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Page 16
We, by the authority of almighty God granted unto us in Saint Peter,
and by the office which we bear on the earth in the stead of Jesus
Christ, do forever, by the tenure of these presents, give, grant,
assign, unto you, your heirs, and successors (the kings of Castile and
Leon), all those lands and islands, with their dominions, territories,
cities, castles, towers, places, and villages, with all the right and
jurisdictions thereunto pertaining: constituting, assigning, and
deputing, you, your heirs, and successors the lords thereof, with full
and free power, authority, and jurisdiction. Decreeing nevertheless by
this, our donation, grant, and assignation, that from no Christian
Prince which actually hath possest the aforesaid islands and firm
lands unto the day of the nativity of our Lord beforesaid, their right
obtained to be understood hereby to be taken away, or that it ought to
be taken away.
Furthermore, we command you in the virtue of holy obedience (as you
have promised, and we doubt not you will do upon mere devotion and
princely magnanimity), to send to the said firm lands and islands
honest, virtuous, and learned men, such as fear God, and are able to
instruct the inhabitants in the Catholic faith and good manners,
applying all their possible diligence in the premises.
We furthermore straightly inhibit all manner of persons, of what
state, degree, order, or condition, soever they be, altho of Imperial
and regal dignity, under the pain of the sentence of excommunication
which they shall incur if they do to the contrary, that they in no
case presume special license of you, your heirs, and successors, to
travel for merchandise or for any other cause, to the said lands or
islands, found or to be found, discovered or to be discovered, toward
the west and south, drawing a line from the pole Arctic to the pole
Antarctic, whether the firm lands and islands found and to be found,
be situated toward India or toward any other part being distant from
the line drawn a hundred leagues toward the west from any of the
islands commonly called De Los Azores and Cabo Verde: Notwithstanding
constitutions, decrees, and apostolic ordinances, whatsoever they are
to the contrary:
In him from whom empires, dominions, and all good things do procede:
Trusting that almighty God directing your enterprises, if you follow
your godly and laudable attempts, your labors and travels herein,
shall in short time obtain a happy end, with felicity and glory of all
Christian people. But forasmuch as it should be a thing of great
difficulty, these letters to be carried to all such places as should
be expedient, we will, and of like motion and knowledge do decree that
whithersoever the same shall be sent, or where soever they shall be
received with the subscription of a common notary thereunto required,
with the seal of any person constituted in ecelesiastical court, or
such as are authorized by the ecclesiastical court, the same faith and
credit to be given thereunto in judgment or elsewhere, as should be
exhibited to these presents.
It shall therefore be lawful for no man to infringe or rashly to
contradict this letter of our commendation, exhortation, request,
donation, grant, assignation, constitution, deputation, decree,
commandment, inhibition, and determination. And if any shall presume
to attempt the same, he ought to know that he shall thereby incur the
indignation of Almighty God and his holy Apostles, Peter and Paul.
Given at Rome, at Saint Peter's: In the year of the incarnation of our
Lord M.CCCC lxx.xxiii. The fourth day of the month of May; the first
year of our seat.
[1] Dated at Rome, May 4th, 1498. It was translated into English
by Richard Eden in 1555, and is printed in Old English and from
black-letter type, by Hart in his "American History Told by
Contemporaries." For the present work the English has been
modernized.
This famous bull was the result of rival claims, made by Spain
and Portugal, to lands discovered beyond the Atlantic. More than
half a century before Columbus found America, the Portuguese had
secured from Pope Eugenius IV a grant in perpetuity of all
heathen lands that might be discovered by them in further
voyages. The grant went so far as to include "the Indies," and
was confirmed by succeeding popes.
When Alexander VI issued his bull the America which Columbus had
found was believed to be not a new continent, but the Indies, and
the Portuguese, who had reached India by way of the Cape of Good
Hope, were threatening to send an expedition across the Atlantic
to take possession and dispute the Spanish claims. It was in
these circumstances, and for the purpose of reconciling the rival
states that Alexander issued the bull, John Fiske has said that,
"As between the two rival powers the Pontiff's arrangement was
made in a spirit of even-handed justice." The bull conferred on
the Spanish sovereigns all the lands already discovered, or
thereafter to be discovered in the western ocean, with
jurisdiction and privileges In all respects similar to those
formerly bestowed upon the crown of Portugal.
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