Flowing Water, Floating Knowledge, Fleeting History

Ever flowing since birth, ocean water became a vessel of information from the moment humankind entered its flux. Several waves of cultural connection trace the moments when – carrying objects, people, ideas – Austronesian, Harappan, Phoenician, Iranian, Greek, Roman, Arab, Indian, Norse, and Chinese seafarers left shore. A connectedness magnified to a planetary scale by the transoceanic voyages of the European Age of Exploration, a wave that reached the five oceans, ever since making water a carrier of ideas to other lands. By observing these historical waves, and by following the routes travelled in the Early Modern era, it seems possible to follow the path of human knowledge through the planet. Or, at least, to have a glimpse at the itinerary of certain ideas, perhaps floating adrift, wandering in the ocean of historiography.

A way to catch such a glimpse may be tracing what ideas were physically transported in these oceanic voyages, that is, what recreational printed books were carried from Europe to the New World and to the Indies. While in the Spanish case seasoned research on the libraries transported across the Atlantic Ocean to American territories has been made, in the Portuguese case there is some work to be made to understand how the history of knowledge and ideas was affected by the flux of information going on board Portuguese ships across the Atlantic and the Indian oceans. The presence of a booklet of the most famous play of Portuguese literary history –the Auto da Barca do Inferno (Act of the Boat of the Netherworld, 1517), by Gil Vicente– in the library of Inéz de la Peña (d. 1521), famous for having travelled from Castille to Santo Domingo with 224 printed objects, is paradigmatic.

The earliest artistic depiction of a round caravel, in the upper right of the oil painting “Arrival of the relics of Saint Auta at Madre de Deus Monastery”. This piece of the polyptych Saint Auta Altarpiece was made by an unknown painter at a Lisbon workshop, circa 1522, and is now displayed at the National Museum of Ancient Art.

A classical allegory of the afterlife in the river of the dead –good souls go to Glory by embarking on an angelic ship, not so-good souls go to Hell by embarking on a devilish ship–, the freshly out of print Auto da Barca do Inferno crossed the Atlantic, disseminating more than a Renaissance literary trope. Surprisingly, it transforms the Virgilian and Dantesque fluvial journey into an oceanic voyage. The traditional vessel transporting the dying souls is not only duplicated, but both Vicente’s ships are turned into square-rigged or round caravels, the late fifteenth-century invention and choice of Portuguese navigators for long-distance oceanic voyages. While the angelic ship is praised as a “saint caravel” all wish to embark, the devilish vessel is rejected by all the deceased, who deprecating it do not wish to enter “in such a caravel”, since its destination is a “lost island” in the middle of the ocean. Adding to the unpleasant idea of spending eternity to Hell, the deceased are offered a sense of lack of security in this voyage, as, while both caravels have instruments to guide them, such as the nautical compass, the devil will not make use of it to arrive to safe port. A lack of care stated by the Fool, who describes the Devil as “one who pisses on the magnetic needle”.

By following the path of this booklet in the Atlantic waters, and its literary transformations, it seems possible to grasp something fleeting in the Early Modern History of Science. A transformation in the perception about how the use of nautical instruments is entwined with the notion of a safe voyage. A transformation of the very scenery of the voyage of life –now oceanic, now magnified. A transformation of the scale of the transmission and circulating of ideas, ever flowing like blue water. [Joana Lima]