1497 Voyage | Age of Exploration | Life on Board | Navigation | About John Cabot Age of Exploration
Why did John Cabot want to sail to the west? John Cabot's voyage in 1497 was an attempt to reach land on the other side of what we now call the Atlantic Ocean. He made a second voyage in 1498. This was an attempt to find a route between England and China. The Background There was a shift in thinking at the time to try and find a different route to the east by sailing westwards. People who favoured this idea must have accepted that the world was round. These people were an exception. In 1497, the average Bristolian had little or no idea of the shape of the world in which they lived. To them, the idea of travelling around the world was as difficult to understand as space travel would have been to a Victorian. The Goods Cabot and his partners eventually hoped to find perfumes, silks and spices. These spices included cinnamon, cloves, ginger, mace, nutmeg and pepper. We can now buy a small tub of these spices for about 50p in a supermarket. In the fifteenth century they were very rare, sought after and expensive goods. They were used to preserve and flavour food that was no longer fresh. The Search for Backing Who paid for Cabot's voyage? No journey of this kind could have taken place without someone putting up the money to pay for it. The players: Henry VII, King of England He had plans to become a great European monarch. To do this he needed to compete with the Spanish and Portuguese Kings who were backing voyages of exploration. Henry probably only gave his approval to Cabot rather than putting money up front. This is suggested by the fact that Henry VII's only contribution to John Cabot's second voyage in 1498 was the loan of one ship. The Merchants of Bristol Cabot's voyage was largely financed by the merchants of Bristol. They were reputed to be a hard bunch. Even so, they preferred to deal with foreigners rather than people from London.
Medieval Bristol Why did Cabot choose to sail from Bristol? Bristol in 1497 was a great European port and the second most important city in England after London. The port had several advantages for anyone who wished to explore the Atlantic Ocean: - It faced in a westerly direction.
- There was a shipbuilding industry and a sailors' quarter in the Marsh Street area of the city.
- Many of these sailors were used to sailing in Atlantic conditions and had almost certainly made voyages to Iceland.
- Bristol shipbuilders were experienced in constructing vessels strong enough to take the battering of North Atlantic waves.
Cabot came to Bristol in either 1495 or 1496 with the intention of finding support for an exploratory voyage across the Atlantic. He stayed in a house in St. Nicholas Street. We know this because there survives an account-book which shows rent being paid by someone called John Cabotto. 1497 - Life at Acton Court Acton Court is a medieval manor house in Iron Acton near Bristol. King Henry VII is known to have stayed there in 1486. Although it is outside the city, the interior furnishings and floor coverings give an idea of the standard of living enjoyed by the merchant class in Bristol. The Fruits of Discovery What were the consequences of Cabot's voyage? Short term In the first instance it made John Cabot famous. People talked about his voyage. He was given a gift of £10 and a pension of £20 a year by Henry VII. Cabot also got backing to make a second voyage in 1498. Medium term Cabot's voyages led other explorers to use Bristol as a port from which to explore the Atlantic. Ferdinando Gorges and Martin Frobisher were two such sixteenth-century explorers. Long term Bristol established itself as an important transatlantic port. Until Liverpool and Glasgow started to be serious competition in the eighteenth century, Bristol had a virtual monopoly of trade that went between the west of England and the Americas. One of the mainstays of this trade was cod. It continued to be important as a commodity from Cabot's time until well into the twentieth century. Hands across the ocean One of the most important long-term effects of Bristol's involvement in Atlantic trade has been the transfer of the English language to the North American continent. North Atlantic Cod Cod was dried and salted in Newfoundland and brought back by ship to Bristol.
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