Abstract
Apparently, the Treaty of Tordesillas dismissed the possibility of Spanish shipping via Africa and the Cape of Good Hope. The preferred route to Asia was via Cape Horn or Acapulco. In this article we will show that access to Southern Africa was not entirely closed to the Spanish between the 16th and 18th centuries. We will analyse shipping in this period and, above all, we will discuss the enlightened reforms of the 18th century that changed the connecting routes between Spain and the Philippines, making them pass through Cape Town, as well as the hostility shown to the Hispanic presence in those waters by great powers like the Netherlands. Based on these connections, we will discuss the exchange of plants between Spain and Southern Africa.
For many authors, contact between Spain and the Philippines took place until the end of the 18th century either via the Magellan Strait or via Acapulco, due to the Treaty of Tordesillas, which ceded to the Portuguese control of the African Atlantic and the Indian Ocean. In this article we suggest the existence of another route, an African one, via the Cape of Good Hope. When Bartolome Diaz rounded the southern tip of Africa in 1488 he was not only opening the route to India, but also the possible utilization of that land as a port of call. However, the Portuguese directed their energy towards the Angolan and Mozambican coasts rather than towards present-day South Africa.
First contacts and obstacles to navigation
Despite the treaties of Alcáçovas-Toledo (1479) and Tordesillas (1494), a Spanish presence is confirmed in most of sub-Saharan Africa during the Early Modern Period, especially in relation to its links to America. 1 Although we do not dismiss the previous arrival of any Spanish ship or person enrolled in any of the Portuguese expeditions to Southern Africa, the first news from that coast can be traced back to El Cano’s first round the world trip, between 1519 and 1522. Although the exhausted survivors did not reach the African continent (except for Santiago Island, in Cape Verde), and the references to this are few, Antonio Pigafetta’s story relates that they remained in front of the Cape of Good Hope, described as the biggest and most dangerous in the world, ‘with the sails lowered due to western and mistral wind and terrifying storms’. 2 We also know how the members of the expedition had their doubts about whether to take refuge at Portuguese Mozambique, due to hunger, thirst, the cold weather and the poor condition of the vessel. However, they decided to press on towards Spain. On 6 May 1522 they rounded the Cape of Good Hope, and after two months and numerous losses they reached Cape Verde, entering Sanlucar on 6 September. 3 A few years later, in 1528, a very brief description of Southern Africa appeared in the General Archive of the Indies, from the Cape of Good Hope to the East, with its islands, capes and ports. 4
Respect for these treaties did not allow the Spanish Crown to legally carry out incursions or settlements in this region, and still less in Southern Africa, which was far away and without any apparent economic value. Nor was there any imperative to trade for slaves there. However, even before the Magellan-El Cano trip, and also after it, the Spanish Crown had detailed information about these lands and their cartographic representation, as shown for example in maps produced for the Casa de Contratación by Juan de la Cosa, Juan Vespucio, Pedro Reinel, Nuño Garcia de Toreno, Diego Ribero or Alonso de Santa Cruz. 5 Bartolome Colon’s maps date from almost the same period, on which toponyms such as ‘Mozambich’, ‘Sofalla’ and ‘Cabo de Bona Esperanza’ appear. 6 In addition, we must pay special attention to the exceptional planisphere map made by the Sevillian Sancho Gutierrez in 1551. In light of this information from Portuguese and Italian sailors and cartographers, we cannot say that the Spanish Crown was unaware of the main features along the Southern African coast.
During the first decades of the 16th century the mapping of coastal Africa improved, including the eastern coast, where the location and shape of Madagascar became more precise, as also happened with other islands in the Indian Ocean. At the end of the century Ambrosio de Ondariz tried to give impetus to the Royal Registers (padrones) as a collection of maps, charts and nautical instruments for the benefit of sailors aboard Spanish ships. One of the suggested Registers, a map of the Atlantic Ocean, included descriptions of Cape Verde, Brazil and African coasts up to the Cape of Good Hope. 7
The increasing knowledge about Southern Africa was not only reflected by cartography, but also by geographical descriptions, banishing some old myths. In 1519 the Suma de Geographia of Spanish humanist and traveller Martín Fernandez de Enciso debunked beliefs about monstrous men in Southern Africa, based on the missionary experience and evidence given by Arab merchants. 8 Luis del Marmol Carvajal, in his Descripción General de Africa, also referred to Southern Africa, highlighting the deserts of the coast between Angola and the Cape of Good Hope, which is a good part of the Namibian coast. Beyond the Cape of Good Hope, the coast of Zangue bay opened up, towards the eastern part. There the first thing that one could see was Cape Agulhas, then the Fumos river and the province of Alagoa, the Espiritu Santo river, Cabo de las Corrientes, Tierra Alta and Cabo de San Sebastian, in the province of Bena Motaxa (Monomotapa). 9
After the Magellan expedition, Spanish interest in the Moluccas increased against Portuguese pressure until 1529, when the Treaty of Zaragoza was signed and the islands were ceded to Portugal. Garcia Joffre de Loaisa’s expedition between 1525 and 1536 had been a failure. The occupation of the Philippines from 1565 by Miguel Lopez de Legazpi brought the need to connect these remote outposts to the rest of the empire. In order to achieve this, the shortest connecting route to America was chosen, between Acapulco and Manila. This was opened by Andres de Urdaneta in 1565 and avoided encroaching on Portuguese interests. Portuguese influence in Africa, the existing treaties and the discovery of new routes to connect Spanish Asia to Mexico retarded Spain’s use of Cape Town during the 16th century, although they did not formally renounce it.
Not everyone had the same opinion about connecting the Philippines to the rest of the Empire. Some were interested in the proposed route through the Pacific Ocean, but others, such as the Governor of the Philippines, Francisco de Sande, in May 1572, supported the convenience of sailing via the Cape of Good Hope for Spanish interests in Borneo, Jolo and Mindanao. 10
Therefore, before 1580 the Southern African coast was not unknown to the Spanish, although the consequences of the Treaties had limited their navigation and encouraged the development of other routes to Asia. The Pacific Ocean became a ‘Spanish lake’ 11 against a Portuguese Indian Ocean.
The Iberian Union as a trigger to reclaim the route
The Union of the Iberian crowns in 1580 put the entire Portuguese Empire in the hands of the Spanish monarchy. Thereafter, an interest in defending Atlantic and Southern Africa became a priority. 12 The Iberians fought to preserve their exclusive access and control against English, French and, above all, Dutch intervention. Safeguarding the route to the East via the Cape of Good Hope was one more battlefield in a global war focused on European disputes. The Dutch, having broken away from Spanish rule, gradually competed for naval supremacy against the Spanish Crown, intensified their efforts in the Spice Islands, and, by extension, threatened the strategic position of Southern Africa. This situation also led the Spanish, with more information about the Southern African coast, to use this alternative route to and from their colonies in Asia.
Naval competition during the Twelve Years’ Truce (1609–21) became a ‘cold war’; a preparation for further conflict. The foundation of the Dutch East India Company in 1602 was a cause for concern. During this period there was a very real prospect that the Dutch would establish their own trading posts in Africa. We might draw attention to the information that Don Iñigo de Cárdenas, Spanish ambassador in France, conveyed in 1609 about Dutch (gelandeses) intentions to fortify the Cape of Good Hope by order of the king of France. This news anticipated by several decades what eventually happened: the foundation of the Cape of Good Hope by Jan van Riebeeck, in 1652. 13 There was also a proposal (at the end of the 16th century or early 17th century) made to the Spanish court about the convenience of building a fortress in Bahia Hermosa, as a haven for ships on the India route sailing near the Cape of Good Hope. For this purpose, it was necessary to transfer 2,000 married couples – an estimated 10,000 people in all – from the Azores and Canary Islands. 14
During the first quarter of the 17th century, new intelligence about sources of bullion prompted renewed interest in the East African kingdom of Monomotapa, where there was already a Portuguese presence. 15 The gathering of information was one product of this. We know that in the early 1620s, during Phillip III’s reign, an expedition with at least two vessels was organised with the intention of discovering the land between Cabo Negro and the Cape of Good Hope. 16 At around the same time (1616) the king was also alive to the value of cultivating connections with San Lorenzo Island (Madagascar) via the Portuguese viceroy, Don Jeronimo de Azevedo. 17
Under the changed circumstances of the Iberian Union, then, expeditions to the Philippines were increasingly sent via the Cape of Good Hope. Access to Portuguese knowledge and expertise played a part in this: between 1559 and 1600 at least six per cent of the pilots examined by the Casa de Contratación were Portuguese. 18 The 1610s were particularly important in reactivating the route to Asia through Cape Town. For example, in 1613 six caravels with 400 soldiers and the field marshal Ruy Gonzalez de Sequeira were dispatched to Juan de Silva, governor of the Philippines. 19 In 1619 another relief fleet, commanded by the field marshal Lorenzo de Zuazola, was sent there via the Cape of Good Hope. 20 However, there are indications that the route was not easy, because of enemy action or poor weather. The latter, already well-attested of course in the Portuguese Carriera da India, beset the Philippines fleet of 1614. Three of the six caravels under the command of admiral Fernando Muñoz de Arambures were damaged by storms, though they reached Angola and Brazil for repairs and continued their journey. 21
The potential significance of the Cape route for trade was raised in 1620 by Pedro de Leuzana, accountant (contador de cuentas) in the Philippines. In a letter to Fernando Carrillo, president of the Council of the Indies, Leuzana suggested opening trade routes via the Cape of Good Hope and closing those from New Spain, so that the silver there was not exhausted. 22 This proposal is interesting because it arose at the very moment when silver exports to Seville were in decline, and the idea of cutting losses may have been current. There was also the underlying idea of being able to escape from the Novohispano merchants’ protection in favour of direct trading with Seville. In this context, we may note an account from 1790 of a voyage made in 1612 around the Cape to the Indian Ocean and on to Diego Rodriguez Island. Taking the route behind San Lorenzo Island it was possible to rest on Comaro or San Juan Island. In addition, Santa Maria Island could be used as a port of call, which was located east of San Lorenzo. 23
On the eve of Portugal’s renewed independence, in 1640, the Spanish Crown was acutely aware of the extremely serious situation in the Indian Ocean where the Portuguese were losing ground to their enemies and increasingly weak. As the Portuguese Friar Agustín Dazevedo wrote: ‘The greatest and main dominion that Your Majesty has in the Portuguese India is the sea.’ 24 The loss of Elmina first, and then Luanda, Benguela, Sao Tome, most of Brazil and outposts across the Estado da India did not augur well for Iberian interests. Within this overall strategic context, the role of Southern Africa and the Cape waxed and then waned. After the end of the Twelve Years’ Truce in 1621, the significance of the Cape route diminished, partly because of Dutch pressure, but also due to a shift of commercial interests and priorities within the Iberian sphere. The Portuguese families who had controlled the route to India were gradually distancing themselves from it. The Portuguese were increasingly interfering in Castilian finances to support Olivares’ militaristic policy and obtain the security provided by the possibility of trade with America. 25 Therefore, in the 1630s, there was a crisis in Iberian navigation to India with significant consequences.
Distancing from a strategic interest
After 1640 Spanish interest in Southern Africa and the Cape changed in response to the dissolution of the Union with Portugal and the growing influence of the Dutch. From their initial settlement at Cape Town in 1652, the Dutch were vigilant in preserving their privileged position of resupply en route to the East. Nonetheless, knowledge of West Africa and the approaches to the Cape still circulated in Spain at this time. In the 1650s the notes of Juan Domingo de Echevarri were found, which contain positions in degrees and minutes of locations from the coast of Spain, Africa, the Cape Verde islands, the West Indies, Virginia and India. There are details of passages from Cape Verde to Cape Agulhas, including Cabo Negro, Bajas de Antonio Casado, Cabo Rostro de San Pedro o de Piedra, Bahía de Coceican, Cabo das Vueltas, the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Agulhas. 26 The Spanish were also interested in the African dimensions of the Anglo-Dutch conflict. Sometimes news arrived about what was happening along the coast. In 1611, for instance, the Spanish ambassador in The Hague related how Holland had received news of the arrival of five English ships to Cape Verde and how their admiral had threatened the Dutch, claiming that the English had monopoly of the coast down to the Cape of Good Hope. 27 At this point Spain did not expect anything in the region: it merely observed the situation.
By the 1670s, the return to political ‘normality’ in Europe and the supply of slaves to the Americas vested greater advantages in maintaining contacts with Cape Town and the islands in the Indian Ocean, although these advantages materialised in an indirect way. Reciprocal trade treaties between the Spanish and Dutch pushed traffic towards certain ports of call, the most visited being Cadiz and the Canarian ports. 28 Moreover, from its inception the Cape Town colony developed a hinterland that was able to meet the demand for provisions for Dutch East Indiamen. 29 Relatively quickly the Dutch considered transplanting grapevines from the Canary Islands or Alicante to Southern Africa where the climate was conducive to viticulture and where shipping provided a ready market. 30 Cape Town also became renowned for grain production and stockbreeding. 31 After Spain recognised Portugal’s independence in 1668, the Portuguese king Alfonso VI acknowledged the likelihood of Spanish ships and merchants frequenting the Estado da India. To his surprise this was not covered by the Treaty of Lisbon, and for this reason on 10 April he decided to do the same with other friendly nations in the negotiation, communication and trade with the Castilians. 32
At the beginning of the 18th century, there was a specific interest in the African coast, obstructed by the climate of war. Some individual charts of the Guinean coast were collected, such as that of 1701, from Cape Verde to the Cape of Good Hope: this contains as much detailed knowledge as any chart to be found anywhere in Europe at that moment. 33 At the same time, with the establishment of the new French dynasty and the court that came with it, better knowledge began to circulate about French trading posts in Africa and the use of resources extracted from the continent. However, the general situation did not change in the first half of the century: much of the slave trade remained in French and English hands; trade with the Philippines was maintained along traditional lines, without a monopolistic company; and there remained a lack of Spanish trading posts or colonial assets in sub-Saharan Africa.
The definitive opening of the Southern African route
From the mid-18th century, the Spanish Crown increased its interests in Africa, not only because of the need to supply its American colonies with slaves, but also as a staging post to the Philippines. The traditional connection between Manila and Acapulco had gone into decline, and the plan was to encourage the import of Asian products to the metropolis by a more direct route, which was more beneficial to the Philippines and the mainland territories, exactly like other European states were doing. This route skirted the Western African littoral, going through the Cape of Good Hope before heading out into the Indian Ocean and towards the Philippines. It also passed near Reunion, bordering Southern Africa, going up to Saint Helena Island before heading to the mainland. The Crown authorised several companies to undertake African trade. Examples include the Company of the Five Greater Guilds of Madrid in 1755, and the company Ustariz from Cadiz and San Ginés y Compañía in 1779. 34 That led by Bernardo van Dahl in the 1760s operated from Cadiz to the Philippines and was licensed to buy in African ports if it suited the company. This company could not benefit from America, though according to the seventh article of its constitution it could buy ‘negroes’ in cash or goods for sale in Spain or the Philippines, so long as they did not take too much advantage of it. Article eight concluded by saying that the cargoes brought to Cadiz, including African goods, could be taken to America, 35 which was logical since that was the natural market for slaves.
In 1758, a Spanish naturalised Englishman, Nicolas Norton Nicols, presented the King with a project to exploit spices in the Philippines by establishing direct trade with Spain through the Cape of Good Hope, which connected Cadiz to Mindanao. Dauphin Port, in Madagascar, was envisaged as a port of call, along with the possibility of using Ascension Island on the return leg. 36 In 1779, the enlightened Juan Bautista Muñoz also proposed using the Cape of Good Hope on the route to Asia, mentioning the possibility of exploiting the recent acquisitions of Annobon Island and Fernando Po as ports of call, although he suggested that Cape Horn should be preferred. 37 Besides the Isle de France, Cape Town was another port of call. One such visit was made by the frigate Juno in 1775: having encountered problems in Table Bay, the vessel arrived at Cape Town on 15 April and remained there until 2 May, providing an opportunity for five locally-owned slaves to get aboard as stowaways. When they arrived in Cadiz, they were surrendered to the Dutch consul in the city for return to Cape Town. 38 This recapture was exceptional; successful escapes aboard Spanish vessels seem to have been more common. 39 In a copy of a document from 27 September 1790 we have information about a trip from Spain to Malacca and the Philippines via the Cape of Good Hope, with the purpose of leaving by November to reach Cape Town in January or February, continuing the voyage behind San Lorenzo Island. 40 . In 1796, the viceroy of Peru ordered Don Ignacio Maria de Alava’s squadron, which was sailing to Asia, to return to Spain through the Cape of Good Hope. 41
In a booklet called Luces prácticas y especulativas de navegación y del comercio de la India Oriental y Occidental, dated in Madrid 25 February 1783, signed by Francisco Belver, captain of a merchant ship who had been living in the Philippines, there is information of a proposal about creating a company to fit out ships in the ports of Alicante, Malaga, Cadiz and Bilbao for voyages to the East: on the one hand rounding the Cape of Good Hope to Malabar, Ceylon, Coromandel, Bengala, Malacca Strait, Batavia, China and Manila; and, on the other hand, to South America, the Magellan Strait, Pacific Islands, Manila and China. This manual proposed that the first expedition should clear Alicante for Buenos Aires, the Cape of Good Hope, and then cross the Mozambique Channel and sail for Mauritius and Borbon, leaving there part of the cargo brought from Europe and Buenos Aires to sell. From there the expedition would go to Ceylon and other Asian destinations. This return route was to be via Mauritius, Borbon, the Mozambique Channel, Cape of Good Hope, Saint Helena, Cape Verde, Madeira and finally Cadiz. 42
During the second half of the 18th century, then, Cape Town became a regular call for European vessels, which typically sailed there via the Canary Islands and proceeded on to India, Ceylon and Indonesia. 43 It is notable that the most common currency in Cape Town during this period was the Spanish real or real de a ocho (Spanish silver dollar). This was widely used in the Dutch and English empires alongside a variety of other silver coins and was favoured for its purity. 44
Moreover, between 1765 and 1773, ships of the Spanish navy frequently rounded the Cape of Good Hope en route to the Philippines from Cadiz. This coincides with a renewed impulse for reactivating navigation along that coast, occurring simultaneously with increasing Spanish interest in trade with India. The Secretariat of the Navy and the Indies sponsored numerous expeditions, including those entrusted to Juan de Casens and Juan de Langara in 1765–67, Juan de Casens in 1768–70, Manuel González de Guiral and Juan de Langara between 1769–70, Jose de Cordoba between 1770–71, Ignacio Mendizabal between 1771–72, Juan de Langara between 1771–73, Gabriel de Alderete between 1775–76, Juan de Araoz between 1774–75, Antonio de Albornoz between 1775–76, Gabriel Guerra between 1775–76, Pablo de Lasaña between 1776–77, Antonio Mesia de la Cerda between 1777–79 and Benito de Lira between 1778–80. 45 A naval chart with routes both outward and homeward was born out of this interest, carried out by Alexo Berlinguero de la Maria, from Cadiz to the Philippines, going through the Cape of Good Hope in 1777. Besides the routes, Table Bay is also described (occupied by the Dutch), together with Falia Bay (also occupied by the Dutch), Saldanha Bay (according to him, not occupied by Europeans), the Cape of Good Hope, Cape Agulhas and the Natal coast. 46
On 10 March 1785, Carlos III of Spain finally signed the Royal Decree founding the Company of the Philippines. Its ships would sail there both through the Cape of Good Hope and via Cape Horn. For the return voyages they usually sailed via Africa, except in periods of war when they were more likely to use American waters.
The increasing Spanish presence in Africa, especially as a stepping stone to the Philippines, aroused the distrust of Spain’s European competitors, particularly among the English and the Dutch, who were provoked by more frequent Spanish navigation outside of the traditional Pacific route to sell Asian goods. Competition in and around Africa turned people’s minds to the legal grounds for the extent of Spanish commerce and navigation. There is considerable evidence for legal and diplomatic dispute. For example, a view from Manila can be found from February 1765 in the form of a 58-page memorial – De la libertad de los españoles para navegar por el cabo de Buena Esperanza – signed by Francisco Leandro de Viana or don Francisco de la Torre. In it he claimed that the division with Portugal of 1493 made by Pope Alexander VI did not refer to the sea, but to lands and islands, and also the fact that they accepted each other in their respective ports. There was no prohibition, as the Dutch argued, in article 5 of the Treaty of Westphalia (1648) or in article 10 of the Treaty of Utrecht (1714). Moreover, Spain could not be barred from what other European powers were permitted. The advantage of the Cape of Good Hope route was being able to ship the army’s clothes direct from Spain to the Philippines, because they were cheaper and better made, rather than from Mexico. The same applied to altar wine and iron from Spain. In general, the prices of goods from Spain were more moderate and exports to the Philippines encouraged domestic manufacture. This way, foreign trade between China and the Philippines would decrease. It was also a safer route in wartime, Cadiz being the port of departure. In any case, there was a need to form a company in the Philippines. The disadvantage was that there was no secure port of call on the African coast, though good relations with France allowed Spanish ships to stop off at Mauritius. The preference was for a Spanish-controlled port or island possession in West Africa. 47 Shortly after, this fact would be recognised with the establishment in Equatorial Guinea after 1778. 48
In 1786 the Dutch West Indies Company urged the States General to rule against the Spanish, including vessels of the Company of the Philippines sailing through the Cape of Good Hope. Its argument rested on the Treaties of Munster (1648; particularly the fifth article) and Utrecht (1713–15), and, curiously, even on the papal bull of 1493. Spain rejected the idea that these treaties excluded them from the region. The Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) had explicitly allowed unrestricted peaceful travel to dominions belonging to the King of Spain and Portugal. At the same time, although trade between the Philippines and Acapulco had been established since 1570, the other route had not been abandoned. In addition, the English and the Dutch could not navigate around Cape Horn, the Mediterranean Sea or the Red Sea for the same reason.
Because of this controversy we have at our disposal a good number of documented Spanish precedents in this navigation. Among the references to crossings via Cape of Good Hope, the Magellan-Elcano expedition is mentioned as the first round the world trip, and in other expeditions, such as those led by Don Garcia Loaisa and even Cano himself to the Mindanao Islands, Jolo and Tidore, where they arrived on 31 December 1526. During the 17th century these examples became more numerous. Another voyage, which we have already mentioned, had left from Cadiz on 14 April 1613 heading to Cabite, under Ruiz González de Sequeira on admiral Fernando Muñoz de Aramburu’s orders, consisting of seven caravels. Another expedition left from the port of Seville and Sanlucar de Barramedaon on 21 December 1619, comprising six galleons and three other vessels, commanded by Lorenzo de Zuloaga and the admiral Garcia de Figueroa. Its purpose was to sail to the West Indies, although the expedition was beset by a storm near Cape Town. In addition, the Compilation of the Laws of the Indies of 1680 was offered as proof, specifically the seventh act, by which Phillip III had allowed the movement of goods in fleets leaving for the Philippines via the Cape of Good Hope. Regarding the fifth article of the Treaty of Munster, where the Spanish were encouraged to operate in the same places as they had always done, there was no contradiction, since the African route had a demonstrable tradition.
The same argument hinged on article 34 of the Peace of Utrecht. For their part, the Dutch relied on the statement given by the marquis of Pozuelo in London, on 6 April 1724, opposing the trade and navigation of the Ostend Company in the Indies, as well as reports and claims that the ministers of England and Holland had made jointly in 1732 and 1768 against Spanish navigation through the Cape of Good Hope, although Spain denied it. The Dutch West India Company (WIC) suggested that the States General should take reprisals against the Spanish establishments in America if the Spanish interfered in Cape Town. The Spanish replied by threatening to use the same violent measures against the Dutch in case of interference. 49
The truth is that Spanish vessels could not ordinarily use Cape Town as a port of call because of Dutch opposition, who only let them obtain water and replenish essential goods, such as firewood, bread, wine, meat and other supplies for a short period of time. This happened to the frigate Astrea in April 1770, in which travelled Simon de Anda y Salazar, governor-elect and field marshal of the Philippines. Having arrived in Table Bay from Cadiz en route to the Asian islands, on 4 April the Spanish were received by a council delegation, which prohibited them from going ashore as a breach of the treaties governing the region. Nonetheless, calling there was important in the prevention of scurvy, as well as carrying out normal repairs. 50 . The Dutch cited the Treaties of Munster and Utrecht as grounds for not providing supplies, and the Spanish could only obtain 70 pipes of water and 130 quintals of firewood, out of the 400 requested, and no meat, bread or vegetables. In vain, the Spanish reminded the Dutch of the case of the ship El Buen Consejo, which in 1765 and 1768 had received good treatment in Malacca and Batavia, and the most recent trip of the frigate Venus in 1769. 51
In the last decades of the 18th century, Dutch ships stopping in Spanish ports before heading to Cape Town became more common. Some of them were very large, up to 1,000 tons, like the ship plying the Middleburg-Cape of Good Hope route that arrived in Tenerife on 17 June 1786. 52 . That same year, the WIC vessel El Viejo Harlem left Tenerife bound for the Cape of Good Hope and Ceylon, as did Triton and Veere in August. Dutch WIC ships heading to Cape Town generally controlled links with Southern Africa. 53 This traffic via Tenerife coincided with the diplomatic instability of the period but persisted through it – from the 1780s down to the early 1800s, Dutch, French and English ships could be found in port at Santa Cruz de Tenerife on their way out to or back from Cape Town. 54
In 1755 the Royal Botanical Garden of Madrid was created. Besides obtaining a greater scientific knowledge about botany, from the outset its aim was to adapt plant species from other parts of the world and introduce them into domestic cultivation. Although most of the imported plants and trees came from America and Asia, there were attempts to introduce African species, too. For example, in 1784, there was information about the arrival of 43 seed types from the Cape of Good Hope and Ceylon. 55 Also, in 1788 La Orotava Acclimatisation Gardens were created, where we know that plants and trees from Southern Africa could be found. During the 18th century Canarian entrepreneurs looked for alternatives to vineyard cultivation, which by then was in prolonged decline caused by loss of trade. The Economic Societies of Friends of the Country (Sociedades Económicas de Amigos del País) sponsored the introduction and development of crops. A clear reflection of this was the creation of the botanical garden in La Orotava valley, which specialised in the acclimatisation of American and Asian plants above all. 56 However, some African plants were also introduced, especially from Cape Town: proteas, mallows, and cypress trees are good examples, along with diverse species of palm tree. 57 The 18th-century naturalist Viera y Clavijo highlighted that not long ago a new species of barrilla, called Mesembryanthemun tenuifolim of Lineo, originating from the Cape of Good Hope, had been imported and cultivated in some gardens. They were called ‘clavelinas de la Madera’ in Gran Canaria, although he called them ‘cosco escarlatino’ due to the colour of their flowers, suitable for cochineal and soda production. 58
Conclusion
Even though Spanish traffic via the Cape of Good Hope was not as regular as on the Acapulco-Manila route, it was continuous between the 16th and 18th centuries. After its initial opening by Elcano, the Cape route fell into abeyance during the 16th century due to the treaties signed with Portugal and the forging of connections between the Philippines and New Spain. Even then it is clear that accurate knowledge of the region circulated quite freely. During the Iberian Union, information about Southern Africa flowed more intensively, leading to the irregular dispatch of fleets through Cape Town in support of Spain’s Asian colonies, especially during the reign of Philip III. Portuguese independence and the foundation of Cape Town by the Dutch led to another downturn in Spanish interest until the second half of the 18th century.
Thereafter, greater investment in the Atlantic slave trade, the creation of monopoly companies and the crisis in the Acapulco-Manila system revived the significance of Cape Town and Southern Africa. This is evidenced by the response of the Dutch, who tried in vain to stop the increasing Spanish presence in those waters. The last decades of the 17th century and the first years of the 19th, in parallel with the first attempt to occupy Equatorial Guinea, saw an increase in Spanish expeditions and in several types of exchange, botanical ones being important examples. The abandonment of the colony of Fernando Po did not blunt Spain’s long-established, if variable, interest in African navigation.
Footnotes
1.
Although books about the connection with the continent in general do not exist, there are others of partial relevance, such as G. Scelle, La traite négrière aux Indes de Castille. Contrats et traits d’assiento (2 vols., Paris, 1906); H. Labouret and P. Rivet, Le Royaume d’Arda et son Évangelization au XVIIe siècle (Paris, 1929); F. Pérez Embid, Los descubrimientos en el Atlántico y la rivalidad castellano-portuguesa hasta el Tratado de Tordesillas (Seville, 1948); L. Silveira, Documentos portugueses sobre la acción de España en África (apontamentos acerca de Fontes existentes em Portugal para o estudo da Africa Española), (Madrid, 1954); A. Rumeu de Armas, España en el África Atlántica (Madrid, 1956); P. M. Anguiano, Misiones capuchinas en África II. Misiones al reino de la Zinga, Benín, Arda, Guinea y Sierra Leona (Madrid, 1957); B. Torres Ramírez, La compañía gaditana de negros (Seville, 1973); A. Rumeu de Armas, Cádiz, metrópoli del comercio con África en los siglos XV y XVI (Madrid, 1976); E. Vila Vilar, Hispanoamérica y el comercio de esclavos (Seville, 1977); A. A. T. Parreira, The Kingdom of Angola and Iberian Interference 1483–1643 (Uppsala, 1985); M. L. Castro and M. L. Calle, Origen de la colonización española en Guinea Ecuatorial (1777–1860), (Salamanca, 1992); D. Northrup, Africas’s Discovery of Europe 1450–1850 (New Cork/Oxford, 2002); G. Santana Pérez y J. M. Santana Pérez, La puerta afortunada: Canarias en las relaciones hispano-africanas de los siglos XVII y XVIII (Madrid, 2002); I. Diadié Haidara, Los últimos visigodos. La biblioteca de Tombuctú (Seville, 2003); J. Bolekia Boleká, Aproximación a la historia de Guinea Ecuatoriall (Salamanca, 2003); A. Laguno, La conquista de Tombuctú. La gran aventura de Yuder Pachá y otros hispanos en el Reino de los Negros (Almuzara, 2006); M. D. García Cantús, Fernando Poo: Una aventura colonial española. I: Las Islas en litigio: entre la esclavitud y el abolicionismo, 1777–1846 (Barcelona, 2006); R. Fernández Durán, La Corona española y el tráfico de negros. Del monopolio al libre comercio (Madrid, 2011); J. A. Piqueras, La esclavitud en las Españas. Un lazo transatlántico (Madrid, 2011); F. Ballano Gonzalo, Españoles en África (Tombooktu, 2013); D. Wheat, Atlantic Africa and the Spanish Caribbean, 1570–1640 (Chapel Hill, 2016).
2.
A. Pigafetta, Primer viaje alrededor del mundo (Madrid, 1985), 159.
3.
Pigafetta, Primer viaje alrededor, 159–61.
4.
Archivo General de Indias (hereafter AGI), Seville, Spain. Patronato Real, 34, R-13. Also in Indiferente, 1528, no. 4.
5.
6.
O. Baldacci, Atlante Colombiano Della Grande Scoperta (Rome, 1992), 44.
7.
R. Cerezo Martínez, La cartografía náutica española en los siglos XIV, XV y XVI (Madrid, 1994), 246.
8.
F. Relaño, La emergencia de África como continente: un nuevo mundo a partir del viejo (Lleida, 2000), 54.
9.
L. del Mármol Carvajal, Descripción General de África, Tomo I (Madrid, 1953), 2 v.–4 v.
10.
AGI, Filipinas, 6, R3, N 35.
11.
See W. L. Schurtz, El galeón de Manila (Madrid, 1992), 257–69.
12.
M. Kearney, The Indian Ocean in World History (New York, 2004), 114–15.
13.
Archivo General de Simancas (hereafter AGS), Valladolid, Spain. Estado K, leg. 1426. The Consultation of State issued in September 1609 was copied from the Portuguese Council of State.
14.
Biblioteca Nacional de España (hereafter BN), Madrid, Spain. Ms. 3826, fol. 99–106 v. In the same proposal the coast and the towns of the Indian Ocean are described, both in Africa and in Asia.
15.
E. Axelson, Portuguese in South-East Africa 1600–1700 (Johanesburg, 1960), 99–101, 192.
16.
AGS, Estado, leg. 436.
17.
Archivo de la Real Academia de la Historia (hereafter ARAH), Madrid, Spain. Colección Salazar y Castro, Luis de, N-63. AGI, Filipinas, 329, L2. 167 v–169 r.
18.
E. Collins, ‘Portuguese pilots at the Casa de la Contratacion and the exámenes de Pilotos’, International Journal of Maritime History, 26, No. 2 (2014), 184.
19.
AGI, Filipinas, 329, L2. 167 v–169 r.
20.
AGI, Filipinas, 329, L 2, 284 r–287 r, 329 r–332 v.
21.
AGI, Filipinas, 329, L 2, 180 r–181 v.
22.
AGI, Filipinas, 29, N 121.
23.
Archivo del Museo Naval (hereafter AMN), Madrid, Spain. 0009, MS 0010/022, 314 r–316 v.
24.
BN, Ms. 3015.
25.
E. de Souza Barros, Negocios de tanta importancia. O Conselho Ultramarino e a disputa pela conduçao da guerra no Atlântico e no Índico (1643–1661) (Lisbon/Açores, 2008), 45–62.
26.
AMN, 0083, Ms. 0080/021.
27.
BN, Ms. 2396, 222 r.
28.
One of them was the ship Beemster, which departed from Texel in June 1671, and arrived in La Gomera, where some of its men deserted, and continued its trip to Southern Africa, docking at Cape Town between October and November 1671, arriving finally in Batavia in January 1672. See J. R. Bruijn, F. S. Gaastra and I. Schöffer, eds., Dutch-Asiatic Shipping in the 17 th and 18 th Centuries. Vol. II. Outward-bound Voyages from the Netherlands to Asia and the Cape (1595–1794) (The Hague, 1979), 172–73. For the presence of Dutch ships in these ports on the way to Cape Town see R. Raven-Hart, Cape Good Hope 1652–1702: The first 50 years of Dutch Colonisation as seen by Callers (Kaapstad, 1971). Also, Santana and Santana, La puerta afortunada, 132–7.
29.
Dutch-Asiatic Shipping in the 17 th and 18 th Centuries, 128–9. It is the fluit Kortenhoef, 216 tons burthen, which left Holland in October 1658, and arrived at Batavia in June 1659, using the Canary Islands, Cape Town and Maurice as ports of call.
30.
W. Ph. Coolhaas, ed., Generale Missiven van governeurs-general en raden aan heren XVII der verenigde oostindische compagnie. Deel IV: 1675–1685 (The Hague, 1971), 96.
31.
R. Ross, Beyond the Pale. Essays on the History of Colonial South Africa (Hannover/London, 1993), 15-20.
32.
A. Iria, Da Navegaçao portuguesa no Índico no século XVII (Documentos do Arquivo Histórico Ultramarino (Lisbon, 1973), 178.
33.
AGI, MP-Europa_África, 64.
34.
C. Martínez Shaw y M. Alfonso Mola, La ruta española a China (Madrid, 2007), 204–5.
35.
Archivo Histórico Nacional (hereafter AHN), Madrid, Spain. Estado, leg. 3208, no. 347. Also in leg. 3188, no. 412.
36.
M. L. Díaz-Trechuelo, La Real Compañía de Filipinas (Seville, 1965), 11–12.
37.
C. Martínez Shaw, El sistema comercial español del Pacífico (1765–1820) (Madrid, 2007), 21.
38.
AGS, Marina, leg, 417–27/858–887. The frigate had left Manila on 17 January 1775, with Juan Aravo in command, and arrived at Cadiz Bay on 17 July. The same vessel would leave Cadiz on 21 February 1776, under Don Pablo Laraña, heading to the Philippines via the Cape of Good Hope.
39.
R. Ross, Cape of Torments Slavery and Resistance in South Africa (Cornwall, 1983), 77.
40.
AMN, 0009, Ms. 0010/016, 219.
41.
AGI Estado, 73, no. 52.
42.
AGI, Indiferente General, 1565.
43.
Centre d’Accueil et de Recherche des Archives Nationales (hereafter CARAN), Paris, France. Affaires étrangères, B/III/350, s./fol. In 1786 El Viejo Harlem, of the WIC, left Tenerife heading to the Cape of Good Hope and Ceylon. In the same year, another ship from Middelburg also came to the island, with an impressive weight of 1000 tons, heading to the Cape of Good Hope.
44.
R. J. Ross, ‘The Cape of Good Hope and the World Economy’, in R. Elphick and G. Buhr, eds., The Shaping of South African Society, 1652–1840 (Cape Town, 1989), 258.
45.
Martínez Shaw, El sistema comercial español, 28.
46.
AGI, MP-Filipinas, 171.
47.
AMN 0816, Ms 2518/016.
48.
M. Castro and M. L. Calle, Origen de la colonización española en Guinea Ecuatorial (1777–1860) (Salamanca, 1992); M. Castro and D. Ndongo, España en Guinea. Construcción del desencuentro: 1778–1968 (Toledo, 1998); Bolekia Boleká, Aproximación a la historia de Guinea; García Cantús, Fernando Poo: Una aventura colonial española.
49.
AHN, Estado, leg. 4836. The development of this debate is discussed in Réflexion sur l’extrait du registre des états géneraux de país-basunis du 22 juillet 1786. Au sujet de la Navigation des Espagnols par le Cap de Bonne-Espérance, ou por la route de l’Est (Madrid, 1787).
50.
AGI, Filipinas, 390, n 18.
51.
AMN 0190, MS 0316/001 Y 002.
52.
CARAN, Affaires étrangères, B/III/350, s./fol.
53.
CARAN, Affaires étrangères, B/III/350. Its load was 60 masts, one part for fire, 40 quintals of gunpowder, one part for cordage, wine, liquor, cheese, ham and other trifles, and 28 boxes of silver coins, equivalent to 400,000 Dutch florins.
54.
P. L. Idenburg, The Cape of Good Hope at the Turn of the 18th Century (Leiden, 1963), 7–11; G. Hernández Rodríguez, Estadísticas de las Islas Canarias 1793–1806 de Francisco Escolar y Serrano, Vol. III (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 1983), 552, 567, 574, 575, 578, 579.
55.
Archivo del Real Jardín Botánico, Madrid, Spain. RJB01/0020/0005/0030.
56.
V. Rodríguez García, Jardín Botánico de Tenerife en el siglo XVIII (Seville, 1979).
57.
A. Herrera Piqué, Pasión y aventura en la ciencia de las luces. Tomo I, Introducción a la exploración científica de las Hespérides, 1700–1850 (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 2006), 229–331.
58.
J. de Viera y Clavijo, Diccionario de Historia Natural de las Islas Canarias. Índice alfabético descriptivo de sus tres reinos: animal, vegetal y mineral (Las Palmas, 1982), 70.