Scribd
Upload
113 views2 pages

Pigafetta's Account of Magellan's Voyage

Pigafetta's travelogue provided an eyewitness account of Ferdinand Magellan's historic 1519-1522 circumnavigation of the globe as Magellan's assistant. The travelogue was considered an important work that achieved international recognition for being the first to document the voyage all the way around the world. It described traditions, customs, cultures and languages of populations in areas previously unknown to Europeans. Even today, the memory of Magellan's expedition lives on in celebrations and educational institutions that honor its historic achievement in connecting the world.

Uploaded by

Aliyah Magsino
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
113 views2 pages

Pigafetta's Account of Magellan's Voyage

Pigafetta's travelogue provided an eyewitness account of Ferdinand Magellan's historic 1519-1522 circumnavigation of the globe as Magellan's assistant. The travelogue was considered an important work that achieved international recognition for being the first to document the voyage all the way around the world. It described traditions, customs, cultures and languages of populations in areas previously unknown to Europeans. Even today, the memory of Magellan's expedition lives on in celebrations and educational institutions that honor its historic achievement in connecting the world.

Uploaded by

Aliyah Magsino
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

I.

Primary source

What type of source is Pigafetta's travelogue?


Pigafetta’s journal became the basis for his 1525 travelogue, The First Voyage Around the World.
According to scholar Theodore Cachey Jr., the travelogue represented “the literary epitome of its
genre” and achieved an international reputation (Cachey, xii-xiii). One of Pigafetta’s patrons,
Francesco Chiericati, called the journal “a divine thing” (xl), and Shakespeare himself seems to have
been inspired by work: Setebos, a deity invoked in Pigafetta’s text by men of Patagonia, makes an
appearance in The Tempest (x-xi).

II. Importance of text

The crew of Magellan’s ship gathered a great deal of information that had never been
recorded, much of it remarkable. The most important was the fact that they circumnavigated
the globe, thus verifying the scientific hypothesis that the world is, in fact, round.

The relevance of his own venture, fundamentally lies in the fact that he took part to the first globe
circumnavigation, between 1519 and 1522, and he was able to accomplish it after the murder of
Ferdinand Magellan, leaving a detailed description of the journey in the Report of the first trip around
the world, a lost manuscript that was rescued later, in 1797, and today is considered one of the most
important documentary evidence relating the geographical discoveries of the Sixteenth Century.

It may be said that the first globalization of our world started in that moment.

It is probably the first global book in history that described the Magellan voyage, but it is also an
extraordinary record of traditions, customs and cultural and linguistic features of populations all over
the world that were unknown until that moment.

This kind of document catch audience like students who are studying history, and those researchers who
are making historical analysis.

III. Antonio Pigafetta is He is an Italian nobleman who accompanied Ferdinand Magellan in this
fateful circumnavigation of the world.

In Antonio Pigafetta’s youth, he studied astronomy, geography and cartography. At the


beginning of the 16th century he served on board the ships of the Knights of Rhodes. During
Magellan’s voyage 1519 to 1522, Antonio Pigafetta was Magellan's assistant and kept a journal
accounting for everything that interested him. It was the earliest written account about the
precolonial Philippines.
IV. What was Pigafetta's book over about?

His account was also a major referent to the events leading to Magellan's arrival in the
Philippines, his encounter with local leaders, his death in the hands of Lapulapu's forces in the
Battle of Mactan, and in the departure of what was left of Magellan's fleet from the islands.

V. It’s the best description we have of the Philippines in the early 16th century, and of just how
Magellan’s expedition encountered the islands and the people, so it’s very valuable.

Even today, the memory of this shared historical unique endeavour is still alive in the different
populations that took part in it or were touched by it. It can be seen in many events and occasions of
sociological, educational and ritual nature: schools and universities in the south of Chile whose names
and values are honouring Ferdinand Magellan; festivities taking place in Cebu City (Philippines) in tribute
to the relic of “el Santo Niño”, a small sculpture that Magellan gave to Humabón's wife; social and
political strategies made in Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego, as well as in Spain and Portugal, where
traditions and Magellan values are enhanced to foster sustainable development projects.

You might also like