Bartolomeu Dias: the voyage round the Cape of Good Hope

In early 1488, three Portuguese ships were sailing south along the west coast of Africa. Storms forced them to leave the coast and head south into the open sea. Several days later, when they turned back towards land, the coast was not where it should have been. They found land only by sailing north, and then realised that they had rounded the southern tip of Africa without seeing it. The commander of the fleet was Bartolomeu Dias.

Background: the stone pillars

According to the Encyclopaedia Britannica, almost nothing is known about Dias’s early life. He was probably born around 1450 and was a “squire” of the royal household, which was not a high post.

After Cape Bojador was passed in 1434, Portuguese sailors kept moving south along the coast. According to Britannica, in 1474 King Afonso V entrusted this work to his son, Prince John. Prince John became King John II in 1481 and ordered that the southern limit of Africa be found. Sailors were given stone pillars called “padrão” (padrão), which they set up in new places. One of these captains, Diogo Cão, reached the Congo river and then went south along the coast of Angola to about 22 degrees latitude. After this, the king entrusted the new expedition to Dias.

Three ships

According to Britannica, Dias’s fleet had three ships: his own, the São Cristóvão; the São Pantaleão, commanded by his colleague João Infante; and a supply ship captained by Dias’s brother Pêro (called Diogo in some sources). The crew included the best pilots of the time, among them Pêro de Alenquer and João de Santiago, who had earlier sailed with Cão.

There is disagreement over the date of departure. The 16th-century Portuguese historian João de Barros writes that Dias left in August 1486 and was away for sixteen months and seventeen days. But according to Britannica, two other contemporaries, Duarte Pacheco Pereira and Christopher Columbus, give his return as December 1488. It is therefore now generally accepted that he left in August 1487. George Kimble, in the Hakluyt Society translation, writes that the 1488 date is also supported by two marginal notes in Columbus’s own hand. He adds that Pacheco wrote around 1505, while Barros wrote around 1550.

Without seeing the Cape

According to Britannica, Dias went beyond Cão’s last pillar. He reached the “Land of Santa Barbara” on 4 December, Walvis Bay on 8 December and present-day Algoa Bay on 26 December. After 6 January 1488, storms did not let him advance along the coast, and for several days he sailed south out of sight of land. When he turned east, no land was visible. Only when he went north did the coast come into view on 3 February. He had thus rounded the Cape without seeing it.

The bay they reached was named “Angra de São Brás” (Bay of St Blaise), because that day was dedicated to the saint. It was also called the “Bay of the Cowherds”, after the herdsmen found there. According to E. G. Ravenstein, who edited the journal of Vasco da Gama’s voyage for the Hakluyt Society, this is present-day Mossel Bay.

The sailors’ decision

Dias continued east and reached present-day Algoa Bay. According to Britannica, the crew here were unwilling to go further. Dias had the opinion of all his officers formally written down, and all voted unanimously for return. In the end they agreed to go on for just a few more days and reached a river. It was named “Rio do Infante” after the pilot of the São Pantaleão. It is today the Great Fish River of South Africa. Strong currents forced Dias to turn back.

Nine years later, when Vasco da Gama’s ships passed along the same coast, their journal recorded: “From the Fleet Islands to the last pillar set up by Dias there are five leagues, and from that pillar to the Rio do Infante fifteen leagues.” According to Britannica, one of Dias’s pillars, the “São Gregório”, was found in 1938 on an island about 48 kilometres short of the Great Fish River.

The Cape of “Good Hope”

On the return voyage, in May 1488, Dias finally saw the Cape that he had rounded without seeing. There are two accounts of its name. According to Barros, Dias called it the “Cape of Storms”, and King John II changed the name to the “Cape of Good Hope”. But Duarte Pacheco Pereira, who met Dias on the island of Príncipe on the return journey, writes in his book “Esmeraldo de Situ Orbis” that Dias himself gave the name. When he saw that the coast here turned north and north-east, “which gave great hope of the discovery of India”, he called it the “Cape of Good Hope”. According to Britannica, Pacheco’s account is the more plausible.

Pacheco puts the latitude of the Cape at 34½ degrees south (according to Kimble, the original is 34 degrees 21 minutes). He writes that the land is very high, that there is severe cold and storms from April to September, and that cows, goats, sheep and fish are plentiful.

Little is known about the rest of the return journey. According to Britannica, Dias passed Príncipe, the coast of present-day Liberia and Mina, the Portuguese trading post in Ghana, and reached Portugal in December 1488.

Later life

It is not known what reward Dias received from the king. According to Britannica, he was later put in charge of building two ships for Vasco da Gama’s expedition, the São Gabriel and the São Rafael. In 1497 he sailed with da Gama only as far as the Cape Verde Islands. According to the World History Encyclopedia, da Gama’s crew also included Dias’s chief pilot Pêro de Alenquer, who had experience of the Cape. Where Dias had struggled along the coast against contrary winds and currents, da Gama made a wide sweep through the open sea to catch favourable winds.

In 1500 Dias set out for India with the fleet of Pedro Álvares Cabral, which reached the coast of Brazil on the way. According to Britannica, the next month, on 29 May 1500, Dias’s ship sank in a storm near the same Cape of Good Hope whose route he had opened twelve years earlier.

Next instalment: Ahmad ibn Majid: master navigator of the Indian Ocean.