The Nation at Its Quincentenary: God Bless Ameryk?

George O. Morrison of Monrovia sends me an article from the British magazine Country Life suggesting that our continent may have been named after a pushy English landowner named Richard Ameryk.

That this question is of no great urgency is attested by the fact that the article is dated June 20, 1963.

However, as we approach the quincentenary (Oct. 12, 1992) of Columbus’ discovery of the New World, our interest in that discovery and its consequences is naturally rekindled.

Only recently I was rebuked by Pat Cologne, chairman of the Governor’s Commission for the Quincentenary, for writing that the historic “Land ho!” had been called out from Columbus’ flagship, the Santa Maria.

Cologne advised me that a seaman aboard the smaller and faster Pinta had actually sighted land first. (It is a telltale reflection of Columbus’ character that it was he himself who claimed the 10,000 maravedis (an obsolete Spanish coin) posted for the first man to sight land.)

That landfall was not North America but Guanahani, one of what we now call the Bahamas. It is this island we see in the traditional paintings of Columbus planting the royal banner of Spain in the sand.

For months Columbus sailed around the Indies, raising crosses and looking for gold. When the Santa Maria ran aground and was lost on Hispaniola, Columbus left a colony of 38 men and sailed for Spain on the Nina. The colony later was annihilated by the natives.

Columbus was a visionary and a courageous sailor; beyond that his character was abominable. He was vain, greedy and despotic. He ordered the hanging of many men for imagined conspiracies; he coveted riches and power; he fancied himself the ruler and owner of the New World. On his second voyage he convinced himself that Cuba was the mainland and made every man swear to it, under pain of having his tongue torn out if he should recant.

Returning to Hispaniola, Columbus assumed despotic authority until the arrival of a governor and chief magistrate appointed by the king and queen. Columbus was sent back to Spain in chains.

On his third voyage he landed on the mainland but thought it was an island. Later he did touch the mainland, at the mouth of the Orinoco, but he fantasized that it was the four rivers of paradise at the top of the world (the world being pear-shaped).

He sailed again. For a year he suffered storms, sickness and mutiny, but he returned to Spain still believing he was entitled to the governorship and possession of the Indies he had discovered. He died in obscurity, dispossessed.

In 1499-1500 the Italian navigator Amerigo Vespucci sailed along the Atlantic coast of South America and discovered the mouth of the Amazon River. In a second voyage he discovered the bay of Rio de Janeiro and sailed as far south as Patagonia.

Geographic scholars were convinced by this voyage that the new lands were not a part of Asia but a New World. In 1507 one Martin Waldseemuller published “Four American Voyages” (Vespucci may have made two other voyages), suggesting that the New World be named for “Amerigo the discoverer.”

Thus, historically, the name (in English) America.

The claim for Richard Ameryk is based on his acquaintance with and probable sponsorship of the English explorer John Cabot, who sailed in 1497 from Bristol to what is believed to have been Labrador, on the continent. (Cabot thought it was Asia.)

Ameryk was an ambitious Bristol merchant and entrepreneur who obtained large holdings of land and is believed to have been a friend of Cabot and to have backed his voyages with cash and supplies. It was characteristic of Cabot to reward friends by giving them islands. A contemporary wrote: “The Admiral . . . has given a companion an island and has also given another to his barber.”

Cabot is thought to have been a frequent visitor at Ameryk’s Tudor mansion. “In the intimate society of Tudor Bristol,” Country Life observes, “he could hardly avoid the hospitality of its most pushing citizen.”

Surely it is not illogical to think that a man who would give an island to his barber might name his most important discovery for a genial host and generous backer.

A more tantalizing piece of evidence is a copy of a calendar of Bristol events of 1497. It reads: “This year on St. John the Baptist’s Day (June 24) the land of America was found by the merchants of Bristowe in a ship of Bristowe called the Mathew.” (The Matthew was Cabot’s ship.)

This document predates Waldseemuller’s naming of the continent for Amerigo Vespucci by 10 years. However, it is only a copy. The original is lost. It is possible, skeptics note, that the copier may have written in “America.” But what would have been his reason?

I find it amusing to think that our country was named after a money- grubbing English social climber.