The Many Landfalls of John Cabot

by Peter E. Pope

On 24 June 1497 John Cabot landed somewhere on the eastern seaboard of what is now Canada, yet even today, five hundred years later, no one knows precisely where. Once an issue in diplomatic negotiations over title to a continent, Cabot's landfall has also been the subject, especially in centennial years, of competing attempts to appropriate the meaning of the event. Beginning with the historical context of Cabot's journey, Pope traces the various landfall theories which have placed his landing in locations from the Strait of Belle Isle to Cape Breton. The very uncertainty of our knowledge, he argues, has allowed nationalists in both Newfoundland and Canada to shape the debate about Cabot's itinerary and to stake claims to the landfall that amount to the invention of differing national traditions. As well, Pope concludes, the invented tradition of 'discovery' has allowed Europeans and their descendants to overlook the fact that their possession of North America is based on appropriation from Aboriginal peoples. Well-illustrated with period maps, engravings, and stamps, The Many Landfalls of John Cabot will appeal to readers interested in early European transatlantic voyages, in the nature of the anniversaries that have celebrated Cabot's landing, and in the question of how national pasts are constructed, often from ambiguous sources. The North American Society for Oceanic History, John Lyman Book Award 1997 (in the area of Canadian Naval and Maritime History.

208 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 1997

Reviews

[E · Rating 3 out of 5]

I admit I came into this looking for a more geographic treatment, only to discover it covers much broader themes. Historiography, certainly, with implications reaching into what I will loosely call political science.

It’s very interesting, although I’m not sure the author truly realized his audience. He states it is meant for the educated layman, but it still sometimes veers into academic tedium. Other times, the prose is clear and flowing, with even the odd jocular remark thrown in. I’m left with the sense that the book is a concatenation of scholarly articles and classroom lecture notes.

In the end, it left me confused. I appreciated the “discovery” (as the author defines it, which I will leave the reader to learn) of the limited historical and geographical knowledge and of the intertwining roles of myth and myth-making, nationalism, what we now call colonialism and much more. I wish I had been helped a little more to gather it all into a meaningful whole.