4 Antonio Pigafetta Bio.

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ANTONIO PIGAFETTA

Italian scholar and explorer from the Republic of Venice. He joined the expedition to the
Spice Islands led by explorer Ferdinand Magellan under the flag of King Charles I of
Spain and, after Magellan's death in the Philippines, the subsequent voyage around the
world. During the expedition, he served as Magellan's assistant and kept an accurate
journal which later assisted him in translating the Cebuano language. It is the first
recorded document concerning the language.
Pigafetta was one of the 18 men who returned to Spain in 1522, under the command
of Juan Sebastián Elcano, out of the approximately 240 who set out three years earlier.
These men completed the first circumnavigation of the world. Pigafetta's surviving
journal is the source for much of what is known about Magellan and Elcano's voyage.
EARLY LIFE
Pigafetta's exact year of birth is not known, with estimates ranging between 1480 and
1491. A birth year of 1491 would have made him around 30 years old during Magellan's
expedition, which historians have considered more probable than an age close to 40.
Pigafetta belonged to a rich family city of Vicenza in northeast Italy. In his youth he
studied astronomy, geography and cartography. He then served on board the ships of
the Knights of Rhodes at the beginning of the 16th century. Until 1519, he accompanied
the papal nuncio, Monsignor Francesco Chieregati, to Spain.

VOYAGE AROUND THE WORLD


In Seville, Pigafetta heard of Magellan's planned expeditionand decided to join,
accepting the title of supernumerary(sobresaliente), and a modest salary of
1,000 maravedís. During the voyage, which started in August 1519, Pigafetta collected
extensive data concerning the geography, climate, flora, fauna and the native
inhabitants of the places that the expedition visited. His meticulous notes proved
invaluable to future explorers and cartographers, mainly due to his inclusion of nautical
and linguistic data, and also to latter-day historians because of its vivid, detailed style.
The only other sailor to maintain a journal during the voyage was Francisco
Albo, Victoria's last pilot, who kept a formal logbook.
RETURN
Pigafetta was wounded on Mactan in the Philippines, where Magellan was killed in
the Battle of Mactan in April 1521 by the local ruler Lapu-Lapu. Nevertheless, he
recovered and was among the 18 who accompanied Juan Sebastián Elcano on board
the Victoria on the return voyage to Spain.
Upon reaching port in Sanlúcar de Barrameda in the modern Province of Cadiz in
September 1522, three years after his departure, Pigafetta returned to the Republic of
Venice. He related his experiences in the "Report on the First Voyage Around the
World" (Italian: Relazione del primo viaggio intorno al mondo), which was composed
in Italian and was distributed to European monarchs in handwritten form before it was
eventually published by Italian historian Giovanni Battista Ramusio in 1550–59. The
account centers on the events in the Mariana Islands and the Philippines, although it
included several maps of other areas as well, including the first known use of the word
"Pacific Ocean" (Oceano Pacifico) on a map.The original document was not preserved.
However, it was not through Pigafetta's writings that Europeans first learned of the
circumnavigation of the globe. Rather, it was through an account written by a Flanders-
based writer Maximilianus Transylvanus, which was published in 1523. Transylvanus
had been instructed to interview some of the survivors of the voyage when Magellan's
surviving ship Victoria returned to Spain in September 1522 under the command
of Juan Sebastian Elcano. After Magellan and Elcano's voyage, Pigafetta utilized the
connections he had made prior to the voyage with the Knights of Rhodes to achieve
membership in the order.

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