Niccolò de' Conti
Niccolò de' Conti | |
|---|---|
| Born | c. 1395 |
| Died | 1469 (aged c. 74) |
| Occupation(s) | Merchant, explorer, writer |
| Known for | Travels in India, Southeast Asia |
| Children | 4 |
Niccolò de' Conti (c. 1395 – 1469)[1] was an Italian merchant, explorer, and writer. Born in Chioggia, he traveled to India and Southeast Asia, and possibly to Southern China, during the early 15th century. He was one of the sources used to create the 1450 Fra Mauro map, which indicated that there was a sea route from Europe around Africa to India.[2]
De' Conti departed from Venice around 1419 and established himself in Damascus, Syria, where he studied Arabic. Over a period of 25 years, his familiarity with the languages and cultures of the Islamic world enabled him to travel to many places on ships owned by Islamic merchants.
De' Conti's travels followed the period of Timurid relations with Europe.[3] They also occurred around the same time and in the same places as the Chinese expeditions of Admiral Zheng He. His accounts are contemporary, and fairly consistent with those of the Chinese writers who were on Zheng He's ships, such as Ma Huan (writing in 1433) and Fei Xin (writing in about 1436).
Travels
After the return of Marco Polo in 1295, there is no record of Italian traders returning from China until the return of de' Conti by sea in 1439.[4] The only exception are the travel accounts by Franciscan friar Odoricus Mattiuzzi (1286-1331) from Friuli, who in 1310 visited Armenia, Mesopotamia, Persia, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Sumatra, Java, Cambodia, Champa and China.[5]
De' Conti first crossed the desert to reach Baghdad and from there sailed down the Tigris to Basra. He then sailed through the Persian Gulf and went to Iran where he learnt Persian.
He then crossed the
Around 1421, de' Conti crossed to "Pedir" in northern
).De' Conti described South-East Asia as "exceeding all other regions in wealth, culture and magnificence, and abreast of Italy in civilization".[2]
In the 1430s he sailed back to India (
Throughout his travels, he was accompanied by his family. However his wife, whom he had met in India, and two of his four children died in Egypt during an epidemic. He continued to Italy with his remaining children. de' Conti returned to Venice in 1444, where he remained as a respected merchant.
Account of voyages
Poggio Bracciolini's record of de' Conti's account, made in 1444, constitutes one of the best accounts of the East by a 15th-century traveler. It was included in the Book IV of his "De varietate fortunae" ("On the Vicissitudes of Fortune").[9]
Accounts of Niccolò de' Conti's travels, which first circulated in
de' Conti also influenced 15th century cartography, as can be seen on the
They build some ships much larger than ours, capable of containing 2,000 butts in size, with five sails and as many masts. The lower part is constructed with of three planks, in order to withstand the force of the tempest to which they are much exposed. But some ships are built in compartments, that should one part is shattered, the other portion remaining intact to accomplish the voyage.[13]
Some translations have 2000 butts (Hakluyt Society), which is around 1,000 tons, while other translations of de' Conti have 2,000 tons (Needham). The translation above is from the Hakluyt Society's translation. A butt was unit of volume that was half a ton.[14]
The man "from
Also in the time of
Eugenius one of them [of Cathay] came to Eugenius, who affirmed their great kindness towards Christians, and I had a long conversation with him on many subjects, about the magnitude of their rivers in length and breath, and on the multitude of cities on the banks of rivers. He said that on one river there were near 200 cities with marble bridges great in length and breadth, and everywhere adorned with columns. This country is worth seeking by the Latins, not only because great wealth may be obtained from it, gold and silver, all sorts of gems, and spices, which never reach us; but also on account of its learned men, philosophers, and expert astrologers, and by what skill and art so powerful and magnificent a province is governed, as well as how their wars are conducted.
De' Conti's book was used by several explorers and travel writers, such as Ludovico di Varthema (1510), and Antonio Pigafetta, who travelled around the world with Magellan's expedition. Alfred Russel Wallace cited de' Conti's account of the peoples of Java and Sumatra in his 1869 book The Malay Archipelago.[18]
Editions
The first printed edition of de' Conti's account was made in 1492 in the original Latin by Cristoforo da Bollate and dedicated to Pietro Cara, who was going on a journey to India. Various translations followed, into Portuguese (1502) and Spanish (1503). The first Italian-language edition appears to have been translated from the Portuguese edition, and was made a part of the collection of travellers' accounts published in 1550 by Giovanni Battista Ramusio. The first English edition was translated from the Spanish, and printed in 1579 by John Frampton, using a combination of Marco Polo's and de Conti's narrations.
See also
References
Citations
- ^ Surdich (1983)
- ^ Beazley, Charles Raymond (1911). . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 7 (11th ed.). pp. 28–29.
- ^ The Cambridge history of Iran William Bayne Fisher, Peter Jackson, Laurence Lockhart p.375ff
- . Page 103 and note 53, noting M. Longhena, Viaggi in Persia, India e Giava di Niccolò de' Conti (Milan, 1929)
- ^ Hakluyt’s Collection of the early voyages, travels, and discoveries of the English nation. A new edition, with additions. Dl II, (London: R.H. Evans e.a., 1810) 142-174.
- ^ Niccolo De Conti refers Telugu as the Italian of the East
- ^ "Conti, Nicolo de - Banglapedia".
- ^ Pedro Tafur, Andanças e viajes.
- ^ It was first translated into English in Jones, J. W. (1857). The Travels of Nicolò Conte [sic] in the East in the Early Part of the Fifteenth Century. Hakluyt Society XXII. London.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) - ISBN 0-415-92026-4.
- ISBN 9780208017246.
- ^ Manguin, P.Y. (1993). The vanishing jong: Insular Southeast Asian fleets in war and trade (15th-17th centuries). Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
- ^ R. H. Major, ed. (1857), "The travels of Niccolo Conti", India in the Fifteenth Century, Hakluyt Society, p. 27 versus Needham, Science and Civilisation in China, p. 452
- ^ "Casks - barrel, butt, punchon, pipe, barrique,hogshead".
- ^ Davidson, p. 58
- ^ Markam, p.7 Full text of the letter
- ^ Davidson, p.52 Another translation
- ^ Wallace, Alfred Russel (1869). The Malay Archipelago: The land of the orang-utan, and the bird of paradise. A narrative of travel, with sketches of man and nature (1 ed.). Macmillan. p. 444.
Sources
- Campbell, Gordon (2003). "Conti, Niccolò de'". The Oxford Dictionary of the Renaissance. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-860175-3.
- Bracciolini, Poggio: De varietate fortunae, book iv [c. 1445] (ed. by Abbé Oliva, Paris 1723).
- Niccolò de' Conti, Chandeigne (ed.), Le voyage aux Indes (in French), 2004, ISBN 2-906462-86-1
- Major, R. H. (ed.). India in the fifteenth century: Being a collection of narratives of voyages to India in the century preceding the Portuguese discovery of the Cape of Good Hope, (Works issued by the Hakluyt Society) (English trans. by J. Winter Jones, Hakluyt Society, London 1857). Republished by Asian Educational Services (30 June 1992). ISBN 81-206-0768-6.
- Parry, J. H. The European Reconnaissance: Selected Documents. London, Macmillan, 1968
- Francesco Surdich, "Conti, Niccolò de'" in Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani vol. 28 (1983)
- Le Goff, Jacques. 'The Medieval West and the Indian Ocean: An Oneiric Horizon' in Time, Work, and Culture in the Middle Ages, University of Chicago Press, 1980.
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| People | |
| Other | |
