship ... the aforementioned letter makes us think that ... the story of events is one of many added by Father Las Casas ...


title: Santa María (ship)

text: There are a number of other logical difficulties with this now isolated legal document; that is, its participants no doubt knew what they meant by its terms, but not enough knowledge of the circumstances survives to clarify their meaning. For example, does imply that Juan de la Cosa had more than one ship of which the crown impressed one? In either case de la Cosa is clearly an entrepreneur or he would not be interested in transporting grain to sell. But if he had only one ship, and that was lost, how was he to transport the grain? Worse, Columbus had already left for his second voyage. There is strong evidence that de la Cosa was a member of it and therefore was not even in Spain when the letter addressed to him was published by the court. These difficulties are sufficient to have resulted in the proposition that there were two Juan de la Cosa's, one a master and entrepreneur, and the other a cartographer (see below).


title: Santa María (ship)

text: There is additional evidence as to the location of "Santa Maria del Puerto," of which de la Cosa is stated to have been its . Not stated is whether it was his native community, or he moved there from elsewhere, or whether his company was located there, or his ships constructed and harbored there. Fortuitously a contemporary letter of the queen gives evidence as to its location, today considered most probable. The letter addresses Juan Rodríguez de Fonseca, the Bishop of Badajoz and royal officer managing the fleet. It is dated 25 August 1496, one month after the return of the fleet. It informs the Bishop that Juan de la Cosa, a of Puerto de Santonia, had petitioned the crown for payment of salary accrued to men who had died in the service of the queen, presumably to be distributed to the relatives. If de la Cosa went on the second voyage, he must have been a of Santa María del Puerto when the queen was considering his petition for compensation for his ship. As he did not move while at sea and he was a of Santoña within a month of his return, Santa Maria del Puerto and Santoña must be the same place, more or less, justifying the hypothesis that Santa Maria del Puerto is a prior name of Santoña.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The etymology of the name is believed to be as follows: an object, "Santa Maria," is being stated to be in a place called Puerto. Fortuitously a single reference from a classical author provides a likely identification of Puerto.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: An ancestral home in Santoña and vicinity is supported by other evidence. There is a church in the vicinity, Santa Maria del Puerto, which once must have had a parish. No parish records concerning Juan have been identified, but the deficit can be explained by known fires over the centuries. There is a district named after the de la Cosa family, who were noble patrons of the neighborhood, and there was also a reputed family home. The de la Cosas were prosperous mariners, explaining how Juan might have gotten the "Santa Maria" (but different theories have been proposed). In any case the high proportion of Cantabrians in the crew supports the theory.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The name, de la Cosa, is consistent with the conventions of forming Spanish names from Basque names. The "de" was prefixed to the name as a sign of their legal nobility. It did not refer to a patronym, as in Indo-European, or to a place. The remaining part of the name was a Basque name, formed according to the conventions of the Basque language. Juan's Basque name is cited in other publications of the times as Lacoza, Lakotsa, Lakotya, La Cosa, and Lakoza. An alternative is Juan Vizcaíno, "John the Basque".


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The evidence concerning Juan de la Cosa is divided in two, an early, poorly attested period up to the missing turning point mentioned by Pery (above), in which he is a shipmaster and entrepreneur, and a later, well attested explorer serving in many senior roles: navigator, cartographer, master and consultant, who continued to sail with Columbus and also with other explorers such as Amerigo Vespucci. His is the earliest-known-surviving map of the new world. This bold explorer was killed by a poisoned arrow in a Custer-like raid on the natives, whom the Spanish had, evidently, underestimated. The early history of the "Santa María" belongs to the early phase.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The most certain evidence of Juan de la Cosa, cartographer, is a world map on parchment discovered in 1832, now in the Museo Naval in Madrid. The map bears the inscription:


title: Santa María (ship)

text: El Puerto de Santa Maria is a city in the province of Cádiz in Andalusia famous for its role in New World exploration. While Juan de la Cosa was born in Santoña, at the time he was a resident of El Puerto de Santa Maria. How Juan de la Cosa arrived at El Puerto de Santa Maria in Andalusia from Cantabria is unknown.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The authenticity of the map has always been in question, especially since much of it is illegible to the unaided eye due to its dilapidated condition. Multispectral analysis, however, has brought out sufficient detail to perform cartographic and geographic analyses upon it, which are ongoing, and have been and are being published in a large variety of sources, many of them graphic. This article relies mainly on the summary given by Arthur Davies, who developed his theses in different articles and came to work up a standard summary.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Exploration in the late 15th century was in the hands of a small class of veteran mariners, such as Columbus, de la Cosa, Vespucci, Cabot (another Genoese), and not a few others. History has dubbed these men and their companions Conquistadores from the later historical results, but it is unlikely that they viewed themselves as such in Columbus's time, being mainly interested in trade, gold, and colonization. Conquest is what they finally had to do to accomplish those goals in the lands of the natives. The resources for their explorations were provided by the monarchs of the major maritime countries: Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, John II of Portugal and his successor, Manuel I of Portugal, and Henry VII of England. These monarchs in particular made exploration and possession of the New World their main preoccupation. They often allocated unlimited funding to the expeditions.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The professional mariners had to be first of all skilled ship captains. Second, they had to be able to navigate and be familiar with charts (a trade word for marine maps). Unlike today's navigators, who rely on admiralty charts and GPS's to determine position within a few feet, 15th-century mariners made their own charts during exploration of unknown lands, the "Portolan charts," from which subsequent sailors to the region would take sailing directions. These were promulgated freely among the mariners, in contrast to the classical protocols of secrecy. The monarchs, who had formulated treaties among themselves, needed to know as quickly as possible who had discovered and claimed what land masses, and when.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: In Columbus's times, the ad hoc portolans were brought back to the office of the chief navigator (whether captain or some other officer) where they were transferred to a mappa mundi, "world map." This latter was on view to any professional who visited the office. The mariners all knew each other. When not voyaging they visited each other to donate their own data and read the latest data from the mappa kept there. The development of the latest maps was their common cause, otherwise they continued to compete.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: That Juan de la Cosa had his own office at Puerto de Santa Maria is thus made certain by the surviving map, published in 1500 under his name. That he did not himself draw the maps is shown by the names assigned places on coasts he visited, and had a major hand in the nomenclature, such as the coast of Venezuela in 1499, but appear garbled or incomprehensible on the map, which must be attributed to a draftsman. De la Cosa knew what names he had assigned. That he supervised work on the map is shown by the fact that he wrote instructions on it concerning the data that was to appear there.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The publication date of the mappa is substantiated by the data that appears upon it. Landforms east of the Amazon were discovered by Vicente Pinzon, 1499 to 1500. Their appearance on the mappa must be dated to after September 1500, when he returned. He lost no time in visiting Juan de la Cosa's office, which must have been there on the port's harbor. That de la Cosa relied on Pinzon is shown by his map note that a certain cape was discovered by Pinzon in 1499. On the other hand, no data from discoveries made after 1500 appear on the map. It may therefore be dated to October to December 1500.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Amerigo Vespucci visited de la Cosa's office in 1500, probably to report data on coasts he had explored. In October, Rodrigo de Bastidas, another seasoned explorer, departed for the New World at the pleasure of the queen. His charter lists Juan de la Cosa and Vasco Núñez de Balboa as members. This is when de la Cosa left his instructions on the mappa. Vespucci is likely to have been left in charge, as, invited to Portugal to confer with its king about an unknown urgent matter, he felt free to bring along the map, as the Portuguese monarch had suggested. Once there, Vespucci was made an offer he did not refuse, to command a new expedition to Brazil, ready and waiting for him. The result was the discovery and claiming of Brazil for Portugal.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: De la Cosa arrived at Lisbon in 1503 on the trail of the map. On making inquiries he was promptly arrested, a hypocritical act, as the monarch knew perfectly well whose map it was. By this time the information had been copied. On negotiation Vespucci agreed to present the map to Isabella. No further additions had been made or would be made; it was strictly a historical and ornamental object, and was already out of date. From these attested facts it is clear that de la Cosa, cartographer, maintained an office in Andalusia at Puerto de Santa Maria near Cadiz, where his mappa mundi was kept on display, and that he led a band of employees who maintained the map and kept the office while he was away on expedition. This status is not inconsistent with a role as entrepreneur.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Columbus's second voyage began on 25 September 1493, with the departure of a 17-ship armada from Cadiz under the command of the Admiral. As for the first voyage, the admiral was required to keep a log, but it also has been lost. Summaries of parts of it survive in his son's biography, and briefly in some other sources. The most extensive account, however, is from a totally independent source, the letter of Dr. Diego Álvarez Chanca to the Council of Seville, of which he was a vesino. Dr. Chanca was the fleet surgeon, appointed by the queen. He wrote from the field, sending the post with Antonio de Torres, who was sailing back to Spain with news and requests.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Apart from the doctor's personal business in Seville, his letter is highly anthropological, giving a cultural view of the natives. With regard to the history of the voyage he says nearly nothing, but the turn of events revealed by the biography and a letter of Columbus posing as a "memorial" (see below) stands in sharp contrast to his optimism. We are, so to speak, being treated to the doctor's bedside manner, the patient being far from healthy.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Of events before the departure, little survives, but the biography supplies some detail. The "turning point" mentioned by Pery (above) is not entirely absent. The first fleet returned to Palos (all two ships) and there received instructions to report to the royals at Barcelona. Nothing is said of de la Cosa. Martín Alonso Pinzón, captain of the renegade ship, the "Pinta", which had gone off on its own hunting for gold, feeling guilty over the report he knew Columbus was going to make, stopped first in Galicia to send a request via messenger for a private audience with the royals. The playing field was no longer level, however. The pope had weighed in, approving the exploration, and setting lines of demarcation. Rejected, and ordered not to come to Barcelona except in the company of Columbus, a dejected Pinzon went home to Palos to die there of illness caused by hardship on the voyage.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Whether he would have faced charges at Barcelona remains to be seen. He would have faced the glorification of Columbus. Previously, on 30 April 1492, the latter had been made a Don, with the title of "Admiral of the Ocean Sea." On 28 May 1493, the status was confirmed, with the addition of the Pope's approval.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: In June Columbus arrived in Seville with a license to collect a fleet, in the same way, no doubt, as he had at Palos. As the fleet departed in September, there was not enough time to build one; i.e., Columbus or his agents commandeered ships, leasing them from the owners. This status did not make them a private navy, as are privateers, since the personnel were in the royal navy and were being paid ultimately by the queen (next section). The biography says "... in a short time he had made ready seventeen ships, large and small, well stocked and carrying all the things and persons needed to settle those lands ..." This statement condensed is often used to fill in a gap in Dr. Chanca's letter, although the doctor cannot be proved to have said it.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Volunteers flocked to the standard from all walks of life, many willing to serve without pay. Columbus chose 1500 he thought would be the most useful. Unknown to him, trouble was already brewing beneath the surface, as was revealed in a crisis and was published in the "Memorial." Given new arms and armor, the soldiers sold them in Seville and kept the old and antiquated. The fine cavalry horses also were sold and replaced with nags. These ad hoc marines obviously expected no combat. The contractors were at work shorting provisions: the casks supplied were not watertight and the wine they carried leaked away; the salt beef was short and in poor condition; foodstuffs required for cooking were missing, having been sold off elsewhere. Later the queen would swoop among the contractors like an avenging angel, but for now provisions and equipment would appear to be adequate.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The fleet, considered prepared, having assembled at Cadiz, departed from there, the admiral commanding, on 25 September 1493. The weather being unusually good, they sighted the New World again on 3 November, Dr. Chanca complaining that "la noa Capitana" (flagship) was slower and had slowed them down. At dawn on the 3rd "un piloto de la nao Capitana," spied land, claiming the reward for that event. The numerous navigators (pilotos) on board argued over the distance from Spain. The doctor quipped, he was not one who had not seen enough water.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The day was Sunday. The land spied was an island. As the dawn brightened another appeared, and then four more. Chanca does not refer to them by name; it is always a relative position: "the first seen", "the second seen", and so on. Some editions include the names dubbed in from the Biography. At the time Chanca wrote, the names were not known or not assigned. In fact Columbus had overshot Hispaniola to the southeast and was picking his way among the Lesser Antilles in the vicinity of Guadeloupe. He knew where he was roughly. All the ship captains had received instructions how to get to Navidad in case they were separated. Those were sealed until required, if ever. The point of this nicety remains obscure, as there was no one to spy out the secret who would not shortly know all.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The Biography says that the admiral named the first island seen Domenica, because discovered on Sunday. He named the second Marigalante after the ship. As the only extant edition of the original Biography is a translation of the Spanish into Tuscan, called Italian on the title page, by Alfonso Ulloa (Basque name), the names in it cannot be assumed to be either Spanish or not Spanish unless so indicated by Ulloa. Whatever the origin, the name stayed with the island in western maps and writings, even though the Spanish did not settle there. It was occupied by the French in 1648, to whom it became Marie-Galante, a Frenchification of a presumed compound, Mari-Galante, "Gallant Mary." Whether in Italian or French, Galante is the same as English gallant.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The application is totally speculative. Saint Mary, if that is the person referenced by the name, is a figure of reverence, not an adventuress, and could not be called the latter without an insult to the religion. Anyone who dared such a meaning in those times would not be alive for much longer; men were burned for less. Only modern pagan writers far from the fires of Inquisition might suggest that under the very noses of the authors of the Inquisition, the Don and Dona of Spain, and the staunchest advocates of Catholicism, Columbus, Juan de la Cosa and all his Basque countrymen, who were indispensable to the expedition, the patron saint of the expedition and the entire new Spanish Empire could be so insulted by a salacious ship name, and the same can be said of those who postulate salacious overtones for the "Niña" and "Pinta".


title: Santa María (ship)

text: ... "traversarano ad un'altra isola, a cui l'Ammiraglio pose nome Marigalante, per hauer la nave Capitana tal nome" ...


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The admiral had planned to settle Navidad further, a goal he still had when he anchored before the sand bar on the last night at sea. On making the shocking discovery the next day that it no longer existed and the Europeans were all dead, massacred by the natives, he changed his mind, responding to the new military dimension of the affair. He explored further along the coast looking for a defensible site with a good harbor.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: He found it at La Isabela, named after the queen, currently a historic park in the Dominican Republic, about from Cap-Haitien, Haiti, a city close to the location of Navidad. According to Dr. Chanca, the criteria were "an excellent harbor and abundance of fish." The site was defensible: the top of a ravine overlooking the Isabela River further defended by an impassible thicket of trees. The soil was so fertile that it grew an abundance of vegetables, especially the yam, in only 8 days. A landing was made 8 days before Christmas, 1493, about 3 months after the expedition had left port in Spain. Exploring parties were sent out to investigate native reports of gold in the hills. One found it in over 50 streams.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Other evidence suggests that the real circumstances were not so rosy as the sanguine doctor decided to portray; in fact, the opportunity to send letters was based on dire need. On 2 February 1494, a return fleet of 12 ships was dispatched to Spain under Antonio de Torres, ostensibly to report the news, but more pointedly to ask for emergency assistance. One third of his men were ill, he said, from eating and drinking native food and water. The doctor was working day and night. The men were still in huts built native-style, or else on the ships. Columbus alone had a stone, European-style house. Stone walls had been started, but the natives moved freely among them. The Europeans were in continual fear of a surprise attack, despite posting sentries. Would the sovereigns send immediately additional professionals and medical supplies along with decent European food, etc. No gold could be mined without the augment.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Columbus did not ask directly. Instead he fabricated the excuse that he was instructing de Torres about what to put in a "memorial," or factual white paper, he was to formulate ad hoc and present to the sovereigns. This ruse fooled no one. De Torres passed it on to the sovereigns and they wrote their comments in the margins.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Those comments were entirely supportive, and he was given almost everything he asked for. The one exception was his request to convert some of the relief ships to slavers. He would capture some Carribs, put them aboard ships used to bring horses and other animals to the island, and transport them to Spain, where they would be converted, educated out of their man-eating, body-painting ways, and sold at the block to recoup the cost. The queen took this type of suggestion under further advisement, but her doing so did not appear to deter Columbus from enslaving the natives. The relief was dispatched immediately, undoubtedly in all or some of the same twelve caravels.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: In 1897 published a book specifically about Columbus's flagship, "La Gallega, Nave Capitana De Colón: Primer Viaje De Descubrimientos", English "The Gallega, Command Ship of Columbus in the First Voyage of Discovery." It was dedicated to "The People of Pontevedra,"


title: Santa María (ship)

text: whose name God has wanted to link to that of the caravel 'La Gallega', from whose castle Columbus saw ... the revealing light of a new world.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: He was being financed by a factory owner of Pontevedra. He also expressed that he wanted to build the confidence of the people so that they might work to restore the prosperity of old. These motives were nothing like the objectivity demanded of today's scholars, but the book was popular right from its first publication. His thesis was that the Gallega had to have been constructed in Pontevedra, Galicia, in Spain's North-West region. at a time when it was a port and was at the peak of its prosperity.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: De la Riega begins with the generally accepted circumstances of Columbus's departure from Spain, which he also accepts.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: "Santa María" was probably a medium-sized nau (carrack), about long on deck, and according to Juan Escalante de Mendoza in 1575, "Santa María" was ""very little larger than" 100 toneladas" (about 100 tons, or tuns) burthen, or burden, and was used as the flagship for the expedition. "Santa María" had a single deck and three small masts.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The other ships of the Columbus expedition were the smaller caravel-type ships "Santa Clara" (known as "La Niña" (""The Girl"")), and "La Pinta" (""The Painted""). All these ships were second-hand (if not third- or more) and were not intended for exploration. "Niña", "Pinta", and the "Santa María" were modest-sized merchant vessels comparable in size to a modern cruising yacht. The exact measurements of length and width of the three ships have not survived, but good estimates of their burden capacity can be judged from contemporary anecdotes written down by one or more of Columbus's crew members, and contemporary Spanish and Portuguese shipwrecks from the late 15th and early 16th centuries which are comparable in size to that of "Santa María". These include the ballast piles and keel lengths of the Molasses Reef Wreck and Highborn Cay Wreck in the Bahamas. Both were caravel vessels in length overall, keel length and in width, and rated between 100 and 150 tons' burden. "Santa María", being Columbus's largest ship, was only about this size, and "Niña" and "Pinta" were smaller, at only 50 to 75 tons' burden and perhaps on deck (updated dimensional estimates are discussed below in the section entitled Replicas).


title: Santa María (ship)

text: On 2 January 1492, the last remaining Moslem stronghold in Spain, Granada, fell to the armies of the Catholic monarchs, Ferdinand and Isabella. They began making changes in the direction of cultural unity. The Moslems were encouraged to leave for North Africa. The Jews were given a choice: convert to Catholicism or leave the country (a dictate that led to the Expulsion of the Jews from Spain). The Spanish Inquisition had already been instituted in 1478 to detect hypocrisy. Roman methods of interrogation were still in effect, which always involved torture, even if the suspect began by confessing everything. As the New Christians (so they were called), were never arrested unless already convicted in public belief, the outcome was almost always some form of burning, dead (if already executed) or alive, although individual expulsion was sometimes used. The Jews who converted, called conversos, were often welcomed into high places with open arms, so to speak. The Grand Inquisitor himself, Tomás de Torquemada, was of a converso family. On the other hand, those who professed Catholicism, but practiced or seemed to practice Crypto-Judaism, were called Marranos. These lived a life of terrible fear and secrecy.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: In the conclusion of their affairs at Granada the monarchs dismissed Christopher Columbus, who had been at their court for 6½ years petitioning for support for an expedition to discover a great circle route to the far east ("regions of India," in English "Indies"), which would entail a voyage due west over the deep and unknown ocean. Paying him for his time and trouble, they dismissed him and his suite for good and all, they thought. They had nothing against his being Italian, as he professed Catholicism also, but their Spanish advisors had condemned the idea as unprofitable.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: No sooner had he departed from nearby Santa Fe, the temporary capital, than Luis de Santángel, a converso in the position of royal treasurer, and some other friends of Columbus, convinced the queen that great risks could bring great profits at a minimal cost on this expedition. Columbus was summoned from the road only four miles away and was unexpectedly given the support he had been denied all this time along with command of the expedition and the permanent rank of admiral and governor of all lands he should acquire. He was to receive 10% of all portable valuables he would acquire, but not until he had acquired them. Meanwhile, the queen would stand the expenses, for which she said she would pledge her jewels for collateral, if necessary (it was apparently not necessary).


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The only way to understand a head of state being privately indebted for public enterprises, or having to pawn personal property, is to turn back the clock in the evolution of modern states. There were no departments or agencies staffed by professionals who for the most part carry on without the immediate supervision of the head of state. Fort Knox, so to speak, was non-existent.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: In 15th-century Spain and other European monarchies the sovereign presided over every state enterprise. The operational expenses were covered in advance by loans to the sovereign or persons designated by the sovereign. The sources of the loans were generally customary. The backers were happy to do that for an agreed interest. The revenue to pay off specific loans came from the exercise of governmental prerogatives: taxes, tariffs, fines, fees, etc. The sovereign presided over the imposition of these obligations. They were collected, however, by private enterprises, as they had been in Roman times. Thus, the promise of Isabella to pay was really the assertion that she would create an obligation for her subjects to pay. Meanwhile, she had to conform to the protocols for borrowing money, such as putting up collateral. Possession of such collateral would never be demanded. The jewels were never at risk.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The voyage was principally financed by a syndicate of seven noble Genovese bankers resident in Seville (the group was linked to Amerigo Vespucci and funds belonging to Lorenzo di Pier Francesco de Medici). Hence, all the accounting and recording of the voyage was kept in Seville. This also applies to the second voyage, even though the syndicate had by then disbanded.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: According to a glowing letter sent by Columbus to his chief supporter, Luis de Santángel, in February 1493, from the Canary Islands, Cuba was the fifth island renamed by him, its new name being Juana. This time the name did not prevail over the native name, Cuba. However, Columbus's order is a simplification. He visited many more small islands, investigating everything everywhere. Striking the north coast of Cuba, he sailed westward, going around the west end of the island. Then he sailed eastward and southward. Clinging to the belief that he was in the Far East, he at first supposed he was off Cipango, Portuguese name for "Japan," which supposition was recorded in the journal. By the time of the letter, he had changed it to Cathay, or China.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: While skimming the coast of Cuba from bay to bay, the ships were visited by many native vessels of life-boat and galley styles. The natives invited them to visit their villages ashore. He found the natives comely and friendly. They were under a pyramidal tribal structure, were polygamous, wore no clothes, painted their bodies, and wore jewelry: rings, bracelets, anklets, necklaces, some of which were made of gold. Furniture was often elaborately carved in the shape of animals with golden eyes and ears. They were all helpful, wondering at the Europeans. Inquiring as to the source of the gold, Columbus was told that it was produced on, and traded from, the island of Bohio.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: On 5 November, the crews collected large amounts of spices that were very expensive in Europe. On the 6th, they were invited to a feast in a mountain village of 50 houses, 1000 population, who thought the Spanish were from heaven. The Spanish smoked tobacco for the first time. On 12 November, they began to detain native visitors to the ship and kidnap natives on shore, planning to carry them back to Spain. Many would be sold into slavery there, against the express orders of the queen. The natives were so credulous that one father whose entire family had been kidnapped begged to be taken also so that he could share heaven. It was at this time that the reputation of childishness and simplicity became attached to the natives, whom the Spanish called Indios, "Indians." He wrote to de Santángel: "they are so unsuspicious and so generous with what they possess, that no one who had not seen it would believe it."


title: Santa María (ship)

text: On 21 November the fleet set course for Bohio. Natives aboard the "Pinto" told Columbus where it was. They must have known a great deal more not told to Columbus, as the master of the "Pinto" decided to go gold hunting on his own. After a confrontation with Columbus the "Pinto" weighed anchor and disappeared. On 23 November the "Niña" and "Santa María" reached Bohio.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The details of the "Santa María" end were given in Columbus's journal, and his son Ferdinand's "Life of Columbus". The two often differ. Ferdinand had access to the original journal, while moderns can access only the summary of Las Casas. Only hypothetical reconstructions of the sequence of events are available. They depend on, or determine, (unknown which) the meaning of certain features and events in the now unknown original. The overall location is certain. Various investigators have examined it in person, drawing different conclusions, among them Samuel Eliot Morison. The archaeologists also have been at work. No evidence is for certain. Interpretations depend on a perceived preponderance of circumstantial evidence.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The wreck did not occur on any planned return trip, as though the mere discovery of new lands was enough for the great explorer. On the contrary, Columbus was on a hunt for portable valuables, having already claimed the entire region as the property of Spain, even though it was inhabited by a populous trading and agricultural nation. That nation was told nothing of Columbus's intent. The main commodities that he was now seeking were gold, spices, and people, in that order.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: On 24 December (1492), not having slept for two days, Columbus decided at 11:00 p.m. to lie down to sleep. The night being calm, the steersman also decided to sleep, leaving only a cabin boy to steer the ship, a practice which the admiral had always strictly forbidden. With the boy at the helm, the currents carried the ship onto a sandbank.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: She struck "so gently that it could scarcely be felt." The obstacle was not a shoal. but a bar protruding above the surface, a beach, and waves with audible surf. The ship was making way into the ever diminishing shallows and becoming embedded more and more deeply in the sandy bottom. The boy shouted. The admiral appeared, followed shortly by the captain. Under orders of the admiral to sink an anchor astern to impede the drift, the captain and seamen launched a boat.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: As the relationship between the admiral and the captain and crew was never very good (the admiral had commandeered the captain's ship), the admiral remained forever recriminatory about what happened next. Disregarding the admiral's orders, the boat rowed to the nearby "Niña", the admiral says, to ask for rescue. Shortly they turned back accompanied by a boat from the "Niña", the idea being, perhaps, that the two boats might tow the flagship back to deeper waters. The admiral claims that the renegade crew was denied permission to board. The "Pinta" was nowhere in sight.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: There is another interpretation. Asserting that the hasty abandonment of the vessel was less than credible, Arthur Davies hypothesizes that the captain perceived the ship as being beyond the help of small boats and an anchor, but might yet be hauled off by the "Niña" under sail in the prevailing offshore winds. He interprets Columbus's words and deeds as probable hypocrisy: "If anyone 'wrecked' the "Santa María" of set purpose, it was surely the admiral himself." The admiral used this method, he suggests, of placing a colony on Hispaniola, which he knew that the rest of the company would not accept otherwise. His motive was the fact that the natives were obtaining gold in the highlands and were brokering it abroad. He needed gold and land to pay for the voyage.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The ship ran aground off the present-day site of Cap-Haïtien, Haiti. Realizing that the ship was beyond repair, Columbus ordered his men to strip the timbers from the ship. The timbers were later used to build a fort which Columbus called "La Navidad" (Christmas) because the wreck occurred on Christmas Day, north from the modern town of Limonade (see map, and the photograph).


title: Santa María (ship)

text: "Santa María" carried several anchors, possibly six. One of the anchors now rests in the Musée du Panthéon National Haïtien (MUPANAH), in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: On 13 May 2014, underwater archaeological explorer Barry Clifford claimed that his team had found the wreck of "Santa María". In the following October, UNESCO's expert team published their final report, concluding that the wreck could not be Columbus's vessel. Fastenings used in the hull and possible copper sheathing dated it to the 17th or 18th century.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Alice Bache Gould is considered the major scholar of the ship's company of the first "Santa María" during the first voyage of Columbus. She spent the better part of her working career in Spain researching the records on Columbus and his times, only coming home for a few years to avoid the Spanish Civil War. Gould died of natural causes before she was able to publish a book, but her articles and notes survive. A book was assembled for her posthumously and published in 1984 by the Real Academia de la Historia in Madrid. It is entitled "Nueva lista documentada de los tripulantes de Colón en 1492"


title: Santa María (ship)

text: She began with the existing lists of three major contributors, whom she termed "Fernández Duro," "Tenorio" and "Vignau". In the comparative list they each received their own column headed by their own abbreviation: FD, T and V, respectively. The list is a column of names with the additional columns marking which author was "in" or "out" for that name. She explains that the only way she could make a comparative list was to arrange them in alphabetic order by first name, as the first names in the sources varied least of all. Each item in the list has a phrase distinguishing the person, almost always their position. She explains that the full entry is given in a later installment (which it is). She had her own column, headed G for "Gould". There are actually four tables, one for 87 secure names, one for imaginary names, one for wrong names, and one for remaining names, considered uncertain from Gould's point of view. The G names were only in the secure category.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Comparing and further investigating the three lists (her own being the fourth) and the documents on which they were based, she undertook to distinguish fact from fancy and to fill in sociological information by analysis. She called the 87 "the crew list" (los tripulantes de Colón en 1492) without making the fine distinctions of the long tradition of maritime language. For example, if "tripulantes" were "de Colón" then Colón was not one of them. The final list aimed at everyone on board the three ships regardless of rank or position; thus, the three captains and the admiral were among them. There were no passengers, marines, expeditionaries, or settlers, as there were on the second voyage.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The records from which the total list of persons that went on the first voyage of Columbus was derived are not sufficiently complete and accurate to provide unquestionable certainty. Due to the length of time, losses by neglect and catastrophe, as well as changes in the language, and copyist errors, have left a patchwork of often contradictory source material. Any list must represent the best solutions to the many problems but there are often many possibilities. Gould's list of 87 persons authorized to be on the three ships of the fleet, has become a standard by default, but she would have been the last person to claim any sort of permanence for it. She regarded the list as being "safe" (seguros), but asserted that in 50 years it would undoubtedly be quite different, due, presumably, to the new discovery of old documents. After the end of the 50 years since her death, the list is still considered the best.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The figure of 87 matches the figure of 90 overall given by Las Casas. The filial biography also gives 90. Gould reluctantly adopts the 90 instead of the 120 stated by Oviedo, reluctant because she thought 90 was "insufficient." Still, 87 is not 90. Allowing for the possibility of missing records, she estimates the fleet to have included 87 through 134 persons, which invalidates some modern claims that the list has been "completely known" or has "long been known." Alice never thought it was, and the 50 years of changes she anticipated never transpired, for whatever reasons. If it was not completely and accurately known then, it is not now.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Gould estimates the complement for each ship as follows. The number of men left at Fort Christmas must be about equal to the complement of the "Santa María". If more were left, the other two crews would be short necessary sailors, and if less, the other ships would have more than they planned for. As 39 men were left, Gould rounds off to about 40 men. The ones left would not necessarily have been crewmen of the "Santa María". They were very likely volunteers, with the crew of the "Santa María" filling in for them.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The "Niña" went on Columbus's attempt to explore the coast of Cuba on the second voyage. Columbus had each man of his fleet of three interviewed as to whether he thought Cuba was mainland Asia, and make an affidavit. The number of affidavits on the "Niña" were recorded. The company of 16 for the "Niña" must represent the number of men required to sail the ship. Gould therefore rounds off to 20, leaving 30 for the "Pinta".


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The gaps in the records are an accumulation of losses and errors over a period of some centuries. Ferdinand and Isabella left little to chance. They created an administration that exercised total control over the growth of the Spanish Empire. It kept detailed records. The first step was to appoint a royal officer, the Bishop of Badajoz, to manage the fleet of exploration. Isabella appointed her own chaplain (Juan Rodríguez de Fonseca). He handled matters such as the payroll, pensions, supplies and outfitting, etc.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: By 1503, near the end of their joint reign—Isabella was to die the next year, while Ferdinand lost the regency and the lordship of the Indies—the royals created the Casa de Contratación de las Indios in Seville, a royal agency to manage all New World exploration. Fonseca went on into the Casa, implementing their intention long after they were dead. It had sweeping powers to do everything required: hire and train cosmographers (a combination of map-maker and navigator), manufacture charts, procure ships, assign explorations, designate colonists, manage colonies from afar, impose taxes upon them, and so on. It kept records of every aspect. Kept secret in the organization was the map template for produced maps. Evidently the experiences of Juan de la Cosa caused them to change the open map policy.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: As the Empire continued to grow, in 1524 the monarch placed another level of management over the Casa: the Council of the Indies. It assumed most of the powers of the Casa. In addition it managed the new Spanish possessions in South and Central America as well as Mexico. The long-lived Fonseca went on into the Council, providing continuity. The Council also kept all the records of empire going back to the late 15th century, when it all began. They had been dispersed to different cities until in 1785 the General Archive of the Indies was created. The records were all to be moved to a new home in the building of the Casa Lonja de Mercadores in Seville, but a space problem soon became evident. it was decided to leave all records created in 1760 and after where they were; thus, a number of other important archives remain, one of which is the Archivo General de Simancas north of Madrid, the former royal archive. Gould spent the latter portion of her life working there, and died there in the entrance. The two archives have been designated UNESCO World Heritage Sites.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The first author in Gould's history of the list is Martín Fernández de Navarrete (1765–1844), a nobleman who had gone to sea as a midshipman at age 15 and, showing remarkable talent, had risen swiftly through the ranks of the officers. Invalided by poor health he became inactive but as a reward for his nobility, enthusiasm and interest, the monarch gave him a commission to research the archives for material relating to a maritime history of Spain. There he discovered the condensations of the logs for Columbus's first and third voyages.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: His researches were interrupted by Spain's war with Bonaparte, which it lost. Navarrete had rejoined, rose to command a frigate, fought in some major battles, and was solicited by Napoleon to become the minister of the navy of occupied Spain. Refusing, he retired to Andalusia to work on a constitution for the new Spain. When the conflict with Bonaparte was all over, and the revolutionary dictator was in exile, Navarrete was made director of the Real Academia de la Historia, from 1824 to his death in 1844, in which capacity he was an intensely prolific author, producing hundreds of works. His first task was the resumption of his history of the exploratory voyages of Spain, the first volume of the first edition coming out in 1825. Volume II also came out in 1825. One of its chapters contains a list of 40 men described as "Lista de las personas que Colon dejó en la Isla Española y halló muertas por los Indios cuando volvió a poblar;" that is, it is a list put forward as being the men who died at Fort Christmas.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: In 1884 another professional naval officer turned historian, Cesáreo Fernández Duro, published a work, "Colon y Pinzon", that presented list of 88 men who had gone with Columbus on the first voyage.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The crew was not composed of criminals as is widely believed. Many were experienced seamen from the port of Palos in Andalusia and its surrounding countryside, as well as from the region of Galicia in northwest Spain. It is true, however, that the Spanish sovereigns offered an amnesty to convicts who signed up for the voyage; still, only four men took up the offer: one who had killed a man in a fight, and three friends of his who had then helped him escape from jail.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Little is definitively known about the actual dimensions of "Santa María", since no explicit documentation has survived from that era. Since the 19th century, various notable replicas have been publicly commissioned or privately constructed. Of them Morison says:


title: Santa María (ship)

text: So-called models, replicas or reproductions of "Santa María" and her consorts are not models, replicas or reproductions, since no plans, drawings or dimensions of them exist; they merely represent what some naval architect, archaeologist, artist or ship modeler thinks these vessels ought to have looked like.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: These opinions are not entirely uneducated. A number of shipwrecks of naos have been investigated, from which verisimilar general measurements could be made, and there are some statements from the literature from which dimensions can be deduced. Whether Morison, a former admiral in the United States Navy, is bringing realism to the topic, or is being perhaps slightly more skeptical than is warranted, is a matter of opinion.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: There is one sense in which none of the "replicas" replicate an ancient ship: the concessions to the conveniences of the modern world, especially on the ships meant actually to sail. These are well-hidden: it might be an engine, or modern rudder machinery in a closed compartment, or communications equipment. No modern sailors are expected to undergo the hardships of a 15th-century voyage. They have bunks where Columbus's sailors slept on the deck, and modern stoves instead of cooking fires on the deck. In case of emergencies, help is a radio call away. The Renaissance seamen risked life and limb, and some died on every voyage. They feared going to sea, and if they did go, feared to get out of sight of land.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Interest in reconstructing "Santa María" started in Spain at around 1890 for the 400th anniversary of Columbus's voyage. An 1892 reconstruction by the Spanish government depicted the ship as a nau.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: A replica was built during Expo 86 and anchored in "Deep Sea Adventure Lake" at West Edmonton Mall. Built at False Creek in Vancouver, British Columbia, the ship was hand-carved and hand-painted, and then transported by flatbed trucks across the Rocky Mountains to Edmonton, Alberta.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: A replica, depicted as a Carrack, was commissioned by the city of Columbus, Ohio as a museum ship, the Santa Maria Ship and Museum. It was built by the Scarano Brothers Boat Building Company in Albany, New York, who later cut the ship in half and transported it by truck to the Scioto River. The replica cost about 1.2 million dollars. The ship was constructed out of white cedar as opposed to an oak wood used on the original to give the ship a long life in the Scioto River and to reduce cost. The main mast was carved out of a single douglas fir tree and was equipped with a top sail (since removed). The ship was built using power tools, with a hull length of , keel length , beam , depth and load . The foremast is high, the mainmast is and mizzen mast is . The replica was declared by Jose Maria Martinez-Hidalgo, a Spanish marine historian, to be the most authentic replica of the "Santa María" in the world during the ship's coronation on 12 October 1991.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: Dana Rinehart, the 50th mayor of Columbus, christened the ship as part of the 500th anniversary of its voyage. The ship was removed from its moorings in 2014, cut into 10 pieces, and stored in a lot south of the city, pending funding to do repairs and restorations. As of early 2016, the plans for restoration have stalled. Its parts can be seen via satellite view on Google Maps .


title: Santa María (ship)

text: A functional replica was built on the island of Madeira, between July 1997 and July 1998, in the fishing village of Câmara de Lobos. The ship is long and wide. In 1998 "Santa María" represented the Madeira Wine Expo 98 in Lisbon, where she was visited by over 97,000 people in 25 days. Since then thousands more have sailed and continue to sail aboard that "Santa María" replica which is located in Funchal.


title: Santa María (ship)

text: The Nao Victoria Foundation built the Nao Santa Maria in Seville, Spain during a 14-month period for the 525th anniversary celebration of Columbus' voyage in March 2018. With four decks and masts, it is 93 feet long and has made several voyages, some across the Atlantic.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: Philip K. Dick's Electric Dreams, or simply Electric Dreams, is a science fiction television anthology series based on the works of Philip K. Dick. The series consists of ten standalone 50-minute episodes based on Dick's work, written by British and American writers. It premiered on Channel 4 in the United Kingdom on 17 September 2017, and in the United States on Amazon Prime Video on 12 January 2018.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: The series was initially planned to run on AMC and Channel 4, before AMC pulled out, leading Channel 4 to announce the series. In February 2017, it was announced that Amazon Video had bought the U.S. rights to the series.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: The series is produced by Sony Pictures Television with Ronald D. Moore, Michael Dinner, and Bryan Cranston serving as executive producers. Cranston also stars in one of the episodes. The episode writers include Ronald D. Moore, Michael Dinner, Tony Grisoni, Jack Thorne, Matthew Graham, David Farr, Dee Rees, and Travis Beacham. Jack Thorne wrote the teleplay for "The Commuter", based on the short story of the same name, with Tom Harper directing the episode.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: In March 2017, Timothy Spall joined the episode "The Commuter", starring opposite Anthony Boyle and Tuppence Middleton. The following month, Jack Reynor and Benedict Wong were cast to lead the episode "Impossible Planet", alongside a supporting cast including Geraldine Chaplin and Georgina Campbell. Also in April, Steve Buscemi was cast in "Crazy Diamond", and Greg Kinnear and Mireille Enos joined the episode "The Father Thing".


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: On 3 May 2017, Anna Paquin and Terrence Howard were cast in the episode "Real Life", with a supporting cast including Rachelle Lefevre, Jacob Vargas, Sam Witwer, Guy Burnet and Lara Pulver. Also in May, Richard Madden and Holliday Grainger were announced to star in "The Hood Maker". Later that month, Vera Farmiga and Mel Rodriguez were cast to lead the episode "Kill All Others", with Jason Mitchell, Glenn Morshower and Sarah Baker also appearing. Finally in May, Janelle Monáe and Juno Temple joined the cast of the episode "Autofac" alongside Jay Paulson and David Lyons.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: In June 2017, Maura Tierney and Annalise Basso were cast to star in "Safe and Sound", and Bryan Cranston was confirmed to appear in the episode "Human Is" with Essie Davis, Liam Cunningham and Ruth Bradley.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: The fourth episode of the series, "Crazy Diamond", filmed in two locations in Kent, England; the Dungeness estate was used for various exterior settings and driving scenes, and the Cheyne Court wind farm was used as the checkpoint Sally passes on her way in and out of the estate.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: Harry Gregson-Williams was hired to compose the main titles theme music and score an episode, and Ólafur Arnalds and Cristobal Tapia de Veer were also hired to score multiple episodes each. Brian Transeau and Mark Isham scored music for the episode titled "Autofac", while Bear McCreary scored music for three episodes in the first season.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: Amazon intended the production as a limited series. Some sources say Sony TV is attempting to find a new home for the drama.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: Each episode is based on a short story by Dick. The episode sequences are different on Channel 4 and Amazon Video.


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: On review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, the series has an approval rating of 73% based on reviews from 52 critics, with an average rating of 6.06/10. The site's critical consensus reads, ""Electric Dreams"s dreamy production values and optimistic tone help make up for a lack of originality and tonal cohesion – and save the show from feeling like just another "Black Mirror" clone." Metacritic assigned the first season a weighted average score of 68 out of 100, based on 16 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".


title: Electric Dreams (2017 TV series)

text: The series was greenlit for production by Channel 4 in the UK and Amazon Video in the United States. The first six episodes were screened weekly on Channel 4 in 2017, with the rest premiering on 12 January 2018 on Amazon, when the entire season was released on Amazon Streaming worldwide (except UK, Canada and Australia). On Amazon, the episode order is sequenced differently from the UK broadcast. "Electric Dreams" was broadcast on Space in Canada, and on the streaming service Stan in Australia.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: The 2022–23 season is Chelsea Football Club's 117th year in existence and 34th consecutive season in the top flight of English football. In addition to the domestic league, Chelsea are participating in this season's editions of the FA Cup, EFL Cup and UEFA Champions League. The season covers the period from 1 July 2022 to 30 June 2023.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: On 23 May, it was announced that long serving goalkeeping coach Christophe Lollichon would leave the club after having joined from Rennes in 2007 to help with the training of former goalkeeper Petr Čech.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: On 28 May, Chelsea released a statement via the club website stating that "Chelsea Football Club can confirm that a final and definitive agreement was entered into last night to sell the Club to the Todd Boehly/Clearlake Capital consortium. It is expected that the transaction will be completed on Monday."


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: The consortium led by Todd Boehly, chairman and CEO of Eldridge Industries, and Clearlake Capital, announced completion of the ownership transfer of Chelsea on 30 May 2022. The consortium also includes Hansjörg Wyss, founder of the Wyss Foundation, and Mark Walter, co-founder and CEO of Guggenheim Partners. Walter and Boehly are partial owners of the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Los Angeles Lakers, and the Los Angeles Sparks. The transaction has received all necessary approvals from The Government of the United Kingdom, The Premier League, and other authorities.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: It was announced on 20 June that long-serving Chairman Bruce Buck would step-down after 19 years in the role effective on 30 June. A further statement was released on 22 June announcing a new-look Board of Directors including Boehly, Eghbali, Feliciano, Walter, Wyss as well as Jonathan Goldstein, Barbara Charone, Daniel Finkelstein and James Pade. It was also revealed that long serving Marina Granovskaia left the club, with Boehly acting as interim Sporting Director as well as chairman. The club then announced on 27 June that Petr Čech would leave his role as technical and performance advisor at the end of the month.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: On 13 July, Chelsea announced their first signing of the season, with English international winger Raheem Sterling joining the club for a reported fee of £47.5 million. Three days later, they completed the signing of Kalidou Koulibaly for a reported fee of £33 million.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: In the first match of the new Premier League season, Chelsea defeated Everton 1–0 at the Goodison Park, with Jorginho scoring the penalty. The second game of the season saw Chelsea face Tottenham Hotspur at Stamford Bridge. After a relatively quiet first half, Chelsea went into the break 1–0 up courtesy of defender Kalidou Koulibaly's first goal for the club – a volley from a Marc Cucurella corner. Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Pierre-Emile Højbjerg equalised in the 68th minute, with Chelsea players and manager, Thomas Tuchel, unhappy that Kai Havertz had been fouled in the build-up to the goal, as well as Tottenham Hotspur forward Richarlison being in an offside position and obstructing Chelsea goalkeeper Édouard Mendy's view of Højbjerg's shot. In the aftermath of the goal, Tuchel squared up to Tottenham Hotspur manager, and former Chelsea boss, Antonio Conte, after Conte's exuberant celebrations. Both managers were shown yellow cards. Chelsea regained the lead through right-back Reece James' composed finish in the 77th minute.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: Tottenham Hotspur equalised again in the 96th minute, after Harry Kane had headed in from a corner. Once again, Tuchel and the Chelsea players were unhappy that Tottenham Hotspur defender Cristian Romero had pulled on Marc Cucurella's hair at the previous corner – an incident which had been reviewed by VAR referee Mike Dean. Following the full-time whistle, there was another heated confrontation between Tuchel and Conte, with referee Anthony Taylor showing both straight red cards. In his post-match press conference, Tuchel stated that he was frustrated with the refereeing decisions against his team, and when asked about the supporters' view that Taylor has a history of making decisions against Chelsea, he replied: "I don't think just some of the fans think that. I can assure you the whole dressing room of us, every single person, thinks that". He went on to say that "of course" his players were worried when they had learned of Taylor's appointment to this game, and replied "maybe it would be better" when asked if Taylor should not referee Chelsea games in future. In the third league match, Chelsea travelled to Elland Road to face Leeds United and suffered a heavy 3–0 defeat, the first of the season, leaving them five points behind leaders Arsenal.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: During the first week of September long time serving head of international scouting Scott McLachlan left the club. He had been on gardening leave for three months after being in his post for the last eleven years – during which he oversaw both the men's and youth recruitment during a significant portion of the Roman Abramovich era. On 6 September, Chelsea started their UEFA Champions League campaign away to Dinamo Zagreb, losing 1–0. Shortly after the loss, Tuchel was sacked by the club. On 8 September, Chelsea announced Graham Potter as their new head coach. Potter's first match saw Chelsea draw Red Bull Salzburg 1–1 in a home Champions League match, with a Sterling goal.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: In Potter's second match, Chelsea defeated Crystal Palace 2–1 away from home. In his third match in charge, Chelsea trounced Milan 3–0 at Stamford Bridge, improving their position in the Champions League. They also won the reverse fixture away from home 2–0 top go top of their group. In between the two UCL games, Chelsea easily dispatched of Wolverhampton, 3–0. Overall, Potter won four and drew one of his first five matches in charge. Chelsea's good form continued, as they defeated Aston Villa 2–0 on the road, with a Mason Mount brace. The next two fixtures were drawn by Chelsea, damaging their title aspirations, first against Brentford away and then against Manchester United at home, 0–0 and 1–1 respectively.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: Chelsea announced they would travel to the United States to take part in the FC Series with a friendly against Arsenal. A month later the club announced two further fixtures as part of the FC Series, against América and Charlotte FC. On 6 July, Chelsea confirmed they would play Udinese in Italy after the American tour.


title: 2022–23 Chelsea F.C. season

text: Chelsea were drawn against German side Borussia Dortmund in the round of 16, with the first leg away from home as they progressed as group winners.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: The Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF–Inkotanyi, , FPR) is the ruling political party in Rwanda. Led by President Paul Kagame, the party has governed the country since its armed wing defeated government forces, winning the Rwandan Civil War in 1994.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: Since 1994, the party has ruled Rwanda using tactics which have been characterised as authoritarian. Elections are manipulated in various ways, which include banning opposition parties, arresting or assassinating critics, and electoral fraud.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: Following the overthrow of Idi Amin in 1979, the Tutsi refugee intelligentsia in Uganda set up the region's first political refugee organization, the Rwandese Alliance for National Unity (RANU), to discuss a possible return to Rwanda. Though primarily a forum for intellectual discussion, it became militant after Milton Obote's election of 1980 resulted in many Tutsi refugees joining Yoweri Museveni in fighting the Ugandan Bush War. In response, Obote denounced Museveni's National Resistance Army (NRA) as composed of Banyarwanda. A failed attempt to force all Tutsi refugees into the refugee camps in February 1982 resulted in a massive purge, driving 40,000 refugees back into Rwanda. Rwanda declared that they recognized only 4000 of these as Rwandan nationals, while Uganda declared that they would take back only 1000. The remaining 35,000 were left in a legal limbo along the border region that lasted for years, from where many refugee youths left to join the NRA.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: Two of the militants who were part of the 1981 NRA raid at Kabamba that began the war were Tutsi refugees: Fred Rwigyema and Paul Kagame, who had grown up together in Kahunge refugee camp and were both active members of RANU. By the time that the victorious NRA entered Kampala in 1986, about a quarter of its 16,000 combatants were Banyarwanda, while Rwigyema was its deputy commander. After the Museveni government was formed, Rwigyema was appointed deputy minister of defense and deputy army commander-in-chief, second only to Museveni in the military chain of command for the nation. Kagame was appointed acting chief of military intelligence. Tutsi refugees formed a disproportionate number of NRA officers because they had joined the rebellion early and thus had accumulated more experience.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: The contributions of the Banyarwanda in the war were immediately recognized by the new government. Six months after taking power, Museveni reversed the decades-old legal regime and declared that Banyarwanda who had resided in Uganda would be entitled to citizenship after 10 years. In December 1987, RANU held its seventh congress in Kampala and renamed itself the Rwanda Patriotic Front. The new RPF, dominated by Banyarwanda veterans of the war, was far more militaristic than the original RANU.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: On 1 October 1990, the RPF led by Major-General Fred Gisa Rwigyema invaded Rwanda, starting the Rwandan Civil War. The RPF incursion was initially successful, despite the death of Rwigyema from a bullet on 2 October. However, the Rwandan Army received help from Belgium, France and Zaire and within a month had regained the initiative, forcing the RPF back into Uganda.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: Paul Kagame, who had been doing military studies in the United States, returned to take over the RPF. Thereafter the RPF resorted to guerrilla attacks, focusing on the Byumba and Ruhengeri areas, gaining control of much of the north of the country in 1992. Eventually negotiations between the RPF and the Rwandan government led to the signing of the Arusha Accords in 1993, resulting in RPF personnel and other refugees being allowed to return to the country. In 1993 the RPF lost local elections in the northern part of Rwanda which it controlled militarily, leading its leaders to conclude that it would not win free and fair elections in the future.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: The cease-fire ended on 6 April 1994 when President Juvénal Habyarimana's plane was shot down near Kigali Airport, killing him and Cyprien Ntaryamira, the President of Burundi. It is still unknown who launched the attack; the RPF blamed Hutu extremists in the Rwandan government, while the government claimed that the RPF was responsible for the attack. The shooting down of the plane served as the catalyst for the Rwandan genocide, which began within a few hours. Over the course of approximately 100 days, an estimated 500,000 to 600,000 Tutsi were killed, on the orders of the interim government. The Tutsi RPF restarted their offensive, and took control of the country methodically by cutting off government supply routes and taking advantage of the deteriorating social order. On 7 June, the Hutu Archbishop of Kigali, Vincent Nsengiyumva, was murdered near the Kabgayi church center with two bishops and thirteen priests by members of the RPF, who were said to have believed the prelates were involved with the killing of their families.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: Some Western observers alleged that the RPF prioritized taking power over saving lives or stopping the genocide. In "Shake Hands with the Devil", Romeo Dallaire writes, "The deaths of Rwandans can also be laid at the door of the military genius, Paul Kagame, who did not speed up his [military] campaign when the scale of the genocide became clear, and even talked candidly with me at several points about the price his fellow Tutsi might have to pay for the cause." According to Gerald Caplan, citing this quote from Dallaire, continued, "The 'cause' was clear. It was not defeating the Government’s forces to stop the genocide as soon as possible. It was continuing the civil war until the RPF could take over the entire country." Luc Marchal, the senior Belgian peacekeeper in Rwanda at the time, told Judi Rever, "Not only did the RPF not show the slightest interest in protecting Tutsis, it fuelled the chaos. The RPF had one objective. It was to seize power and use the massacres as stock in trade to justify its military operations. This is what I saw."


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: The RPF victory was complete when Kigali was captured on 4 July and the rest of the country on 18 July. The RPF was split into a political division which retained the RPF name, and a military one, called the Rwandan Patriotic Army (now the Rwandan Defence Forces).


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: After the RPF took control of the country, in 1994, it formed a government of national unity headed by a Hutu president, Pasteur Bizimungu. Kagame became Minister of Defense and Vice-President. According to "Reuters", "Cooperation between Bizimungu, a Hutu, and Kagame, a Tutsi, was intended to symbolize post-genocide reconciliation." This collaboration did not survive, however. Bizimungu left the government in 2000, and after forming his own political party, he was arrested in 2002. Sentenced to 15 years in prison, he was released with a pardon from Kagame in 2007. Despite political gestures from the RPF toward Rwanda's Hutu majority, there remained substantial distrust of Hutus toward the Tutsi-dominated RPF, based on a number of factors: killings of Hutus by the RPF both in Rwanda and later in Congo, plus mass arrests of suspected genocide perpetrators.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: In February 1998 Kagame was elected president of the RPF, replacing Alexis Kanyarengwe, and in March 2000 he became the national president. Following a constitutional referendum in 2003, Kagame was elected president with 95% of the vote. The RPF formed a coalition with several smaller parties, which received 74% of the vote in the 2003 parliamentary elections, winning 40 of the 53 elected seats in the Chamber of Deputies. The coalition won 42 seats in the 2008 parliamentary elections, and Kagame was re-elected as president in 2010 with 93% of the vote. The 2013 parliamentary elections saw the RPF-led coalition win 41 seats.


title: Rwandan Patriotic Front

text: According to political scientist Lars Waldorf, the RPF "sees majoritarian democracy with free elections not just as a recipe for political defeat but also for murderous violence".


title: 2023 Cricket World Cup qualification

text: The 2023 Cricket World Cup Qualification process is the edition of Cricket World Cup qualification for the 2023 Cricket World Cup and the introduction of a new qualification process. A series of cricket competitions will determine which countries will take part in the 2023 Cricket World Cup. In total, 32 countries are taking part in the qualification process, from which 10 will qualify for the World Cup.


title: 2023 Cricket World Cup qualification

text: The 32 teams are divided into three leagues—Super League (13 teams), League 2 (7 teams) and Challenge League (12 teams). Based on the results of the leagues, teams either directly qualify for the World Cup, are eliminated from World Cup qualification, or advance to other supplementary qualifying tournaments through which they can qualify for the World Cup. The supplementary qualifying tournaments also determine the promotion and relegation between the leagues. As it was the first use of the new process, teams were allocated to the three leagues based on their ICC member status, ODI status and rank from the 2017–2019 ICC World Cricket League.


title: 2023 Cricket World Cup qualification

text: As with the previous edition, the 2023 World Cup will feature ten teams. The main route for qualification is the 2020–23 Super League tournament. From the thirteen competitors in this tournament, the top seven sides plus the hosts (India) will qualify for the World Cup. The remaining five teams, along with five Associate sides, will proceed to the 2023 Qualifier, from which two teams will go through to the final tournament.


title: 2023 Cricket World Cup qualification

text: Six teams will take part in the Qualifier Play-off: the bottom four teams from the League 2 along with the top teams in Groups A and B of the Challenge League. The top two teams from this tournament will progress to the Qualifier.


title: 2023 Cricket World Cup qualification

text: The Qualifier will feature ten teams in total: the bottom five teams from the Super League not including World Cup hosts India; the top three teams from the League 2, and the top two teams from the Qualifier Play-off. The top two teams from this tournament will qualify for the World Cup.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: The Histories (, ; also known as The History) of Herodotus is considered the founding work of history in Western literature. Written around 430 BC in the Ionic dialect of classical Greek, "The Histories" serves as a record of the ancient traditions, politics, geography, and clashes of various cultures that were known in Greece, Western Asia and Northern Africa at that time. Although not a fully impartial record, it remains one of the West's most important sources regarding these affairs. Moreover, it established the genre and study of history in the Western world (despite the existence of historical records and chronicles beforehand).


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: "The" "Histories" also stands as one of the earliest accounts of the rise of the Persian Empire, as well as the events and causes of the Greco-Persian Wars between the Persian Empire and the Greek city-states in the 5th century BC. Herodotus portrays the conflict as one between the forces of slavery (the Persians) on the one hand, and freedom (the Athenians and the confederacy of Greek city-states which united against the invaders) on the other. "The Histories" was at some point divided into the nine books that appear in modern editions, conventionally named after the nine Muses.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Herodotus claims to have traveled extensively around the ancient world, conducting interviews and collecting stories for his book, almost all of which covers territories of the Persian Empire. At the beginning of "The Histories", Herodotus sets out his reasons for writing it:


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: This points forward to the "folksy" yet "international" outlook typical of Herodotus. However, one modern scholar has described the work of Hecataeus as "a curious false start to history," since despite his critical spirit, he failed to liberate history from myth. Herodotus mentions Hecataeus in his "Histories", on one occasion mocking him for his naive genealogy and, on another occasion, quoting Athenian complaints against his handling of their national history. It is possible that Herodotus borrowed much material from Hecataeus, as stated by Porphyry in a quote recorded by Eusebius. In particular, it is possible that he copied descriptions of the crocodile, hippopotamus, and phoenix from Hecataeus's "Circumnavigation of the Known World" ("Periegesis" / "Periodos ges"), even misrepresenting the source as "Heliopolitans" ("Histories" 2.73).


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: But Hecataeus did not record events that had occurred in living memory, unlike Herodotus, nor did he include the oral traditions of Greek history within the larger framework of oriental history. There is no proof that Herodotus derived the ambitious scope of his own work, with its grand theme of civilizations in conflict, from any predecessor, despite much scholarly speculation about this in modern times. Herodotus claims to be better informed than his predecessors by relying on empirical observation to correct their excessive schematism. For example, he argues for continental asymmetry as opposed to the older theory of a perfectly circular earth with Europe and Asia/Africa equal in size ("Histories" 4.36 and 4.42). However, he retains idealizing tendencies, as in his symmetrical notions of the Danube and Nile.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: His debt to previous authors of prose "histories" might be questionable, but there is no doubt that Herodotus owed much to the example and inspiration of poets and story-tellers. For example, Athenian tragic poets provided him with a world-view of a balance between conflicting forces, upset by the hubris of kings, and they provided his narrative with a model of episodic structure. His familiarity with Athenian tragedy is demonstrated in a number of passages echoing Aeschylus's "Persae", including the epigrammatic observation that the defeat of the Persian navy at Salamis caused the defeat of the land army ("Histories" 8.68 ~ "Persae" 728). The debt may have been repaid by Sophocles because there appear to be echoes of "The Histories" in his plays, especially a passage in "Antigone" that resembles Herodotus's account of the death of Intaphernes ("Histories" 3.119 ~ "Antigone" 904–920). However, this point is one of the most contentious issues in modern scholarship.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Homer was another inspirational source. Just as Homer drew extensively on a tradition of oral poetry, sung by wandering minstrels, so Herodotus appears to have drawn on an Ionian tradition of story-telling, collecting and interpreting the oral histories he chanced upon in his travels. These oral histories often contained folk-tale motifs and demonstrated a moral, yet they also contained substantial facts relating to geography, anthropology, and history, all compiled by Herodotus in an entertaining style and format.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Herodotus writes with the purpose of explaining; that is, he discusses the reason for or cause of an event. He lays this out in the preamble: "This is the publication of the research of Herodotus of Halicarnassus, so that the actions of people shall not fade with time, so that the great and admirable achievements of both Greeks and barbarians shall not go unrenowned, and, among other things, "to set forth the reasons why they waged war on each other"."


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Both Homer and Herodotus begin with a question of causality. In Homer's case, "who set these two at each other's throats?" In Herodotus's case, "Why did the Greeks and barbarians go to war with each other?"


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Herodotus's means of explanation does not necessarily posit a simple cause; rather, his explanations cover a host of potential causes and emotions. It is notable, however, that "the obligations of gratitude and revenge are the fundamental human motives for Herodotus, just as ... they are the primary stimulus to the generation of narrative itself."


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Some readers of Herodotus believe that his habit of tying events back to personal motives signifies an inability to see broader and more abstract reasons for action. Gould argues to the contrary that this is likely because Herodotus attempts to provide the rational reasons, as understood by his contemporaries, rather than providing more abstract reasons.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Herodotus attributes cause to both divine and human agents. These are not perceived as mutually exclusive, but rather mutually interconnected. This is true of Greek thinking in general, at least from Homer onward. Gould notes that invoking the supernatural in order to explain an event does not answer the question "why did this happen?" but rather "why did this happen to me?" By way of example, faulty craftsmanship is the human cause for a house collapsing. However, divine will is the reason that the house collapses at the particular moment when I am inside. It was the will of the gods that the house collapsed while a particular individual was within it, whereas it was the cause of man that the house had a weak structure and was prone to falling.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Some authors, including Geoffrey de Ste-Croix and Mabel Lang, have argued that Fate, or the belief that "this is how it had to be," is Herodotus's ultimate understanding of causality. Herodotus's explanation that an event "was going to happen" maps well on to Aristotelean and Homeric means of expression. The idea of "it was going to happen" reveals a "tragic discovery" associated with fifth-century drama. This tragic discovery can be seen in Homer's "Iliad" as well.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: John Gould argues that Herodotus should be understood as falling in a long line of story-tellers, rather than thinking of his means of explanation as a "philosophy of history" or "simple causality." Thus, according to Gould, Herodotus's means of explanation is a mode of story-telling and narration that has been passed down from generations prior:


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: The accuracy of the works of Herodotus has been controversial since his own era. Kenton L. Sparks writes, "In antiquity, Herodotus had acquired the reputation of being unreliable, biased, parsimonious in his praise of heroes, and mendacious". The historian Duris of Samos called Herodotus a "myth-monger". Cicero ("On the Laws" I.5) said that his works were full of legends or "fables". The controversy was also commented on by Aristotle, Flavius Josephus and Plutarch. The Alexandrian grammarian Harpocration wrote a whole book on "the lies of Herodotus". Lucian of Samosata went as far as to deny the "father of history" a place among the famous on the Island of the Blessed in his "Verae Historiae".


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: The works of Thucydides were often given preference for their "truthfulness and reliability", even if Thucydides basically continued on foundations laid by Herodotus, as in his treatment of the Persian Wars. In spite of these lines of criticism, Herodotus' works were in general kept in high esteem and regarded as reliable by many. Many scholars, ancient and modern (such as Strabo, A. H. L. Heeren, etc.), routinely cited Herodotus.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: To this day, some scholars regard his works as being at least partly unreliable. Detlev Fehling writes of "a problem recognized by everybody", namely that Herodotus frequently cannot be taken at face value. Fehling argues that Herodotus exaggerated the extent of his travels and invented his sources. For Fehling, the sources of many stories, as reported by Herodotus, do not appear credible in themselves. Persian and Egyptian informants tell stories that dovetail neatly into Greek myths and literature, yet show no signs of knowing their own traditions. For Fehling, the only credible explanation is that Herodotus invented these sources, and that the stories themselves were concocted by Herodotus himself.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Like many ancient historians, Herodotus preferred an element of show to purely analytic history, aiming to give pleasure with "exciting events, great dramas, bizarre exotica." As such, certain passages have been the subject of controversy and even some doubt, both in antiquity and today.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Despite the controversy, Herodotus has long served and still serves as the primary, often only, source for events in the Greek world, Persian Empire, and the broader region in the two centuries leading up to his own days. So even if the "Histories" were criticized in some regards since antiquity, modern historians and philosophers generally take a more positive view as to their source and epistemologic value. Herodotus is variously considered "father of comparative anthropology," "the father of ethnography," and "more modern than any other ancient historian in his approach to the ideal of total history."


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Discoveries made since the end of the 19th century have generally added to Herodotus' credibility. He described Gelonus, located in Scythia, as a city thousands of times larger than Troy; this was widely disbelieved until it was rediscovered in 1975. The archaeological study of the now-submerged ancient Egyptian city of Heracleion and the recovery of the so-called "Naucratis stela" give credibility to Herodotus's previously unsupported claim that Heracleion was founded during the Egyptian New Kingdom.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Herodotus claimed to have visited Babylon. The absence of any mention of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon in his work has attracted further attacks on his credibility. In response, Dalley has proposed that the Hanging Gardens may have been in Nineveh rather than in Babylon.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: The reliability of Herodotus's writing about Egypt is sometimes questioned. Alan B. Lloyd argues that, as a historical document, the writings of Herodotus are seriously defective, and that he was working from "inadequate sources." Nielsen writes: "Though we cannot entirely rule out the possibility of Herodotus having been in Egypt, it must be said that his narrative bears little witness to it." German historian Detlev Fehling questions whether Herodotus ever traveled up the Nile River, and considers doubtful almost everything that he says about Egypt and Ethiopia. Fehling states that "there is not the slightest bit of history behind the whole story" about the claim of Herodotus that Pharaoh Sesostris campaigned in Europe, and that he left a colony in Colchia. Fehling concludes that the works of Herodotus are intended as fiction. Boedeker concurs that much of the content of the works of Herodotus are literary devices.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: However, a recent discovery of a baris (described in "The Histories") during an excavation of the sunken Egyptian port city of Thonis-Heracleion lends credence to Herodotus's travels and storytelling.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Herodotus' contribution to the history and ethnography of ancient Egypt and Africa was especially valued by various historians of the field (such as Constantin François de Chassebœuf, comte de Volney, W. E. B. Du Bois, Pierre Montet, Martin Bernal, Basil Davidson, Derek A. Welsby, Henry T. Aubin). Many scholars explicitly mention the reliability of Herodotus's work (such as on the Nile Valley) and demonstrate corroboration of Herodotus' writings by modern scholars. A. H. L. Heeren quoted Herodotus throughout his work and provided corroboration by scholars regarding several passages (source of the Nile, location of Meroë, etc.).


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Cheikh Anta Diop provides several examples (like the inundations of the Nile) which, he argues, support his view that Herodotus was "quite scrupulous, objective, scientific for his time." Diop argues that Herodotus "always distinguishes carefully between what he has seen and what he has been told." Diop also notes that Strabo corroborated Herodotus' ideas about the Black Egyptians, Ethiopians, and Colchians. Martin Bernal has relied on Herodotus "to an extraordinary degree" in his controversial book "Black Athena".


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: British egyptologist Derek A. Welsby said that "archaeology graphically confirms Herodotus's observations." To further his work on the Egyptians and Assyrians, historian and fiction writer Henry T. Aubin used Herodotus' accounts in various passages. For Aubin, Herodotus was "the author of the first important narrative history of the world."


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Herodotus provides much information about the nature of the world and the status of science during his lifetime, often engaging in private speculation likewise. For example, he reports that the annual flooding of the Nile was said to be the result of melting snows far to the south, and he comments that he cannot understand how there can be snow in Africa, the hottest part of the known world, offering an elaborate explanation based on the way that desert winds affect the passage of the Sun over this part of the world (2:18ff). He also passes on reports from Phoenician sailors that, while circumnavigating Africa, they "saw the sun on the right side while sailing westwards", although, being unaware of the existence of the southern hemisphere, he says that he does not believe the claim. Owing to this brief mention, which is included almost as an afterthought, it has been argued that Africa was circumnavigated by ancient seafarers, for this is precisely where the sun ought to have been. His accounts of India are among the oldest records of Indian civilization by an outsider.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: After journeys to India and Pakistan, French ethnologist Michel Peissel claimed to have discovered an animal species that may illuminate one of the most bizarre passages in the "Histories". In Book 3, passages 102 to 105, Herodotus reports that a species of fox-sized, furry "ants" lives in one of the far eastern, Indian provinces of the Persian Empire. This region, he reports, is a sandy desert, and the sand there contains a wealth of fine gold dust. These giant ants, according to Herodotus, would often unearth the gold dust when digging their mounds and tunnels, and the people living in this province would then collect the precious dust. Later Pliny the Elder would mention this story in the gold mining section of his "Naturalis Historia".


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Some "calumnious fictions" were written about Herodotus in a work titled "On the Malice of Herodotus" by Plutarch, a Chaeronean by birth, (or it might have been a Pseudo-Plutarch, in this case "a great collector of slanders"), including the allegation that the historian was prejudiced against Thebes because the authorities there had denied him permission to set up a school. Similarly, in a "Corinthian Oration", Dio Chrysostom (or yet another pseudonymous author) accused the historian of prejudice against Corinth, sourcing it in personal bitterness over financial disappointments – an account also given by Marcellinus in his "Life of Thucydides". In fact, Herodotus was in the habit of seeking out information from empowered sources within communities, such as aristocrats and priests, and this also occurred at an international level, with Periclean Athens becoming his principal source of information about events in Greece. As a result, his reports about Greek events are often coloured by Athenian bias against rival states – Thebes and Corinth in particular.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: It is clear from the beginning of Book 1 of the "Histories" that Herodotus utilizes (or at least claims to utilize) various sources in his narrative. K. H. Waters relates that "Herodotos did not work from a purely Hellenic standpoint; he was accused by the patriotic but somewhat imperceptive Plutarch of being "philobarbaros", a pro-barbarian or pro-foreigner."


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Herodotus at times relates various accounts of the same story. For example, in Book 1 he mentions both the Phoenician and the Persian accounts of Io. However, Herodotus at times arbitrates between varying accounts: "I am not going to say that these events happened one way or the other. Rather, I will point out the man "who I know for a fact" began the wrong-doing against the Greeks." Again, later, Herodotus claims himself as an authority: "I know this is how it happened because I heard it from the Delphians myself."


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Throughout his work, Herodotus attempts to explain the actions of people. Speaking about Solon the Athenian, Herodotus states "[Solon] sailed away on the pretext of seeing the world, "but it was really so that he could not be compelled to repeal any of the laws he had laid down"." Again, in the story about Croesus and his son's death, when speaking of Adrastus (the man who accidentally killed Croesus' son), Herodotus states: "Adrastus ... "believing himself to be the most ill-fated man he had ever known", cut his own throat over the grave."


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Although Herodotus considered his "inquiries" a serious pursuit of knowledge, he was not above relating entertaining tales derived from the collective body of myth, but he did so judiciously with regard for his historical method, by corroborating the stories through enquiry and testing their probability. While the gods never make personal appearances in his account of human events, Herodotus states emphatically that "many things prove to me that the gods take part in the affairs of man" (IX, 100).


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: In Book One, passages 23 and 24, Herodotus relates the story of Arion, the renowned harp player, "second to no man living at that time," who was saved by a dolphin. Herodotus prefaces the story by noting that "a very wonderful thing is said to have happened," and alleges its veracity by adding that the "Corinthians and the Lesbians agree in their account of the matter." Having become very rich while at the court of Periander, Arion conceived a desire to sail to Italy and Sicily. He hired a vessel crewed by Corinthians, whom he felt he could trust, but the sailors plotted to throw him overboard and seize his wealth. Arion discovered the plot and begged for his life, but the crew gave him two options: that either he kill himself on the spot or jump ship and fend for himself in the sea. Arion flung himself into the water, and a dolphin carried him to shore.


title: Histories (Herodotus)

text: Herodotus clearly writes as both historian and teller of tales. Herodotus takes a fluid position between the artistic story-weaving of Homer and the rational data-accounting of later historians. John Herington has developed a helpful metaphor for describing Herodotus's dynamic position in the history of Western art and thought – Herodotus as centaur: