Bacalao (island)
Bacalao (or Bacalhau , Bachalaos , Bacalhaos , Baccalieu , Baccalar ) is a phantom island that was recorded on several maps from the 16th century. Sightings of the island of Newfoundland probably triggered the entry of Bacalao on the nautical charts. The name appeared on a map for the first time in 1508, but reports of such an island had already been made before that.
As early as 1474, the Portuguese King Alfonso V lent lands on the Azores island of Terceira to the Portuguese navigator João Vaz Corte-Real for his discovery of "Terra Nova do Bacalao" ( New Land of Stockfish ). Bartolomé de Las Casas wrote about Portuguese voyages of discovery to the land of Bacalao ( Terra do Bacalhau ). This led to the assumption that Corte-Real discovered America a few decades before Columbus .
One theory about the origin of the name assumes that fishermen from the Iberian Peninsula fished off Newfoundland as early as the 15th century and processed cod into stockfish ( Bacalao in Spanish or Bacalhau in Portuguese ). The speculations about Bacalao add further speculations about the "true discoverers of America ".
In the northwest of the Newfoundland peninsula Avalon lies an uninhabited, only 5 km² large island called Baccalieu Island (also Baccalao) with which - today - the phantom island can be confused by name. Jack Withers' (1899–1964) folk song The Cliffs of Baccalieu also refers to the real Newfoundland island.
Individual evidence
- ↑ http://www.academyofcodfish.com/cod-corte_real_navigators.htm ( Memento from August 20, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Primary sources: the Corte Real family (English)