COLUMBUS WAS FIVE YEARS LATE 'FINDING' NEW WORLD

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23352, 7 September 1950, Page 7

COLUMBUS WAS FIVE YEARS LATE 'FINDING' NEW WORLD

(N.Z.P.A. —Reuter —Copyright,)

(11.30 a.m.) LONDON, Sept. 6. Christopher Columbus falsified his ship’s log because a Portugese explorer named Detalmoa beat him to the New World by live years.

Professor A. Davies, of Exeter University, said this in an address to scientists of the British Association at Birmingham today.

Profcsor Davies said several features of first voyage suggested he had positive knowledge of the existence of land before be set out for the west. His conviction that he would find land 750 leagues west of the Canary Islands was based on information given to him by his brother, a map-maker in Portugal and he maintained a course due west from the Canary Islands for this purpose. Professor Davies said that ns soon as the ships left Canary Islands, Columbus began to falsify the log on his ship and by the time the vessel had reached the West Indies Columbus’ log showed that the ships had covered 900 miles more than they really had. When Columbus landed in Cuba be recorded the latitude as 42 degrees north instead of 21 degrees north. These falsifications were deliberate on the part of Columbus so that he could claim a new discovery. Prnfessor Davies added that from 1500 onwards world maps began to appear based on Portuguese charts which showed Ihe coastline of North America in detail many years before the Spaniards began to explore the coast of the United States. Although no logs and records of earlier voyages of Portuguese were in existence there was a Portuguese Royal Charter of 1487 authorising Detalmoa to make voyages of discovery to the West.