Talk:Pedro Álvares Cabral/Archive 1

Mercenary
It's known that this guy killed around 3,000 indigenan in Litoral of Brazil when arrived. He is a killer and is a hero in Portugal. Since Cabral arrived here, we Brazilians have been killed by Portuguese culture of exploration and denegration.

This is a LIE.

TRUE: The Discovery of Brazil - a week in the region Bahia(almost 10-11 days), Porto Seguro, Cabralia etc. (before the fleet set sail to the Cape and to India in Asia) was the most peacefull week of the history of European discoveries, without any dead, Native or Portuguese; Natives spend a night in the ships, they dance with Portuguese men, aid the portuguese made a huge Cross, watch the two Mass, the rituals. A unique moment of paradise in history. If don´t know nothing about history, please avoid stupid comments.


 * The typical Brazilian speech: "It's Cabral's fault". Come on, you achieved independence 200 years ago, stop blaming the Portuguese. Afonso Silva 09:42, 22 April 2006 (UTC)


 * On a more sober note, I feel we might tone down the repeated "discovery" talk of places where people had been living for thousands of years. Lets talk about sex. --Wetman 01:25, 22 April 2006 (UTC)

I agree with you Afonso Silva. I mean, come on!!!!!!!!! Brazil has independence for about 200 years now and they´re still saying that its Cabral´s or the Portuguese fault??!! For God sake, do something with your country and stop blaming others! When Portugal achieved independency (and we did it by our hands, we didn´t need a king from other country to say it for us) did the Portuguese cry for 200 years saying that the Castilians or Moors had ruin their country? NO!!! We transformed it in the biggest discoverer of its times (maybe of all times!). You have a great sunny country, and you say you are a happy people, what more do you whant? Your country is huge (thanks to us). The spanish conquistadores didn´t dezimated your tribes (because we, not them, colonized you, and we were much nicer that the spanish conquistadores. Just ask to the Aztecs, Incas, Maias...ho wait, you can´t, they were dezimated. Too bad, now you can´t see how the spanish were much nicer than the portuguese, as some brazilians think. Now seriously, I really think its a shame what happent to those tribes, and i´m just using Spain has an exemple, I like Spain, great country.). So stop blaming us, and do something for your country. I´m sure that he deserves that you do something for him.


 * The portuguese gave you the fifth biggest country in the world. Half of South America. What are you personally doing to improve the unjust society you are living on? The uncapacity shown in every leader you had until today? Are you going to blame the portuguese for the lack of proper and decent gorvernment you have been having for the last two centuries (200 years it´s a long time!)? What Brasil needs is to organize themselves and work seriously. Stop the street crime and abductions. Stop hunger, lack of education, unemployment and death at birth. Create a just society and be productive. You can't carry on being the country of the three S: Sex, Samba and Soccer. It´s easy to blame the others while sitting and doing absolutely nothing to improve your quality of life.

"It's known that this guy killed around 3,000 indigenan in Litoral of Brazil when arrived. He is a killer and is a hero in Portugal. Since Cabral arrived here, we Brazilians have been killed by Portuguese culture of exploration and denegration."

All this is no more than a hilarious lie. There is no such evidence at all. Cabral and his crew didn't kill any native Indians when they spent a week at Porto Seguro. It is true that Portuguese colonists later killed many Indians, but not Cabral. People who make such ignorant statements besmirch the reputation of Wikipedia. The person who wrote that should be barred from further postings. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.9.30.236 (talk • contribs) 18:07, 13 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Hi, I'm Brazilian and I agree with all that you said! So I ask for your apologies as a Brazilian and as a Portugal descendant. Betum (talk) 18:20, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Improving the article.
Hello to all! I will begin improving the article and focusing on nominating it to featured. Any help, comments or anything at all will be welcome. --Lecen (talk) 02:20, 21 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I've been editing the article so far. Since no one has said anything, I will presume that my work here is accepted. --Lecen (talk) 23:01, 22 August 2010 (UTC)
 * At last I'm done with most of the article. Now I will begin working in the sections related to the voyage itself. --Lecen (talk) 04:17, 6 September 2010 (UTC)
 * There are only two sections missing. When I am done with both, I will write the lead and the article will be finished. At last. --Lecen (talk) 11:24, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Only one section remains unfinished. When it is over, I will write the lead. --Lecen (talk) 02:48, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * The "Return to Europe" is a mess. It will make more sense once I finish it. The article is almost done. Any comments? --Lecen (talk) 19:48, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Looking good, but the lead needs an update. Connormah (talk) 22:33, 11 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Done with the article's main text. I will add another image soon and will work on the lead. Also, I'm going have to correct the map on Cabral's voyage. The book from which I got clearly made several awful mistakes. --Lecen (talk) 15:23, 12 September 2010 (UTC)
 * All done! --Lecen (talk) 15:11, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Fleet Commander-in-Chief - What is the point of this section?
I fail to see the point of the depth of detail about whether or not Cabral was qualified or not. As I began reading, I thought it was building up to the point about him landing up in Brazil, while he was meant to go around Africa. But not. So, what is the point? Weren't ALL commissions in all countries at the time given out to favourites/ allies/ the nobles etc? So why should it be so odd in this case? Rui &#39;&#39;Gabriel&#39;&#39; Correia (talk) 17:10, 5 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Perhaps you might know that back then people were chosen based on birth not on skills or experience, but not everyone knows that. In the case of Cabral, the explanation is much more needed because it he was and still is a man who little is known about his past before the voyage. Any reader will wonder why the King would chose an obscure man to lead the most important and pwerful (and expensive) armada ever sent abroad. --Lecen (talk) 18:45, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

Too much info for one page?
I made a small edit that was subsequently reversed. Rather than reverse it again, I'd like to discuss it here, and make a general point about this page. I replaced "stone age hunter-gatherers" with 'Tupiniquim', the proper name of the tribe Cabral encountered in Brazil. In the reversal, the editor noted that "article has as goal to describe the cultural and technologic gap". I thought the goal of the article was a biographical sketch of Cabral? I don't mean to be facetious, but such details about cultural & techological development of the Tupiniquim ought properly to be looked up in the article about the Tupiniquim, rather than in the biography of Cabral. (unfortunately, the Tupiniquim article in Wiki is very poor; the larger Tupi people article contains some info, but is far too brief.)

This is just one instance of what I believe is a general problem with this article: there's too much effort to insert too many things in one biographical article, which ought properly to be looked up elsewhere. It is not only the discussion of the Tupiniquim. Many of the details of the discovery of Brazil could profitably be moved to an article about the 'Discovery of Brazil' (more specifically, the 2nd Portuguese India Armada (Cabral, 1500) article, which also give details of the armada's mission and travails in India). The details of the noble status and pay structure of fleet commanders is already discussed in the article on Portuguese India Armadas generally.

As the principal author of these latter articles, naturally, I am not unbiased in wishing to see them used. But I wrote up those articles principally in an attempt to liberate biographical articles from being overloaded with too much detail. Naturally, some repetition and recapitulation is inevitable. But a lot of the smaller details here can be transferred to improve the 2nd Armada article or the article on the Tupiniquim, and leave this article focused on Cabral himself. - Walrasiad (talk) 05:01, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
 * "Além disso, a comparação lijonjeira desses selvagens da Idade da Pedra com os habitantes inocentes de um paraíso terreno ou de uma idade do ouro..." (Boxer, p.99). I can not write something that the author did not say. The article reveals the voyage from Cabral's point of view. It says how and why he was chosen and how much he would be paid for. It gives information about him and not the others. If you want to see the other articles you've created improved, do it, then. --Lecen (talk) 05:12, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

But you are not obliged to repeat every statement by Boxer or any other author. This is a biographical article about Cabral, not a history of Portuguese discoveries, nor a history of Brazil. If you try to pack too much information into one article, you run the danger of clutter, meandering and hanging details out of context. It can be made much briefer and more focused on Cabral the Man. A lot of these details are already found (or should be found) in other articles and thus don't need to be repeated here.

For instance, Cabral's trip, all the events in Brazil, Calicut, etc. are already mentioned in great detail in the 2nd Armada article. They do not need to be repeated here in a similar degree of detail. The bio article can and should treat the expedition in a much more summarized fashion, and allow the biography of Cabral the Man (early life, career, later life, temperament, likes/dislikes, family, reputation, death, memory) to be brought front-and-center into relief.

And the description of Tupiniquim society - including Portuguese impressions of the Tupiniquim - should be in an article about the Tupiniquim. Alas, you decided to strip the Tupiniquim of their name and reduce them to faceless, nameless 'stone-age hunter gatherers' (which is inaccurate - they were agriculturalists, they cultivated manidioc). Their name really needs to be mentioned and a link made to a Wiki article about them, so a reader can find more info about them and their society.

If you want to just convey Cabral's impression of them, fine. But make it clear you're talking about Cabral's impression and not making a general disquisition. Cabral was only there for a little over a week. The technology gap did not matter to their interaction - he did not fight them, did not build colonies, it doesn't seem he even ever visited one their villages. And, oh, Cabral was blissfully unaware of their cannibalism. That was first discovered by Lemos/Vespucci later. ;) - Walrasiad (talk) 07:35, 7 October 2010 (UTC)


 * The only problem with specifying that it was the Tupiniquim who made first contact with Cabral is that WP:V requires that a WP:RS be cited to add a new fact such as this. Without such a reference, the article can only say what is supported by the existing references. That the article covers some of the information from the article regarding the voyage of the Second Armada is inevitable. This is usual in biographical articles where some of the person's achievements are also covered in separate articles. In this case, the material regarding the voyage is already summarized (compare the 17k length covering the voyage in the Cabral article with the 41k+ of material covering the voyage in the Armada article). In addition, the material in the Cabral article relies on wider sources than used for the Armada article. The term "stone age" refers to societies with certain characteristics and includes those who do not possess metalworking technology. It is not a value judgement. The article does mention that the inhabitants did some farming. But again, identifying them with the requires a solid reference be cited. In many cases, first-contact peoples were devastated by introduced disease or subsequent warfare, and other peoples replaced them. Because of this, it cannot be assumed that later occupants of an area are the same as those who were there at the time of contact. If you can provide a publication by a reliable source which explicitly identifies the people as Tupiniquim, then the change can be made.  &bull; Astynax talk 16:44, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I've seen other authors asserting that they were Tupiniquins. However, I used Boxer as source and all he says is that they were part of the larger Tupi-Guarani family language (which has several tribes). But that is not important for the article itself. --Lecen (talk) 17:25, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

If its references you need for the Tupiniquim, that's easy to fix:


 * Greenlee, op. cit. p.8.
 * Quintella, Ignacio da Costa (1839–42) Annaes da marinha portugueza. Lisboa., v.1 p.252.
 * Visconde de Sanches da Baena (1897) O Descobridor do Brazil, Pedro Alvares Cabral: memoria apresentada á Academia real das sciencias de Lisboa. Lisbon, p.43.
 * Moacyr Soares Pereira (2000) Indios Tupi-Guarani na Pre-Historia: Suas invasões do Brasil e do Paraguai, seu destino após o descobrimento, Maceio: EDUFAL, p.134.
 * Sadlier, D.W. (2008) Brazil Imagined: 1500 to the Present, Austin: University of Texas Press. p.10.

The term 'stone age' is a bit controversial and not really used anymore - particularly not to describe societies post-3000 BC. Its got rather derogatory connotations and prompts pause and wincing. It is best to use some other term.

But my greater objection is to the term 'hunter-gatherer', which is just plain wrong, regardless of what Mr. Boxer says. Tupi were agriculturalists. And I don't mean they supplemented their diet with a little gardening. They were primarily agriculturalists - cultivated mandioc was their staple diet (and what they fed Cabral's crew continuously). They did a little hunting on the side to supplement, but this was not their mainstay. They had regular cleared fields for the cultivation of mandioc, maize, beans, etc. Indeed, so reliant on agriculture that Vespucci (who visited them again in 1502 & 1503) asserted they didn't know how to hunt at all!

Of course,there were hunter-gatherers in Brazil - Aimore on the coast, and many of the tribes in the interior. But these were not the ones Cabral encountered.

Of course, if it is Cabral's impression we're talking about, they certainly didn't see much of the local economy - they hardly left the beach. Caminha didn't think they cultivated ('else nem lavram nem criam'), but that was based on observing their unfamiliar reaction to European livestock - chickens, sheep, etc. Caminha states clearly enough the Tupiniquim staple was mandioc ("nem comem se non dese inhame que aquy ha muito e desa semente e fruitos que a tera e as aruores de sy lancam"; inhame = yam, which is what mandioc looks like.)

At any rate, we have more detailed documentation of Tupi agriculture after the colonists and missionaries began arriving. (A description of Tupi agriculture can be found many places, e.g. S. Schwartz (1985) Sugar plantations in the formation of Brazilian society: Bahia, 1550-1835, Cambridge UP, p.30) To characterize the Tupiniquim as 'hunter-gatherers' is simply incorrect. Walrasiad (talk) 19:40, 7 October 2010 (UTC)


 * That's wonderful! Now you can add all that to the article about the Tupiniquim. But this article has as focus Cabral and that's it. --Lecen (talk) 22:59, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

Exactly! Discussions about the cultural, economic and technological development of the Tupiniquim should be in an article about the Tupiniquim, not in an article about Cabral! This paragraph:


 * "As in the first contact, the meeting was friendly and Cabral presented the locals with gifts.[56] The inhabitants were stone age hunter-gatherers, to whom the Europeans would assign the generic label "Indians". The men collected food by stalking game, fishing and foraging, while the women engaged in small-scale farming. They were divided into countless rival tribes.[57] Some of these groups were nomadic and others sedentary—having a knowledge of fire but not metalworking. A few tribes engaged in cannibalism.[58]"

shouldn't be here. It is not only that the statements here are erroneous and misleading, but this is not the place for it. If you want to discuss division of labor in Tupi society or the historical usage of the term 'indian', link to those articles.

The only point of interest for the purposes of this article is whom did Cabral meet. Their social structure, economy, customs, fate, etc. can be looked up in an article about them, which will hopefully be more clear and accurate and detailed than this off-the-cuff dubious paragraph.

Yet a reader can't even look it up since it doesn't even say whom Cabral met!

I am not trying to be difficult or mischievous. I realize a lot of work went into this article and I commend the effort. But it tries to do too much. As a result, it ends up with several off-hand dubious statements and paragraphs like this which raise a few eyebrows. I don't expect you to do every topic justice. But if you can't do it justly within that space, then refrain from trying to fit it in. Just link to the topic, where there is more space to deal with it properly. This is a Cabral bio article. Stick to Cabral's bio, and just link other articles if you feel it needs more material, comment or background or further points to discuss.

Keep in mind this is Wikipedia. And the power of an online encyclopedia is the hyperlink - that is, that with one click, you can look up info about something. I urge to exploit that. Link a lot. Link as much as you can. You don't need to put it all - or try to put it all - in one place.

I could beef up the Tupiniquim article. Indeed, I could write a whole series of articles about every tribe on the Brazilian littoral coast. But it is not very encouraging project to undertake if the writers of important articles - like this one, or the articles on Martim Afonso de Sousa or Mem de Sa, or the Capitanias - won't make use of them. Walrasiad (talk) 03:50, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
 * You should have read the article carefuly. It does not says that the Tupiniquim were stone age, food collectors, etc... It says that the inhabitants of what is now Brazil were like that. Tha would include the Tapajós, Guaranis, Tupinambás, etc... Nonetheless, none of the tribes in Brazil knew metal casting and their agricultural knowledge was very, very limited. --Lecen (talk) 03:59, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

It is far from clear. The paragraph glides smoothly from the locals Cabral met to "the inhabitants", without qualifications about being for all of modern Brazil. A reader can easily presume you are referring to the ones Cabral met.

If it is about Brazil as a whole, then what is the point of that paragraph in a discussion about Cabral's landing? Shouldn't it be about the inhabitants he actually met? Walrasiad (talk) 07:30, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
 * Unless they believe that "Indian" is synonymous with Tupiniquim. The article is quite precise: It says that the inhabitants of the new continent was divided in several different and rival tribes and that the one Cabral met was the Tupiniquim. Simple like that. --Lecen (talk) 11:50, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

But it isn't precise. It isn't clear. There's no qualification that it is referring to the continent as a whole (is it the whole continent now? I though you said it was modern Brazil as a whole?  I'm confused.)  Yes, it is very much suggesting the Tupiniquim were called 'indians' and all that.

[And for the record, they weren't. Neither Cabral nor Caminha called them 'indians'. Indeed, it was relatively rare among early Portuguese. 'Indian' was a Spanish appelation used in Spanish territories - rather natural, as, for the Spanish, 'las Indias' meant the Americas. But for the Portuguese, 'as Indias' meant Asia, so there was no naturalness to using 'indio' here. Early Portuguese usage was gentios, brasis, negros, etc. plus a hodge podge of local terms (tupis, tamoios, guarares, etc.) as it warranted. Yes, the Portuguese gradually embraced the Spanish usage (mainly because the Church took it up), but it wasn't a smooth transition. It was often qualified, 'indio do brasil' or 'indio da terra' to clarify, and was still used interchangeably with other terms. So I am not sure why you're even bringing that term up. How on earth is this relevant to Cabral?] - Walrasiad (talk) 14:54, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

Brazil 1500 in cartography
This article claims that the Cantino chart of ca. 1502 is the "earliest surviving chart showing the explorations of Pedro Álvares Cabral to Brazil." Well, it is not. As you can see on the image at the right of this text, the map of Juan de la Cosa (1500) shows an "Ysla descubierta por portugal" (island discovered by Portugal), which all scholars agree to identify as the lands discovered by Cabral.

Furthermore, this same map contains a legend regarding the exploration of today-Brazilian coasts by the Castilian navigator Vicente Yáñez Pinzón. I think it could be a good illustration for the "Forerunners" section.

Regards. --Hispalois (talk) 00:25, 14 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Thank you for letting us know about that, Hispalois. I already fixed the picture's caption. About adding the picture you suggested, that's a little more difficult. Since we had a very, very, very complicated FAC nomination, changing or adding pictures will need a serious discussion before anything is done. Regards, --Lecen (talk) 01:10, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Well, Cosas's depiction is largely conjectural. Cosas arrived in Spain in June (the same month Gaspar de Lemos returned to Lisbon) but left again for America in October. So Cosas only had a couple of months or so to do this entire map, probably not enough time to gather accurate information from Lemos's crew or spies. He probably only heard a rumor about it, and just drew in a conjectural island. Still, it is technically the first surviving map with a identification of Cabral's discovery. (can't think of any other Portuguese discovery this might be referring to otherwise; Gama didn't come across any islands there, as far as anyone knows.) Walrasiad (talk) 02:51, 14 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Walrasiad, I think we agree. I would just like to point out that there is no unanimity about the dates of La Cosa's arrival and return to Spain. He may have arrived either in November 1499 or in June 1500. He then left again for the Indies either "end of 1500" or "mid 1501". I can provide numerous references to support each of these contradictory dates but I do not know if this discussion page is the right place to do it. Regards. --Hispalois (talk) 08:05, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Lecen, thanks for the minor correction. I read the FAC nomination page and understand your concern with adding images but I would like to stress that the La Cosa chart is not some 19th century work whose copyright may or may not have expired. It is a 510 year old map whose author died 500 years ago. It is public domain, like the Cantino map that you display in the same article. So, I think that adding to this article an image of La Cosa's chart is 100% compliant with the policies of both Wikipedia and Commons. --Hispalois (talk) 08:05, 14 November 2010 (UTC)