They Are Supposed To
Be The Easternmost Of The Papua Archipelago, Afterwards Visited By
Carteret, Bougainville, And Other Navigators.
Mendana, during his last
voyage, discovered a group of islands to which he gave the name of
Marquesas de Mendoza.
This group properly belongs to Polynesia: of the other islands in this
quarter of the globe, which were discovered prior to the eighteenth
century, Otaheite is supposed to have been discovered by Quiros in 1606.
His object was to discover the imagined austral continent; but his
discoveries were confined to Otaheite, which he named Sagittaria, and an
island which he named Terra del Esperitu Sancto, which is supposed to be
the principal of the New Hebrides. The Ladrones were discovered by Magellan
in 1521. The New Philippines, or Carolinas, were first made known by the
accidental arrival of a family of their natives at the Philippines in 1686.
Easter island, a detached and remote country, which, however, is inhabited
by the Polynesian race, was discovered by Roggewein in 1686.
Having thus exhibited a brief and general sketch of the progress of
discovery, from the period when the Portuguese first passed the Cape of
Good Hope to the beginning of the eighteenth century, we shall next, before
we give an account of the state and progress of commerce during the same
period, direct our attention to the state of geographical science in the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
We have already stated that the astrolobe, which had been previously
applied only to astronomical purposes, was accommodated to the use of
mariners by Martin Behaim, towards the end of the fifteenth century.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 570 of 1007
Words from 155492 to 155759
of 273188
