Episode 166: The story of a map and the People who Studied it

In this episode, we look at a 1544 map of the world drawn by Sebastian Cabot, and the people who studied and copied it.

Book Recommendation:
New World Inc: The Making of America by England’s Merchant Adventurers by John Butman and Simon Targett

Rough Transcript of Episode 166: The Story of a Map and the People who Studied it

Hello and welcome to the Renaissance English History Podcast, a part of the Agora Podcast Network. I’m your host, Heather Teysko, and I’m a storyteller who makes history accessible because I believe it’s a pathway to understanding who we are, our place in the universe, and being more deeply in touch with our own humanity. This is Episode 166 – and it’s about a map of the world by Sebastian Cabot, and the people who talked about it – Richard Eden, and Clement Adams.

I’ve been reading a book called New World, Inc.: The Making of America by England’s Merchant Adventurers by John Butman and Simon Targett, and it’s basically a business history of the age of exploration during the Elizabethan period. And one of the names I came across that I hadn’t heard before was Clement Adams. As I read more about him, I realized that he was worthy of his own episode on this show, as his story dovetails on a few other fascinating tidbits of the mid 16th century. 

The February 1883 issue of the journal Science has an article in about a map of the world known as the Sebastian Cabot map that was rediscovered in the mid 19th century in Germany. In 1883 when this article was printed, the library of Harvard College had just received a copy of the map, and the article in the journal went into great detail about the map, and its history. The original is still to this day in the French national library.

The map became famous in England, and would go on to inspire a generation of explorers including Richard Hakluyt, thanks to the engraving created by Clement Adams. The short version on Clement Adams is that he was born in 1519 – he was a writer, engraver, and tutored Edward VI’s friends. He was educated at Cambridge, worked for William Cecil, and wrote about voyages that were happening at sea. It’s thanks to him that we know so much about the early voyages of the ships who tried to find the Northeast passage.

So in this episode, I want to chat about Clement Adams, but I also want to talk about the map, and how it influenced the explorers and funders. 

Adams was born in Buckington, Warwickshire, about 1519, as I said. He was educated at Eton, and then went to  King’s College, Cambridge in 1536, and was elected fellow in 1539. He took the degree of B.A. in 1540–1, and of M.A. in 1544, and was appointed schoolmaster to the king’s henchmen (ie the friends of Edward VI) at Greenwich 3 May 1552, at a salary of 10l. per annum. He died 9 Jan. 1586–7, and was buried in Greenwich.

The earliest mention of Adams in the printed literature of the sixteenth century is by his contemporary, Richard Eden, the father of English geography. Richard Eden was a contemporary of Adams, and he translated works of travel writers and explorers into English, which helped further the interest in exploration in the mid 16th century. Interestingly, in the footsteps of famous alchemist/scientist/explorers like John Dee, the middle 1540’s he worked as an alchemist for Richard Whalley, who would later become the Sheriff of Nottinghamshire. He received a salary of £20/ year as he sought the secret of turning base metal into gold.

In the mid 1550’s, Eden translated the first part of  Decades of the New World, a series of letters and reports of the early explorations of Central and South America that was published beginning 1511 and later anthologized. Eden translated the first three decades, and published them in 1555, thus beginning the genre of English discovery travel writing, which stimulated English exploration of the New World.Eden’s translations were reprinted with supplementary materials in 1577 by Richard Willes under the new title, The historie of travayle into the West and east Indies. Richard Hakluyt had the remaining five decades translated into English by Michael Lok and published in London in 1612.

In the translation of Decades, we learn that Clement Adams was a schoolmaster and not a traveller. Thanks to Adams we have the first written account of the earliest English exploration and trade with Russia. Eden writes: ‘Wheras I have before made mention howe Moscouia was in our time discovered by the direction and information of the said master Sebastian Cabot who long before had this secret in his mind, I shall not need here to describe that voyage, forasmuch as the same is largely and faithfully written in the Latyn tonge by that learned young man, Clement Adams, schoolmaster to the Queenes henshemen (i.e. pages of honour) as he received it at the mouth of the sayde Richard Chancelor.’

Cabot made his famous Mappe-monde, recording the discoveries of himself and his father, John Cabot, along the coast of ‘Newfoundland’ in 1497, the date of which discovery has been the subject of much debate among geographers and historians. 

Supposedly a French map already in existence was used as a base for the 1544 map, and Cabot’s contributions to it were confined largely to notes on his own and his father’s voyages, and of his views on navigation. There are a total of four known editions of the map. 
1. The map in the Bibliotheque Nationale, drawn in 1544;  found at a curate’s dwelling in Baviere in 1843 ; 

2. A map seen at Oxford by Nicolas Heschoff, in 1666; drawn in 1549; 

3. The map engraved by Clement Adams, seen by Hakluyt in 1565 ; 

4. Finally the map Purchas pretends to have examined in the private gallery of the King of England. It bore the date of 1549. 

After Cabot came to England, the new version of this map was produced by Clement Adams in 1549, and to this Cabot made some additions, particularly in his claim to have reached on his northern voyage, a channel between 61 ° and 64 ° N. which extended westwards for at least ten degrees of longitude. This formed excellent publicity for his views smce the map was bought and displayed by many merchants and courtiers, though no copy has’ survived. Cabot is not known to have received further publicity in print before 1553 when Richard · Eden referred to ‘his voyages in A treatyse of the newe India (1553)-and was later to give further references to him in The decades of the newe worlde or west India (1555)

A contemporary copy of Cabot’s map, discovered in Germany, the one I mentioned from the 19th century journal Science  is preserved in the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, the original of which is now lost, in a volume first published in 1594. It would appear that there was also a copy preserved at Oxford at the period named; be this as it may, we learn from Hakluyt, in 1584, that yet another copy was made and ‘cut’ by Adams, which was evidently well known at the period, for we read in a manuscript by Hakluyt on ‘Westerne Planting’ (discovered in 1854) of ‘the copy of [Gabote’s] map sett out by Mr. Clemente Adams, and is in many marchants houses in London.’ 

Hakluyt, five years later, repeats this statement as to the map by Adams, in quoting a legend relating to the discoveries of the Cabots to be found upon it, described by him as ‘an extract taken out of the mappe of Sebastian Cabot, cut by Clement Adams, concerning his [Cabot’s] discovery of the West Indias which is to be seene in her Maiesties privie gallerie at Westminster, and in many other ancient merchants houses.’ 

No copy of this map engraved by Adams is now known to exist. The only basis for the assumption that he was a traveller is the association of his name with that of Richard Chancellor. That he did not accompany Chancellor in his first voyage to Russia in 1553 is certain, for the name of every person above the rank of an ordinary seaman that accompanied both Sir Hugh Willoughby and Chancellor in the voyage is preserved to us in the pages of Hakluyt (cf. edition of 1589, p. 266). The name of the only clerkly person among the two crews was that of John Stafford, ‘minister’ on board the ‘Edward Bonaventure,’ commanded by Chancellor.

The work referred to by Eden was committed to writing by Adams upon Chancellor’s return from his first voyage to Russia in 1554. The title runs thus: ‘Nova Anglorum ad Moscovitas navigatio Hugone Willowbeio equite classis præfecto, et Richardo Cancelero nauarcho. Authore Clemente Adamo, Anglo.’ 

It was first printed by Hakluyt in his Collections of 1589. This is followed by a translation headed thus: ‘The newe Nauigation and discouerie of the kingdome of Moscouia, by the North east, in the yeere 1553; Enterprised by Sir Hugh Willoughbie, knight, and perfourmed by Richard Chanceler, Pilot maior of the voyage. Translated out of the former Latine into English,’ probably by Hakluyt himself. In the two subsequent editions of Hakluyt the Latin text by Adams is omitted. When discussing Sebastian Cabot, Adams tells how ‘certain grave citizens of London, and men of great wisdom, and careful of the good of their country… began first of all to deal and consult diligently with him’, Sebastian Cabot, who is described as ‘a man in those days very renowmed’. His growing reputation is attested also by the imperial ambassador who wrote of him on 4 September 1553-‘the people of London set a great value on the captain’s services, and believe him to be possessed of secrets concerning English navigation’. 

So that’s it for this week. The Book recommendation this week is New World, Inc.: The Making of America by England’s Merchant Adventurers by John Butman and Simon Targett.  I’ll have a link to purchase in the show notes at englandcast.com/map.   Let me know what you thought about this episode -You can get in touch with me through the listener support line at 801 6TEYSKO or join the new Tudor Learning Circle, which is a free social network just for Tudor history nerds. Thanks so much for listening, and I hope you’re having a joyful advent season!

[advertisement insert here: if you like this show, and you want to support me and my work, the best thing you can do (and it’s free!) is to leave us a rating on iTunes. It really helps others discover the podcast. Second best is to buy Tudor-themed gifts for all your loved ones at my shop, at TudorFair.com, like leggings with the Anne Boleyn portrait pattern on them, or boots with Elizabeth I portraits. Finally, you can also become a patron of this show for as little as $1/episode at Patreon.com/englandcast … And thank you!]