Guillaume Le Testu

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Guillaume Le Testu
Born c. 1509
Le Havre, Normandy, France
Died April 29, 1573 (aged 64)
near Nombre de Dios, Panama
Cause of death Beheaded
Nationality French
Other names Guillaume Le Tetu
Occupation Explorer, navigator, cartographer and privateer
Known for Cartographer of the Dieppe maps and world atlas in 1555; first navigator to discover Australia.
Religious beliefs Protestant

Guillaume Le Testu, also called Têtu, (c. 1509 or 1512-April 29, 1573) was a 16th century French corsair, explorer and navigator during the Elizabethan age. He was a successful privateer during the early years of the French Wars of Religion. In 1573 he and Sir Frances Drake attacked a Spanish mule train escorting gold and silver to Nombre de Dios on the Atlantic coast of Panama, and he was subsequently killed following his capture by the Spanish.

He was one of the foremost cartographers of his time, being one of the last students to be taught at Dieppe, and is one the authors of the Dieppe maps. Many of his maps are distinguished by a high degree of sophistication and extensive detail, his work influencing future generations of navigators and explorers over the course of the next century. His work was also used by Admiral Gaspard de Coligny and French Huguenots hoping to establish themselves in Brazil, Florida and much of the Caribbean; however these attempts were abandoned following Coligny's assassination in 1672 and Le Testu's own death the following year. [1]

Le Testu was also one of the first to introduce the theory of a large southern continent, known on his maps as Jave le Grande or Great Java, and located southward of the Moluccas in his earliest work: Le Testu is now generally accepted as the earliest navigator to discover Australia. This had been long claimed by French scholars, largely based on a 1655 map with his signature and the outline of Jave le Grande. Critics have previously argued that Le Testu may have simply heard of the continent from others and used it in his own work, [2] however earlier maps authored by Le Testu in 1536 and 1542 have since been discovered in the British Museum and the French Department de la Marine, confirming these to be based on his earliest voyage to the Spice Islands in 1531. His Cosmographie Universelle (1555) and world atlas (1556) are both in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris.[3]

Contents

[edit] Biography

[edit] Early life

Guillaume le Testu was born sometime around 1509, either in Le Havre, Normandy or Grasse, Provence . He studied cartography at the famed school of Dieppe and later left on a series of exploration missions throughout the world. During one of his early voyages from Marseille, he was one of the earliest to chart what is thought to be the coast of Western Australia in 1530 or 1531. He may have been the first Frenchman to discover the island continent, to judge from separate charts he drew in 1536 [4] and 1542; the latter being discovered in the British Museum by Richard Henry Major, F.S.A., Keeper of Maps and Charts, in 1877.[5] In these charts, Guillaume depicted the inhabitants and wildlife by drawings of unicorns and other legendary beasts. [6] Curiously, the swan-like creatures and flightless birds also appearing on the continent have been compared to the black swan and the cassowary found in Australia and parts of the East Indies. [7]

He was known often to use such traditional cartographers' imagery in his work, for example, showing the African continent populated with snakes 700 feet long, as well as basilisks, satyrs and other creatures such as the "Blemmyae", men with no heads, and the "Cynocephalics", or dog-heads. [8]

[edit] Explorer and privateer

In 1550, he was commissioned by King Henri II to create a map of the Americas, particularly where the French were trading. In June 1551, he sailed to Brazil on both an exploration and reconnaissance mission from Henri II, charting as far as the Rio de la Plata. His ship, the Salamandre,[9] reached as far south as 26 latitude a fair distance past present-day Rio de Janeiro. In late December, he became involved in a firefight with two Portuguese ships near Trinidad and sustained heavy damage to his ship, although he was successful in mapping much of the South American coastline by the time of his return to Dieppe in July 1552.[10]

He was later involved in the founding of a Dutch colony near Rio de Janeiro in 1555 and, the following year, was appointed a royal pilot upon presenting to Henry II an atlas of the world containing 56 maps he had personally drawn by hand on his previous expeditions. [11] This atlas was dedicated to his mentor and patron Admiral Gaspard de Coligny, who had become leader of the Huguenots only three years earlier. This manuscript was pieced together using a collection of charts from French, Spanish and Portuguese sources supplied by Coligny. Included in this atlas was a southern continent which, at the time, had yet to be discovered. He explained his theory, commenting,

“ However, what I have marked and depicted is only by imagination, and I have not noted or remarked on any of the commodities or incommodities of the place, nor its mountains, rivers or other things; for there has never yet been any man who has made a certain discovery of it. [12] ”

The next several years saw the outbreak of the French Wars of Religion, civil wars between the Huguenots and Catholics; in 1567, Le Testu sided with the Protestant Huguenots, conducting privateering raids for two years before his capture by the Catholics. He would remain imprisoned for over four years until he was released by order of King Charles IX, due to public interest on his behalf.

[edit] Raid on Nombre de Dios and death

On March 23, 1573, Le Testu unexpectedly encountered Sir Frances Drake near Cabo de Cativas in Panama. He was in command of the 80-ton warship Havre (or the New Haven) with a crew of seventy; although it is unknown what was Le Testu's mission in the area, he may have been there under Italian sponsorship.[13] He reportedly presented to Drake a scimitar, formerly belonging to the condottiero Piero Strozzi, as a gift on behalf of Coligny. [14] It was during this meeting, having brought news of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre, that he offered to join Drake in a final raid against a Spanish mule train en route to Nombre de Dios before leaving the area.

He and Drake sailed their combined fleet to the Rio Francisco. Le Testu and Drake landed with their men just east of Nombre de Dios. Le Testu had 20 men under his command while Drake himself led 15 men and a number of his Cimarron allies. As their ships sailed off, with orders to return for them in four days, the party headed inland to a spot two leagues south of the city, arriving on April 29, where they awaited the Spanish mule train. It was soon after their arrival that the party heard bells in the distance signaling the arrival of the caravan. Cimarrons scouts also warned of their approach reporting the size of the caravan consisting of almost 200 mules each carrying up to three hundred pounds of treasure. Drake had chosen the spot for the ambush, believing the Spaniards to be at their most vulnerable as they were nearing their destination after traveling through miles of jungle, to take the mule train off guard in a surprise attack. They drove off the Spanish guards, although at a cost of several Cimarron and Frenchmen.[15]

The attack was a complete success with nearly 30 tons of gold and silver discovered by Drake and Le Testu. Between 80,000-100,000 pesos in gold were taken by the privateers: in fact, there was so much treasure that the privateers were unable carry all the silver off and buried what remained. Le Testu's share came to £20,000. He was seriously wounded during the first assault however, choosing to rest until he was able to travel, and was left on the road with two of his men staying behind with him. As the rest of the party continued to meet the scheduled rendezvous with their fleet, they discovered a Spanish fleet waiting for them instead. Drake was forced to construct a raft and sail out to an island roughly three leagues offshore, where he contacted his own ships. Safely aboard with his crew once more, he sent a rescue party back for La Testu. When his men finally came back, they reported that Le Testu and his men had been caught by Spanish soldiers and executed. One of the men had been tortured to recover most of the buried silver before he too was killed. The French privateer was beheaded[16] and his head taken back to Nombre de Dios where it was displayed in the marketplace.

Drake's men had managed to find some silver which had been missed, which they brought back to split between the English and French crews before sailing back for Europe.[17] The surviving French later complained the English had taken the majority of the proceeds, however. [1]

[edit] References

This article incorporates text translated from the corresponding French Wikipedia article as of 2008-05-28.
  1. ^ a b Quinn, David B. Explorers and Colonies: America, 1500-1625. London: Hambleton Press, 1990. (pg. 63) ISBN 1-85285-024-8
  2. ^ Jenks, Edward. A History of the Australasian Colonies (From Their Foundation to the Year 1893). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1895. (pg. 5-6)
  3. ^ Clarke, Marcus. History of the Continent of Australia and the Island of Tasmania (1787 to 1870). Melbourne: F.F. Bailliere, 1870. (pg. 4)
  4. ^ Favenc, Ernest. The History of Australian Exploration from 1788 to 1888. BiblioBazaar, 2006. (pg. 347) ISBN 1-4264-2163-X
  5. ^ Calvert, Albert F. The Exploration of Australia. Vol. I. London: Dean & Son, 1901. (pg. 2)
  6. ^ McIntosh, Gregory C. The Piri Reis map of 1513. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2000. (pg. 45) ISBN 0820321575
  7. ^ Eisler, William. The Furthest Shore: Images of Terra Australis from the Middle Ages to Captain Cook. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995. (pg. 23) ISBN 0-521-39268-3
  8. ^ Pettegree, Andrew. Europe in the Sixteenth Century. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers, 2002. (pg. 228) ISBN 0-631-20704-X
  9. ^ The salamander was a royal device favoured by Henry II and his father, Francis I.
  10. ^ McGrath, John T. The French in Early Florida: In the Eye of the Hurricane. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2000. (pg. 17) ISBN 0-8130-1784-X
  11. ^ Buisseret, David, ed. Monarchs, Ministers, and Maps: The Emergence of Cartography as a Tool of Government in Early Modern Europe. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992. (pg. 103) ISBN 0-226-07987-2
  12. ^ Jacob, Christian. The Sovereign Map: Theoretical Approaches in Cartography Throughout History. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006. (pg. 146) ISBN 0-226-38953-7
  13. ^ Lane, Kris E. Blood and Silver: A History of Piracy in the Caribbean and Central America. Oxford, UK: Signal Books, 1999. (pg. 40) ISBN 1-902669-01-0
  14. ^ Knox, Robert. Nineteen Years Captivity in the Highlands of Ceylon, March 1660 - October 1679. New Delhi and Chennai: Asian Educational Services, 2004. (pg. xix) ISBN 81-206-1927-7
  15. ^ Whitfield, Peter. Sir Francis Drake. New York: New York University Press, 2004. (pg. 34) ISBN 0-8147-9403-3
  16. ^ Andrews, Kenneth R. Trade, plunder and settlement: Maritime enterprise and the genesis of British Empire, 1480-1630. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1984. (pg. 131) ISBN 0-521-27698-5
  17. ^ Kelsey, Harry. Sir Francis Drake: The Queen's Pirate. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1998. (pg. 63-64) ISBN 0-300-08463-3

[edit] Further reading

  • Anthiaume, Albert. Un pilote et cartographe havrais au XVIth siècle. Paris: Imprimerie nationale, 1911.
  • Lemonnier, Léon. Sir Francis Drake. Paris: Le Renaissance du livre, 1932.

[edit] External links