It's one of those stories which pops up on a regular basis, normally about once a year and not because of the annual day, i.e. 12 October, when Christopher Columbus discovered the Americas, specifically the island he called San Salvador.
The recurring story is the one of where Columbus came from. Whole lives' works have been spent in the attempt to prove that the generally accepted view that he came from Genoa is bunkum. Why do people persist in seeking to disprove the Genoa theory and in wishing to locate his origin elsewhere? Different reasons. Scholarly obstinacy is one. The desire to reveal a whole different truth (and a real one at that) is another. To expose a conspiracy is a third.
The conspiracy is twofold. One is that a Catholic-centred perception of Columbus cannot permit him to be or to have been of a Jewish background. The other is the Hispanic necessity. In the name of the Crown of Castile and of Isabel I, the queen at the time, albeit she was married to an Aragonese, Ferdinand, and in the subsequent name of Castile over centuries, to grant Columbus a Catalan background is an impossibility.
The Jewish-Catalan collision is central to the theory of the Ibizan researcher Nito Verdera. In an interview with "El Mundo", he has once more explained why he believes that Columbus - his family at any rate - had moved to Ibiza from Catalonia, why he is convinced that this family and Columbus were "conversos" (converted from Judaism to Catholicism), and why therefore Columbus was born in Ibiza Town.
Verdera has established a museum in Ibiza. The house where it is located was documented in the fourteenth century as having been lived in by a Francesc Colom. The surname is important. This Catalan style was to appear in various documents concerning Columbus. The Castellano style - Colón - did not.
The name is an essential ingredient in Verdera's argument. Linguistics in more general terms are also essential, as they have been with other researchers. In 2009, for example, Estelle Irizarry, emeritus professor of Spanish literature at the University of Georgetown in Washington, published her "The DNA Of The Writings Of Columbus". Irizarry places Columbus as having come from Catalan-speaking Aragon and having been descended from the Jewish-Spanish race persecuted from the fourteenth century. The language used by Columbus, she maintains, was Ladino-Catalan, Ladino having been the language of the Sephardic Jews.
In the Balearics, the more recognised Columbus alternative theory is that of Gabriel Verd. Columbus - Cristòfor Colom - was born in Felanitx in 1460 (not 1451, which is the year usually given) and was the illegitimate son of the Prince of Viana from Aragon, the brother of Ferdinand. He was therefore the king's nephew. His mother was Margarita Colom, and he was to rise to the prominence he did in the Spanish court because of this secretive family background. This is an important part of Verd's theory, because the Genoa connection - Columbus had a humble background - has never really adequately explained how Columbus came to be hanging around royal circles.
Verdera dismisses Verd's theory. Columbus, according to Verd, would have only been 46 when he died in 1506. There are documents which suggest he was 60 when he died, meaning he had been born earlier than 1451 (in Genoa) and certainly earlier then 1460 (in Felanitx at the finca of s'Alqueria Roja to be precise). Verdera is also upset that he, unlike Verd, has not been given financial support for his research. In 2004, María Antonia Munar, then the president of the Council of Mallorca, approved a grant of over 50,000 euros. "I have a patent interest in Christopher Columbus being from Mallorca. I feel satisfied at having shown my support for Professor Gabriel Verd, and I intend to continue to do so," she said. A research programme, "Development of Human Genetic Research on Columbus's Origins", was to receive the grant to study theories that Columbus was born in Mallorca and "whose staunchest supporter is the historian Gabriel Verd".
The Ibiza theory, as far as Verdera is concerned, is the accurate one. Likewise, Verd sticks to his Felanitx theory. They can't both be right, and only limited numbers of people will believe that either of them is right. Among those who refuse to believe either of them are all the scholars down the years who have maintained that Columbus - Christoffa Corombo - was from Genoa. An alternative theory, were it ever proven, would leave an awful lot of people with egg on their faces.
And this - definitive proof - is unlikely to ever be unearthed. For all the counter theories, there are ones that give credence to Genoa having been his birthplace. Much is made of Columbus not having written in Italian, but the Ligurian of Genoa was not a written language. He wouldn't necessarily have known Italian. But the search for proof continues nonetheless.
Index for November 2016
Airbnb - 11 November 2016, 19 November 2016
Balearic maximum population - 4 November 2016
Canaries tourism website - 15 November 2016
Christmas shopping - 26 November 2016
Christopher Columbus - 30 November 2016
Creative tourism - 17 November 2016
Day of the Dead - 1 November 2016
Dijous Bo - 12 November 2016
Donald Trump and Spain - 10 November 2016
Employment and seasonality - 2 November 2016
Golf history - 13 November 2016
Holiday brochures - 9 November 2016
Interior tourism - 22 November 2016
José Ramón Bauzá - 28 November 2016
Podemos at war - 14 November 2016
Politicians' clothing sense - 20 November 2016
Puerto Pollensa - 21 November 2016
Regionalism - 16 November 2016
Slogans and tourism - 29 November 2016
Tourism debate in the Balearics - 18 November 2016
Tourism minister - 6 November 2016, 8 November 2016
Tourism promotion - 3 November 2016, 5 November 2016
Trasmediterránea - 27 November 2016
Travel fairs of the past - 7 November 2016
Showing posts with label Christopher Columbus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Christopher Columbus. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 30, 2016
Tuesday, February 10, 2015
The Felanitx Theory: Columbus
At the end of 2011, I offered an annual award for the "historian of the year". To this day, I would imagine that Gabriel Verd remains blissfully unaware of this accolade but four years later he may be placing himself on the shortlist to pick up a far more celebrated prize. The citation in 2011 went along the lines of perseverance in the face of almost overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Verd is the Mallorcan historian who insists that Christopher Columbus was from Felanitx. His life's work has pretty much been devoted to proving this. In 2011 he was convinced. Now, he is on the point of producing evidence which will demonstrate definitively that Columbus was from Felanitx and not from Genoa or any other place which has laid a claim on him.
At the weekend at a restaurant (Son Colom) in Felanitx which doubles as an exhibition centre for Columbus, Verd was able to explain his theories to visitors who included the president of the Council of Mallorca, Maria Salom. He asserted that the "Felanitx theory is the most coherent that there is". The competing theories include Ibiza, Galicia and, of course, Genoa, which is the city that history scholars over the centuries have accepted that Columbus came from.
Having Maria Salom along for the day was understandable, as the Council is one of the keepers of Mallorcan culture and heritage and as it was the Council, in 2004, which forwarded a grant of over 50,000 euros for research into Columbus's origins and genetics; one of the biggest supporters of this research was Gabriel Verd. There have, subsequently, been DNA tests carried out which have sought to establish links between local populations and Columbus (certainly with his younger brother, Bartholomew). These don't, however, seem to have proved anything - definitively.
The research has been and is valid. Though it is the accepted version of history that Columbus came from Genoa, there have always been certain questions, e.g. why he himself made little reference to Genoa and, more importantly, why he spoke in the strange way he did. Linguistic research has held much of the key to resolving the arguments regarding Columbus's origins. It is this linguistic element, along with Mallorca's culture and heritage, which was what interested a former president of the Council, Maria Antonia Munar, who held this office when the 2004 grant was made. She admitted at the time that she had "a patent interest in Columbus being from Mallorca", and one suspects that this interest would have been partly kindled by nationalism. Munar's party, the Unió Mallorquina, was Mallorcan nationalist. Columbus a Mallorcan? The discoverer of America was Mallorcan all along and not an Italian and definitely not a Spaniard? It's the stuff of nationalist dreams and one, moreover, that features some version of Catalan as the mother tongue.
A further linguistic element is the name Porto Colom in Felanitx. Colom means pigeon in Catalan. In Italian the word is "colombo". In the Genoa region of the fifteenth century it was "corombo". There were people called Pigeon all over the western Med. Porto Colom, as in "colunbi", was noted on an Italian map of Mallorca from the thirteenth century, so it is perfectly logical that people might have adopted Colom as a surname because of the place name. Or alternatively, they were just named after a pigeon. Either way, as far as Columbus was concerned, Verd has maintained that his name came from his mother, Margarita Colom, who gave birth to the illegitimate son of Carlos, an Aragonese nobleman who was the brother of Ferdinand, later the husband of Isabel and so one half of the Catholic Kings. And the precise location of the birth was the Felanitx finca of s'Alqueria Roja.
Gabriel Verd believes that this year he will add to the celebrations of notable Mallorcans (Ramon Llull, 700th anniversary of his death, and Fray Junipero, his canonisation) by proclaiming that Columbus was definitively a Mallorcan. There is a part of me which really wants him to be right, for him to turn historical orthodoxy on its head and for history to therefore have to be rewritten. But despite his confidence that he will prove Columbus's Mallorcan birth definitively, unless it is in such a powerful way with new, previously unseen, original source documents that can substantiate the Felanitx theory and be scrutinised by peers who might be convinced of the arguments, the overwhelming evidence in favour of Genoa will remain.
Even if he were to provide definitive proof, would all Mallorcans be happy? History is less kind to Columbus than it once was. He is now accused of genocide and so of the extinguishing of Taino Indian culture in Hispaniola. The fact that smallpox and other diseases were largely responsible for the Tainos being all but wiped out doesn't stop contemporary views which portray a barbarous Columbus. Would Mallorca really want that legacy?
At the weekend at a restaurant (Son Colom) in Felanitx which doubles as an exhibition centre for Columbus, Verd was able to explain his theories to visitors who included the president of the Council of Mallorca, Maria Salom. He asserted that the "Felanitx theory is the most coherent that there is". The competing theories include Ibiza, Galicia and, of course, Genoa, which is the city that history scholars over the centuries have accepted that Columbus came from.
Having Maria Salom along for the day was understandable, as the Council is one of the keepers of Mallorcan culture and heritage and as it was the Council, in 2004, which forwarded a grant of over 50,000 euros for research into Columbus's origins and genetics; one of the biggest supporters of this research was Gabriel Verd. There have, subsequently, been DNA tests carried out which have sought to establish links between local populations and Columbus (certainly with his younger brother, Bartholomew). These don't, however, seem to have proved anything - definitively.
The research has been and is valid. Though it is the accepted version of history that Columbus came from Genoa, there have always been certain questions, e.g. why he himself made little reference to Genoa and, more importantly, why he spoke in the strange way he did. Linguistic research has held much of the key to resolving the arguments regarding Columbus's origins. It is this linguistic element, along with Mallorca's culture and heritage, which was what interested a former president of the Council, Maria Antonia Munar, who held this office when the 2004 grant was made. She admitted at the time that she had "a patent interest in Columbus being from Mallorca", and one suspects that this interest would have been partly kindled by nationalism. Munar's party, the Unió Mallorquina, was Mallorcan nationalist. Columbus a Mallorcan? The discoverer of America was Mallorcan all along and not an Italian and definitely not a Spaniard? It's the stuff of nationalist dreams and one, moreover, that features some version of Catalan as the mother tongue.
A further linguistic element is the name Porto Colom in Felanitx. Colom means pigeon in Catalan. In Italian the word is "colombo". In the Genoa region of the fifteenth century it was "corombo". There were people called Pigeon all over the western Med. Porto Colom, as in "colunbi", was noted on an Italian map of Mallorca from the thirteenth century, so it is perfectly logical that people might have adopted Colom as a surname because of the place name. Or alternatively, they were just named after a pigeon. Either way, as far as Columbus was concerned, Verd has maintained that his name came from his mother, Margarita Colom, who gave birth to the illegitimate son of Carlos, an Aragonese nobleman who was the brother of Ferdinand, later the husband of Isabel and so one half of the Catholic Kings. And the precise location of the birth was the Felanitx finca of s'Alqueria Roja.
Gabriel Verd believes that this year he will add to the celebrations of notable Mallorcans (Ramon Llull, 700th anniversary of his death, and Fray Junipero, his canonisation) by proclaiming that Columbus was definitively a Mallorcan. There is a part of me which really wants him to be right, for him to turn historical orthodoxy on its head and for history to therefore have to be rewritten. But despite his confidence that he will prove Columbus's Mallorcan birth definitively, unless it is in such a powerful way with new, previously unseen, original source documents that can substantiate the Felanitx theory and be scrutinised by peers who might be convinced of the arguments, the overwhelming evidence in favour of Genoa will remain.
Even if he were to provide definitive proof, would all Mallorcans be happy? History is less kind to Columbus than it once was. He is now accused of genocide and so of the extinguishing of Taino Indian culture in Hispaniola. The fact that smallpox and other diseases were largely responsible for the Tainos being all but wiped out doesn't stop contemporary views which portray a barbarous Columbus. Would Mallorca really want that legacy?
Sunday, February 03, 2013
A Guide To Columbus - Officially
If you fancied offering your services as a tour guide, could you just put an ad in a paper and wait for tourists to come flocking? Well, you could, but you would need to be aware that you might be breaking the law.
Some definition is probably required. A tour guide, as in a rep with a tour operator for example, is not the same as what the Balearics tourism ministry and the Official College of Tour Guides in the Balearic Islands consider to be a tour guide. Article 65 of the tourism law identifies what is meant by a tour guide - "guía turístico or turística", depending on gender and not to be confused with a different "guía turística", which is a published guide. Such a human guide engages in regular and professional work in providing information and interpretative services regarding the islands' historical and natural heritage, assets of cultural interest and any other tourism resource. He or she must be accredited, and authorisation to work as a guide has to be granted by the tourism ministry.
There has been a recent flurry of activity regarding official tour guides in Mallorca. Groups have visited two towns to learn more about matters of specific cultural interest, the towns in question being Petra and Felanitx. Forty guides turned up in Petra to be able to offer "routes", both cultural and gastronomic, related to Fray Juniper, whose 300th birthday is being celebrated this year. (I'm not sure what the gastronomic bit has to do with the old Father, but be that as it may.)
This is all perfectly reasonable. Juniper Serra was born in Petra, of this there is no doubt. He is one of Mallorca's most famous sons, albeit that his fame outside of Mallorca is largely restricted to California, where he was a missionary. The twenty guides who have been to Felanitx, on the other hand, pitched up to hear about someone whose Mallorcan connection is, at best, highly questionable: Christopher Columbus.
The guides heard from the Mallorcan historian who has been arguing the case for Coumbus having come from Felanitx for years, Gabriel Verd Martorell. Much though I admire Verd's persistence, the biggest problem he has lies in convincing a sceptical world that his version of history is the correct one. The world still believes, and probably correctly, that Columbus came from Genoa.
One report of the gathering of the guides in Felanitx used a telling word. It said (and I translate) that the guides "are charged with indoctrinating ...". It may not have intended the implication, but indoctrination is usually taken to mean instruction in often contentious ideas to the point that they are accepted uncritically. The guides of Felanitx are, in effect, a means of furthering propaganda about Columbus that remains unproven.
There are of course examples of tourism attractions which are based on falsehoods: Loch Ness is one such. No guide worth his salt or his profession would insist that the monster exists, and so information which is conveyed concentrates on how the legend came about. And this is how it should be. If guides make it perfectly clear that Columbus's origins in Felanitx are but one theory about Columbus, then no real harm is done. If they end up leaving visitors believing that he did come from Felanitx, then they are causing harm, because they will have turned a theory into a fact. Much would depend upon how persuasive the "indoctrination" is and so therefore the belief.
One comes back to the credentials that a tour guide needs under the tourism law. They are designed, one would presume, to ensure that a guide is capable of disseminating fact, of distinguishing between fact and supposition or alternative theory and of not passing on garbage. There are many involved in the tourism industry who deal with the latter because they are misinformed or not informed at all. Hence, why there is an official college for guides and official authorisation required for guides to practise.
The Felanitx theory is an intriguing one and it certainly isn't without persuasion. Verd is sincere in his beliefs about Columbus. But it is, I stress, only a theory, and tour guides, one would hope, would appreciate this. There is, from the same report I mentioned above, another telling line. It is a quote from Verd. "We have made the product (Columbus from Felanitx), but until now have failed to commercialise it." And therein lies the rub, the commercialisation, the marketing, the money. But the word for "made" in the original Spanish report is potentially the most telling: "fabricado".
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Some definition is probably required. A tour guide, as in a rep with a tour operator for example, is not the same as what the Balearics tourism ministry and the Official College of Tour Guides in the Balearic Islands consider to be a tour guide. Article 65 of the tourism law identifies what is meant by a tour guide - "guía turístico or turística", depending on gender and not to be confused with a different "guía turística", which is a published guide. Such a human guide engages in regular and professional work in providing information and interpretative services regarding the islands' historical and natural heritage, assets of cultural interest and any other tourism resource. He or she must be accredited, and authorisation to work as a guide has to be granted by the tourism ministry.
There has been a recent flurry of activity regarding official tour guides in Mallorca. Groups have visited two towns to learn more about matters of specific cultural interest, the towns in question being Petra and Felanitx. Forty guides turned up in Petra to be able to offer "routes", both cultural and gastronomic, related to Fray Juniper, whose 300th birthday is being celebrated this year. (I'm not sure what the gastronomic bit has to do with the old Father, but be that as it may.)
This is all perfectly reasonable. Juniper Serra was born in Petra, of this there is no doubt. He is one of Mallorca's most famous sons, albeit that his fame outside of Mallorca is largely restricted to California, where he was a missionary. The twenty guides who have been to Felanitx, on the other hand, pitched up to hear about someone whose Mallorcan connection is, at best, highly questionable: Christopher Columbus.
The guides heard from the Mallorcan historian who has been arguing the case for Coumbus having come from Felanitx for years, Gabriel Verd Martorell. Much though I admire Verd's persistence, the biggest problem he has lies in convincing a sceptical world that his version of history is the correct one. The world still believes, and probably correctly, that Columbus came from Genoa.
One report of the gathering of the guides in Felanitx used a telling word. It said (and I translate) that the guides "are charged with indoctrinating ...". It may not have intended the implication, but indoctrination is usually taken to mean instruction in often contentious ideas to the point that they are accepted uncritically. The guides of Felanitx are, in effect, a means of furthering propaganda about Columbus that remains unproven.
There are of course examples of tourism attractions which are based on falsehoods: Loch Ness is one such. No guide worth his salt or his profession would insist that the monster exists, and so information which is conveyed concentrates on how the legend came about. And this is how it should be. If guides make it perfectly clear that Columbus's origins in Felanitx are but one theory about Columbus, then no real harm is done. If they end up leaving visitors believing that he did come from Felanitx, then they are causing harm, because they will have turned a theory into a fact. Much would depend upon how persuasive the "indoctrination" is and so therefore the belief.
One comes back to the credentials that a tour guide needs under the tourism law. They are designed, one would presume, to ensure that a guide is capable of disseminating fact, of distinguishing between fact and supposition or alternative theory and of not passing on garbage. There are many involved in the tourism industry who deal with the latter because they are misinformed or not informed at all. Hence, why there is an official college for guides and official authorisation required for guides to practise.
The Felanitx theory is an intriguing one and it certainly isn't without persuasion. Verd is sincere in his beliefs about Columbus. But it is, I stress, only a theory, and tour guides, one would hope, would appreciate this. There is, from the same report I mentioned above, another telling line. It is a quote from Verd. "We have made the product (Columbus from Felanitx), but until now have failed to commercialise it." And therein lies the rub, the commercialisation, the marketing, the money. But the word for "made" in the original Spanish report is potentially the most telling: "fabricado".
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Corombo Or Colom: The Columbus conundrum
Christopher Columbus wasn't born Christopher Columbus. He was born Christoffa Corombo. Or he was born Cristòfor Colom. Let's go with the latter.
Some time in 1460, Cristòfor Colom was born in the Mallorcan town of Felanitx. The exact location was the finca of s'Alqueria Roja. His father was an Aragonese nobleman, the brother of Fernando who was to become king of Aragon and of Castile and Léon, and his mother was called Margarita Colom. Cristòfor was the bastard nephew of the Spanish king. This bloodline, unknown to others at the royal court, was to prove vital in giving Cristòfor the patronage to sail to what he thought was Japan or China, but which turned out to be the Caribbean, and in his being named a viceroy and becoming governor of Hispaniola.
There are certain things wrong with this. Wrong, that is, unless you subscribe to the theory that Columbus was indeed born in Felanitx.
Some time in 1451, Christoffa Corombo was born in Genoa, an independent republic which eventually became part of Italy. His father was called Domenico, and he was a lowly weaver who later became an innkeeper. Christoffa's mother, Susanna, was also a weaver. Somehow, Corombo managed to rise from these humble origins to find a place in the Spanish court and acquire the patronage that he did in order to sail to find China in a direction opposite to the one that was already known about.
There is nothing wrong with this, unless you subscribe to the theory that Columbus was born, not in Genoa, but in Felanitx.
Which is right and which is wrong? The Genoa version is the accepted version. The Felanitx version is one that has been proposed by the Mallorcan historian Gabriel Verd Martorell. He has devoted more or less his life's work in seeking to prove that Corombo was Colom and that he was born in Felanitx.
I have huge admiration for Verd's scholarship and for his persistence. His Felanitx theory is not without persuasiveness. It is one that has arisen from what remain legitimate questions as to Columbus' background and specifically how he acquired a strange speaking voice (and it is argued that this was because of Catalan origins) and how he came to be given a title (that of viceroy) that would have been reserved for the Spanish nobility.
Verd has challenged the orthodox view of Columbus, but part of the problem he has had in making a truly convincing case for there to be a complete revision of history is that his theory is just one of many which place Columbus' birthplace as anywhere but Genoa.
Undeterred by the fact that Verd has yet to convince a sceptical world that Christoffa from Genoa was indeed Cristòfor from Felanitx, the town of Felanitx has co-opted Columbus as an "illustrious son" and is to open an exhibition in Portocolom (note the Colom). This exhibition, conveniently near to the tourist office, is to be dedicated to Columbus and to his Mallorcan connection.
While the exhibition may well assist in promoting Verd's theory, there is another benefit; one to the town of Felanitx. Even without definitive proof of Columbus' association with the town, there is presumably a gain to be made by promoting the association. A tourism gain. Or so the town hall would hope.
Its mayor, Gabriel Tauler, has been pushing the Columbus association for some time. He has wanted Columbus "routes" this and no doubt Columbus souvenir mini-carabela ships that. The routes, one imagines, wouldn't involve taking a carabela and heading off to Genoa. He has managed, however, to fall foul of linguistic dogma in issuing invites to the opening of the Columbus-expo. They've gone out in Castellano and not in Catalan. They are more widely understandable, says the mayor. Which is true, but much of the Columbus-from-Felanitx argumentation has to do with that strange speaking voice. If he was indeed originally a Catalan speaker, then Catalan as at least part of the invite was probably warranted.
Who knows? Maybe Columbus did come from Felanitx. His Catalan connection is at least intriguing, but that he also often wrote in Catalan isn't necessarily so much of a surprise. He could well have acquired the language and, if one accepts his origins in Genoa, then he wouldn't have written in Ligurian, the language of Genoa, as it wasn't a written language. It would also, as a tongue, have given him a strange speaking voice.
Christoffa Corombo or Cristòfor Colom, who can tell? Verd would insist that it were the latter. I wish him well in continuing to try and prove his theory.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Some time in 1460, Cristòfor Colom was born in the Mallorcan town of Felanitx. The exact location was the finca of s'Alqueria Roja. His father was an Aragonese nobleman, the brother of Fernando who was to become king of Aragon and of Castile and Léon, and his mother was called Margarita Colom. Cristòfor was the bastard nephew of the Spanish king. This bloodline, unknown to others at the royal court, was to prove vital in giving Cristòfor the patronage to sail to what he thought was Japan or China, but which turned out to be the Caribbean, and in his being named a viceroy and becoming governor of Hispaniola.
There are certain things wrong with this. Wrong, that is, unless you subscribe to the theory that Columbus was indeed born in Felanitx.
Some time in 1451, Christoffa Corombo was born in Genoa, an independent republic which eventually became part of Italy. His father was called Domenico, and he was a lowly weaver who later became an innkeeper. Christoffa's mother, Susanna, was also a weaver. Somehow, Corombo managed to rise from these humble origins to find a place in the Spanish court and acquire the patronage that he did in order to sail to find China in a direction opposite to the one that was already known about.
There is nothing wrong with this, unless you subscribe to the theory that Columbus was born, not in Genoa, but in Felanitx.
Which is right and which is wrong? The Genoa version is the accepted version. The Felanitx version is one that has been proposed by the Mallorcan historian Gabriel Verd Martorell. He has devoted more or less his life's work in seeking to prove that Corombo was Colom and that he was born in Felanitx.
I have huge admiration for Verd's scholarship and for his persistence. His Felanitx theory is not without persuasiveness. It is one that has arisen from what remain legitimate questions as to Columbus' background and specifically how he acquired a strange speaking voice (and it is argued that this was because of Catalan origins) and how he came to be given a title (that of viceroy) that would have been reserved for the Spanish nobility.
Verd has challenged the orthodox view of Columbus, but part of the problem he has had in making a truly convincing case for there to be a complete revision of history is that his theory is just one of many which place Columbus' birthplace as anywhere but Genoa.
Undeterred by the fact that Verd has yet to convince a sceptical world that Christoffa from Genoa was indeed Cristòfor from Felanitx, the town of Felanitx has co-opted Columbus as an "illustrious son" and is to open an exhibition in Portocolom (note the Colom). This exhibition, conveniently near to the tourist office, is to be dedicated to Columbus and to his Mallorcan connection.
While the exhibition may well assist in promoting Verd's theory, there is another benefit; one to the town of Felanitx. Even without definitive proof of Columbus' association with the town, there is presumably a gain to be made by promoting the association. A tourism gain. Or so the town hall would hope.
Its mayor, Gabriel Tauler, has been pushing the Columbus association for some time. He has wanted Columbus "routes" this and no doubt Columbus souvenir mini-carabela ships that. The routes, one imagines, wouldn't involve taking a carabela and heading off to Genoa. He has managed, however, to fall foul of linguistic dogma in issuing invites to the opening of the Columbus-expo. They've gone out in Castellano and not in Catalan. They are more widely understandable, says the mayor. Which is true, but much of the Columbus-from-Felanitx argumentation has to do with that strange speaking voice. If he was indeed originally a Catalan speaker, then Catalan as at least part of the invite was probably warranted.
Who knows? Maybe Columbus did come from Felanitx. His Catalan connection is at least intriguing, but that he also often wrote in Catalan isn't necessarily so much of a surprise. He could well have acquired the language and, if one accepts his origins in Genoa, then he wouldn't have written in Ligurian, the language of Genoa, as it wasn't a written language. It would also, as a tongue, have given him a strange speaking voice.
Christoffa Corombo or Cristòfor Colom, who can tell? Verd would insist that it were the latter. I wish him well in continuing to try and prove his theory.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Monday, September 27, 2010
The Columbus Improbability: Felanitx
Want to give your town's tourism a bit of a boost? Easy. All you do is ally yourself to some old weird beard who helped to eradicate a distant tribe of loin-cloth-wearing and peace-loving foreigners: Christopher Columbus, the Kenny Rogers of the fifteenth century, all white chin furniture and islands of the gulf stream.
The mayor of Felanitx wants to make Columbus an "illustrious son" of the town and to attract all-year American tourists in search of their roots at a new theme park with Taino indians (not that they'd be real ones), labouring in building a governor's residence and dying of smallpox. But let's overlook Columbus's genocidist credentials. He wasn't in truth much good at wiping out a race - there are more efficient ways than the ones he and his successors deployed - much as he wasn't much good at discovering America.
It may come as a surprise to learn that Columbus didn't discover Manhattan or Disney World. What he did stumble across, while thinking he was on the way to China, were some islands, one of which is today carved down the centre on maps, the right bit of which is the Allinclusivan Republic, sometimes known as "Dominican" to a bar-owning fraternity of Mallorca intent on wreaking winter-home-from-home, all-inclusive revenge on this part of the Caribbean in retaliation to that of the non-Saint Miguel-buying all-inclusive hoi polloi of the resorts.
Of course, any schoolboy could tell you that it was Columbus who discovered America, although this is increasingly unlikely given the nature of history teaching, which is probably as well given that it isn't strictly true. But the same schoolboy might just also be able to tell you that Columbus came from Genoa in Italy. Which is true, at least it is generally thought to be. Not, however, that some would agree, such as the mayor of Felanitx.
There is a Mallorcan historian called Gabriel Verd Martorell. For years now he has been banging on about Columbus being a felanitxer. The town does have form when it comes to the great Columbus claim; its resort, Porto Colom, claims Columbus for itself. Porto Colom equals Port Columbus. What Martorell reckons is that an Aragonese noble, Charles, exiled to Mallorca by his father, shacked up with a Margarita Colón (Colón, Colom, it's all the same) and out popped Chris - in 1460, nine years after what is normally taken as the year of his birth in Genoa.
Charles was the brother of Fernando, also of Aragon, who married Isabel of Castile and thus - through their union as Catholic Kings - created the modern Spain. It was Fernando and Isabel who, after some years of being pestered, finally gave in to Columbus's desire to go and find China in the opposite direction from that to which it was normally approached.
The mystery of Martorell's theory is that no one at the time, back in the royal court of the late fifteenth century, seemed to cotton on to the fact that Columbus was indeed Fernando's nephew. At least this is what most, in fact all history books would have us believe. Until, that is, Sr. Martorell came along to imply that Fernando knew all along but obviously wasn't telling, and that it was Columbus's nobility that allowed the king and queen to grant him the most unusual title of viceroy - which they did -when he set off for wherever it was he was going to.
Of course, Martorell might be right, though a professor at the university in Palma considers his version of the Columbus story to be highly improbable. But Mayor Tauler of Felanitx believes him and can see a decent tourist opportunity when it presents itself. The only problem might be convincing all those tourists, especially the American ones, who might otherwise be Genoa-bound.
Columbus is the most famous Spaniard who wasn't actually Spanish. It's for this reason that there is such an industry which wants to find proof that he was as well as an offshoot industry which would like to confer Catalan status on the discoverer as a way of cocking a snook at Spanish pretensions. Politically and touristically there is much riding on the Columbus engima. Over to you, Felanitx.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The mayor of Felanitx wants to make Columbus an "illustrious son" of the town and to attract all-year American tourists in search of their roots at a new theme park with Taino indians (not that they'd be real ones), labouring in building a governor's residence and dying of smallpox. But let's overlook Columbus's genocidist credentials. He wasn't in truth much good at wiping out a race - there are more efficient ways than the ones he and his successors deployed - much as he wasn't much good at discovering America.
It may come as a surprise to learn that Columbus didn't discover Manhattan or Disney World. What he did stumble across, while thinking he was on the way to China, were some islands, one of which is today carved down the centre on maps, the right bit of which is the Allinclusivan Republic, sometimes known as "Dominican" to a bar-owning fraternity of Mallorca intent on wreaking winter-home-from-home, all-inclusive revenge on this part of the Caribbean in retaliation to that of the non-Saint Miguel-buying all-inclusive hoi polloi of the resorts.
Of course, any schoolboy could tell you that it was Columbus who discovered America, although this is increasingly unlikely given the nature of history teaching, which is probably as well given that it isn't strictly true. But the same schoolboy might just also be able to tell you that Columbus came from Genoa in Italy. Which is true, at least it is generally thought to be. Not, however, that some would agree, such as the mayor of Felanitx.
There is a Mallorcan historian called Gabriel Verd Martorell. For years now he has been banging on about Columbus being a felanitxer. The town does have form when it comes to the great Columbus claim; its resort, Porto Colom, claims Columbus for itself. Porto Colom equals Port Columbus. What Martorell reckons is that an Aragonese noble, Charles, exiled to Mallorca by his father, shacked up with a Margarita Colón (Colón, Colom, it's all the same) and out popped Chris - in 1460, nine years after what is normally taken as the year of his birth in Genoa.
Charles was the brother of Fernando, also of Aragon, who married Isabel of Castile and thus - through their union as Catholic Kings - created the modern Spain. It was Fernando and Isabel who, after some years of being pestered, finally gave in to Columbus's desire to go and find China in the opposite direction from that to which it was normally approached.
The mystery of Martorell's theory is that no one at the time, back in the royal court of the late fifteenth century, seemed to cotton on to the fact that Columbus was indeed Fernando's nephew. At least this is what most, in fact all history books would have us believe. Until, that is, Sr. Martorell came along to imply that Fernando knew all along but obviously wasn't telling, and that it was Columbus's nobility that allowed the king and queen to grant him the most unusual title of viceroy - which they did -when he set off for wherever it was he was going to.
Of course, Martorell might be right, though a professor at the university in Palma considers his version of the Columbus story to be highly improbable. But Mayor Tauler of Felanitx believes him and can see a decent tourist opportunity when it presents itself. The only problem might be convincing all those tourists, especially the American ones, who might otherwise be Genoa-bound.
Columbus is the most famous Spaniard who wasn't actually Spanish. It's for this reason that there is such an industry which wants to find proof that he was as well as an offshoot industry which would like to confer Catalan status on the discoverer as a way of cocking a snook at Spanish pretensions. Politically and touristically there is much riding on the Columbus engima. Over to you, Felanitx.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Friday, November 06, 2009
Grantchester Meadows
In Cambridgeshire there is a golf course which is completely organic. You'll have to forgive me, I missed the name of the course, but there was a report about it on Five Live the other day. I emailed the station to ask if they could send me the name, but ... . Anyway, the point about this is that it demonstrates the extent to which golf developments are being planned in a way that they have strong environmental elements. The course itself has separate meadows for flowers and birds, while a river attracts numerous types of wild fowl. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds has been involved in the planning of the course, and the representative from the RSPB said that, though golf courses can be harmful to the environment, managed correctly there is no reason why courses cannot co-exist happily with nature.
Instinctively, I'm inclined to believe this. A development that just ploughs up habitats unthinkingly is no good, and this may well have been the case in the past: one thinks of all the conversion of unproductive agricultural land in Britain that was turned over to golfers. Yet, why shouldn't the two make for environmental bedfellows? In the Cambridgeshire case, the golfers themselves are said to be all in favour because of the ambience created, while apparently the Royal and Ancient now have firm environmental management policies.
One says all this in connection with courses in Mallorca, especially those in the planning or to be developed, such as the one in Muro about which there has been such a protracted environmental hoo-hah. Things have gone pretty quiet on the Son Bosc development front, but the Gobby lobby have had its latest objection rejected, one that centred on a less-than-favourable report by its own people being ignored by the environment ministry.
I have never understood why there has been such a fuss, other than the fact that the course might turn out to be a white elephant. From an environmental point of view, it surely can be made to work. Perhaps the Muro developers should be talking to those in Cambridgeshire who are making it work.
Continuing Columbus
And ever more on the Columbus story, and once again thanks to Dom for his feedback on this. There is a blog site - http://www.medievalnews.blogspot.com - which would be good for any of you who might have a general interest in history, but specifically it ran a thing on 26 October entitled "Scholar casts doubt on claims that Columbus was a Catalan". This reports views of a Dr. Diana Gilliland Wright who questions the significance of a particular form of punctuation used by Columbus and said to be indicative of Catalan of the time. She says that this was used elsewhere, for instance by the Venetians who were of course Italian, even if Venice is some distance from Genoa. Moreover, she says that spelling at that time was "fluid", which does to a degree support my own view that Columbus could very easily have acquired a "polyglot tongue" especially if his written works were grafted onto what was effectively a blank canvas as native Genoese did not have a written language as such.
Light Up The Sky
'Tis that time of the year. There is even a Bonfire Night tomorrow night at the Mallorca Cricket Club ("the island's premier ex-pat community family event , it says: why do they spell expat with a hyphen; it's one word). But note that it is Bonfire Night, not Guy Fawkes. We've stopped having guys. We don't burn effigies. Or do we? Somewhere in Surrey, they put Jordan to the flame yesterday. What a splendid idea, all that silicone exploding, while a touch of satire, rather like the giant heads in Mallorca at fiesta time, are often satirical representations of local politicians and others. Makes me think. Who would I burn? A couple of clients I can think of could do with a good dousing. Who would you burn? Step forward - probably - Gordon and any number of MPs, but otherwise ... ?
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Police, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYZQYui8Svc. Today's title - well, don't know that it is Grantchester, but it'll do. Two questions - who was the poet who wrote about Grantchester - "stands the church clock at ten to three" - and which band did something with this title?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Instinctively, I'm inclined to believe this. A development that just ploughs up habitats unthinkingly is no good, and this may well have been the case in the past: one thinks of all the conversion of unproductive agricultural land in Britain that was turned over to golfers. Yet, why shouldn't the two make for environmental bedfellows? In the Cambridgeshire case, the golfers themselves are said to be all in favour because of the ambience created, while apparently the Royal and Ancient now have firm environmental management policies.
One says all this in connection with courses in Mallorca, especially those in the planning or to be developed, such as the one in Muro about which there has been such a protracted environmental hoo-hah. Things have gone pretty quiet on the Son Bosc development front, but the Gobby lobby have had its latest objection rejected, one that centred on a less-than-favourable report by its own people being ignored by the environment ministry.
I have never understood why there has been such a fuss, other than the fact that the course might turn out to be a white elephant. From an environmental point of view, it surely can be made to work. Perhaps the Muro developers should be talking to those in Cambridgeshire who are making it work.
Continuing Columbus
And ever more on the Columbus story, and once again thanks to Dom for his feedback on this. There is a blog site - http://www.medievalnews.blogspot.com - which would be good for any of you who might have a general interest in history, but specifically it ran a thing on 26 October entitled "Scholar casts doubt on claims that Columbus was a Catalan". This reports views of a Dr. Diana Gilliland Wright who questions the significance of a particular form of punctuation used by Columbus and said to be indicative of Catalan of the time. She says that this was used elsewhere, for instance by the Venetians who were of course Italian, even if Venice is some distance from Genoa. Moreover, she says that spelling at that time was "fluid", which does to a degree support my own view that Columbus could very easily have acquired a "polyglot tongue" especially if his written works were grafted onto what was effectively a blank canvas as native Genoese did not have a written language as such.
Light Up The Sky
'Tis that time of the year. There is even a Bonfire Night tomorrow night at the Mallorca Cricket Club ("the island's premier ex-pat community family event , it says: why do they spell expat with a hyphen; it's one word). But note that it is Bonfire Night, not Guy Fawkes. We've stopped having guys. We don't burn effigies. Or do we? Somewhere in Surrey, they put Jordan to the flame yesterday. What a splendid idea, all that silicone exploding, while a touch of satire, rather like the giant heads in Mallorca at fiesta time, are often satirical representations of local politicians and others. Makes me think. Who would I burn? A couple of clients I can think of could do with a good dousing. Who would you burn? Step forward - probably - Gordon and any number of MPs, but otherwise ... ?
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Police, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYZQYui8Svc. Today's title - well, don't know that it is Grantchester, but it'll do. Two questions - who was the poet who wrote about Grantchester - "stands the church clock at ten to three" - and which band did something with this title?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Wednesday, November 04, 2009
Flim Flam Man
Something of a follow-up day today. Follow-up to two stories, one about Columbus, the other about "Sun, Sea and A&E". Both stem from comments received.
To Columbus first, and the piece on The Columbus Industry. The author of the comment describes much of the evidence that seeks to establish Columbus's place of birth as anywhere other than Genoa as "flim flam". A rather good expression. I must use it myself some time. Intuitively, I cannot go along with the non-Genoa hypotheses, while factually there is, as the commentator points out, much which does uphold the Genoa argument.
When the book by Estelle Irizarry and its findings were being reported, it was being said that it had been proved that Columbus was Catalan. The book has done no such thing. Had it been irrefutably proved, then there would have been one hell of a song and dance. But there wasn't, because it hadn't been. What the book has done is to advance an important contribution to the Columbus debate, one that underscores previous work that has sought to make the Catalan link. And it is genuinely important as it has addressed Columbus's use of language, one that has baffled historians and also baffled his contemporaries, such as Las Casas. Irizarry may have established a Catalan element and also established that Columbus spoke Catalan (or a Ladino variant) before Castilian, but this, in itself, does not mean that he might not have acquired this somewhere other than Catalonia or Aragon. Until it can be proved, indisputably, that Columbus was born somewhere other than Genoa, the debate will continue, and the Genoa argument will continue to hold sway.
Mallorca on the telly
And so to "Sun, Sea and A&E". I think I have upset someone, namely Gill Bucklitsch, the lady who works at Muro hospital, is featured on the programme and who was interviewed by "The Bulletin", something that inspired an earlier piece. She found it "rather insulting". In which case I apologise. It is not my intention to offend.
Moving on, the piece was one about the celebrity that comes from reality TV and also TV's portrayal of Mallorca, one that I described as "telly froth". I'm afraid that I don't buy the argument that reality TV is somehow promotion for Mallorca. That "Sun, Sea and A&E" shows local health services and staff in a positive light is commendable, but do people choose their holidays on the basis of medical provision? Perhaps they ought to, in which case they wouldn't go to Egypt if they heard of the story of the eight-year-old girl who was whisked away from her parents, suspected of having landed with swine flu.
When Clarkson and the boys came to do their "Top Gear" show, it was also said that this would be good for Mallorca. Why? It was a programme about cars and a rally, not a travelogue. The interest for some would have been heightened as they would have known the location, that I can see, but it would not necessarily result in a sudden rush of bookings from those who didn't. That there is now talk of a new race-track for Mallorca may be beneficial, though don't let's expect an Abu Dhabi and Button and Vettel haring around a Mallorcan F1 circuit any time soon. Nevertheless, with the sun shining, Mallorca did look pretty good during whatever it was the Top Gear trio were doing, and I can't pretend to understand what, other than the fact they were driving cars - some of the time.
Otherwise, what would make for good TV for Mallorca? Travel shows, yes, a decent drama series, yes. A soap might even do it. And then there might be historical dramas. Chopin's winter in Mallorca wouldn't do, as a truthful telling would reveal how much he disliked Valldemossa. Robert Graves possibly, though I'm not sure what. Or how about the Moors and the Christians? Shot on location around Pollensa, though the chances of a British production team doing it would be remote, on the grounds of religious insensitivity. Shame, it could make a rollicking good drama. The story of the reclaiming of Albufera? Shot on location around Alcúdia, Sa Pobla and Muro. There are probably any number of possibilities that would be genuinely meaningful.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Superb, The Decemberists. This is them on Letterman, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlb197LmwSw. And here is the shorter version of the O Valencia video.
Today's title - this was a film with George C. Scott, and there was also a song by one of the most distinctive female vocalists from the '60s and '70s.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
To Columbus first, and the piece on The Columbus Industry. The author of the comment describes much of the evidence that seeks to establish Columbus's place of birth as anywhere other than Genoa as "flim flam". A rather good expression. I must use it myself some time. Intuitively, I cannot go along with the non-Genoa hypotheses, while factually there is, as the commentator points out, much which does uphold the Genoa argument.
When the book by Estelle Irizarry and its findings were being reported, it was being said that it had been proved that Columbus was Catalan. The book has done no such thing. Had it been irrefutably proved, then there would have been one hell of a song and dance. But there wasn't, because it hadn't been. What the book has done is to advance an important contribution to the Columbus debate, one that underscores previous work that has sought to make the Catalan link. And it is genuinely important as it has addressed Columbus's use of language, one that has baffled historians and also baffled his contemporaries, such as Las Casas. Irizarry may have established a Catalan element and also established that Columbus spoke Catalan (or a Ladino variant) before Castilian, but this, in itself, does not mean that he might not have acquired this somewhere other than Catalonia or Aragon. Until it can be proved, indisputably, that Columbus was born somewhere other than Genoa, the debate will continue, and the Genoa argument will continue to hold sway.
Mallorca on the telly
And so to "Sun, Sea and A&E". I think I have upset someone, namely Gill Bucklitsch, the lady who works at Muro hospital, is featured on the programme and who was interviewed by "The Bulletin", something that inspired an earlier piece. She found it "rather insulting". In which case I apologise. It is not my intention to offend.
Moving on, the piece was one about the celebrity that comes from reality TV and also TV's portrayal of Mallorca, one that I described as "telly froth". I'm afraid that I don't buy the argument that reality TV is somehow promotion for Mallorca. That "Sun, Sea and A&E" shows local health services and staff in a positive light is commendable, but do people choose their holidays on the basis of medical provision? Perhaps they ought to, in which case they wouldn't go to Egypt if they heard of the story of the eight-year-old girl who was whisked away from her parents, suspected of having landed with swine flu.
When Clarkson and the boys came to do their "Top Gear" show, it was also said that this would be good for Mallorca. Why? It was a programme about cars and a rally, not a travelogue. The interest for some would have been heightened as they would have known the location, that I can see, but it would not necessarily result in a sudden rush of bookings from those who didn't. That there is now talk of a new race-track for Mallorca may be beneficial, though don't let's expect an Abu Dhabi and Button and Vettel haring around a Mallorcan F1 circuit any time soon. Nevertheless, with the sun shining, Mallorca did look pretty good during whatever it was the Top Gear trio were doing, and I can't pretend to understand what, other than the fact they were driving cars - some of the time.
Otherwise, what would make for good TV for Mallorca? Travel shows, yes, a decent drama series, yes. A soap might even do it. And then there might be historical dramas. Chopin's winter in Mallorca wouldn't do, as a truthful telling would reveal how much he disliked Valldemossa. Robert Graves possibly, though I'm not sure what. Or how about the Moors and the Christians? Shot on location around Pollensa, though the chances of a British production team doing it would be remote, on the grounds of religious insensitivity. Shame, it could make a rollicking good drama. The story of the reclaiming of Albufera? Shot on location around Alcúdia, Sa Pobla and Muro. There are probably any number of possibilities that would be genuinely meaningful.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Superb, The Decemberists. This is them on Letterman, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlb197LmwSw. And here is the shorter version of the O Valencia video.
Today's title - this was a film with George C. Scott, and there was also a song by one of the most distinctive female vocalists from the '60s and '70s.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Saturday, October 24, 2009
The Columbus Industry
This is the thing about Columbus that appeared in "Talk Of The North" this week, the piece to which I referred on 16 October (Chris and Yasmin). I was thinking of reproducing another thing that went into TOTN - about the Ternelles carry-on - as it had, what I thought, a pretty good gag in the final paragraph which mysteriously didn't appear. But as I've done enough on that subject already, you'll never know the gag.
Anyway, here's the Columbus industry:
Christopher Columbus, Cristóbal Colón, Cristofol Colom, Cristoforo Colombo - take your pick. There is a Columbus industry in Spain, one dedicated to proving that the discoverer of the Americas did not come from Genoa. There is also a lot riding on Columbus not being Italian. So synonymous is he with Spain that the "Día de la Hispanidad" coincides with the day on which he made landfall at what he called San Salvador on 12 October, 1492. In the variants of his name, he is celebrated by streets, such as Cristofol Colom in Alcúdia old town; in Porto Colom he has been claimed as one of their own. DNA tests on those with the Colom or Colón surname have sought to prove his Spanishness or maybe his Catalan or even Mallorcan origins.
The traditional historical view of Columbus is that he came from Genoa, but there has long been sufficient mystery as to his background that his birthplace has been the subject of fierce and patriotic debate, and no more so than in Spain where the patronage of the Catholic Kings resulted in his discovery of the New World and heralded Spain's Golden Age. National pride, akin to Spain winning the Euros, would flow from it actually being proven that C.C. was a Spaniard all along, or you might think it would were it not for his tarnished image or that he was in fact Catalan.
Nevertheless, Genoa is usually accepted as being his place of birth, and the Genoese were merchant traders and familiar to the Spanish court of the late fifteenth century. In itself, it would have been no surprise had he, from Genoa, been hanging around in the general area of Isabel and Ferdinand. But the Columbus mystery remains and has largely centred on how he spoke and on how he wrote. The only real agreement is that his language has been hard to pinpoint. One argument is that he learnt a corrupted form of Castilian while in Lisbon some years before his first voyage. (His wife, indisputably, was Portuguese.) That he appeared never to write in Italian may have been due to the fact that his Genoese dialect, if this was indeed his "native" tongue, was a spoken and not a written language.
In seeking to resolve the Columbus mystery, a new book by Estelle Irizarry, emeritus professor of Spanish literature at the University of Georgetown in Washington, argues that Columbus was in fact of Catalan origin and that he spoke Catalan before he could speak Castilian. In "The DNA Of The Writings Of Columbus", Irizarry places Columbus as having come from Catalan-speaking Aragon, itself of symbolic importance to Mallorcans as this was the kingdom of the "conquistador", Jaume I.
Intriguingly, Irizarry has identified characteristics of linguistic use which point to Columbus possibly having been descended from the Jewish-Spanish race persecuted from the fourteenth century. The language of the Sephardic Jews in Spain was Ladino, a mix of primarily Hebrew and Spanish. Though Irizarry has identified use of Ladino by Columbus, she implies that there was also a variant - Ladino-Catalan - and that this usage indicates a Catalan origin. Sephardic Jews were to be found across Spain, but they were certainly prominent in Aragon and Catalonia, and even in Palma.
Claims of Jewish or Catalan lineage or birth are nothing new in the Columbus mystery. But if Irizarry has indeed managed, via a study of linguistics, to unravel the mystery and to establish a Catalan origin, how well would this all sit with Columbus and the Día de la Hispanidad? Not very well where more radical Catalan voices might be concerned, one would imagine. The Columbus industry, moreover, has scarred the reputation of the discoverer, which might make those who would claim "ownership" of him pause and consider him in terms of current-day political correctness. Not only was he a lousy administrator, he has been blamed for the wiping-out of the indigenous Taino indians. The Tainos may have bequeathed us certain words - hammock, hurricane, barbecue, for example - but they survived as a separate race for only a short period once Columbus had colonised La Española.
Yet for all this, how does it square with the fact that Columbus did have Genoese connections? With the fact this brothers came from Genoa to join him on voyages? Or with the generally held view that his father, Domenico, is meant to have originated from the village of Moconesi near to Genoa? Or that he himself once clearly stated that he was born in Genoa, despite his frequently being attributed with having said that he came from nothing?
Columbus, it is said, sought to hide his origins because they were humble. His father, if indeed Domenico was his father, was a mere weaver. It might be construed that he was ambiguous as to his background because of a possible Jewishness, even if it was not unknown for "conversos" from the Jewish faith to rise to positions of importance at the time of his voyages. But it is not inconceivable that he acquired what was a polyglot tongue. His time in Lisbon may be more significant than previously thought, as Portugal, prior to expelling Jews at the very end of the fifteenth century, had become something of a refuge for Sephardic Jews leaving Spain in the years before the final expulsion order of 1492. If it is true that Columbus acquired his Castilian in Lisbon, then might it be that this was influenced by Ladino? Columbus was clearly exposed to the Jewish community in Lisbon. In his will, he referred to the Jew who guarded the gate to the Jewish quarter. This all said, it is the Catalan element in Professor Irizarry's findings that is the wild card.
The Columbus mystery and the Columbus industry will continue. There's too much riding on them for his origins to be finally and irrefutably laid to rest.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - It was on my list of last year's songs of the year - Paul McCartney and Youth, "Sing The Changes", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wQmHhlZlfg.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Anyway, here's the Columbus industry:
Christopher Columbus, Cristóbal Colón, Cristofol Colom, Cristoforo Colombo - take your pick. There is a Columbus industry in Spain, one dedicated to proving that the discoverer of the Americas did not come from Genoa. There is also a lot riding on Columbus not being Italian. So synonymous is he with Spain that the "Día de la Hispanidad" coincides with the day on which he made landfall at what he called San Salvador on 12 October, 1492. In the variants of his name, he is celebrated by streets, such as Cristofol Colom in Alcúdia old town; in Porto Colom he has been claimed as one of their own. DNA tests on those with the Colom or Colón surname have sought to prove his Spanishness or maybe his Catalan or even Mallorcan origins.
The traditional historical view of Columbus is that he came from Genoa, but there has long been sufficient mystery as to his background that his birthplace has been the subject of fierce and patriotic debate, and no more so than in Spain where the patronage of the Catholic Kings resulted in his discovery of the New World and heralded Spain's Golden Age. National pride, akin to Spain winning the Euros, would flow from it actually being proven that C.C. was a Spaniard all along, or you might think it would were it not for his tarnished image or that he was in fact Catalan.
Nevertheless, Genoa is usually accepted as being his place of birth, and the Genoese were merchant traders and familiar to the Spanish court of the late fifteenth century. In itself, it would have been no surprise had he, from Genoa, been hanging around in the general area of Isabel and Ferdinand. But the Columbus mystery remains and has largely centred on how he spoke and on how he wrote. The only real agreement is that his language has been hard to pinpoint. One argument is that he learnt a corrupted form of Castilian while in Lisbon some years before his first voyage. (His wife, indisputably, was Portuguese.) That he appeared never to write in Italian may have been due to the fact that his Genoese dialect, if this was indeed his "native" tongue, was a spoken and not a written language.
In seeking to resolve the Columbus mystery, a new book by Estelle Irizarry, emeritus professor of Spanish literature at the University of Georgetown in Washington, argues that Columbus was in fact of Catalan origin and that he spoke Catalan before he could speak Castilian. In "The DNA Of The Writings Of Columbus", Irizarry places Columbus as having come from Catalan-speaking Aragon, itself of symbolic importance to Mallorcans as this was the kingdom of the "conquistador", Jaume I.
Intriguingly, Irizarry has identified characteristics of linguistic use which point to Columbus possibly having been descended from the Jewish-Spanish race persecuted from the fourteenth century. The language of the Sephardic Jews in Spain was Ladino, a mix of primarily Hebrew and Spanish. Though Irizarry has identified use of Ladino by Columbus, she implies that there was also a variant - Ladino-Catalan - and that this usage indicates a Catalan origin. Sephardic Jews were to be found across Spain, but they were certainly prominent in Aragon and Catalonia, and even in Palma.
Claims of Jewish or Catalan lineage or birth are nothing new in the Columbus mystery. But if Irizarry has indeed managed, via a study of linguistics, to unravel the mystery and to establish a Catalan origin, how well would this all sit with Columbus and the Día de la Hispanidad? Not very well where more radical Catalan voices might be concerned, one would imagine. The Columbus industry, moreover, has scarred the reputation of the discoverer, which might make those who would claim "ownership" of him pause and consider him in terms of current-day political correctness. Not only was he a lousy administrator, he has been blamed for the wiping-out of the indigenous Taino indians. The Tainos may have bequeathed us certain words - hammock, hurricane, barbecue, for example - but they survived as a separate race for only a short period once Columbus had colonised La Española.
Yet for all this, how does it square with the fact that Columbus did have Genoese connections? With the fact this brothers came from Genoa to join him on voyages? Or with the generally held view that his father, Domenico, is meant to have originated from the village of Moconesi near to Genoa? Or that he himself once clearly stated that he was born in Genoa, despite his frequently being attributed with having said that he came from nothing?
Columbus, it is said, sought to hide his origins because they were humble. His father, if indeed Domenico was his father, was a mere weaver. It might be construed that he was ambiguous as to his background because of a possible Jewishness, even if it was not unknown for "conversos" from the Jewish faith to rise to positions of importance at the time of his voyages. But it is not inconceivable that he acquired what was a polyglot tongue. His time in Lisbon may be more significant than previously thought, as Portugal, prior to expelling Jews at the very end of the fifteenth century, had become something of a refuge for Sephardic Jews leaving Spain in the years before the final expulsion order of 1492. If it is true that Columbus acquired his Castilian in Lisbon, then might it be that this was influenced by Ladino? Columbus was clearly exposed to the Jewish community in Lisbon. In his will, he referred to the Jew who guarded the gate to the Jewish quarter. This all said, it is the Catalan element in Professor Irizarry's findings that is the wild card.
The Columbus mystery and the Columbus industry will continue. There's too much riding on them for his origins to be finally and irrefutably laid to rest.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - It was on my list of last year's songs of the year - Paul McCartney and Youth, "Sing The Changes", http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wQmHhlZlfg.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Friday, October 16, 2009
Chris And Yasmin
The history of the Jewish people in Spain has largely reflected their treatment in many other countries. Though the Jews were generally accommodated by the Muslims during the period of the caliphate, persecutions in the form of pogroms emerged from the eleventh century, and in the fifteenth century Jews were forced to convert to Catholicism, to go into exile or be subjected to the inquisition. Spanish history, from mediaeval times, has partly been one of persecution of two peoples - the Jews and the Catalans. All the more ironic, therefore, that a new book should suggest that the iconic figure of Christopher Columbus was not only Catalan but that he also spoke Ladino, the Judaeo-Spanish language of the Sephardic Jews of Spain.
The Columbus angle I won't go into here; it is likely to be covered elsewhere - in "Talk Of The North". But if the book, by a Professor Irizarry of the University of Georgetown, has indeed resolved the mystery surrounding Columbus's origins, it will shatter a number of illusions.
While Catalan persecution was essentially one of proscription, and not just by Franco - Philip V banned Catalan under the "Nueva Planta" decrees of the early eighteenth century (this was in fact dramatised as part of Alcúdia's "Via Fora" programme during the summer) - Jewish persecution was more extreme. By the later nineteenth century, though there were few Jews left in Spain, they were still singled out as being responsible for the ruin of Spain during a period of newly assertive arch-Catholicism that was to endure and to find expression in Franco's nationalism. It is another irony, though, that Franco did not share Hitler's hatred of the Jews. Indeed Spain was something of a safe haven for Jews, which was just one of the reasons why Hitler mistrusted Franco.
Just as Catalan culture has enjoyed a remarkable renaissance, so also has the Sephardic Jewish tradition and its culture begun to flourish under a liberal democracy. It was perhaps no coincidence that during the summer the Sephardic music group Yardem performed in Pollensa, a town which bears its Catalan cultural credentials more strongly than most others in Mallorca. Within the new Catalan tradition, there is arguably more support of other cultures that had been threatened with extinction or had been banished.
Ladino and Sephardism have now also shot to prominence through the work of Yasmin Levy. The daughter of Isaac Levy, himself a hugely significant figure in Ladino culture, has released an astonishing album - "Sentir" - which takes Ladino and has combined it, to the annoyance of some purists, with elements of flamenco; it is produced by the influential Spanish flamenco artist and producer, Javier Limón.
It is a coincidence that, just as Levy is bringing back the music of a culture that was effectively kicked out of Spain in the late fifteenth century, so also is that culture being given additional exposure through, of all people, Christopher Columbus, whose discovery of the Americas on 12 October 1492 is celebrated annually as part of the "Día de la Hispanidad" (Spanish day) celebrations. How very, very ironic.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Saint Etienne, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UZyfEl4fF4.
LINK
No quiz today, but here is a documentary thing about Yasmin Levy. There are further links from this to songs from her album: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_HN5R6f5Uk.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
The Columbus angle I won't go into here; it is likely to be covered elsewhere - in "Talk Of The North". But if the book, by a Professor Irizarry of the University of Georgetown, has indeed resolved the mystery surrounding Columbus's origins, it will shatter a number of illusions.
While Catalan persecution was essentially one of proscription, and not just by Franco - Philip V banned Catalan under the "Nueva Planta" decrees of the early eighteenth century (this was in fact dramatised as part of Alcúdia's "Via Fora" programme during the summer) - Jewish persecution was more extreme. By the later nineteenth century, though there were few Jews left in Spain, they were still singled out as being responsible for the ruin of Spain during a period of newly assertive arch-Catholicism that was to endure and to find expression in Franco's nationalism. It is another irony, though, that Franco did not share Hitler's hatred of the Jews. Indeed Spain was something of a safe haven for Jews, which was just one of the reasons why Hitler mistrusted Franco.
Just as Catalan culture has enjoyed a remarkable renaissance, so also has the Sephardic Jewish tradition and its culture begun to flourish under a liberal democracy. It was perhaps no coincidence that during the summer the Sephardic music group Yardem performed in Pollensa, a town which bears its Catalan cultural credentials more strongly than most others in Mallorca. Within the new Catalan tradition, there is arguably more support of other cultures that had been threatened with extinction or had been banished.
Ladino and Sephardism have now also shot to prominence through the work of Yasmin Levy. The daughter of Isaac Levy, himself a hugely significant figure in Ladino culture, has released an astonishing album - "Sentir" - which takes Ladino and has combined it, to the annoyance of some purists, with elements of flamenco; it is produced by the influential Spanish flamenco artist and producer, Javier Limón.
It is a coincidence that, just as Levy is bringing back the music of a culture that was effectively kicked out of Spain in the late fifteenth century, so also is that culture being given additional exposure through, of all people, Christopher Columbus, whose discovery of the Americas on 12 October 1492 is celebrated annually as part of the "Día de la Hispanidad" (Spanish day) celebrations. How very, very ironic.
QUIZ
Yesterday's title - Saint Etienne, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UZyfEl4fF4.
LINK
No quiz today, but here is a documentary thing about Yasmin Levy. There are further links from this to songs from her album: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_HN5R6f5Uk.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Friday, October 12, 2007
Took Some Time To Celebrate
Another day, another holiday. What’s this one? Día de la Hispanidad - day of Spanishness, or something like that. A national day, though there are some factions none too keen on the whole deal, like some of the Catalonians, a bunch of whom are using today to declare that the Catalan countries are the last colony of the Spanish monarchy. Whatever.
In actual fact today is a sort of three-in-one day as it is also Columbus’s day and the day for the Virgen del Pilar. How about that, three “holidays” and they go and put them all on the same day, but given that holidays come thick and fast here, we should be grateful, or ungrateful, depending on your view. One chap in “Ultima Hora”, asked about the meaning of today, reckons it is of no consequence except for the fact that he doesn’t have to work. Like public holidays everywhere, in other words.
And just a footnote to yesterday’s history lesson. There was something else that bugged me about that article. Couldn’t put my finger on it. Then it registered. The article says that “a man named Pedro de Córdoba wrote to King Ferdinand (Fernando) in 1517 and told the monarch ...” What this “man” (actually a quite important figure of the times) told the king is of little consequence as, and this was what had been concerning me, Fernando died in 1516.
And as I looked at this article again, I noticed something else very strange. It says that Columbus could have merged two cultures, one of them (the Spanish presumably) being a culture that “had grown with the teachings of Aristotle, Galileo and Newton.” Eh!? Galileo was born in 1564, Newton in 1663. Given that Columbus died in 1506 ... Enough, enough. Where do they get this rubbish from?
QUIZ
Yesterday - Chick Corea. Today’s title is the second line from ...?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
In actual fact today is a sort of three-in-one day as it is also Columbus’s day and the day for the Virgen del Pilar. How about that, three “holidays” and they go and put them all on the same day, but given that holidays come thick and fast here, we should be grateful, or ungrateful, depending on your view. One chap in “Ultima Hora”, asked about the meaning of today, reckons it is of no consequence except for the fact that he doesn’t have to work. Like public holidays everywhere, in other words.
And just a footnote to yesterday’s history lesson. There was something else that bugged me about that article. Couldn’t put my finger on it. Then it registered. The article says that “a man named Pedro de Córdoba wrote to King Ferdinand (Fernando) in 1517 and told the monarch ...” What this “man” (actually a quite important figure of the times) told the king is of little consequence as, and this was what had been concerning me, Fernando died in 1516.
And as I looked at this article again, I noticed something else very strange. It says that Columbus could have merged two cultures, one of them (the Spanish presumably) being a culture that “had grown with the teachings of Aristotle, Galileo and Newton.” Eh!? Galileo was born in 1564, Newton in 1663. Given that Columbus died in 1506 ... Enough, enough. Where do they get this rubbish from?
QUIZ
Yesterday - Chick Corea. Today’s title is the second line from ...?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Thursday, October 11, 2007
The Enchantment
It just goes to show. One of the good things about this blog is when someone picks me up on something, offers a different slant. It’s as it should be. So following on from the piece about Barcares, Anne Marie says that it is her “favourite place in the whole world” and that it has a “calm enchantment”.
On reflection, yesterday’s piece was probably a bit of a disservice, an observation made at the fag-end of the season when the weather is not at its best. But also one of the things about Barcares and that whole stretch of coast to Manresa, Mal Pas, Bonaire and then up to La Victoria is that it exists at the opposite end of the spectrum to what most people experience of Alcúdia - which is The Mile. Chalk and cheese.
In a way, you wish more visitors would go to this part of Alcúdia. I can quite understand a sense of “calm enchantment” that, for sure, one would never feel along The Mile. Having stopped off at Barcares yesterday, I then drove up to the hermitage at La Victoria, one of those hairy drives on a narrow hillside road, but not in the real-hairy category of the road to Formentor or, more so, to Soller. And when you get to La Victoria, it’s all peace and total tranquility, mountain goats appearing out of the woods and munching away, the view across the bay to Pollensa one of the finest views the island has to offer.
Anyway, here is a touch of the enchantment and also a scene from the hermitage.
Columbus. Tomorrow, 12 October, is the anniversary of his “discovery” of America. “Euro Weekly” runs an unattributed piece on Columbus this week, noting the anti-Columbus protests aimed at his misdeeds. I take an interest in this because of his iconic status in Spanish history and also because of the ongoing claim that he was from Mallorca (for which there is little more than wishful thinking).
I have had cause to correct the history of Columbus in the past, and the EW article gives similar cause. The implication of the article is that Columbus first landed at Hispaniola or La Española; itself a common claim. He did not. On 12 October 1492, Columbus landed at an island in the Bahamas he was to call San Salvador. He then went to Cuba before La Española. According to the article, Columbus discovered the Dominican Republic, travelling on his way from the island of Hispaniola, today called Haiti. This gives a wholly wrong impression. The island of Hispaniola (La Española) comprised both modern-day Haiti and the Dominican Republic; they are not separate islands.
The article goes on by implying that Columbus, on his first trip, discovered a “little patch of land that later came to be called America”. He did not. It was on his third voyage in 1498 that he found the mainland (it was Venezuela); and it was only then that he realised that there was a large mainland. On his fourth voyage, he found central America of the modern-day Honduras and Panama. The article continues by saying that at the end of his return journey (by which one assumes the article to mean his second voyage), the Spanish left with 1600 prisoners. They did not. Columbus did order the seizure of 1600 or so Indians in response to a “rebellion”, but only 550 were sent back to Spain (Castile).
I’m sorry if this sounds a tad picky, but it galls me when such inaccuracies are presented as fact.
Where the article is a bit surer is in looking at Columbus’s role in the treatment of the indigenous Taino Indians, which is the basis for much of the anti-Columbus protest. But it is too simplistic to suggest that he was responsible for “wiping out a people”.
Columbus may have been a great discoverer, but he was a lousy administrator who wielded too much power in a generally incompetent fashion. The brutality of which he, and also his brother Bartolomeo, are accused, was partly a result of a failure (or unwillingness) to distinguish between peaceable Tainos and the cannibal Caribes, who were judged fair game even by supporters of the Indians such as Las Casas; it was also a result of some Tainos not being prepared to commit submissively to Christianity; it was also a result of being unable to control the various factions and other adventurers who came to the Caribbean in Columbus’s wake; it was also a result of greed in seeking gold and slaves (a crime committed by many others); it was also a result of the period in history.
The Taino population did decline dramatically, but this is only partly explained by extermination. Many were deported as slaves; many died of various causes, not least the diseases that the Europeans brought with them; many (well women) were taken by Spanish men, and the resultant cross-bred offspring added significantly to the fall in the pure population.
Tomorrow is the day to celebrate Columbus. Good or bad, let’s at least judge him on the whole story and let’s at least try and get the facts straight.
(As before, I would acknowledge Hugh Thomas “Rivers Of Gold” as source for some of this.)
QUIZ
Yesterday - Meat Loaf “Bat Out Of Hell”. Today’s title. Well, bit of a long-shot this I guess, but it’s the title of one heck of an album by which jazz pianist who also once performed a great track called “Spain”.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
On reflection, yesterday’s piece was probably a bit of a disservice, an observation made at the fag-end of the season when the weather is not at its best. But also one of the things about Barcares and that whole stretch of coast to Manresa, Mal Pas, Bonaire and then up to La Victoria is that it exists at the opposite end of the spectrum to what most people experience of Alcúdia - which is The Mile. Chalk and cheese.
In a way, you wish more visitors would go to this part of Alcúdia. I can quite understand a sense of “calm enchantment” that, for sure, one would never feel along The Mile. Having stopped off at Barcares yesterday, I then drove up to the hermitage at La Victoria, one of those hairy drives on a narrow hillside road, but not in the real-hairy category of the road to Formentor or, more so, to Soller. And when you get to La Victoria, it’s all peace and total tranquility, mountain goats appearing out of the woods and munching away, the view across the bay to Pollensa one of the finest views the island has to offer.
Anyway, here is a touch of the enchantment and also a scene from the hermitage.
Columbus. Tomorrow, 12 October, is the anniversary of his “discovery” of America. “Euro Weekly” runs an unattributed piece on Columbus this week, noting the anti-Columbus protests aimed at his misdeeds. I take an interest in this because of his iconic status in Spanish history and also because of the ongoing claim that he was from Mallorca (for which there is little more than wishful thinking).
I have had cause to correct the history of Columbus in the past, and the EW article gives similar cause. The implication of the article is that Columbus first landed at Hispaniola or La Española; itself a common claim. He did not. On 12 October 1492, Columbus landed at an island in the Bahamas he was to call San Salvador. He then went to Cuba before La Española. According to the article, Columbus discovered the Dominican Republic, travelling on his way from the island of Hispaniola, today called Haiti. This gives a wholly wrong impression. The island of Hispaniola (La Española) comprised both modern-day Haiti and the Dominican Republic; they are not separate islands.
The article goes on by implying that Columbus, on his first trip, discovered a “little patch of land that later came to be called America”. He did not. It was on his third voyage in 1498 that he found the mainland (it was Venezuela); and it was only then that he realised that there was a large mainland. On his fourth voyage, he found central America of the modern-day Honduras and Panama. The article continues by saying that at the end of his return journey (by which one assumes the article to mean his second voyage), the Spanish left with 1600 prisoners. They did not. Columbus did order the seizure of 1600 or so Indians in response to a “rebellion”, but only 550 were sent back to Spain (Castile).
I’m sorry if this sounds a tad picky, but it galls me when such inaccuracies are presented as fact.
Where the article is a bit surer is in looking at Columbus’s role in the treatment of the indigenous Taino Indians, which is the basis for much of the anti-Columbus protest. But it is too simplistic to suggest that he was responsible for “wiping out a people”.
Columbus may have been a great discoverer, but he was a lousy administrator who wielded too much power in a generally incompetent fashion. The brutality of which he, and also his brother Bartolomeo, are accused, was partly a result of a failure (or unwillingness) to distinguish between peaceable Tainos and the cannibal Caribes, who were judged fair game even by supporters of the Indians such as Las Casas; it was also a result of some Tainos not being prepared to commit submissively to Christianity; it was also a result of being unable to control the various factions and other adventurers who came to the Caribbean in Columbus’s wake; it was also a result of greed in seeking gold and slaves (a crime committed by many others); it was also a result of the period in history.
The Taino population did decline dramatically, but this is only partly explained by extermination. Many were deported as slaves; many died of various causes, not least the diseases that the Europeans brought with them; many (well women) were taken by Spanish men, and the resultant cross-bred offspring added significantly to the fall in the pure population.
Tomorrow is the day to celebrate Columbus. Good or bad, let’s at least judge him on the whole story and let’s at least try and get the facts straight.
(As before, I would acknowledge Hugh Thomas “Rivers Of Gold” as source for some of this.)
QUIZ
Yesterday - Meat Loaf “Bat Out Of Hell”. Today’s title. Well, bit of a long-shot this I guess, but it’s the title of one heck of an album by which jazz pianist who also once performed a great track called “Spain”.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
