Over the Edge of the World

Chapter II The Man Without a Country

The Sun came up upon the left,

Out of the sea came he!

And he shone bright, and on the right

Went down into the sea.

When word of Magellan’s spectacular commission reached Portugal, King Manuel reacted with alarm. The navigator had betrayed them all, and the members of the royal court were at a loss to understand why he had done so. The Portuguese court historian João de Barros, who had a passing acquaintance with Magellan, contended that a demonic force had possessed the navigator: “Since the devil always maneuvers so that the souls of men entertain evil deeds in whose undertaking he shall perish, he prepared this occasion for this Ferdinand Magellan to become estranged from his king and his kingdom, and to go astray.” No one in Portugal dared to admit the actual reason for Magellan’s behavior, that King Manuel had refused to back the navigator, humiliating him over and over again.

King Manuel did what he could to ruin Magellan’s name while, at the same time, trying to lure Magellan and Faleiro back to Portugal. He involved the Portuguese ambassador to King Charles’s court, Álvaro da Costa, who sought out the two exiles, promising that King Manuel would reconsider their request for an expedition. Da Costa was explicit about the dire consequences that would befall the two if they continued with their plan to sail for Spain; they would offend God, King Manuel, and relinquish all personal honor. Nor would matters end there; their families and heirs would suffer, and they would upset the delicate truce between Spain and Portugal at the very moment that King Manuel was planning to marry King Charles’s sister, Leonor.

Magellan refused to be swayed by the ambassador’s entreaties. He suspected that if he returned to Portugal he would be thrown into jail, tried for treason, and executed. Summoning all his meager diplomatic skills, Magellan replied that he had formally renounced his allegiance to King Manuel and given his loyalty to King Charles. He had no obligation to serve anyone else.

Frustrated by Magellan’s stubbornness, Álvaro da Costa appealed to King Charles himself. “Your Highness has plenty of vassals for discoveries without having to turn to those malcontents,” he argued. Uncertain about how to handle the matter, King Charles turned to his advisers for guidance, and they reiterated their position that the Spice Islands lay in the Spanish hemisphere, and Magellan’s expedition would not violate the Treaty of Tordesillas. King Charles followed the advice, and Magellan and Faleiro retained his backing in spite of pressure from Portugual.

Da Costa tried to put the best face on his failed attempt at diplomacy. He wrote to King Manuel that Magellan and Faleiro actually wished to return to Portugal, but King Charles prevented them from doing so. Da Costa probably believed his letter would remain confidential, but its contents became known, much to the outrage of King Charles. Ultimately, da Costa’s false claims hurt Portugal’s cause, and hardened King Charles’s determination to stand by his two embattled explorers. Portugal’s attempt to attack Magellan confirmed the belief of King Charles’s advisers that they had hit on a scheme of great strategic value. Yet relations between the two neighboring countries were more complicated than they appeared. Despite all the tension between them, King Manuel proceeded with his plans to marry Charles I’s sister, Leonor, according to a contract dated July 16, 1518. In so doing, rivals for the control of world trade would be yoked by marriage. Instead of ending the strife, the impending union pushed the conflict offshore. Rather than competing head to head on the Iberian peninsula, Spain and Portugal would grapple for control of trade routes around the world. They remained simultaneously rivals and allies, as affairs of state and matters of the heart alternated in rapid succession.

Four days after King Manuel completed his nuptial arrangements, the Spanish monarch instructed the Casa de Contratación to proceed with Magellan’s expedition to the Spice Islands without delay. Magellan and Faleiro were to receive money to begin their preparations, and they were ordered to Seville to outfit their ships.

City of Gold. City of Water. City of Faiths. “Quien no ha visto Sevilla,” runs a saying, “no ha visto maravilla.” “Who has not seen Seville, has not seen wonder.” For centuries, Seville, the preeminent city of Andalusia, has held Spain in its thrall. “I have placed Seville, or rather God has placed her, as the mother of all the cities and center of the glory and excellences of that territory,” wrote an early historian of the city, “for it is the most populous and greatest of her capitals.” Now, at the height of the Age of Discovery, Seville hovered at the apex of its prosperity and influence. The city straddling the Quadalquivir River was an amalgam of Roman, Visigoth, Muslim, Jewish, and Christian cultures. Its fame reverberated throughout the known world, borne on ships to destinations only vaguely located on maps. Throughout Europe, only Venice, Naples, and Paris were larger; Seville, with a population of about 100,000, was on a par with Genoa and Milan, each of them a thriving trading center; London, the largest city in Britain, claimed only half as many inhabitants as boisterous Seville.

Above all, Seville was a commercial center, “well adapted to every profitable undertaking, and as much was brought there to sell as was bought, because there are merchants for everything,” in the words of a sixteenth-century observer. “It is the common homeland, the endless globe, the mother of orphans, and the cloak of sinners, where everything is a necessity and no one has it.” Only Seville was capable of providing Magellan with the technology, the labor, and the financial resources to travel halfway around the world in search of lands to claim and spices to bring back to Europe.

It was also a city of faith, the home of the third largest church in the world, after Saint Peter’s in Rome and Saint Paul’s in London. Work on Seville’s cathedral continued for well over a hundred years, until 1519, the year Magellan set sail for the Spice Islands. With its bell tower, vaults, chambers, and fantastic amalgam of Gothic, Greco-Roman, and Arabic architecture, the cathedral became the expression of Seville’s striving, a world unto itself. The flame of the Catholic faith burned most brightly in Seville during Semana Santa, Holy Week, lasting from Palm Sunday to Easter Sunday, when solemn, almost frightening processions of religious penitents coursed through the city’s narrow, winding streets and capacious squares. The penitents walked barefoot over the sharp stones and splinters embedded in the streets, bearing a wooden cross, their feet bleeding, displaying their wounds in emulation of Jesus. This was an act of piety straight out of the Middle Ages, a demonstration of blind obedience to an omnipotent Lord, a recognition of and mastery over mortal suffering, and an acknowledgment of humankind’s sinful state. As such, it served as good practice for the rigors and pains of a voyage of discovery.

As Magellan and Faleiro arrived in Seville to commence preparations in earnest for the voyage, the ill will between Spain and Portugal led to rumors that the lives of the Portuguese co-commanders were in danger. It was said that Bishop Vasconcellos, a confidant of King Manuel, inspired an assassination attempt. Magellan was inclined to ignore the death threats, but King Charles took the intimidation so seriously that he provided bodyguards for Magellan and Faleiro, granted them another audience, proclaimed them Knights of the Order of Santiago, and reaffirmed the terms of their original commission. Having done all he could to demonstrate his support of the two Portuguese, King Charles urged them to begin their expedition as soon as possible. Time was short, and an empire was at stake.

Something has come up,” Magellan wrote to King Charles on Saturday, October 23, 1518, in the midst of outfitting the fleet for the voyage. Unlike many captains, Magellan involved himself in the day-to-day preparations, even loading goods onto the ships as if he were an ordinary seaman, not the Captain General, and that was how the trouble started. Despite his close interaction with the sailors and dockworkers, or perhaps because of it, Magellan believed he did not receive the cooperation and respect to which he was accustomed. In desperation, he appealed to the one individual who could restore order.

It is possible that Magellan’s problems stemmed at least in part from his inadequate Spanish; time and again, he had to rely on translators, and his inability to communicate underscored his outsider status. Even now, writing to King Charles, he had to rely on a scribe, “because I still do not know how to write in Spanish as well I should.” He proceeded to explain the matter. “I had to haul one of the ships to shore because there was an ebb tide. I got up at three in the morning to make sure that the riggings were in place and when it was time to work I ordered the men to put up four flags with my coat of arms on the mast where those of the captain are customarily placed, while those of Your Majesty were to be placed on top of Trinidad, which is the name of the ship.” The unusual juxtaposition of signs, emphasizing that a Portuguese captain was sailing for Spain, attracted a large, gossipy crowd of onlookers. “Because in this world there is never any lack of envious people, they began to talk. They said I had done wrong in putting up my coat of arms on the capstan.” The crowd thought that the four flags containing Magellan’s coat of arms signified those of the king of Portugal. Resentment boiled along until a functionary ordered Magellan to remove the offending flags. “I approached him and told him that those flags were not of the King of Portugal but my own, and that I was a vassal of Your Majesty.” And he refused to remove the flags. Another Spanish official approached Magellan with the same demand. No, Magellan explained, he would not take down the flags.

As Magellan was explaining all this to the official, the man who had first approached him, “without any warning and without any authority to do so . . . came up the steps calling the people to seize the Portuguese captain who had put up the flags of the King of Portugal.” He demanded to know why Magellan chose to display these flags, and Magellan, not surprisingly, refused to explain.

At that moment, chaos erupted. The insolent functionary “called military officers to seize me and laid his hands on me, shouting that they would seize me and my men.” Worse, “There were some who showed their intentions to harm my men rather than to help us do what was for the service of Your Majesty.” At that point, the two officials who had challenged Magellan got into a fight with each other over how to treat Magellan. The workmen outfitting Trinidad quickly fled, as did a number of the sailors, further exasperating Magellan, who stood by helplessly as he watched the local officials disarm the sailors, and even arrest several of them and lead them away to prison. In the struggle, one of Magellan’s pilots was stabbed as he was going about his work. Although Magellan escaped harm, his dignity and authority had suffered a blow. To make matters worse, the fight had occurred in the open, under the watchful eye of a Portuguese spy, who would carry news of the brawl back to Lisbon.

“Because I believe that Your Majesty does not approve of maltreating men who leave their kingdom and their own kind to come and serve Your Majesty,” Magellan wrote, “I ask you most humbly to decide what would be best for your service. Whatever Your Majesty orders would give me utmost satisfaction because I consider the affront done me not an affront done to one Ferdinand Magellan, but done to a captain of Your Majesty.”

Magellan’s fury at the incident was understandable. An exile, he enjoyed the protection of King Charles, but in reality he was at the mercy of the mob and self-appointed busybodies. If he could not maintain order here on the quay at Seville, how would he lead men on the perilous journey across an uncharted ocean to the Spice Islands? And if there was another uprising on a distant shore, where it would be impossible for him to summon the king’s help, how would matters stand?

Within days of receiving Magellan’s letter, King Charles demonstrated his loyalty and punished the offenders—those who had boarded Trinidad, stabbed the pilot, seized Magellan himself—and arrested the sailors. Preparations for the voyage continued, but the flag incident served as a warning to Magellan that his men, especially the Spaniards, posed a danger as great as the sea itself.

On April 6, 1519, the king sent orders to another officer, Juan de Cartagena—orders that became the most controversial aspect of the entire expedition—to serve as the inspector general of the fleet under the command of the two Portuguese commanders. Yet his salary was considerably more than Magellan’s, the highest of any in the fleet: 110,000 maravedís. Essentially, Cartagena was to have the final say over all commercial aspects of the expedition; he was the chief accountant and representative of the king’s treasury. “You must see to it that a book is kept in which you will make entry of all that is loaded in the holds. These things must be marked with your mark, each different class of merchandise being by itself; and you must designate particularly what belongs to each person, because, as will be seen later, the profits must be allotted at so much to the pound, in order that there may be no fraud.”

That was not all. It would be Cartagena’s job to “see to it carefully that the bartering and trading of said fleet is done to the greatest possible advantage to our estates.” He would have to check every entry in every book, and once it met his approval, sign off on it. At every step, he was to exercise “much care and vigilance.” And it was certainly in his interest to do so, because he had invested his own funds in the expedition. This provision made Magellan responsible to Cartagena for all commercial decisions. The wording (“to the greatest possible advantage to our estates”) enabled Cartagena to step in at any moment and prevent Magellan from enriching himself, even if he believed he was entitled to do so under his own contract with King Charles. Implicitly, these new instructions to Cartagena took precedence over the prior arrangement.

There was more. Cartagena was to function as the eyes and ears of the king throughout the voyage. “You will advise us fully and specifically of the manner in which our instructions and mandates are complied with in said lands; of our justices; of the treatment of natives of said lands; . . . [and] how said captains and officers”—meaning, especially, Magellan and Faleiro—“observe our instructions, and other matters of our service.” If the co-commanders were negligent in any way, Cartagena was to report their behavior to the Casa de Contratación in writing. The instructions were so thorough that a Spaniard predisposed to mistrust Magellan and Faleiro could conclude that he, and not they, had the final say on the conduct of the entire voyage.

And that was exactly the conclusion to which Cartagena came.

Even as he undercut Magellan’s authority, King Charles remained concerned about the possibility of open conflict between Spain and Portugal and tried his hand at personal diplomacy. Writing to Manuel from Barcelona in February 28, 1519, Charles confessed, “I have been informed by letters which I have received by persons near you that you entertain some fear that the fleet which we are dispatching to the Indies, under the command of Ferdinand Magellan and Ruy Faleiro, might be prejudicial to what pertains to you in those parts of the Indies”—which was putting it mildly. Charles continued. “In order that your mind may be freed from anxiety, I thought to write to you to inform you that our wish has always been, and is, duly to respect everything concerning the line of demarcation which was settled and agreed upon with the Catholic king and queen my sovereigns and grandparents.” And he vowed that “our first charge and order to the said commanders is to respect the line of demarcation and not to touch in any way, under heavy penalties, any regions of either lands or seas which were assigned to and belong to you by the line of demarcation.”

On May 8, 1519, amid frenzied preparations for departure, King Charles delivered his final instructions for the voyage to Magellan and Faleiro, instructions so detailed that the two commanders might have thought the king would be coming along with them in one of the ships.

Magellan and Faleiro were ordered to record every landfall and landmark they attained, and if they came across any inhabited lands, they were to “try and ascertain if there is anything in that land that will be to our interest.” They were also to treat humanely any indigenous peoples they happen to find, if only to make it possible for the fleet to assure its supply of food and water. Magellan could seize any Arabs he found in the Portuguese hemisphere—an implicit admission that he might violate the Treaty of Tordesillas, after all—and, if he wished, sell them for slaves. In contrast, if Magellan came across Arabs in the Spanish hemisphere, he was to treat them well and to make treaties with their leaders. Only if they were belligerent could Magellan subject them to punishment, as a warning. But this was not in any sense a slaving expedition. Magellan was to go in search of spices and lands, and nothing else, and when he reached the Spice Islands, his instructions were to “make a treaty of peace or commerce with the king or lord of that land” before he attempted to load the goods onto his ships.

Although the king warned Magellan to be careful in his dealings with Indians (“Beware you do not trust the natives because sometimes, on account of going unarmed, disasters happen”), the orders insisted that Magellan treat them fairly. “You shall not cheat them in any way, and . . . you shall not break [the deal]. . . . You shall not consent in any manner that any wrong or harm be done to them . . . ; rather, you shall punish those who do harm.”

And on a sensitive point, Magellan and Faleiro had to see to it that the crew members had no contact with local women. “You shall never consent to have anyone touch a woman . . . the reason being that in all those parts the people, on account of this thing over and above all, might rebel and do harm.” That order would prove impossible to enforce, as would another clause prohibiting the use of firearms; members of the expedition were forbidden to discharge them in newly found lands lest they terrify the Indians on whose goodwill they would depend. It was another well-intended but impractical edict; if the men had weapons, they would use them.

The orders spelled out what Magellan should do in the event that one of the ships became separated from the fleet: “They should wait a month at the place agreed before and leave a sign which will consist of five rocks put on the ground forming a cross on both sides of the river, and another cross of sticks. You will also leave something written in a receptacle buried in the ground indicating the time and date the ship came by.”

The orders also covered minor, but important matters. Sailors, for instance, had permission to write whatever they wished in their letters home; fortunately for future historians of this voyage, there was to be no censorship. Blasphemy, on the other hand, was forbidden aboard ship (Magellan found it impossible to enforce this directive), as were card and dice players. Since these items were ubiquitous aboard the ships of discovery, it is unlikely that Magellan bothered to discourage games of chance, but he may have succeeded in preventing professional gamblers and cardsharps from enlisting in the crew and fleecing the other crew members during the voyage.

In addition to Magellan and Faleiro, the co-commanders of the expedition, a copy of these orders was sent to Cartagena, in his capacity of inspector general. And it is possible that Cartagena, with his exalted impression of his role, took these orders to mean that the king of Spain now considered him equal in rank to Magellan.

King Manuel made one more attempt to subvert the Armada de Molucca. He sent his agent, Sebastián Álvares, a factor, to Seville, with orders to undo Magellan’s resolve. On July 18, 1519, Álvares secretly reported that the officials at the Casa de Contratación “cannot stomach” Magellan. The artful spy spoke vaguely but provocatively of disputes between the Casa de Contratación and Magellan concerning the sailors’ salaries. And he recounted his own efforts to persuade Magellan to call off the expedition: “I went to the lodgings of Magellan, where I found him arranging baskets and boxes with victuals of preserves and other things”—delicacies to be enjoyed by the expedition’s leaders rather than the crew. Álvares began a carefully rehearsed argument to persuade Magellan to abandon his nefarious scheme. I wished to recall to his memory how many times, as a good Portuguese and his friend, I had spoken to him, and opposed the great error he was committing. . . . I always told him . . . that he should see that this road has as many dangers as a St. Catherine’s Wheel.” According to the oft-repeated legend, Emperor Maxentius, a fierce pagan, captured a young convert to Christianity named Catherine in A.D. 305. It was said that fifty philosophers tried to persuade her that her belief in Christianity was foolish, but Catherine, despite her youth, confounded their arguments and converted them to the faith. Maxentius ordered those unlucky philosophers put to death, and Catherine was sent to prison, where the emperor’s wife visited her and also converted to Christianity. At that, the emperor decided that Catherine herself must die. He ordered a wheel embedded with razors to be constructed; Catherine was bound to its rim, but instead of slicing her to pieces, the wheel shattered, and its splinters and razors injured the onlookers. In despair, the emperor finally ordered Catherine beheaded. If Magellan did not desire to suffer the fate of Catherine, Álvares urged him to “return to his native country and the favor of your Highness, where he would always receive benefits.”

Magellan replied that he was committed to Spain, and nothing could change his mind.

Álvares’s practiced reply would have unnerved a weaker soul than Magellan. “I said to him, that to acquire honor unduly, and when acquired by such infamy, was neither wisdom nor honor . . . for he might be certain that the chief Castilians of this city, when speaking of him, held him to be a vile man, of low blood, since to the dis-service of his true king and lord he accepted such an enterprise.” Furthermore, “He might be sure that he was held to be a traitor in going against the State of your Highness.” Every term of opprobrium that Álvares hurled at Magellan strengthened the mariner’s resolve to carry out his mission. Even Álvares was impressed by Magellan’s conviction. “It seemed to me that his heart was true as to what befitted his honor and conscience.”

Despite his resolve, Magellan suffered pangs of conscience over his decision to abandon his homeland. “He made a great lamentation,” Álvares observed, “but that he did not know of anything by means of which he could reasonably leave a king who had shown him so much favor. I told him . . . that he should weigh his coming to Portugal.”

Leaving Magellan to his torment, Álvares tried to persuade himself and King Manuel that the expedition would never come to pass. He counted on the once brilliant Faleiro’s deteriorating mental state to aid the Portuguese skulduggery. “I spoke to Ruy Faleiro on two occasions,” Álvares reported to his sovereign. “It seems to me that he is like a man deranged in his senses. . . . It seems to me that, if Ferdinand Magellan were removed, Ruy Faleiro would follow whatever Magellan did.”

If the fleet somehow managed to depart, Álvares advised that the five ships were barely seaworthy. “They are very old and patched up, for I saw them when they were beached for repairs. It is eleven months since they were repaired, and they are now afloat, and they are caulking them in the water. I went on board [one of them] a few times, and I assure Your Highness that I should be ill inclined to sail in them to the Canaries.” These islands were only a few days’ sail from the Iberian coast, and if the ships could not be trusted to sail that far, how could they possibly reach the Indies?

Álvares went on to boast that he knew what course the fleet planned to follow. Once the ships crossed the Atlantic, if they crossed it, Brazil would remain “on their right hand” as they sailed to the line of demarcation dividing the Spanish and Portuguese halves of the world. He erroneously informed the king that the fleet would then sail across open water west and northwest to the Spice Islands. “There are no lands laid down in the maps which they carry with them,” Álvares noted with malicious glee. “Please God the Almighty that they make such voyage as did the Côrte Reals”—Portuguese explorers whose fleet had sunk without a trace.

Of all the problems Álvares recounted, the most serious was Ruy Faleiro’s fragile mental state. Since leaving Portugal, and perhaps even before, the brilliant cosmographer had exhibited signs of instability. One acquaintance said that Faleiro “sleeps very little and wanders around almost out of his mind.” Others remarked on his irritability or simply stated that he had lost his mind. The evidence, fragmentary though it is, suggests that Faleiro was suffering from bipolar disorder or some form of extreme depression. Magellan remained silent on the subject of his colleague’s condition, but all around him Spanish officials commented on the danger of taking Faleiro in his unstable condition on a long and trying voyage. What if he went mad, misused his authority as co-admiral, and endangered the entire expedition?

Even King Charles took note of Faleiro’s condition, and on July 26, 1519, issued a royal certificate declaring that Faleiro would not sail with Magellan. Instead, the cosmographer would remain in Seville to prepare for another expedition that would follow in Magellan’s wake. This violation of the ten-year exclusive King Charles had granted Magellan was more likely a face-saving gesture designed to preserve what little dignity Faleiro had left, for he never went to sea.

Magellan seemed relieved to rid himself of the unstable Faleiro; he agreed to the removal as long as the fleet could keep the cosmographer’s precious, state-of-the-art navigational instruments, which is exactly what occurred. Faleiro’s trove consisted of thirty-five compasses, supplemented by an additional fifteen devices that Magellan purchased in Seville; a wooden astrolabe constructed by Faleiro himself; six metal astrolabes of a more common variety; twenty-one wooden quadrants; and eighteen hourglasses, some of which Magellan purchased himself. Then there were the charts, twenty-four in all, most of them top secret, all of them extremely valuable. An unauthorized individual caught with a chart could be punished severely, even with death. They were kept under lock and key, and under armed guard. Of the total number of charts, six had been drafted by Faleiro. Eighteen others were the work of the cosmographer Nuño Garcia, seven of these under the direction of Faleiro, and eleven more under the direction of Magellan. All of these precious items remained with the armada, at Magellan’s disposal. The fleet also carried quantities of prepared blank parchment, as well as dried skins to make still more parchment, if necessary, for additional maps.

So the team of Magellan and Faleiro, the driving force behind the expedition since their days in Lisbon, was sundered. In reality, the architect of Faleiro’s removal was probably Fonseca rather than King Charles. As head of the Casa de Contratación, Fonseca had long been looking for a way to alter the arrangement whereby two Portuguese commanded the expedition, and Faleiro’s illness provided just the excuse he needed. There is a story that Fonseca artfully provoked a quarrel between the two Portuguese comrades by entrusting the royal standard to Faleiro, indicating that he, not Magellan, would be the Captain General of the fleet. Magellan was said to have become so incensed that he requested Faleiro’s removal from the enterprise, and Fonseca was only too glad to comply.

Fonseca replaced the would-be explorer with Andrés de San Martín, a well-connected Spanish cosmographer and astrologer who had long sought a lofty role for himself in the Casa’s affair. San Martín occupied a prestigious position in the roster, and commanded a generous salary—an advance of 30,000 maravedís, plus an additional 7,500 to cover expenses—but he did not hold Faleiro’s exalted rank. Faleiro had dazzled the Spanish with his brilliance, passion, and his aura of mysticism. San Martín, in contrast, was a fully qualified astronomer and astrologer who enjoyed the respect of the Spanish authorities, and nothing more.

The removal of Faleiro opened the way for Cartagena, the inspector general, to take his place. From Fonseca’s point of view, the promotion contained a certain numerical logic because the expedition would now have one Spanish and one Portuguese leader, but Magellan did not view matters that way. He considered himself the sole Captain General, and Cartagena simply the inspector general, not a co-admiral. Archbishop Fonseca clearly had another idea, for he appointed Cartagena as Faleiro’s replacement, specifying that he was “persona conjunta.” The exact meaning of this title was subject to varying interpretations, but at the minimum it meant that Magellan was supposed to consult with Cartagena in all matters. At the maximum, it meant that the two were co-commanders, with Cartagena, as inspector general, having a slight edge in his capacity as Magellan’s official supervisor.

Although he had no experience at sea, Juan de Cartagena found himself leading one of the largest maritime expeditions mounted by Spain. This bizarre situation had much to do with his relationship with the man who appointed him, Archbishop Fonseca. Cartagena was considered Fonseca’s nephew, but as everyone realized, that term was a euphemism: In reality, Cartagena was Fonseca’s illegitimate son. Nor was he the only example of this peculiar brand of nepotism. The fleet’s accountant, Antonio de Coca, was the “nephew” of Fonseca’s brother. Not only that, but Fonseca appointed two close “friends” and “servants” of his as captains of two of the ships; these were Luis de Mendoza, who assumed command of Victoria, and Gaspar de Quesada, of Concepción. Not surprisingly, all three captains appointed by Fonseca—Cartagena, Quesada, and Mendoza—despised and looked down on Magellan from the moment they came on board.

Here, at last, was Fonseca’s revenge on Magellan. No matter what the contract said, Fonseca had managed to stifle Magellan’s authority, and, potentially, his share of the proceeds of the expedition, by appointing his natural son and his close allies to virtually all the important positions in the armada. Collectively, they, and not Magellan, would have the final say over the disposition of the fleet and its finances. They, and not Magellan, would decide the allocation of personnel and resources. Magellan still held the rank of Captain General, it was true, but it was reduced in power; from Fonseca’s point of view, Magellan served at the pleasure of his Castilian captains, rather than the other way around. The arrangement made it impossible for Magellan and his captains to make decisions in the best of circumstances, even if they felt goodwill toward one another. And if they lacked mutual trust and respect, which was far more likely to be the case, it set the stage for endless challenges to Magellan’s authority, in other words, for mutiny.

Not content with the removal of Faleiro, the archbishop turned his malign attention to Juan de Aranda, who had first introduced Magellan to the Castilian court. Fonseca launched an investigation in Juan de Aranda’s business arrangements with Magellan and Faleiro; all three were interrogated separately. Under oath, Magellan described the fees Aranda had received for the services he rendered to the explorers, and the signed agreement to distribute a portion of the proceeds to Aranda. On June 15, 1519, Aranda himself went before the Supreme Council of the Indies, and by all accounts acquitted himself well. He had served the interests of the Spanish crown in his dealings with Magellan and Faleiro, and as for his personal stake in the expedition, it was the custom of the era.

Despite these favorable indications, the Supreme Council censured Aranda for his actions, declaring that he had committed a criminal act by receiving money from Magellan; the judgment was signed by the council’s president, who just happened to be Fonseca. Two weeks later, the Spanish crown took up the council’s charges against Aranda and removed him from any further involvement with the expedition. He was, in short, disgraced. Fonseca could have tarred Magellan and Faleiro with the same brush, but they were not the targets of the inquiry, which concluded that these men were innocent of scandal. With the purge of the unstable Faleiro and now the acquisitive Aranda, Magellan could only have felt a sense of relief mingled with fear of what the all-powerful Fonseca might do next to the Armada de Molucca.

As the date of departure approached, Magellan turned his attention to the complicated and hugely expensive matter of provisioning the ships. During the long months of preparation, Magellan’s five ships were tied up at a dock known as the Puerto de las Muelas, because it was paved with millstones. It was here, at Millstone Dock, that the ships took on all the sailing gear, arms, provisions, and furnishings that they would bring on the voyage. It was the only dock where wine, an essential part of the sailors’ diet, was permitted to be loaded. The dock, and the area around it, throbbed with activity, the waters constantly stirred by small craft coming and going, the streets packed with carts bearing supplies, all of them checked by customs inspectors who made certain that the merchants paid their tariffs—and their payoffs—to the proper authorities.

Magellan approached the task of provisioning with as much attention to detail as he did the outfitting of the ships, and with good reason. The food represented a considerable investment: 1,252,909 maravedís, nearly as much as the cost of the entire fleet, and that figure covered just enough food to see them through the first leg or two of the voyage. It was expected that the sailors would be looking for additional food at almost every port, and in the ocean itself.

Of the food that Magellan took on at Seville, nearly four-fifths consisted of just two items, wine and hardtack. Wine was considered the most important; it was tax free, and an official was required to come aboard and make certain it had not soured or become contaminated. The wine was stored in casks, which were carefully maintained, and in pipes sealed with a cork and with pitch. These were meticulously stowed on board the ships according to a plan designed to maximize the use of the limited space below deck.

Hardtack, the other staple of the sailor’s execrable diet, consisted of coarse wheat flour, including the husk, kneaded with hot water (never cold), and cooked twice. The result, a tough, brittle biscuit known as biscocho, was stored for up to a month before it was sold. Inevitably, the hardtack degraded in the humid conditions at sea, and when it became soft, and rotten, and inedible, it was called mazamorra; the sailors boiled the stuff until it turned into a mush known as calandra, said to be so vile that even starving sailors refused it.

The ships also held flour stored in wooden barrels, to be kneaded with seawater and then grilled as a kind of tortilla, as well as meat, usually pork, bacon, ham, and especially salted beef. And some meat came on the hoof. The fleet carried seven cows and three pigs; they were slaughtered just before or just after departure; otherwise, they would have eaten their way through a considerable amount of valuable food. Their presence turned the ship into a floating barn, with an odor to match. Barrels of cheese, almonds in the shell, mustard, and casks of figs were also loaded on board the ships. As unlikely as it sounds, Magellan’s fleet carried fish—sardines, cod, anchovies, and tuna—all of it dried and salted. In expectation of catching fresh fish along their route, the ships’ holds included a generous amount of fishing line and a plentiful supply of hooks. There was little in the way of fresh vegetables; instead, the sailors consumed chickpeas, beans, rice, garlic, almonds, lentils. All fruit was preserved. Raisins, a particular favorite of the sailors, came in two varieties, “sun raisins,” dried in the open air, and “lye raisins,” boiled in a mild lye solution. Magellan also carried with him jelly and jam preserves, including a cider jam known as “diacitron.” The officers brought with them a delicacy in the form of preserved quince, carne de membrillo, a jam made from the small, hard, applelike fruit. As the voyage wore on, quince jelly would play a crucial role in the lives of the sailors, and Magellan’s as well.

There were casks filled with vinegar, which was used as a disinfectant both for the ships and for contaminated water. On rare occasions, starving sailors would add vinegar to rotting hardtack. Sugar and salt also had a place in the list of provisions. Salt was plentiful, and was used for preserving meat and fish through the voyage, while sugar was scarce. It was administered to sailors who had fallen ill, but not used in food. Honey, far cheaper, served as the universal sweetener.

These provisions made for an unhealthy diet, high in salt, low in protein, and lacking vitamins that sailors needed to protect themselves against the rigors of the sea. Given the inadequacy and volatility of his food supply, it was no surprise that Magellan’s first thought on arriving at ports of call was replenishing his stock, and, along with it, his sailors’ health and morale.

Disputes over the crew’s composition and pay bedeviled Magellan until the moment of the fleet’s departure from Seville. Three of his Spanish pilots demanded to be paid as much as the more experienced Portuguese pilots Magellan had retained, but King Charles refused, reminding them that they had already been richly rewarded with a full year’s pay in advance, free lodgings in Seville, and the prospect of knighthood.

The composition of the crew engendered greater controversy. Magellan was suspected of packing the roster with his countrymen, but the reality was that experienced Spanish seamen willing to enlist on the voyage were scarce, and so he was forced to include many foreigners. The Casa de Contratación decreed that Magellan must limit his entire crew to 235 men, including cabin boys. If he did not obey this constraint, the Casa sternly warned, the resulting “scandal or damage” would be blamed on him, “as it would any person who chooses to disobey a royal command.” When the armada’s roster, bloated with well-connected Spaniards, exceeded this number, the Casa stopped short of halting preparations, but it placed Magellan on warning. And when he hired no less than seventeen apprentice sailors, or grumetes, he was forced to let them go. He was reminded that key positions such as bookkeepers and bursars must be filled by Spaniards. Magellan protested that he had retained the services of only two Portuguese bursars, and he pleaded in writing with the Casa to allow the men he had enlisted to board the ships, regardless of nationality. If he could not have the crew he wanted, he insisted that he would abandon the expedition.

The Casa would not let matters rest there. On the day before the fleet’s departure from Seville, August 9, 1519, Magellan was summoned from his frantic last-minute preparations to testify that he had made every effort to hire Spanish officers and crew members rather than foreigners. He had, in fact, gone to great lengths to comply, and he swelled with pride as he delivered his sworn statement. “I proclaimed [through a town crier] in this city [Seville], in squares and markets and busy places and along the river that anyone—sailors, cabin boys, caulkers, carpenters, and other officers—who wished to join the Armada should contact me, the captain, or talk to the masters of the ship, and I also mentioned the salaries stipulated by the king. Sailors will receive 1,200 maravedís, cabin boys 800 maravedís, and pages 500 maravedís every month, and carpenters and caulkers five ducats every month. None of the villagers born here wanted to join the Armada.” And that was the truth. Qualified sailors were rare in Seville, and qualified sailors willing to risk their lives on a voyage to the Spice Islands rarer still.

Desperate to recruit qualified crew members for the expedition, Magellan cast his net even further. He sent his master-at-arms to Málaga with a letter from the Casa de Contratación indicating the salaries and benefits those joining the Armada de Molucca would receive. Other officers fanned out to popular seaports such as Cádiz in search of willing hands, but those willing to risk their lives on a voyage into the unknown proved scarce. “I couldn’t find enough people,” Magellan explained, “so I accepted all the foreigners we needed, foreigners such as Greeks, and people from Venice, Genoa, Sicily, and France.” Although he did not say so, few Spanish seamen wanted to sail under a Portuguese captain.

As matters stood at the time of departure, Magellan had official permission to hire only a dozen Portuguese; in reality, he was taking nearly forty with him. At the last minute, he sacrificed three relatives whom he had quietly enlisted, one of whom was a pilot approved by the Casa, but he kept berths for at least two others: Álvaro de Mesquita, a relative on his mother’s side, and Cristóvão Rebêlo, his illegitimate son.

Magellan’s last-minute compromises on the composition of the crew placated the Casa, and the Captain General received final permission to proceed with his expedition. To guarantee this voyage, he had sacrificed his allegiance to his homeland, his partnership with Ruy Faleiro, and a considerable amount of his authority as Captain General, but he had kept his essential mission intact. After twelve months of painstaking preparation, the Armada de Molucca was at last ready to conquer the ocean.

Just before departure, the officers and crew of the five ships comprising the fleet attended a mass at Santa María de la Victoria, located in Triana, the sailors’ district.

During the ceremony, King Charles’s representative, Sancho Martínez de Leiva, presented Magellan with the royal flag as the Captain General knelt before a representation of the Virgin. This marked the first occasion that Charles had bestowed the royal colors on a non-Castilian. Magellan could only have felt that he was now invested with the king’s full trust.

Still kneeling, his head bent, Magellan swore that he was the king’s faithful servant, that he would fulfill all his obligations to guarantee the success of the expedition, and when he was finished, the captains repeated the oath and swore to obey Magellan and to follow him on his route, wherever it might lead.

Among those in attendance at Santa María de la Victoria that day was a Venetian scholar named Antonio Pigafetta who had spent long years in the service of Andrea Chiericati, an emissary of Pope Leo X. When the pope appointed Chiericati ambassador to King Charles, Pigafetta, who was about thirty years old at the time, followed the diplomat to Spain. By his own description, Pigafetta was a man of learning (he boasted of having “read many books”) and religious conviction, but he also had a thirst for adventure, or, as he put it, “a craving for experience and glory.”

Learning of Magellan’s expedition to the Spice Islands, he felt destiny calling, and excused himself from the diplomatic circles to seek out the renowned navigator, arriving in Seville in May 1519, in the midst of feverish preparations for the expedition. During the next several months, he helped to gather navigational instruments and ingratiated himself into Magellan’s trust. Pigafetta quickly came to idolize the Captain General, despite their differing nationalities, and was awestricken by the ambitiousness and danger of the mission. Nevertheless, Pigafetta decided he had to go along. Although he lacked experience at sea, he did have funds and impeccable papal credentials to recommend him. Accepting a salary of just 1,000 maravedís, he joined the roster as a sobrasaliente, a supernumerary, receiving four months of his modest pay in advance.

Magellan, who left nothing to accident, had an assignment for Pigafetta; the young Italian diplomat was to keep a record of the voyage, not the dry, factual pilot’s log, but a more personal, anecdotal, and free-flowing account in the tradition of other popular travel works of the day; these included books by Magellan’s brother-in-law, Duarte Barbosa; Ludovico di Varthema, another Italian visitor to the Indies; and Marco Polo, the most celebrated Italian traveler of them all. Making no secret of his ambition to take his place in letters beside them, Pigafetta readily accepted the assignment. His loyalties belonged to Magellan alone, not to Cartagena or to any of the other officers. For Pigafetta, the Armada de Molucca was the tangible result of Magellan’s daring, and if the expedition succeeded, it would be the result of Magellan’s skill and God’s will—of that Pigafetta was quite certain.

From the moment the fleet left Seville, Pigafetta kept a diary of events that gradually evolved from a routine account of life at sea to a shockingly graphic and candid diary that serves as the best record of the voyage. He took his role as the expedition’s official chronicler seriously, and his account is bursting with botanical, linguistic, and anthropological detail. It is also a humane and compassionate record written in a distinctive voice, naïve yet cultivated, pious yet bawdy. Of the handful of genuine chronicles of foreign lands available at the time, only Pigafetta’s preserved moments of self-deprecation and humor; only his betrayed the realistic fears, joys, and ambivalence felt by the crew. His narrative anticipates a modern sensibility, in which self-doubt and revelation play roles. If Magellan was the expedition’s hero, its Don Quixote, a knight wandering the world in a foolish, vain, yet magnificent quest, Pigafetta can be considered its antihero, its Sancho Panza, steadfastly loyal to his master while casting a skeptical, mordant eye on the proceedings. His hunger for experience makes it possible to experience Magellan’s voyage as the sailors themselves experienced it, and to watch this extraordinary navigator straining against the limits of knowledge, his men’s loyalty, and his own stubborn nature.

Pigafetta was not the only diarist on the voyage. Francisco Albo, Trinidad’s pilot, kept a logbook, and some of the surviving sailors gave extensive interviews and depositions on their return to Spain, or wrote their own accounts from memory. The plethora of firsthand impressions of the voyage, combined with the fantastically detailed Spanish records, make it possible to re-create and understand it from a variety of perspectives, ranging from the deeply personal and casually anecdotal to the official and legalistic; royalty and ordinary seamen alike have their voices in this epic of discovery.

An important limitation governed all the accounts, varied as they are. They provide only the European perspective on a voyage that affected nations and cultures around the world, often profoundly. There is no testimony from the individuals whom Magellan’s fleet would visit. Occasionally, we can glean disturbing hints of the reactions of those whom the armada would visit, and what they thought of the intruders in their black ships, the men who had come from a great distance, men bearing gifts but also guns.

Magellan’s departure deeply affected the fortunes of those he left behind. His wife, Beatriz, pregnant with their second child, lived quietly in the city under the protection of her father. She received a monthly stipend, as specified in Magellan’s contract, but she was, in fact, a hostage to the Spanish authorities. If word should reach Seville that Magellan had done anything untoward during the expedition, or exhibited disloyalty to King Charles, she would be the first person the king’s agents would seek out.

Although it seemed Magellan had placed his pregnant wife and young child at risk in the hostile environment of Seville, he did take elaborate precautions to ensure their future—and his own posthumous glory—in his will, dated August 24, 1519. Magellan knew from experience the risks of embarking on his voyage of discovery. He knew that each day of the voyage he would be at the mercy of forces he could scarcely contemplate, forces that only his fervent belief in God and unswerving loyalty to King Charles would be able to help him surmount. Although he coveted the renown and rewards of a successful voyage, he realized he might die far from home, in a part of the world that was still a blank on European maps. This knowledge imparted to his will a special weight and urgency.

In the will, Magellan left thousands of maravedís to various churches and religious orders, all of them in Seville, which he designated as his permanent home in this life and the next: “I desire that if I die in this city of Seville my body may be buried in the monastery of Santa María de la Victoria in Triana—ward and precinct of the city of Seville—in the grave set apart for me; and if I die on this said voyage, I desire that my body may be buried in a church dedicated to Our Lady, in the nearest spot at which death seize me and I die.” He proposed very specific and pious plans for his funeral rites: “And I desire that on the said day of my burial thirty masses may be said over my body—two cantadas and twenty-eight rezadas, and that they shall offer for me the offering of the bread and wine and candles that my executors desire; And I desire that in the said monastery of Santa María de la Victoria a thirty-day mass may be said for my soul, and that the accustomed alms may be given therefor; and I desire that on the said day of my burial three poor men may be clothed—such as I have indicated to my executors—and that to each may be given a cloak of gray stuff, a shirt, and a pair of shoes, that they may pray to God for my soul; and I also desire that upon the said day of my burial food may be given to the said three paupers, and to twelve others, that they may pray for my soul.”

Magellan made certain that all acknowledged family members and retainers would be well taken care of. He specified that Beatriz’s entire dowry of 600,000 maravedís be returned to her; that his illegitimate son, Cristóvão Rebêlo, whom he called “my page,” receive a legacy of 30,000 maravedís; and that his slave, Enrique, be freed. Since Enrique, like Cristóvão, would accompany Magellan on the voyage to the Spice Islands, the terms of his freedom were of particular interest: “I declare and ordain as free and quit of every obligation of captivity, subjection, and slavery, my captured slave Enrique, mulatto, native of the city of Malacca, of the age of twenty-six years more or less, that from the day of my death thenceforward forever the said Enrique may be free and manumitted, and quit, exempt, and relieved of every obligation of slavery and subjection, and that he may act as he desires and thinks fit.”

All that, plus 10,000 maravedís.

Magellan envisioned leaving behind a great empire. He left to Rodrigo, “my legitimate son,” along with any other legitimate male heirs that he might have with Beatriz Barbosa, all the rights and titles King Charles had granted to him for the voyage to the Spice Islands; in other words, these children might grow up to find themselves the rulers of distant lands, administered by Spain, and very wealthy rulers at that. All that Magellan asked was that they give a portion of their income to their mother, making her a wealthy widow. And even if she remarried after Magellan’s death, “I desire that there be given and paid to her the sum of two thousand Spanish doubloons.”

The will covered every eventuality that might befall a great explorer such as Magellan—except what would actually occur once he set forth from Seville.

The Portuguese reacted bitterly to the imminent departure of the Armada de Molucca. King Manuel ordered the harassment of Magellan’s relatives who remained in their homeland. To make his dishonor public, vandals were sent to the family estate in Sabrosa; they tore the Magellan escutcheon from the gates and smashed it to the ground. Even young relatives of Magellan found themselves the object of derision and were stoned. Fearing for their lives, they fled the country. Francisco de Silva Téllez, who claimed to be Magellan’s nephew, eventually sought refuge in the Portuguese colony of Brazil, where he dictated instructions that suggest the depth of shame stirred by Magellan’s betrayal: “I order all my relatives and heirs to put no other stone nor shield of arms in my house . . . in Sabrosa because I want them forever effaced, in the same condition that our lord and King prescribed, as punishment of Ferdinand Magellan’s crime of moving to Castile.” Should others take up Magellan’s mantle, his nephew warned that he would refuse to acknowledge them “should I learn that they had entertained feelings and designs so base and ruinous to their families as befell my father and me, who felt compelled to leave our house out of shame and fear that our neighbors would attack us, as they justly could not suffer him who went against Portugal, his motherland, to serve the Castilians, our natural enemies.”

Abandoned, the Sabrosa estate fell into disrepair, and another house rose on the site. The stone that once held the Magellan escutcheon met with a special fate: It was covered with excrement.