Key West Florida Weekly

PONCE not the first to POUNCE

New book, old maps indicate other explorers landed here before de León.



 

SEVEN YEARS AGO, THE Sunshine State, with 67 counties, many cities and towns, thousands of private businesses and every chamber of commerce from Key West to Pensacola, jumped into a frenzied birthday soiree, together investing millions on parties, statuary, proud memorabilia and a host of other attractions designed to harvest what by now may be billions of dollars from tourism.

All of it, however, seemed to celebrate a lie.

A charming and benign lie, perhaps — a lie based on some truth — but nevertheless a lie: Florida was celebrating its 500th birthday as a European and American invention discovered in 1513 by Ponce de Leon, who bumped into the place looking for the Fountain of Youth.

According to proponents of that lie, which included every significant media outlet in the state, Ponce de Leon arrived on the west coast, probably in Charlotte Harbor near Sanibel Island, laying European eyes on the peninsula for the first time.

Unfortunately, none of that was true. The Sunshine State, then known as Beimani (hence Bimini) and shortly thereafter as Terra Incognita, was discovered 15 or so years earlier by other European explorers.

A hand-drawn map by Juan de la Carlos, dated 1500, clearly shows Florida for the first time. COURTESY IMAGES

A hand-drawn map by Juan de la Carlos, dated 1500, clearly shows Florida for the first time. COURTESY IMAGES

Now, two map collectors and one of the state’s most renowned archaeologists — Robert Carr, the executive director of The Archaeological and Historical Conservancy — have published a book that explains a much more likely history.

They’ve assembled a compelling and broad range of evidence revealing that several Europeans saw and discovered Florida before Ponce de Leon. They call the book “The Florida Keys: A History Through Maps.”

But the evidence amounts to more than maps.

“We’re not making any claims in the book others haven’t made. But we’re using specific data and information together, including maps and the archaeological discoveries that Bob Carr made near the Bonnet House in Fort Lauderdale (in the late 1980s),” explains Brian Schmitt, a Florida Keys resident who grew up there.

Peter Martyr used diaries and charts from the voyages of several explorers, including John Cabot, to create this relatively accurate 1511 map of Florida and Caribbean islands. It’s the first printed map of discoveries in the New World, now owned by Brian Schmitt.

Peter Martyr used diaries and charts from the voyages of several explorers, including John Cabot, to create this relatively accurate 1511 map of Florida and Caribbean islands. It’s the first printed map of discoveries in the New World, now owned by Brian Schmitt.

“Bob found a pile of conch shells opened by people who didn’t know how to do it,” he says. Now a Realtor, Mr. Schmitt formerly studied neurobiology at Florida Atlantic University and once published a graduate thesis on spiny lobsters in the journal, “Science,” before taking over his dad’s business. He’s coauthor with Todd Turrell and contributor Mr. Carr.

A Neapolitan, marine engineer and consultant, Mr. Turrell is the author of two previous books, one a look at Naples through antique and modern maps and the other a map history of the Bahamas. He points to a startling fact, the basis of the new book: “There are a half-dozen maps showing Florida prior to 1513, and map dealers have known this for awhile. Brian’s map collection is world-class, and he’s an expert on the Keys.”

The new book appeared in print just in time for a Miami map fair of international collectors, which was canceled in response to the coronavirus.

The Spanish opened conch shells like the Indians — at the top. These were bashed in or pierced by Europeans before the Spanish.

The Spanish opened conch shells like the Indians — at the top. These were bashed in or pierced by Europeans before the Spanish.

Unfortunate as that timing was, the book is a revelation of sorts to historians and history lovers, including Mr. Carr himself, famous for discovering at the beginning of this millennium the Miami Circle and a nearby burial site on the Miami River for Native Americans who lived there before the Tequesta tribe, hundreds of years B.C.

“As an archeologist and Floridian, getting at the truth is important to me,” Mr. Carr says. “History is the story of the victor, so I grew up in Florida with the mythology of Ponce de Leon.”

But Ponce de Leon had been with Columbus as a young man, and the Spanish had long since learned how to open conch shells like the various indigenous people of the Caribbean and Florida — by punching a small hole in the top, cutting a tendon holding the meat and removing it. The shells Mr. Carr found, however, were bashed in, and one includes a slender horizontal incision in its center “likely made by the point of a steel sword — by somebody who wasn’t Spanish.”

SCHMITT

SCHMITT

At the beginning of the 16th century, explains Mr. Turrell, exploration “was about money, it was about survival, it was about profit. Every one of those voyages had casualties, massive casualties in some cases. Their lives depended on getting things right, including maps. All were trying to claim lands for themselves or their countries.”

Like others, Ponce de Leon died doing it — in July 1521.

For 250 years the Spanish controlled the history, so they adopted a myth current in Europe then, but unrelated to Ponce de Leon. It was the existence of the Fountain of Youth and the Spanish attached it to him and presented a version of history that painted a less-than-accurate picture.

What really happened

Three maps in particular seem to jump from the pages of history: one dated 1500 by Juan de la Cosa and in manuscript form — hand-drawn since maps were not yet printed — details British flags along a sprawling coastline north of Cuba. That’s likely the northeast coast of the current United States.

Archaeologist Robert Carr found conch shells in Fort Lauderdale bashed in or pierced by the steel swords of Europeans before the Spanish arrived. COURTESY PHOTO

Archaeologist Robert Carr found conch shells in Fort Lauderdale bashed in or pierced by the steel swords of Europeans before the Spanish arrived. COURTESY PHOTO

The second, a map known as the 1502 Cantino Planisphere, was smuggled out of Portugal by a spy for an Italian duke, Alberto Cantino. Such information was pursued aggressively by competing nations. It shows inlets and bays along Florida’s coastline in highly detailed, recognizable form.

But the third is considered the most singular historic prize and one of the key pieces of evidence. It is also now part of Mr. Schmitt’s collection, an artifact and historic place maker about the size of a sheet of typing paper he purchased for $250,000 from a California-based collector.

“Peter Martyr published it and it was sequestered by the crown. They tried to get rid of it,” says Mr. Schmitt. “They were concerned other folks would get it — the English, the Portuguese — so there are very few remaining copies in the world.”

This is the first printed map of the New World, made in 1511 by Peter Martyr D’Anghiera and popularly called the Peter Martyr map.

To order “The Florida Keys — A History Through Maps,” go to: www.islandmapstore.com/keysbook/, or call 239-963-3497. COURTESY IMAGE

To order “The Florida Keys — A History Through Maps,” go to: www.islandmapstore.com/keysbook/, or call 239-963-3497. COURTESY IMAGE

A chronicler of the New World for the Spanish crown, “Peter Martyr had access to all these guys and their logs, their maps,” Mr. Schmitt notes.

His definitive map clearly shows the Keys and Florida, compiled from the accounts of ships’ captains, navigators and sailors who had been not just to the New World, but to lands north of Cuba.

“It synthesized both the Spanish discoveries and those from other folks, including John Cabot and his son, Sebastian

Cabot, who took credit for some of his father’s discoveries and may or may not have been on those voyages.”

John Cabot made at least two voyages to the New World for the English crown, and he made them before 1500, in the late 1490s.

“The Cabots were Genoese like Columbus, under the employ of the English,” Mr. Schmitt explains. The Anglicized name was a take on his real name, Giovanni Caboto.

This cropped image of the 1502 Cantino Planisphere or Map of the World clearly shows Florida and Cuba, drawn at least 11 years before Ponce de León sailed into Charlotte Harbor. COURTESY IMAGE

This cropped image of the 1502 Cantino Planisphere or Map of the World clearly shows Florida and Cuba, drawn at least 11 years before Ponce de León sailed into Charlotte Harbor. COURTESY IMAGE

According to Peter Martyr, who quoted comments made to him by John Cabot’s son, Sebastian, “after they failed to find the Northwest passage (starting in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia) they went south, so far south that Cuba was on their left, at the latitude of Gibraltar. They believed Cuba and Gibraltar were essentially on the same latitude,” says Mr. Schmitt.

“Based on that quote by Peter Martyr describing what Sebastian Cabot said, if you take it literally, it would have put Cabot right off the Florida Keys. The Spanish knew the English had discovered lands north of Columbus’s discoveries. So they knew the English were there.”

The shells

To put the historic icing on that cake, archaeologist Bob Carr points to the shells he found more than three decades ago while studying prehistoric Native American sites in Broward County.

“The discovery really startled me,” he said. “I mapped and photographed them, and I began to realize: even though this was a prehistory site, these shells came from the age of discovery.”

The term describes the European awareness and growing knowledge of the New World, beginning with the Spanish and Columbus.

“I knew the Spanish would never try to perforate a shell or open it the way it was. That’s not the way to do it, and I knew it when I found it. It couldn’t be the Spanish, they’d already been in Puerto Rico, the Bahamas and Hispaniola. This had to be somebody from Europe, but not from Spain.”

Somebody like Cabot, who had never been taught how to open conch shells.

There was more, too. “We found some melted lead near the pile, which is often found when you’re making musket balls,” Mr. Carr explains.

Having discovered these shells, he then took the next step and carbon dated them.

“The radiocarbon dating is fairly accurate, and it shows these shells dating from 1470 to 1490. That doesn’t mean they couldn’t have been opened (the hard way with a knife or sword) outside of those dates, though. So while it’s not conclusive, it’s compelling.”

Cabot, who had five ships, four of which made it back after the journeys, is a strong possibility in Mr. Carr’s mind as the first European to see Florida.

“What I’ve learned as an archaeologist, and one of my goals, is not just to uncover history but to disseminate it, to get it into public discourse. We have to do that. And our knowledge is always changing.”

Making the maps

Two facts become surprising to any who consider what the early explorers and mapmakers had to work with: First, that they could survive the expeditions and put their data into the historic record, sometimes in spite of each other. And second, that they could map unknown lands with relative accuracy, however imprecise, and benefit from them.

“During the ‘primary’ mapping period, which went up to the early 1600s,” Mr. Schmitt says, “maps were drawn using very rudimentary surveying tools — compasses, astrolabes and devices used to measure latitude, or the distance north or south of the equator.”

What about longitude?

“Longitude, or east and west, was a problem not solved until the mid-1700s with Harrison’s clocks, which allowed a determination of longitude. Instead they used dead reckoning. They had chip logs and sand timers to crudely measure longitude before that. Chip logs were essentially pieces of wood thrown over the side and allowed to freely trail aft with a knotted line attached. They counted the number of knots (hence the nautical mile measured in knots) — tied along the line at known intervals — as they passed through the sailor’s hand during a known period of time. They measured that by the sandglass, as the chip was carried by the sea behind the boat, as it sailed along.”

That way, they could measure distance traveled and speed, then “convert the results to depict the distances along shorelines they passed.”

And one other thing: “Rarely would these early mapmakers utilize depth sounding devices, or chains or direct measuring devices, until the mid-1600s. And that greatly increased the accuracy and utility of sea charts.”

Until then they made do — and probably prayed a lot. ¦

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