superfluously for they that doe superfluously are of Kinne to the Deuil Slay not your children for no cause Bee yee not Fornicators for that is wickednesse and a bad way Be reuenged on Murtherers Say nothing till yee know it for you must giue account of your saying 26. In disputing or reasoning vse onely good words Answere in honest sort to him which asketh thee 27. Be iust in weight and measure 37. The Deuill standeth ouer the makers of songs and lies that is the Poets if they amend not doing good 68. If you cannot giue be daily in prayers Pay your tithes following GOD and the Prophet They which do not good but for vaine glory and ostentation shall bee damned 118. The Histories which are in the Old Testament are so cited by him as if hee neuer had read them so many dreames and lies are inserted Az. 12. Before PRAIER WASH the face the hands the armes vp to the elbow the feete vp to the ankles and after carnall company wash in the Bath and if water cannot bee had with dust of cleane earth GOD desireth cleannesse 9. In prayer let them be sober that they may know what they say 2. GOD will not aske why men pray not toward the East for the East and West is his but will demand of the workes which they haue done of their Almes Pilgrimages and Prayers He commandeth that they be humble in prayer and that in prayer they turne towards Mecca Euery one which shall pray asking that which is good which way soeuer hee shall turne him shall be heard of GOD although the true manner of praying be toward the Center of the Temple of Mecca They which are good make their prayers to helpe them by their patience and abstinence GOD dwelleth in such men Pray according to the vsuall custome in all places the foot-man on foote the horseman on his horse Az. 3. He that giueth his owne for Gods sake is like a graine that hath seuen eares euery of which containeth an hundred graines Good men loose not your Almes by vaine glorie 4. Giue almes of the good gaines of your money and of that which the earth produceth but GOD respecteth not gifts of that which is vniustly gotten Satan perswaded you to giue nothing for feare of pouertie To giue almes publikely is good but to giue priuately is better and this blotteth our sinnes Giue especially to those which stay in one place and are ashamed to aske 6. GOD will giue Paradise to them which in time of famine and scarcetie giue liberally and which receiue iniuries and repent of their sinnes Az. 2. Euery one which draweth nigh to death let him leaue of his money to his family and kindred to distribute in almes and they which shall change that vse shall be iudged of the Creator c. Az. 2. They which are intreated to beleeue the Diuine Precepts say they will follow their Ancestors in their Sect What would yee follow your Fathers if they were blinde or deafe Will yee be like them in being mute blinde and foolish Az. 2. O good men EATE that good which he hath giuen you and giue him thanks aboue all other things calling vpon him Abstaine from that which dieth of it selfe from Swines flesh from bloud and from euery other creatur that is killed and not in the name of the Creator But in case of necessity it is not sinne for GOD is mercifull and will forgiue you this 12. Eate not of that which is drowned burned in the fire and touched of the Wolfe 16. Eate nothing which hath not before beene blessed To the Iewes we made many things vnlawfull because of their wickednesse 2. Hee which shall contradict this Booke shall continually bee consumed in vnquenchable fire and none of his workes shall helpe him Az. 3. To them that doubt of WINE of Chesse Scailes and of Tables thou shalt say that such sports and such drinkes are a great sinne and although they be pleasant or profitable yet are they hurtfull sinnes if they say what shall we then doe thou shalt say the good things of GOD. Perswade them to seeke the Orphanes and succour them as their Brethren or else GOD will make them so poore that they shall not bee able to helpe either themselues or others 13. Wine Chesse and Tables are not lawfull but the Deuils inuentions to make debate amongst men and to keepe them from doing good Let none goeon hunting in the Pilgrimage moneth Az. 3. Take not a WIFE of another Law nor giue your daughters to men of another Law except they before conuert to your Law Let no man touch a woman in her disease before she be well clensed Vse your wiues and the woman which are subiect to you where and how you please Women which are diuorced may not marrie till after foure moneths hauing had three times their menstruous purgation Let them not deny their husbands their company at their pleasure They are the heads of the women After a third diuorce from one man they may not marrie the same man againe except they haue in the meane time beene married to another and be of him diuorced Let the woman nurse their children two yeeres receiuing necessaries of the fathers After buriall of a husband let them stay vnmarried foure moneths and ten daies and not goe out of the house in a yeere after Take yee two three foure wiues and finally as many as in your minde you are content to maintaine and keepe in peace It is vnlawfull to marry with the Mother Daughter Sister Aunt Neece Nurse or the Mother or Daughter of the Nurse and take not a whore to wife 9. Let the wiues keepe their husbands secrets or else let them be chastised and kept in house and bed till they be better 10. Let the husband seeke to liue peaceably with his wife 31. Cast not thine eyes on other mens wiues though they be faire A woman conuicted of adulterie by testimonie of foure women must be kept in her house till shee die and let none come at her Az. 8. If you loue not your wiues you may change them but take away nothing of that which is giuen them Az. 3. Sweare not in all your affaires by GOD and his names They which forsweare themselues shall haue no good thing in the world to come And 35. Sweare not rashly for GOD seeth euery thing They which sweare from their hearts are bound thereto before GOD and not else To redeeme such an oath they must feede or cloath ten poore men or fast three daies Az. 13. Az. 4. Offer violence to no man in respect of the Law for the way of doing good and euill is open 4. GOD gaue first the Testament then the Gospell and lastly the true Booke the Alfurcan of the Law in confirmation of those former Az. 4. They which liue of VSVRIE shall not rise againe otherwise then the Deuils they embrace that which GOD hath said is
wee haue banished together out of our Coasts euery one distrusting or defrauding others whiles eyther by miserable keeping or luxurious spending he which is bad to all is worst to himselfe To this Barne they bring at a certaine time of the yeere all the Venison Fish and Crocodiles dryed before in the smoke for the better preseruation which they meddle not with til need forceth them and then they signifie the same to each other The King may take thereof as much as he will This prouision is sent in baskets on the shoulders of their Hermaphrodites which weare long haire and are their Porters for all burthens They hunt Harts after a strange manner for they will put on a Harts skinne with the legges and head on so that the same shall serue them to stalke with and they will looke thorow the eye and the holes of the Hide as if it were a Vizor thereby deceiuing their Game which they shoot and kill especially at the places where they come to drinke Their Crocodiles they take in a strange manner They are so plagued with these beast that they keepe continuall watch and ward against them as other-where against their Enemies For this purpose they haue a watch-house by the Riuers side and when hunger driues the beast on shore for his prey the Watchmen call to men appointed they come tenne or twelue of them bearing a beame or tree the smaller end whereof they thrust into the mouth of the Crocodile comming vpon them gaping for his prey which being sharpe and rough cannot be got out and therewith they ouer-turne him and then being laid on his backe easily kill him The flesh tasteth like Veale and would be sauoury meate if it did not sauour so much of a Muskie sent Their sobrietie lengtheneth their liues in such sort that one of their Kings told me saith Morgues that he was three hundred yeeres old and his Father which there he shewed me aliue was fiftie yeeres elder then himselfe when I saw him mee thought I saw nothing but bones couered with skinne His sinewes veines and arteries sayth Laudonniere in description of the same man his bones and other parts appeared so cleerely thorow his skinne that a man might easily tell them and discerne the one from the other He could not see nor yet speake without great paine Monsieur de Ottigni demanding of their age the younger of these two called a company of Indians and striking twice on his thigh laid his hands on two of them hee shewed that they were his Sonnes and striking on their thighes he shewed others which were their Sonnes and so continued till the fift generation And yet it was told them that the eldest of them both might by the course of Nature liue thirtie or fortie yeeres more They haue a diuellish custome to offer the first-borne male-children to the King for a sacrifice The day of this dismall Rite being notified to the King he goeth to the place appointed and sits downe Before him is a blocke two foot high and as much thicke before which the mother of the child sitting on her heeles and couering her face with her hands deploreth the death of her sonne One of her friends offereth the child to the King and then the women which accompanied the mother place themselues in a Ring dancing and singing and shee that brought the child stands in the mids of them with the child in her hands singing somewhat in the Kings commendation Sixe Indians stand apart and with them the Priest with a Club wherewith after these ceremonies he killeth the child on that blocke which was once done in our presence Another religious Rite they obserue about the end of Februarie they take the hide of the greatest Hart they can get the hornes being on and fill the same with the best hearbs which grow amongst them hanging about the hornes necke and bodie as it were Garlands of their choisest fruits Hauing thus sowed and trimmed it they bring the same with songs and pipes and set it on a high tree with the head turned toward the East with prayers to the Sunne that hee would cause the same good things to grow againe in their land The King and his Magician stand neerest the tree and begin all the people following with their Responds This done they goe their wayes leauing it there till the next yeere and then renue the same ceremonie Ribault at his first comming had two of the Floridians aboord with him certaine dayes who when they offered them meat refused it giuing them to vnderstand that they were accustomed to wash their face and to stay till sun-set before they did eate which is a ceremonie common in all those parts They obserue a certaine Feast called Toya with great solemnitie The place where it is kept is a great circuit of ground swept and made neat by the women the day before and on the Feast day they which are appointed to celebrate this Feast come painted and trimmed with feathers and set themselues in order Three others in differing painting and gestures follow with Tabrets dancing and singing in a lamentable tune others answering them After that they haue sung danced and turned three times they fall to running like vnbrideled Horses through the midst of the thicke Woods the Indian Women continuing all the day in weeping and teares cutting the armes of the yong Girles with Muskle-shels with hurling the blood into the Ayre crying out three times He Toya Those that ranne through the Woods returne two dayes after and then dance in the midst of the place and cheere vp those which were not called to the Feast Their dances ended they deuoure the meat for they had not eate in three dayes before The Frenchmen learned of a boy that in this meane-while the Iawas had made inuocation to Toya and by Magicall Characters had made him come that he might speake with him and demand diuers strange things of him which for feare of the Iawas he durst not vtter To prouoke them vnto reuenge against their enemies they in their Feasts haue this custome There is a Dagger in the roome which one taketh and striketh therewith one that is thereunto appointed and then places the Dagger where he had it and anon renueth the stroke till the Indian falling downe the women Girles Boyes come about him and make great lamentation the men meane-while drinking Cassine but with such silence that not one word is heard afterwards they apply Mosse warmed to his side to heale him Thus doe they call to minde the death of their Ancestors slaine by their enemies especially when they haue inuaded and returne out of their enemies Countrey without the heads of any of them or without any Captiues §. III. Of the more In-land parts of Florida discouered by NVNEZ BVt let vs take view of the more Southerly and Westerly parts of Florida beyond the point Of Pamphilo Naruaes his vnfortunate Expedition
also the first naming of the seuen Planets The Science of Astronomie they say was much furthered by Enoch who saith Eupolemon was by the Greekes called Atlas to whom they attributed the inuention thereof Plinie was of opinion that Letters were eternall Howsoeuer it is more then apparant that the Booke bearing Enochs name is very fabulous which because the Tales therein professe antiquity although they were later dreames I thought it not vnfit to borrow out of Scaliger somewhat of that which he hath inserted in his Notes vpon Eusebius the Greeke Copie being as the Phrase testifieth translated out of Hebrew which had beene the worke of some Iew the Antiquity appeareth in that Tertullian citeth it The words are these And it came to passe when the sonnes of men were multiplyed there were borne to them faire Daughters and the Watch-men so he calleth the Angels out of Dan. 4. lusted and went astray after them and they said one to another Let vs choose vs Wiues of the Daughters of men of the Earth And Semixas their Prince said vnto them I feare me you will not doe this thing and I alone shall be debter of a great sinne And they all answered him and said We will all sweare with an Oath and will Anathematise or Curse our selues not to alter this our minde till we haue fulfilled it and they all sware together These came downe in the dayes of Iared to the top of the Hill Hermon And they called the Hill Hermon because they sware and Anathematised on it These were the names of their Rulers Semixas Atarcuph Arachiel Chababiel Orammante Ramiel Sapsich Zakiel Balkiel Azalzel Pharmaros Samiel c. These tooke them Wiues and three Generation were borne vnto them the first were great Gyants the Gyants begat the Naphelim to whom were borne Eliud and they taught them and their Wiues Sorceries and Inchantments Ezael taught first to make Swords and Weapons for Warre and how to worke in Metals He taught to make Womens Ornaments and how to looke faire and iewelling And they beguiled the Saints and much sinne was committed on the Earth Other of them taught the vertues of Roots Astrologie Diuinations c. After these things the Gyants beganne to eate the flesh of men and men were diminished and the remnant cryed to Heauen because of their wickednesse that they might come in remembrance before him And the foure great Archangels Michael Gabriel Raphael and Vriel hearing it looked downe on the Earth from the holy places of Heauen and beholding much bloud-shed on the Earth and all vngodlinesse and transgression committed therein said one to another That the Spirits and Soules of men complaine saying That yee should present our Prayer to the Highest and our destruction And the foure Archangels entring said to the Lord Thou art GOD of GODS and Lord of Lords c. Thou seest what Ezael hath done hee hath taught Mysteries and reuealed to the World the things in Heauen c. Then the Highest said The Holy one The Great one spake and sent Vriel to the sonne of Lamech saying Goe to Noe tell him of the end approching and a floud shall destroy the Earth c. To Raphael hee said Goe Raphael and binde Ezael hand and foot and cast him into darkenesse and open the Wildernesse in the Desart of Dodoel and there cast him and lay vpon him sharpe stones to the Day of Iudgement c. And to Gabriel he said Goe Gabriel to the Gyants and destroy the sonnes of the Watch-men from the sonnes of men set them one against another in warre and destruction To Michael he said Goe Michael binde Semixa and the others with him that haue mixed themselues with the daughters of men vntill seuentie Generations to the hils of the Earth vntill the day of their iudgement till the iudgement of the World bee finished and then they shall bee brought into the confusion of fire and vnto tryall and vnto the Prison of the ending of the World and whosoeuer shall be condemned and destroyed from hence-forth shall be cast together with them till the finishing of their Generation c. And the Gyants which were begotten of the Spirits and flesh they shall call them euill Spirits on the Earth because their dwelling is on the Earth The Spirits that depart out of their bodies shall bee euill Spirits because they were engendred of the Watch-men and men But it were tedious to recite further The antiquity of it and because it is not so common and especially because some of the Ancients and of the Papists haue beene misse-led by these Dreames refused iustly by Ierome and Augustine interpreting the sonnes of GOD in Moses to be spoken of Angels as their Translation did read it haue moued me to insert those Tales Notable is the diligence of the Purgatorie Scauengers who in Viues notes vpon Aug. de Ciuit. Dei Lib. 15. cap. 23. haue in their Index Expurgatorius set the Seale of their Office vpon a testimonie alleaged out of Eusebius de Praep. Euang. Lib. 5. cap. 4. as if they had beene Viues his owne words to be left out in the Impression The words because they sauour of the former errour haue Theere placed Non ergo Deos neque bonos damonas Gentiles sed perniciosos solummodo venerantur Quam rem magis Plutarchus confirmat dicens fabulosas de dijs rationes res quasdam significare à daemonibus antiquissimis gestas temporibus ea quae de gigantibus ac de Titanibus decantantur daemonum fuisse operationes Vnde mihi suspicio saith Eusebius but Viues is fined for it nonnunquam incidit ne ista illa sint quae ante diluuium a gigantibus facta diuina Scriptura tetigit de quibus dicitur Cùm autem vidissent Angeli Dei filias hominum quia essent speciosae elegerunt sibi ex illis vxores ex quibus procreati sunt famosissimi gigantes à saeculo Suspicabitur enim fortasse quispiam illos illorum spiritus esse qui ab hominibus postea dij putati sunt pugnasque illorum tumultus bella esse quae fabulosè de dijs conscribebantur Lactantius saith that when the World was multiplyed GOD sent Angels to keepe men from fraudes of the Deuill to whom he forbade all earth contagion These were by the Deuill insnared with women therefore depriued of Heauen and their Progeny of a middle nature betwixt Men and Angels became vncleane Spirits so that hence grew two kindes of Daemones or Deuillish Spirits the one heauenly the other earthly which would now seeme to be keepers and are destroyers of men The Angels are sometimes called the sonnes of God but that name is communicated to men who by nature children of wrath by faith in the naturall and onely begotten Sonne of GOD haue this prerogatiue to bee the sonnes of GOD and fellow-heires with CHRIST But some of the children of the Kingdome shall bee cast out because they
the other beganne first to haue a being which hee further prosecuteth in many particulars But before we prosecute these Babylonian affaires after the Floud it shall not be amisse to shew here the Chaldaean Fables of Antiquities before the Floud out of Berosus a Chaldaean Priest which liued in the time of Alexander Polyhistor citeth out of Berosus his first Booke this report of himselfe and Tatianus saith he was the Priest of Belus and wrote his Chaldaean Storie to Antiochus the third after Seleucus in three Bookes His name signifieth the Sonne of Osee Alorus raigned the space of ten Sari Sarus with them is three thousand sixe hundred yeares Alasparus three Sari Amelus thirteene Sari Amenus twelue Metalarus eighteene Daorus tenne Aedorachus eighteene Amphis tenne Otiartes eight Xixuthrus eighteene in his time as is said before the Floud happened The whole space is an hundred and twentie Sari which amounteth to foure hundred thirtie two thousand yeares This I thought not vnfit although incredible to report from Berosus both because my scope is to declare as well false as true Religions it being not Theologicall but Historicall or rather Historically Theologicall and because the Ancients Cicero Lactantius Augustine haue mentioned this monstrous Computation of the Chaldaean Kalender which yet they racke higher to foure hundred threescore and ten thousand yeeres Here you haue the particulars out of Apollodorus and Abidenus which both borrowed them of Berosus Polyhistor addeth that there came one out of the Red Sea called Oannes and Annedotus a Monster other-where like a fish his head feet and hands like a man as saith Photius but Al. Polyhistor ascribeth two heads one of a fish and the other of a man the Image whereof was vnto his times reserued This Monster liued without meate and taught them the knowledge of Letters and all Arts buildings of Cities foundations of Temples enacting of Lawes Geometry and Husbandry and all necessaries to mans life Afterwards he returned to the Sea and after him appeared other such Monsters Foure of them came out of the Sea saith Abidenus when Daos whom Apollodorus calleth Daorus raigned their names were Euedochus Eneugamus Enaboulus Anementus Pentabiblus it seemeth was then their chiefe Citie That Oannes the first did write of the first beginning That all was darknesse and water in which liued monstrous creatures hauing two formes men with two wings and some with foure with one body two heads one of a man and another of a woman with the priuities of both Sexes others with hornes and legs like Goats some with Horse feet some like Centaures the former part Men the after part Horses Buls also headed like Men and Dogges with foure bodies c. with many monstrous mixtures and confusions of creatures whose Images were kept in the Temple of Belus Ouer all these ruled a woman named Omorkae which signifieth the Sea and by like signification of Letters the Moone Then came Belus and cut her in twaine and made the one halfe of her Land the other Heauen and the creatures therein appeared This Belus made men and beasts the Sunne Moone and Planets these things reporteth Berosus in his first Booke in the second he telleth of Kings before mentioned which raigned till the Floud After the Floud also the same Polyhistor out of him sheweth That Sisuthrus hauing by Saturnes warning before built an Arke as is before said and laid vp all Monuments of Antiquitie in Sipparis a Citie dedicated to the Sunne and now with all his World of Creatures escaped the Floud going out of the Arke did sacrifice to the gods and was neuer seene more But they heard a voyce out of the Ayre giuing them this Precept To bee Religious His Wife Daughter and Ship-master were partakers with him of this honour Hee said vnto them the Countrey where they now were was Armenia and hee would come againe to Babylon and that it was ordayned that from Sipparis they should receiue Letters and communicate the same to men which they accordingly did For hauing sacrificed to the gods they went to Babylon and digged out the Letters Writings or Bookes and building many Cities and founding Temples did againe repayre Babylon Thus farre out of Alexander Polyhistor a large Fragment of the true Berosus CHAP. XI Of the Citie and Countrey of Babylon their sumptuous Walls Temples and Images LEauing these Antiquities rotten with Age let vs come to take better view of this stately Citie Herodotus Philostratus Plinie and Solinus report concerning the compasse of Babylon That the walls contayned foure hundred and eightie furlongs situate in a large Plaine foure square inuironed with a broad and deepe Ditch full of water Diodorus saith That there were but so many furlongs as are dayes in the yeare so that euery day a furlong of the wall was built and thirtie hundred thousand Work-men imployed therein Strabo ascribeth to the compasse three hundred and eightie furlongs and Curtius three hundred fiftie eight ninetie furlongs thereof inhabited the rest allotted to Tylth and Husbandry Concerning the thicknesse of the walls or the height they also disagree The first Authors affirme the height two hundred Cubites the thicknesse fiftie They which say least cut off halfe that summe Well might Aristotle esteeme it a Countrey rather then a Citie being of such greatnesse that some part of it was taken three dayes before the other heard of it Lyranus out of Hierome vpon Esay affirmeth that the foure squares thereof contayned sixteene miles a piece wherein euery man had his Vineyard and Garden according to his degree wherewith to mayntaine his Family in time of siege The Fortresse or Tower thereof he saith was that which had beene built by the Sonnes of Noah And not without cause was it reckoned among the Wonders of the World It had a hundred Brazen gates and two hundred and fiftie Towers It was indeed a Mother of Wonders so many Miracles of Art accompanyed the same the workes partly of Semiramis partly of Nabuchodonosor which I would desire the Reader to stay his hastie pace and take notice of Euery where I shall not I cannot be so tedious in these kinds of Relations Diodor. thus addeth of Semiramis shee built also a bridge of fiue furlongs The walles were made of Bricke and Asphaltum and slimy kind of Pitch which that Countrey yeeldeth Shee built two Palaces which might serue both for ornament and defence one in the West which inuironed sixtie furlongs with high Bricke walles within that a lesse and within that also a lesse circuit which contayneth the Tower These were wrought sumptuously with Images of beasts and therein also was game and hunting of beasts this had three gates The other in the East on the other side the Riuer contayned but thirtie furlongs In the lower Countrey of Babylonia she made a great square Lake contayning two hundred furlongs the walls whereof were of Bricke and that pitchie Morter
name before mentioned you please to giue her which I know not how mystically is also called Cybele Berecynthia and with a confused mixture of Heauen and Earth THE EARTH Astaroth a word plurall is exemplified in the European Iunones mentioned in Inscriptions and in those altars in Master Camden and Master Selden inscribed DEABVS MATRIBVS diuers of which haue beene found in this Iland intended by them as were also the Beli which made vowes DIS SYRIS Lucian sayth that he saw also at Biblos the Temple of Venus Biblia wherein are celebrated the yeerely rites of Adonis who they say was slaine in their Countrie with beatings and wofull lamentings after which they performe Obsequies vnto him and the next day they affirme him to be aliue and shaue their heads And such women as will not bee shauen must prostitute their bodies for one day vnto strangers and the mony hence accrewing is sacred to Venus Some affirme that this ridiculous lamentation is made not for Adonis but Osiris in witnesse whereof a head made of Paper once a yeere in seuen dayes space comming swimming from Egypt to Byblos and that without any humane direction Of which Lucian reporteth himselfe an eye-witnesse This is called the mourning for Thamuz which Iunius interpreteth Osiris whence the fourth moneth commonly their Haruest is called Tamuz For Ists which instituted these rites was their Ceres Hierom interpreteth it Adonis but it seemeth the difference is more in the name then the Idoll or rites Women were the chiefe lamenters if not the onely as Ezechiel testifieth and the pronenesse of that sexe to teares and to superstitious deuotion also which they seeme to acknowledge whose praying stile is pró deuoto foemineo sexu likewise Ethnike Authors are witnesses Plutarch sayth the women kept the Adonia or feast of Adonis euery where through the Citie setting forth Images obseruing exequies and lamentation Ammianus reported of this festiuall solemnized at Antiochia at the same time when Iulian entred the Citie then filled with howlings and lamentings and elsewhere compareth the women which lamented the death of their young Prince to the women which obserued the rites of Venus in the feasts of Adonis Iulius Firmicus affirmeth that in most Cities of the East Adonis is mourned for as the husband of Venus and both the smiter and the wound is shewed to the standers by For Mars changed into the shape of a Bore wounded him for the loue of Venus Hee addeth that on a certaine night they lay an Image in a bed and number a set bead-roll of lamentations which being ended light is brought in and then the Priest anointeth the chappes of the Mourners whispering these words Trust in God for wee haue saluation or deliuerance from our griefes And so with ioy they take the Idoll out of the Sepulchre Was not this mourning thinke wee sport to the Deuill especially when this Adonia was applyed vnto the buriall and resurrection of Christ the Pageant whereof followeth the Good-Friday and Lenten fast of the Papists Yet is this worse then the former not onely because Corruptio optimi pessima the best things by abusing are made worst but also because the treason of Iudas and Peters deniall is proposed in action to the peoples laughter inter tot eachinos ineptias solus Christus est serius seuerus saith L. Viues complayning of this great wickednesse of the Priests magno scelere atque impietate Sacerd. but here and elsewhere often when he telleth tales out of Schoole the good mans tongue is shortned and their Index purgeth out that wherewith hee seeketh to purge their leauen But let vs backe from Rome to Biblos Hereby runneth the Riuer Adonis also which once a yeere becommeth red and bloudie which alteration of the colour of the water is the warning to that their Mourning for Adonis who at that time they say is wounded in Libanus whereas that rednesse ariseth indeed of the winds which at that time blowing violently doe with their force carry downe alongst the streame a great quantity of that red Earth or Minium of Libanus whereby it passeth This constancy of the wind might yet seeme as maruellous as the other if diuers parts of the world did not yeeld vs instance of the like In Libanus also was an ancient Temple dedicated to Venus by Cyniras Astarte or Astaroth was worshipped in the formes of sheepe * not of the Sydonians only but of the Philistims also in whose Temple they hanged the armour of Saul And wise Salomon was brought by doting on women to a worse dotage of Idolatrie with this Sydonian Idoll among others And not then first did the Israelities commit that fault but from their first neighbour-hood with them presently after the dayes of Ioshua This Sidon the ancient Metropolis of the Phoenicians now called Saito in likelihood was built by Sidon eldest Sonne of Canaan and fell to the lot of Asher whence it is called Great Sidon It was famous y for the first Glasse-shops and destroyed by Ochus the Persian This faire mother yeelded the world a Daughter farre fairer namely Tyrus now called Sur whose glory is sufficiently blazed by the Prophets Esay and Ezechiel being situate in an Iland seuen hundred paces from the shore to which Alexander in his siege vnited it whom it held out eight moneths as it had done Nabuchodonosor thirteene yeeres which long siege is mentioned in Ezec. 26.7 in nothing more famous then for helping Salomon vnder Hiram their King to build the Temple a hundred fiftie fiue yeeres before the building of Carthage This Hiram Iosephus reports it out of Dius a Phoenician Historiographer inlarged the Citie and compasses within the same the Temple of Iupiter Olympius and as he addeth out of Menander Ephesius therein placed a golden Pillar he pulled downe the old Temples and built new and dedicated the Temples of Hercules and Astarte Ithobalus Astartes priest slew Phelles the King and vsurped the Crowne He was great Grandfather to Pygmalion the brother of Dido Founder of Carthage The Phoenicians famous for Marchandise and Marinership sailed from the red Sea round about Afrike and returning by Hercules pillars arriued againe in Aegypt the third yeere after reporting that which Herodotus doubted of and to vs makes the Storie more credible that they sailed to the South-ward of the Sunne They were sent by Pharaoh Neco Cadmus a Phoenician was the first Author of Letters also to the Greekes At Tyrus was the fishing for purple not farre off was Arad a populous Towne seated on a rocke in the sea like Venice Alongst the shore is Ptolemais neere which runneth the Riuer Belaeus and nigh to it the sepulchre of Memnon hauing hard by it the space of an hundred cubites yeelding a glassie sand and how great a quantitie soeuer is by ships carried thence is supplied by the Winds which minister new sands to be by the nature of the place changed
doer instituted Anno. 1300. to be obserued euery hundreth yeere and Clement the sixt abridged to the fiftieth as Auentinus Trithemius Crantzius and others haue written Whether they were Heathenish in imitating the Ludi seculares or Iewish in following the legall Iubilee Certaine it is Rome thereby becomes a rich Mart where the Marchants of the Earth resort from all places of the Earth to buy Heauen and Babylon the great Citie is cloathed in fine linnen and purple and scarlet and gilded with gold and precious stone and pearles with the gaines of her Wares giuing in exchange the soules of men washed from their sinnes A thing more precious to Christ then his most precious blood But his pretended Vicars haue learned to effect it the filling of their purse with greater ease deuout Pilgrims from all parts visiting Saint Peters staires whence they goe truely Saint Peters heires Siluer and gold haue I none and yet finde their Pardons too cheape to be good But to returne to our Pilgrimage and to obserue the obseruation of the Iewish Iubilee This feast was partly ciuill in regard of the poore of the inheritances of the Israelitish Families specially that of the Messias and of the computation of times as amongst the Greekes by Olympiads and amongst the Romanes by Lustra and indictions partly also it was mysticall in regard of the Gospell of Christ preaching libertie and peace to the Conscience the acceptable yeere of the LORD And thus much of those Feasts which GOD himselfe instituted to this Nation which how the Iewes of later times haue corrupted and doe now superstitiously obserue instituting others also of their owne deuisings shall bee handled in due place Wee are next to speake of those Feasts which vpon occasions they imposed vpon themselues before the comming of CHRIST to which wee will adde a briefe Kalender of all their Fasts and Feasts CHAP. VI. Of the Feasts and Fasts which the Iewes instituted to themselues with a Kalender of their Feasts and Fasts through the yeere as they are now obserued THE Prophet Zacharie in his seuenth and eighth Chapters mentioneth certaine fasting daies which the Iewes by Ecclesiasticall Iniunction obserued One in the tenth day of the tenth moneth because on that day Ierusalem began to bee besieged 2. Reg. 24. A second Fast was obserued on the ninth day of the fourth moneth in remembrance that then the Chaldeans entred the Citie A third Fast they held on the ninth day of the fift moneth in respect of the Citie and Temple burned on that day First by Nabuchodonosor Secondly by Titus on the same day Which the Iewes doe yet obserue with strict penance going bare-foote and sitting on the ground reading some sad Historie of the Bible and the Lamentations of Ieremie three times ouer Their fourth Fast they celebrated on the third day of the seuenth moneth in remembrance of Godoliah slaine by Ismael Iere. 41.42.2 Reg. vlt. To these are reckoned the Fast of Easter in the thirteenth day of Adar their twelfth Moneth and on the seuenteenth day of the fourth moneth in the remembrance of the Tables of the Law broken by Moses the institution whereof seemeth to be late seeing the Scripture doth not mention it In this moneth the Aegyptians kept the Feast or Fast of their Osiris lamenting for him which seemeth to be the same that is mentioned Ezech. 8. Where women are said to mourne for Tamuz whom Plutarch calleth Amuz and from thence deriueth Iupiters title of Ammon Of him was this fourth moneth called Tamuz On the foureteenth and fifteenth daies of Adar they kept the feast of Phurim or Lots instituted in remembrance of that deliuerance from Haman by the authoritie of Ioachim the high-Priest as Functius relateth out of Philo An. M. 3463. Antonius Margarita a christened Iewe reporteth that on these daies the Iewes reade the Historie of Ester and so often as Haman is mentioned they smite on their seates with their fists and hammers otherwise spending the time of this feast in Bachanall riots and excesse They also had the feast of Wood-carrying called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mentioned by Iosephus in which the custome was for euery one to carry Wood to the Temple to maintaine the fire of the Altar The Feast of Dedication otherwise called the feast of Lights and the institution thereof is largely described 2. Maccab. 4. in remembrance of the institution of Diuine worship and Sacrifice in the Temple which had beene by Antiochus polluted and sacred to Iupiter Olympius all the seruices appointed by the Law being abolished By Iudas Maccabeus the Temple and Altar and other holy instruments were dedicated the same day three yeeres after their first pollution called therefore the feast of Lights as I thinke saith Iosephus because so vnexpected a light shon forth vnto them But Franciscus Iunius in his Annotations vpon the Syrian translation of the tenth of Iohn where this Feast is mentioned alleageth out of the Tallmud another cause as followeth When on the fiue and twentith day of Cisleu they entred into the Temple they found not pure oyle except in one little vessell which contained sufficient for the Lamps but one day of which Oyle they lighted the Lamps in order which lasted eight daies till they pressed out of the Oliues cleane Oyle And therefore the wise-men of that time decreed that yeerely those eight daies beginning at the fiue and twentith of Cisleu should be daies of ioy and that euery one in the doores of their houses euery euening during those eigh daies should light Lamps for declaration of that miracle wherein they must not fast nor lament Likewise 1. Mac. 13. is ordained festiuall the three and twentieth day of Iar for the expiation of the Tower of Ierusalem by Simon Mac. On the last day of the feast of Tabernacles they finish the reading of the Law with much ioy and solemnitie calling it the feast of the ioy of the Law The next Sabbath begins their Reading of the first Parasch or Section which was also read that day they made an end of the last lest they should seeme weary of it and glad it were ended These Paraschs or Sections of the Law as our Lessons in our Seruice were ancient as appeareth Act. 15.21 in number fifty foure for twice they put together two short ones When Antiochus burned and prohibited the Law they reade in stead of Moses the Prophets and after Antiochus his death they continued both as the first and second Lesson with vs That of the Prophets they called haphtara that is a dismissing because after it the people were dismissed euen as the name Missa for like cause was giuen to the Christian holies They reade Moses not onely on the Sabbaths but also on Mundaies and Thursedaies which by them that would seeme more holy were fasted also as Luc. 18. appeares by the bragges of that supercilious Pharise I fast twice in the weeke Sigonius reckoneth also the feast of
persons were there whose touch might pollute them They washed also Cups and Brasen vessels and Beds not Chamber-beds to lie on Drusius expoundeth but dining-beds which they vsed in stead of Tables They would not eate with Publicans or sinners yea they accounted themselues polluted with their touch Their hypocrisie in prayer Christ mentioneth that it was long and open in the streetes c. It was thrice in the day at the third sixt and ninth houre Their words submisse and softly as of Hannah 1. Sam. 1. and toward the Temple They Tythed all Luke 18. Math. 23. euen the smallest matters For Tythes saith Akiba are the Hedges of thy Riches And another Prouerbe learne it Tythe that thou maist be rich Epiphanius addeth they paid first fruits thirtieths and fiftieths Sacrifices and Vowes Their Phylacteries or Seruatories Defensiues so the word signifieth in Hebrew Totaphoth they vsed as Preseruatiues or Remembrancers of the Law and ware them larger then other men Hierome calls them Pittaciola resembling to them herein some simple superstitious women wearing little Gospels and the wood of the Crosse and such like of zeale not according to knowledge strayning a Gnat and swallowing a Cammell This superstition then complayned of by Hierome yet remaineth saith Scaliger among Christians and Mahumetans which weare about them the Gospell of S. Iohn Christ condemneth not the Rite but their ambition for dilating not for wearing them to which all the Iewes were bound and all the Iewes and Samaritans obserued They vsed the like ambition in their Fringes or twisted Tassels which the Iewes call Zizis and vse them still as after shall appeare Their Oathes were By Ierusalem the Temple the Heauen Earth their Head by the Law Fagius obserueth that the Iewes in swearing lay their hand on the booke of the Lawe at this day Other Oathes are little esteemd Hence it seemeth came our corporall oathes on a book The Iewes saith Capito thinke it no Oath if one forsweare by Heauen or Earth vnlesse he say by him which dwelleth there c. And none is subiect to that Curse in which the name of God is not added That of Corban pertayneth to this place mentioned Math. 15.5 Marke 7.11 which some interprete as if a Iew should say to his Parents That he had alreadie dedicated all that to God to whom vowes are to be performed wherewith he might haue helped them Doctor Rainolds saith That the Iewes as they were prone to vngodly vowes so this was an vsuall vow amongst them and they would binde it with an Oath That such or such a man should haue no profit by them The Oath which they herein vsed as most solemne was By the Gift for so they were instructed That if any sware by the Altar it was nothing but if by the Gift he was a debtor The Pharises therefore taught if any had said to his father By the Gift thou shalt haue no profit by me then he might in no case doe them any good against the Commandement Honour thy Father c. The Iewes vsed to binde their vowes with a curse as they which vowed Paules death vsing yet to suppresse the curse it selfe as If they shall enter into my rest So these By the gift if they haue any profit by me meant they should haue none Thus the Talmud saith he the Booke of their Canon Law and Schoole-Diuinitie saith That a man is bound to honor his Father vnlesse he vow the contrary Masius explaineth it thus That they did consecrate by saying Corban all where-with they should haue benefited their parents as if they had said Let it be Anathema or deuoted whatsoeuer it be with which I may profit thee And therefore those Rabbines vnder pretext of Religion allowed not to spend on his parents that which he had thus vowed to God Scaliger thus interpreteth the place as if a sonne being by his parents admonished of his dutie should put them off with this exception vnlesse that which I haue offered for thee free me of this burthen But let the more curious reade it in himselfe and what Masius Serarius and others haue written hereof The Pharises were esteemed pitifull The Sadduces more cruell They were much addicted to Astrologie and the Mathematikes whose names of the Planets Epiphanius rehearseth as also the twelue Signes There were seuen sorts of the Pharises which the Talmud reckoneth first Sichemita which measure pietie by honour and profit as the Sichemites which for the marriage of Dina endured circumcision Secondly Nacphi which lifted not his feete from the ground the third Kisai Draw-blood which smiteth his head to the wall to cause the bloud to come and also shutteth his eyes that he behold not a woman The fourth that standeth on his perfection called Mahchobathi What is my sinne as if there wanted nothing to his Righteousnesse The fift Meduchia which goe lowly and stooping The sixt The Pharisee of Loue which obeyeth the Law for loue of vertue or reward The seuenth the Pharisee of Feare which is holden in obedience by feare of punishment This they call Iobs Pharisee the former Abrahams Epiphanius describeth their strict obseruations Some saith he prescribed to themselues ten yeeres or eight or foure yeeres continence Some lay on plankes which were onely nine inches broad that when they slept they might fall to the pauement so to be awakened againe to prayer and keepe themselues waking Others put stones vnder them for the same end by pricking to awake them Others lay on Thornes for that purpose Scaliger reproueth Epiphanius for affirming that the Pharises ware womans attire as not agreeing to their austeritie which despised all beds beate themselues against walles and put thornes in the fringes of their garments to prick them he thinketh him deceiued by some Iewes report and addeth that the moderne Iewes haue little or no knowledge of those ancient Pharises but as they learne it of the Christians or of Pseudo-Gorionides so hee calleth the Hebrew booke ascribed to Ioseph Ben Gorion whom Drusius esteemeth and Scaliger proueth to be a counterfeit wherein Serarius and Ribera concurre with them The Pharises in a selfe-conceit and singularitie called all but themselues in a disgracefull scorne Other men so said he Luke 18. I am not as other men whereas they accounted themselues Masters of others on whom also they bound heauie burthens in their Rules and Cases the breach whereof they iudged Sinne in the people but yet held not themselues bound thereto For example Euery Israelite ought euery day by their Rule to say ouer the ten Commandements and that in the first Watch which might not be deferred for danger of sinne and yet amongst themselues they esteemed it lawfull at any houre of the night But vpon the Proselytes they imposed more then on the other Israelites all which they were bound to in their censure vnder paine of Hell fire and therefore
they reade the first Lecture and the last thereof and leape about the Arke with the Bookes and they hurle Pearles Nuts and such fruits among the youth which in their scrambling sometimes fall together by the eares and marre the sport On this day they sell their Synagogue-offices the Clarke making proclamation who will giue most at the third time obtayneth first the office of lighting the Lights all the yeere then that of prouiding the Wine which they vse to begin the Feasts with in respect of the poore which haue no wine to hallow at home Thirdly is set to sale the office Gelilah of folding vp and vnfolding the Law Fourthly Hagbohah of lifting vp the Law and carrying it in Procession Fiftly the office Etzchaijm of touching those turned pieces of wood whereto the Law is fastened which the young-men are forward to buy in hope of holinesse and longer life Sixtly Acheron to bee called foorth last on the festiuall dayes to reade somewhat of the Law Seuenthly Schetria to be deputed or substituted in place of the negligent officer c. The money hence arising is for the vse of the poore and reparations of their Synagogue but in these sale-offices wealth hath more honour then worthinesse Their feast of Dedication wee cannot say much more of then that which alreadie hath beene said much nicenesse herein is obserued about the Lights wherewith they solemnize this darkenesse which I willingly omit these lights thy vse in their houses all the space of these eight dayes burning Their feast of Lots they keepe with all riot two dayes as with some at Shroue-tide the men disguising themselues in womens habite the women in mens they holde that hee shall be fortunate which then laboureth women especially then make merry in remembrance of Queene Esther and they with their infants are present in the night at the reading of the booke of Esther which is all written in a large sheet of Parchment and reade from the beginning to the end In times past they had two stones in one of which was written Hamans name which they beat together till the name was blotted out to fulfill that Scripture The name of the wicked shall rot Cursed bee HAMAN blessed bee MORDECAI cursed bee ZERES Hamans wife blessed be ESTHER cursed bee all Idolaters blessed be ISRAEL When they come to the place where Hamans ten sonnes are named they reade it all in one breath for in a twinkling of an eye they were all slaine They make great cheere for so did Esther in feasting Assuerus In these two dayes they doe nothing but eate drinke dance pipe sing play c. The rich are bound to send to the poore Iewes double presents which must not be spent but on this solemnitie they quaffe it is saith Rabbi Isaac Tirna a good worke till they finde no difference betweene Arur Haman and Baruch Mordecai Cursed bee HAMAN blessed bee MORDECAI vociferations that day obserued and hold it lawfull to drinke till they cannot tell their fiue fingers on the hand They obserue festiuall the Equinoctials and Solstices and a certaine Rogation day they vse the Fasts before mentioned out of Zach. 7. with other superstitions Some of them fast also as is said on Mundayes and Thursdayes and some on the tenth of March for the death of Miriam at whose departure a certaine Fountaine dryed vp and the people were left without water but in this moneth the Rabbins will not allow fasting because of their deliuerance therein out of Egypt Some fast for the death of Samuel Aprill 28. and for the taking of the Arke April 10. and at other times for other Prophets Some fast on the New-Moones Eeuen some when they haue had an infortunate dreame and all that day in which their Father dyed through their whole life Their fasting is an abstinence from all eating and drinking till night But of these fasts and other their solemnities is said before in the abstract of their Kalender taken out of Ioseph Scaliger Their fast on the 17. of the fourth Moneth for the destruction of their Citie is rigourously kept and from thence to the ninth day of the moneth following are holden vnluckie dayes in which Schoolmasters may not beate their Schollers nor any man will sew at the Law And for the burning of the Temple in the ninth day of the fifth moneth they goe bare-foot reade heauie stories and Ieremiahs Lamentations and mourne among the graues of the dead and are sad all that moueth from the first to the tenth day they eate no flesh nor drinke wine nor bathe nor marrie nor cut their hayre they sew not at the Law for Hosea saith The moneth shall deuoure their portion and they shall bee taken saith Ieremie in their moneth On the eight day they eate onely Lentils for they may not eate Pease or Beanes because they haue blacke spots like mouthes which Lentils want and therefore more fitly represent a heauie man which wanteth his mouth for sorrow egges they may eate in the night for their roundnesse for sorrow as if it were round rolleth from one to another They haue their fasts also on speciall occasions as they tell of one Chone Hammagal which in a great drought put himselfe into a pye made fit for his body and prayed saying Lord of the World the eyes of thy children are vpon mee as one whom they thinke familiar with thee I sweare by thy holy name that I will not come hence till thou shew mercy And then it rayned presently for how could it choose They tell the same pye-tale of Moses likewise and of Habbacuc expounding that Hab. 2.1 I will stand on my watch I will stand in my Pye Their manner is saith Victor Carbensis to curse Titus and say he was of the generation of Agag the Amalechite and such a blasphemer as neuer was any and that for his blasphemies he was stricken with madnesse CHAP. XIX Of their Cookerie Butcherie Marriages Punishments Funerals BVt why doe wee entertaine you so long in Feasts and Fasts both almost violent to humane nature howsoeuer the Glutton is neuer glutted with the one and the superstitious rather kill the flesh then the vices of the flesh with the other Medio tutissimus ibis We will soberly recreate your spirits with a walke into the Cooke-roome and thence to the Butcherie and then to the Bride-chamber to take view of their Espousals Marriages Diuorces and thence diuorce your eyes from these spectacles and thence diuert them to their Beggers Penances and to that fatall diuorce ending your walke where the walkes of all flesh end at Death and the Graue §. I. Of their Cookerie THey haue Kitchin vessels of two sorts one for flesh another for white-meates Their milke vessels of wood are marked with three cuts because that sentence Thou shalt not seethe a Kid in his mothers milke is three times in the Law repeated Euery Iew carrieth two kniues with him one for Flesh the other for
Red because either the ground or the sand or the water thereof is Red as Bellonius hath obserued for none of them are so The people thereabouts take care for no other houses then the boughes of Palme-trees to keepe them from the heat of the Sunne for raine they haue but seldome the cattell are lesse there then in Egypt In the ascent of Mount Sinai are steps cut out in the Rocke they beganne to ascend it at breake of day and it was afternoone before they could get to the Monasterie of Maronite Christians which is on the top thereof There is also a Meschit there for the Arabians and Turkes who resort thither on pilgrimage as well as the Christians There is a Church also on the top of Mount Horeb and another Monasterie at the foot of the Hill besides other Monasteries wherein liue religious people called Caloieri obseruing the Greeke Rites who shew all and more then all the places renowmed in Scriptures and Antiquities to Pilgrims They eate neither flesh nor white meates They allow food vnto strangers such as it is rice wheat beanes and such like which they set on the floore without a cloth in a woodden dish and the people compose themselues to eate the same after the Arabian manner which is to sit vpon their heeles touching the ground with their toes whereas the Turkes sit crosse-legged like Taylors There is extant an Epistle of Eugenius Bishop of M. Sinai written 1569. to Charles the Arch-duke wherein hee complaineth that the Great Turke had caused all the reuenues of the Churches and Monasteries to bee sold whereby they were forced to pledge there Holy Vessels and to borrow on Vsurie Arabia Foelix trendeth from hence Southwards hauing on all parts of the Sea against which it doth abutt the space of three thousand fiue hundreth and foure miles Virgil calls it Panchaea now Ayaman or Giamen This seemeth to bee the Countrie wherein Saba stood chiefe Citie of the Sabaeans whose Queene visited Salomon for so the Iewes reckon howsoeuer the Abassines challenge her to themselues Aben Ezra on Dan. 11. calls this Saba Aliman or Alieman and Salmanticensis Ieman which is all one for all is but the Article signifying the South as the Scriptures also call her Queene of the South For so it was situate not to Iudaea alone but to the Petraean and Desart Arabia The name Seba or Saba agreeth also with the name of Sheba Gen. 10.7 As for Sheba the Nephew of Abraham by Ketura it is like he was founder of the other Seba or Saba in Arabia Deserta the elder posteritie of Chush hauing before seated themselues in the more fertile Southerne countrie and because both peoples these in Arabia and those in Africa were comprehended vnder one generall name of Aethiopia hence might those of Africa take occasion to vsurpe the Antiquities of the other Yea it is more likely that these Abassens in Africa a thousand yeeres after that the Queene was buried were seated in Arabia and thence passed in later ages into Africa subduing those Countries to them For so hath Stephanus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Abassens so we now call those Aethiopians in the Empire of Presbyter Iohn are Nation of Arabia beyond the Sabaeans and the Nubian Geographer diuers times mentions Salomons wife in Arabia which I cannot interpret but of that Queene so that out of Arabia they carried this Tradition with them as it is likely into Africa where want of learning and plentie of superstition had so increased their Legend of this Queene as we shall after heare Beniamin Tudelensis writeth likewise that the Region of Seba is now called the Land of Aliman and that it extendeth sixteene dayes iourneys alongst the Hills in all which Region there were of those Arabians which had no certaine dwellings but wandred vp and downe in Tents robbing the neighbour Nations as is also reported of the Saracens neere Mecca which gouernment of Mecca both Beniamin and Salmanticensis adioyne to that of Aliman or the Kingdome of Saba for so saith he the Iewes in those parts still call the chiefe Citie of that Kingdome It hath store of Riuers Lakes Townes Cities Cattell fruits of many sorts The chiefe Cities are Medina Mecca Ziden Zebit Aden Beniamin addeth Theima or Theman a Citie walled fifteene miles square enclosing ground for tillage in the walls Tilmaas also Chibar and others There is store of siluer gold and varietie of gemmes There are also wilde beasts of diuers kindes As for the Phoenix because I and not I alone thinke it a fable as neither agreeing to reason nor likelihood and plainely disagreeing to the Historie of the Creation and of Noahs Arke in both which God made all Male and Female and cōmanded them to increase and multiply I thinke it not worthy recitall One wonder of Nature done in Abis a Citie of this Region will not I thinke bee distastfull cited by Photius out of Diodorus Siculus written in some part of his workes which is now wanting One Diophantus a Macedonian being married to an Arabian woman in that Citie Abis had by her a daughter called Herais which in ripe age was married to one Samiades who hauing liued a yeere with her did after trauell into farre Countries In the meane time his wife was troubled with an vncouth and strange disease A swelling arose about the bottome of her belly which on the seuenth day breaking there proceeded thence those parts whereby Nature distinguisheth men from the other sexe which secrets shee kept secret notwithstanding continuing her womans habit till the returne of her husband Who then demanding the companie and dutie of his wife was repelled by her father for which he sued him before the Iudges where Herais was forced to shew that which before her modestie had forbidden her to tell and afterwards naming himselfe Diophantus serued the King in his warres with the habite and heart of a man and leauing her feminine weaknesse as it seemed to her husband who in the impatience of his loue slue himselfe Our Author addeth also that by the helpe of the Physicians such perfection was added to this worke of Nature that nothing remained to testifie hee had beene a woman he annexeth also like examples in some others Ludouicus Vertomannus or Barthema as Ramusius nameth him tells at large his iourney through all this threefold Arabia he trauelled from Damasco to Mecca Anno 1503. with the Carauan of Pilgrimes and Marchants being often by the way set vpon by Armies of those Theeuish and Beggerly Arabians This iourney is of fortie dayes trauell trauelling two and twentie houres and resting two for their repast After many dayes they came to a Mountaine inhabited with Iewes ten or twelue miles in circuit which went naked and were of small stature about fiue or sixe spannes high black of colour circumcised speaking with a wominish voice And if they get a Moore in their power they flay
Heresie of Eutyches heere Iason had built a Temple to Iupiter in the straights which seuer Europe from Asia after Melas measure fiue furlongs Of their ancient Kings others haue related but one cannot passe this our Historie without obseruation and that is Mithridates the sixth King of that name who loosing his father in the eleuenth yeere of his age by his Tutors was trecherously assailed but escaped and by vse of that antidote which of him still beareth the name Mithridate out-liued their poysoning conspiracie Hee liued indeed to the death of thousands which either his crueltie or his warres consumed Foure yeeres together to auoid their Treasons he liued in the fields and woods vnder a shew of hunting both preuenting their designes and inuring himselfe to hardnesse Hee spake two and twentie languages being Lord of so many Nations Hee held warres with the Romans sixe and fortie yeeres whom those renowned Captaines Sylla Lucullus Pompey did so conquer as he alway arose againe with great lustre and with greater terror and at last dyed not by his enemies command but voluntarily in his old age and his own Kingdome neuer made to attend the Roman triumphs Syllaes felicity Lucullus prowesse and Pompeyes greatnesse notwithstanding His aspiring thoughts had greedily swallowed the Soueraignty both of Asia and Europe He caused in one night all the Romans in his Dominions to be slaine in which massacre perished a hundred and fiftie thousand as some haue numbred But it cannot be conceiued saith Orosius how many there were or how great was the griefe both of the doers and sufferers when euery one must betray his innocent guests and friends or hazard his owne life no Law of Hospitalitie no Religion of Sanctuary or reuerence of Images being sufficient protection And no maruell if he spared not his enemies when he slew Exipodras and Homochares his sonnes and after the poysonings and voluntary death of Monyma his wife Statira and Roxane his daughters his sonne Pharnaces like to taste of the same cup won to his part his fathers Armie sent against him with which he pursued his father so hotly that hee hauing denounced a heauy curse vpon him entred amongst his Wiues Concubines and Daughters and gaue them poyson pledging them in the same liquor which his body accustomed to his Antidotes easily ouer-came and therefore was faine to intreat another to open a bloudy passage for that his cruell soule A man saith Orosius of all men most superstitious alway hauing with him Philosophers and men expert in all Arts now threescore and foureteene yeeres old The Religion in Pontus was little differing from the Greekes Wee read of the Sacrifices of this King to Ceres and to Iupiter Bellipotens in which the King brought the first wood to the fire He powred also thereon Hony Milke Wine Oyle and after made a Feast In honour of Neptune they drowned Chariots drawne with foure white Horses with which it seemed they would haue him ease himselfe in his Sea-voyages At the mouth of Pontus was the Temple of Iupiter Iasus called Panopeum and nigh thereto a Promontory sacred to Diana sometime an Iland ioyned to the Continent by an Earthquake Hereabouts was the Caue Acherusium whose bottomlesse bottome was thought to reach to Hell I may in the next place set downe Paphlagonia which as it fareth with such as haue mightie Neighbours can scarcely finde her proper limits Some reckon it to Galatia before described and sometimes Pontus hath shared it and either the force of Armes or bountie of Emperours hath assigned it at other times to Phrygia Cilicia or other parts the bounds thereof are thus deliuered Pontus confineth on the North on the East the Riuer Halys on the South Phrygia and Galatia on the West Bithynia Of the people hereof called Heneti some deriue the Veneti of Italy They now call it Roni It had the name Paphlagonia of Paphlagon the sonne of Phineus The Mount Olgasys is very high and in the same are many Paphlagonian Temples Sandaracurgium is another Mountaine made hollow by the Metall-miners which were wont to bee slaues redeemed from capitall Sentence who heere exchanged that speedie death for one more lingring So deadly is the Alpha and Omega the beginning and ending of this Idoll of the World which the Spaniards haue verified in the West by the destruction of another world Vitruuius tells of a Fountaine in Paphlagania as it were mixed with Wine whereof they which drinke without other liquor proue drunken The Heptacometae and Mossynoeci inhabited about those parts a people of that beastly disposition that they performed the most secret worke of Nature in publike view These are not so much notorious for being worse then beasts as their neighbours the Tibareni for surpassing in iustice other men They would not warre on their enemy but would faithfully before relate vnto him the Time Place and Houre of their fight whereas the Mossynoeci vsed to assault strangers that trauelled by them very treacherously They haue also a venemous kinde of Hony growing out of their trees with which they beguiled and slew three troupes of Pompey The Tabareni obserued one strange fashion that when the woman was deliuered of a childe her husband lay in and kept his chamber the women officiously attending him a custome obserued at this day amongst the Brasilians CHAP. XVI Of Asia proprie dicta now called Sarcum THis Region in the strict sense being a particular Prouince of the lesser Asia is bounded on the West with part of Propontis and Hellespont the Aegean Icarian and Mertoan Seas on the South with the Rhodian Sea Lycia and Pamphilia on the East with Galatia on the North with Pontus and Bithynia and part of Propontis In which space are contained Phrygia Caria and both Mysias Aeolis Ionia Doris Lydia Some circumcise from hence both Phrygia and Mysia alledging the authoritie of Saint Luke But in the Apocalypse Chap. 1. these parts are also added and 1. Pet. 1.1 PHRYGIA is diuided into the greater which lyeth Eastward and the lesse called also Hellespontiaca and Troas and of some Epictetus The greater PHRYGIA hath not many Cities Here stood Midaium the Royall Seat of Mydas and Apamia the Phrygian Metropolis Phrygia is called of the riuer Phryx which diuideth it from Caria Herodotus telleth that the Phrygians were accounted the most ancient of all people for the triall whereof Psammetichus King of Egypt had shut vp without societie of any humane creature two children causing onely goats to bee admitted to suckle them who after long time pronounced bec which they had learned of the goates but because that with the Phrygians signified bread therefore they accounted the Phrygians first authors of mankinde Before Deucalions floud Nannacus is reported to raigne there and foreseeing the same to haue assembled his people into the Temple with supplications and prayers Hence grew the prouerbe to say A thing was from
together of rosted Almons they made bread and wine of the roots of herbs This and venison was there food In one plaine of Media were pastured fiftie thousand Mares belonging to the King the herbe whereon they principally fed is stil called Medica The race of Horses called Nisaei were here bred and hence dispersed allouer the East Among the Medes none might be King by the Law of the Countrey except hee were in stature and strength eminent All the Medes saith Bardesanes a famous Chaldaean nourish Dogs with great care to which they cast men readie to die whiles they are yet breathing to be deuoured of them The Medes worshipped the fire with barbarous honours done thereto Their Kings held such Maiestie that none might laugh or spit before them They were seldome seene of their people They had alway Musitians attending them Their wiues and children accompanied them in their battells The name of the Medes remained famous after the Persian Conquest as appeareth by the stile which the Scripture giueth them The Law of the Medes and Persians which was vnchangeable the King himselfe not hauing power to reuoke his sentence As for the Catalogue of the Kings which succeeded Arbaces vntill the time of Astyages and the times of their raigne wee haue before shewed it out of Scaliger in our first Booke Chap. 13. True it is that all agree not in that account Reinerus Reineccius leaueth out diuers of them and numbreth the yeeres of the Median Dynastie but 261. whereas our former account hath 322. But I had rather referre the Reader to that Catalogue then trouble him with new out of this or other Authors Media hath beene diuided into Media Maior and Atropatia the former containeth Tauris supposed by Ortelius to be the forenamed Ecbatana yet now wanting walls altogether containing in circuit sixteene miles and of people two hundred thousand subdued to the Turke 1585. and before by Selim and Soliman but since recouered by the Persian Sultania famous for the fairest Moschee in the East Casbin to which the Persian hath remoued the Royall Seat from Tauris The Lake of Van three hundred miles long and an hundred and fiftie broad after Strabo Manlianus Lacus of salt-water the greatest next to Meotis Gyllius affirmeth that eight great Riuers runne into it without any apparant issue to the Sea Atropatia is now called Seruan the chiefe Citie is Sumachia or Shamaki in which the Sophi not long since built a Turret of flint and free-stone and in a ranke of flints therein did set the heads of the Nobilitie and Gentrie of the Countrey for a terrour to the rest the quarrell was pretended for Religion intended for Soueraigntie Their ancient Religion differed not much from the Persian and such also is it still Their Kings had many wiues which custome extended after to the Villages and Mountaines in so much that they might not haue lesse then seuen The women also esteemed it a credit to haue many husbands and a miserable calamitie to haue lesse then fiue Cyrus subdued them to the Persians Alexander to the Macedons What should wee speake of the Parthians who made Ecbatana their Seat Royall in the Summer time and of the Saracens Tartars Persians and Turkes who haue successiuely vexed these Countries Not farre from Shamaki saith Master Ienkinson was an olde Castle called Gullistone now beaten downe by the Sophi and not farre from thence a Nunrie of sumptuous building wherein was buried a Kings daughter named Ameleck Channa who slew her selfe with a knife for that her Father would haue forced her shee professing chastitie to haue married a Tartar King vpon which occasion the Maidens euerie yeere resort thither to bewaile her death There is also a high Hill called Quiquifs vpon the top whereof they say dwelt a Gyant named Arneoste hauing on his head two great Hornes and Eares and Eyes like a Horse and a tayle like a Cow who kept a passage thereby till one Haucoir Hamshe a holy man bound him with his woman Lamisache and his sonne After who is therefore had in Saint-like reputation Obdolowcan King of this Country vnder the Sophi besides gracious entertainment granted vnto Mr. Anthony Ienkinson for our English Merchants great priuiledges Anno 1563. Gilan also anciently Gelae is reckoned to Media Into these Cities of Media the Israelites were transported together with their Religion by Salmanesar the Assyrian GOD in his manifold wisdome so punishing their sinnes and withall dispersing some sparks of diuine truth CHAP. III. Of the Parthians and Hyrcanians §. I. Of Parthia PArthia is placed by Plinie in the rootes of the Hills hauing on the East the Arians on the West the Medes on the South Carmania on the North Hyrcania rounded with desarts Hee affirmeth that the Kingdomes of the Parthians were eighteene Eleuen of them neere to the Caspian Sea and the other seuen neer the Red Sea The word Parthian signifieth with the Scythians an exile Their chiefe Citie was Hecatompylos now as some affirme Hispaham for the excellencie thereof called of the Persians Halfe the world These Scythian exiles in the times of the Assyrians Medes Persians and Macedonians were an obscure people the prey of euery Conquerour which after seemed to diuide the world with the Romans Their speech was mixt of the Median and Scythian their Armies consisted most part of seruants which they held in great respect instructing them in feats of Armes In an Armie of fiftie thousand wherewith they encoutred Antonie there were onely eight hundred freemen The Parthians had no vse of gold or siluer but in their armour They had many wiues whereof they were so iealous that they forbad them the sight of other men They performed all businesse priuate and publike on horse-backe this being the distinction of free-men from seruants Their buriall was in the bellies of birds or dogs Their naked bones were after couered with earth they were exceedingly superstitious in the worship of their gods a stout vnquiet seditious vnfaithfull people Arsaces first a famous thiefe after the Founder of that Kingdome left no lesse memorie of himselfe amonst the Parthians then Cyrus among the Persians or Alexander among the Macedonians The day wherein hee ouerthrew Seleucus was solemnly obserued euery yeere amongst them as the beginning of their libertie Of him they called all their Kings Arsaces as the Roman Emperors are named Caesars They called themselues the brethren of the Sunne and Moone which are in those places worshipped This Arsaces was worshipped after his death They were no lesse bloudie to their brethren when they came to the Crowne then the Ottomans are at this day Phrahartes slew thirtie of his brethren and before them his father and after his sonne rather then he would endure a possibilitie of a Competitor About 224. yeeres after Christ Artabanus the last Persian King being slaine by Artaxeres or Artaxares the
knowledge both of the Turkish and of the Tartarian Historie as well as of the Scythian The MASSAGETAE famous for the ouerthrow of Cyrus esteeme the Sunne alone for God and offer vnto him a horse They haue one wife to each man and yet euery one vseth also his Neighbors wife openly hanging meane while his quiuer on the Waine or Cart The best death and most happy amongst them is when they are become old to bee cut in pieces and to be eaten together with sheeps flesh if hee dye naturally they burie him in the earth as dying a base and beastly death Their weapons are of brasse their furniture of gold of both which they haue much store little of yron and siluer The BACTRIANS when they were old or worne with sicknesse cast their Parents to Dogs which they kept for this purpose and called Buryall Dogs The Bactrian women are pompous riding in great state and lye with their seruants and with strangers They haue among them Brachmanes Zoroastres the Bactrian is accounted first author of the Magi and of liberall Arts he liued twenty yeeres in a wildernesse with cheese but others account this another Zoroastres The SACAE sometimes made neerer sometimes further inuasions they possessed Bactria and a great part of Armenia which after of them was called Sacasena and proceeded vnto Cappadocia where in the midst of their feastings being in the night surprised by the Persians and slaine they left their name Saca or Sacea to a yeerely solemnitie among the Persians in memory of this victory Of the Sacae some hold our Saxons to be descended Dionysius in his Greeke verses giueth them the highest praise for shooting of all others The AMAZONS of whom is before related are said to be descended of the Scythians who vnder the conduct of Plinos and Scolpythus settled themselues by the Riuer Thermodon and possessed the field of Themiscyra But when they continued to spoile the adioyning Countries they were by secret conspiracie of those people destroyed Their wiues became Warriours both in defence and offence and did great acts vnder their two Queenes Marthesia and Lampedo after Ohera and Antiope the daughter of Marthesia in the time of Hercules reigned then Penthesilea who in the Troian warres was slaine Yet the reliques of that Nation continued vntill Minthia or Thalestris in Alexanders time and by degrees ware out altogether One of their Queenes instituted the sacrifice to Mars and Diana called Tauropolium saith Diodorus who addeth that they liued not without men but that they put the men to domesticke drudgeries and exercised the women in the field Yet doth hee no lesse then Strabo make doubt of these Amazonian or Vnimammian Nation and no lesse of the HYPERBOREAN which hee thus relateth out of Hecataeus that they dwell in an Iland in the Ocean neere vnto the Pole in which Latona was borne and Apollo was most of all worshipped and that the Ilanders generally are Apolloes Priests euerie day chanting Hymnes in his praise they haue also a huge Groue and a round Temple dedicated to Apollo to whom their Citie is sacred These and other things fable they of the Hyperborei to which Salinus addeth many other of the clemencie of the ayre of the innocencie of the men of their freedome from sicknes and voluntarie seeking for death in the fulnes of daies after they haue made merrie casting themselues from a certaine Rocke into the Sea all these pleasures concurring notwithstanding things contrarie both to Truth and Nature except with Goropius wee turned some parts at least of this Historie into an Allegorie He yet historically interpreteth that they which placed the Hyperborei beyond the Arimaspi these beyond the Issedones and those also beyond the Scythians and these againe beyond the Cimmerians intended the Europaean Scythians or inhabitants about Maeotis the Liuonians and Muscouites the Issedones to be in Scandia and all alongst those frozen or Icy Seas as he proueth by Etymologie of the word North-East and Eastwards from these in the continent of Asia he placeth the Arimaspi and in the continent of America Mexicana hee seateth the Hyperborei They which list to haue recourse to his learned discourses of this argument Porcacchi telleth of some Scythians which hanged their dead on trees as the Colchi of old and some Tartarians are still reported to do esteeming it a disgrace to be buried in the earth The Taurici buried with their Kings some of their best friends The DERBICES feasted with the flesh of their kinsmen which were seuentie yeeres old the women at that age they strangled and after buried The CASPIANS straitly imprisoned such as attained to that age and their famished them Some say they laid them amongst the woods and obserued what became of them esteeming them as is said before of the Persians highly honoured and next to a canonizing whom the Birds tare with their talons In the next degree of happinesse whom Dogs or wilde beasts praied on but beneath all disasters and disaduentures which could find neither the one nor the other to become vnto them such enemie-friends The TIBARENI crucifie those old men which they haue best loued The HERVLES being sicke or old were placed by their kindred on a pile of wood and there by another which was not of that kinne slaine with a dagger who being descended the pile was fired His wife was forced to hang her selfe or else to abide perpetuall infamie But I am loth to burie you in these buriall Rites The Scythians punished no fault more seuerely then theft They would make themselues drunken with the smoake of hearbs burnt in the fire They sware by the Kings Throne by their Sword and by the Wind When they had sacked Athens and piled a heape of bookes to the fire which others had compiled with studious paines one of the companie disswaded burning of then lest that the Greekes neglecting the Muses would become Martiall They doubled their numbers at foure as we doe at ten through vnskilfulnesse in numbring §. IIII. Of the SERES WE might proceed further in these cold Scythian narrations if the deepe Snowes long Desarts beastly Men and man-kind beasts Men-eaters and other monstrous aduentures in the way did not make it both perplexed and dangerous Leauing therefore these horrid and vncouth Nations the first ciuill Countrie Eastward is the Seres the quietest and mildest of men fleeing the commerce and traffique with other Nations bartering yet with such Nations as resort to them not valuing wares by words but by their eyes Among them is reported to be neither Thiefe nor Whore nor Murtherer nor Hailes nor Pestilence nor such like plagues A woman after conception or in her purgation is not desired None eateth vncleane flesh none knoweth sacrifices but euerie one is iudge to himselfe of that which is right They tell that they liue two hundred yeeres that the Common-wealth is gouerned by a Councell of
as Pequin now and Nanquin are the situation South-east from Cinczianfu and fiue and twentie miles from the Sea the high houses and shops vnderneath the exceeding trade reuenue pastimes by water multitudes fairenesse and length of the streets all so conspiring to proue this Han or Hamceu to bee that Quinsay of Paulus True it is that Quinsay was then greater being as Venetus sayth an hundred miles about But the euerting of that Farfur and his Familie then raigning the diuerting of the Court to Cambalu by the Tartars and after to Nanquin by Humvn and neuer returning hither might lessen the same And might not warres in that long siege by the Tartars in the recouerie thereof by the Chinois easily circumcise her superfluitie Besides who knoweth whether all this huge Lake might be contained in that account of Paulus still compassed about with buildings Or before those warres the Lake it selfe might as Suceu now is be builded on which Time and Warre hath consumed nor since the remoue of the Court were so necessarie Mandeuile mentions warres at Quinsay in his time Nicolo di Conti which was here about the yeere 1440. saith Quinsay was in his time new built of thirtie miles compasse Or if any like better that Suceu it selfe to which also many of these arguments agree should be this Quinsay I contradict not That which somtimes I haue thought that Quinsay after so long a sicknesse and consumption of warres died bequeathing her Land-greatnesse to Nanquin her Sea-treasures to Suceu both arising out of the ashes of that Quinsay-Phenix I finde cannot I meane for Nanquin agree with the distance betwixt Suceu and Nanquin aboue foure dayes iourney Of this Quinsay let the Reader take a large and leasurely view in Marcus Paulus which but for tediousnesse I could hither haue transcribed Whether Hanceu or Suceu bee it or whether both these Paradises doe now succeed that Citie of heauen or wheresoeuer else it be it was which these are the wonder of the world reported saith Paulus to haue 12000. bridges 1600000. housholds in which was a rich Mart of all commodities of the world there was spent euery day 9589. pounds of Pepper it had ten principall Market-places square each square halfe a mile the chiefe streets leading thereto being fortie paces wide and running strait from one end of the Citie to the other these Market-places foure miles asunder But I forbeare the rest this Citie had twelue principall Companies or Arts each of which had 12000. shops the adioyning Countrey reckoned the ninth part of Mangi paide sixe millions and 400000. Duckats to the Great Chan yeerely for custome of Salt made of the Sea-water by the heate of the Sunne in large plaines besides sixteene millions and 800000. Duckats otherwise But let vs looke on some of the meaner Cities one of those called Hien is Scianhai in the Prouince of Nanquin in 29. degrees ouer-against Cerra and within foure and twentie houres sayle of Iapon and therefore is defended with a Garrison and a Nauie it hath about 40000. housholds and the iurisdiction adioyning seemes a continued Citie with Gardena intermixed payes to the King 300000. Duckats there is great store of Rice and Cotton and in this Citie and the Suburban liberties are 200000. Weauers thereof the aire wholsome and they liue ordinarily to a great age some to fourescore and fourescore and ten and many to a hundred yeeres The keyes of Cities are euery night brought to the Gouernours and thousands appointed to watch to preuent theeues themselues being the worst they ring bells at certaine spaces to each other These Cities of China ordinarily want that elegance and magnificence which stately Temples and sumptuous building doe affoord vnto our Cities of Europe Their houses are lowe without the ornament of Porches Galleries Windowes and prospect into the streets Besides these habitations they haue many which dwell not on land but in their ships For their shipping is of two sorts one for sayle another for habitation also and these meanes or fairer according to the wealth of the owners In the one side they carrie their families in the other side their passengers Many Barques are as victualling houses by the way and likewise as shops of merchandize Many of the poorer water-dwellers get their liuing by labour on land their wiues ferry ouer passengers and vse meanes to get fish They bring vp thousands of Duckes hatched with artificiall heate in dung which hauing fed with a little Rice in the morning they put out at a doore into the water which presently swim on land and eate the weedes which growe among the Rice these weeders thereby procuring some wages of the husband-men to their owners and at night are called home with a Tabor each resorting to their owne Barque They haue certaine Sea-crowes or Cormorants wherewith they fish tying their gorges that they cannot swallow the fishes which they take till their Masters turne being serued they are suffered to hunt for themselues which one in this Citie of London hath lately imitated and effected In the winter they haue store of Ice and Snow whereby the Riuers are frozen euen about Nanquin They haue abundance of all things necessarie to the life of man fruits flesh and fish with prices correspondent They haue two and somewhere three haruests in the yeere Few Mountaines but Plaines of an hundred leagues Wine they make of Rice They eate thrice a day but sparingly There drinke be it water or wine they drinke hot and eate with two stickes of Iuorie Ebonie or like matter nor touching their meate with their hands and therefore little napery serueth them Their warme drinkes and abstinence from fruits are great preseruatiues of their health which for the most part they enioy and none of them haue the stone which some say is with vs caused by cold drinkes but let vs take more full view of their persons and conditions §. IIII. Of their Persons Attire and many strange Rites SOme of the Chinois haue faces almost square many in the Prouinces of Canton and Quamsi haue two nayles on their little toes a thing common to all the Cauchin Chinois Their women are all of lowe stature and account small feet their greatest elegance and therefore binde and swaddle them so from their infancy all their liues that they seeme in going stump-footed which seemes to be by deuice of some to keepe them within doores Neither men nor women euer cut off their haire which is generally blacke and other colour a deformitie they let it growe on their crownes only till fifteene yeeres of age after that all their heads ouer loose on their shoulders till twentie yeeres when they put on their virilis pileus the cap of manhood and then gather it vp the men into caules or hats hollow at the top for the haire to passe thorow which the women vse not but trimme vp their haire on knots with gold siluer stones and flowers eare-rings also at their
timely and quick passage and be borne againe in richer Families And therefore they seeke no corners but execute their bloudy parricides publikely Yea greater abominations then these are here perpetrated vpon as sleight grounds many laying violent hands vpon themselues both in desperation and impatience and in malice also so to hurt their enemies Thus they say many thousands both of men and women euery yeere drowne themselues in Riuers hang themselues sometimes at their aduersaries doors or poyson themselues whereupon their kindred complaine to the Magistrates on those which gaue cause or occasion to these extremities which sometimes are seuere in these cases to the accused It may be reckoned among their cruelties which in the Northerne Prouinces is practised the gelding of their Male-Infants so to make them capable of the Kings seruice none other being admitted to attend or speake with Him and the whole sway of the Kingdome being in great part in these vn-manly hands of ten thousand scarce any but Plebeian illiterate seruile in condition and conditions impotent impudent of weake both conceit and performance Neither is this a little crueltie that the Magistrates are thought to kill as many against the Lawes as the Lawes themselues by execution of iudiciall sentence by their custome of beating men with Canes in manner at their owne lust This makes men that they are not Masters of their owne but are in continuall feare to be vndone by calumny and tyranny The Choinois are also a fraudulent and treacherous people They contemne strangers scorning to learne any thing out of their bookes as being vnlearned and rude yea all the Characters whereby they expresse the name of strangers are compounded of such as signifie beasts hauing indeed a beastly and diabolicall conceit of them When Embassadors come to them from Neighbour-Countries to pay their tributes or for other busines they are very suspiciously intreated entertained as captiues all the time of their iourney not permitting them to see any thing They shut them vp like beasts in stables within their Palaces neuer admit them the Kings presence themselues dealing with few of the Magistrates and all their businesse being ordered by Officers thereto assigned Nor may any natiue trauell out of the Kingdome without diuers cautelesse Petreius the Portugall Embassador died in prison at Canton They will not suffer strangers which haue staid long in China in some places the custome is nine yeeres to returne from thence Their Souldiers are base meere mercinaries not regarding honor where they are not rewarded with honor alike vile in estimation and action the most part slaues thereto by their owne or parents wickednesse legally condemned except at times of employment being Porters Horse-keepers or of like seruile drudgerie Their Captaines and Commanders haue some shaddow of dignitie but the substance we haue before rightly attributed to them who can punish these as the meanest Long nayles are some say accounted a Gentlemanly signe as of hands not employed to labour Their exceeding pride in which they are not exceeded of any appeared in this that they thought the Iesuites must needs attaine the Popedome at their returne into Europe as hauing so much bettered their learning by the Chinois Authors But These haue since euen by the opinion of learning obtained a better estimation It were tedious to tell of their opinions touching the Creation All being a rude and vnformed Chaos Tayn say they framed and settled the Heauen and Earth This Tayn created Pauzon and Pauzona Pauzon by power of Tayn created Tanhom and his thirteene brethren Tanhom gaue names to all things and knew their vertues and with his said brethren multiplied their generations which continued the space of ninetie thousand yeeres And then Tayn destroyed the world for their pride and created another man named Lotzitzam who had two hornes of sweet sauour out of which presently did spring forth both men and women The first of these was Alazan which liued nine hundred yeeres Then did the Heauen create another man Lotzitzam was now vanished named Atzion whose Mother Lutim was with child with him only in seeing a Lions head in the ayre This was done in Truchin in the Prouince of Santon he liued eight hundred yeeres After this Vsao and Hantzui and Ocheutey with his sonne Ezonlom and his nephew Vitei the first King of China they say were the inuenters of their many Arts In the later Epistles from China dated 1606. and 1607. little is there to further this Historie As for their tales of Miracles in those and the Iaponian Epistles bearing the same date wherein Ignatius Loyolaes picture is made a miracle-worker I hold them not worth relation The Chinois beleeue as is there reported that there is a certaine spirit which hath power of the life and death of children that are sicke of the measells and therefore when their children are sicke thereof they hang a glasse before the dore of the chamber where he lyeth that the spirit comming to destroy the child seeing his Image in that glasse should not dare to approach neerer Their Baptisme cured the disease a new remedy for measels a new vertue of Baptisme Their order for the Poore may be a patterne vnto Christians they suffer none to beg nor to be idle If any be blinde yet hee is set to some worke as grinding in a Querne or such like of which sort after Boterus account there are foure thousand blind persons that grinde still in Canton alone If they be impotent that they cannot worke their friends if they be able must-prouide for them if not they are kept in Hospitalls out of which they neuer passe and haue all necessaries prouided them by Officers appointed in euery Citie to this businesse Common women are confined to certaine places and may not goe abroad nor dwell in the Citie for infecting others and are accountable to a certaine Officer of their euill earnings which when they are old is bestowed on their maintenance Their dwelling is in the Suburbs of Cities They are great Sodomites although they haue many Wiues and Concubines which they buy of their Parents or in the Markets in like manner as the Turkes They are not by Law prescribed to obserue this or that Sect and therefore they haue many Sects some worshipping the Sunne some the Moone some nothing and all what themselues best like as is in part before shewed They take their oathes as here by kissing a booke with thrice drinking of a certaine liquor Antony Dalmeida saith that in saying Masse they were so thronged with the people that they were almost trodden vnder foot And of a Chinian Priest contrarie to the zeale elsewhere in any Religion they were inuited to dinner and feasted together with many other of their Priests that vsed them kindly §. VIII Of their Temples IT followeth now that we speake of places Religious amongst the Chinois of which their Temples challenge the first place their Sepulchres the next Of
reckoning but a few Puts where Fisher-men dwell and a few Villages within Land This is the Centre of the Easterne Traffique They are proud of their language which some say was deuised by the founders wherein they deuise many Sonnets and amorous Poesies The Malayos of Country-people goe naked with a cloth about their middle and a little roll of cloth about their heads Lodouico Barthema who was there before the Portugals knew it supposed that here arriued more ships then in any Citie in the world The Riuer Gaza neere thereunto is more after his reckoning then fifteene miles ouer The people in the Countrey lodge in Trees for feare of Tygres It is strange that Barros writes of these Tygres that in the height of eight yards they will reach and deuoure men their chiefe preseruatiues against them are their night fires the multitude is such that many enter by night into the Citie for prey of which hee tels that after the Portugals had taken it that a Tygre leaped ouer a high wall and carried away three slaues tied to a piece of timber together with the wood leaping againe vpon the wall with admirable lightnesse The Countrey being barren the Citie abounded neuerthelesse with plentie of necessaries exceeding those places whence they were brought After that Alphonsus Albuquerke had conquered Malacca the Moores dispossessed there seated themselues in diuers places along the coast some of them vsurped the title of Kings §. IIII. Of Patane and the neighbouring petie Kingdomes PAtane is a Citie Southwards from Siam chiefe of that Kingdome whereto it giueth name in the height of seuen degrees The buildings are of Wood and Reed but artificially wrought The Mesquit for many of them are Mahumetanes is of Bricke The Chinois are more then the natiue Inhabitants They are of an Ash-colour They vse three languages the Malayan which to them is naturall the Sian and Chinan The first is written like the Hebrew from the right hand the second like the Latine from the left and almost in like Characters the third from the right to the left with a descent from the top to the bottome The Chinois haue Idolatrous Temples and so haue the Sians wherein are many golden statues the Priests which attend them are clothed in yellow They haue sacred youths which are their Oracles The people when they enquire of them sit a conuenient distance from the Images and obserue the young mans gestures who with his haire disheuelled lyeth prostrate before the Idoll singing and playing on Instruments vntill he arise and standeth vp For then as possessed of the Deuil he runneth vp and downe with a terrible countenance and maketh a stirre as if he would kill himselfe and them that stand by with a sword which he hath in his hand Then the people prostrating themselues request him to declare the Deuils Oracle and he answereth as pleaseth him his lies being accounted Oracles Adulterie is here a capitall offence the father of the malefactor being the Executioner or his next kinsman if he be dead yet is this vice common notwithstanding this rigor by reason of the womens vnbridled lust The Kingdome hath bin gouerned many yeeres by a Queene who gaue good entertainment to the Hollanders Iames Neccij and his fellowes An. 1602. after their double misfortune and madnes which had befallen them the one in iest the other in earnest this at Macao in China where they were and knew it not and setting twentie men on shoare neuer saw them againe but heard that the Portugals had caused fifteen of them to be hanged the other at Auarella Falca in 11. degrees and an halfe where they found the Tract of Carts and footings of beasts but could not see a man nor shoot a beast They ghessed that the people liued as the Tartars wandring in Carts and Tents without any settled dwelling The place was by them called Sotternym by reason that many of their company had lost the vse of reason and became mad with eating a certaine fruit there growing like to Plums with a tender stone which continued till they had slept Had they knowne then the easinesse of the cure it had bin better then any Comedie to haue tickled their Splene and prouoked laughter to see one fighting against the enemies which assaulted him at his Cabbin to heare another with piteous shrikes crie out on the multitude of Deuils and Hobgoblins which affrighted him a third sees strange sights and cries out The ship is full of strangers and whiles one in more pleasing distraction enioyeth and ioyeth in that distracted pleasure the sight of God and his Angels another transported by this humoured Charon with dreadfull and gastly lookes and trembles at his supposed sights of the Deuill and his hellish associats It were a madnesse to relate how exceedingly this their madnesse was diuersified and how many Acts this Tragicall Commedie had till sleepe had dispersed those fumes wherewith that fruit had distracted their braines From thence as is said they came to Patane where the Queene entertained them in good sort and to their contentment As the difference of their writing in such neerenesse of dwelling is very much so no lesse is found in their Religions The Pataneans are Mahumetanes The Chinois and Siamites are Ethniks in that diuersitie of Rites which you haue heard Whiles the Hollanders were there one of those youths in that Propheticall dictraction before mentioned warned them to depart from thence for a great fire would otherwise consume them whereupon many forsooke their habitation and yet no fire happened They also saw the execution of their seuere Law against Adulterie on two noble Personages whose lewd familiaritie being detected shee chose to bee strangled and hee to bee stabbed the Law permitting them their choice of the kindes of death which by the fathers of the parties was executed on them In single persons it is accounted no crime And if a forreine Merchant come to trade there they vse to aske him if he need not a woman yea many young women offer their seruice and the price and time being agreed on she whom he pleaseth to chuse goeth with him to his house and in the day performeth the office of a seruant in the night of a Concubine but then neither of them may seeke change of pleasure without great perill The Siamites that liue here weare two or three balls of Gold or Siluer as bigge as a Tennis-ball in their yards as we shall after obserue in Pegu The Mahumetans weare them not The Queene keepes her selfe close at home among her women of which some may not marry but yet may doe worse others may hauing first obtained the Queenes licence It is seldome that shee is seene yet sometimes she rideth on an Elephant in Progresse for her recreation And for Elephants they haue a deuice to take them in this sort Some ride into the woods on a tame Elephant and when they espie a wilde
their meat naked and where they dresse and eate their meat make a Circle within which none must enter during that time Their women are brought vp from their child-hood with shackles some of Siluer some of Brasse and some of Iron on their legges and Rings in their eares all which encrease with themselues being made bigger as they grow so that in time a man may thrust his hand through the holes of their eares Also they weare Bracelets of Elephants teeth about their armes from the wrist to the elbow Wee haue alreadie spoken of the Bulloches their Northerly neighbours Sunne-worshipping Giantly bignesse and Inhumane humanitie in eating mans-flesh and likewise of the Puttans or Agwans The Bulloches in Sinda and vpon the Persian Gulfe it seemes of this generation are Mahumetans Robbers by Land and Pyrats by Sea whereto they adde the murther of those they rob Their treachery to Sir R. Sherly and the Expedition is before mentioned which had it had expedition according to their plot they had murthered all but the Surgeon the Musician the Boyes and the Women When I was in Sinda saith M. Withington they tooke a Boat with seuen Italians and one Portugall Fryar this ripped vp by them to seeke Gold in his entrailes the rest slaine in the fight Yet there are very honest men of them in Guzerat and about Agra Touching other Superstitions of this Kingdome thus wrireth Ioannes Oranus in the Narration of this Kingdome Not farre from the Citie Lahor is an Idoll resembling a woman which they call Nazar Coto framed with two Heads six or seuen Armes and twelue or fourteene Hands one of which brandisheth a Speare another a Club. Hereunto resort many Pilgrims to worship and hereof they tell many miracles as that many cut off their tongues which are againe restored whole vnto them but remaine mute Some thinke our breath to bee our Soule Some affirme That all things are the same thing Some that God onely hath a being other things are shadowes and appearances Some thinke all things and some the round Circle of the World and some themselues to bee God Almost all doe hold the commigration of Soules into the bodies of Beasts They say the World shall last foure Ages or Worlds whereof three are past The first lasted seuenteene Laches euery Laches contained an hundred thousand yeeres and eight and twentie thousand yeeres Men in that World liued ten thousand yeeres were of great stature of bodie and great sinceritie of minde Thrice in this space did God visibly appeare on the Earth First in forme of a Fish that hee might bring out the Booke of the Law of Brama which one Causacar had hurled into the Sea The second time in forme of a Snaile that he might make the Earth dry and solid Lastly like a Hog to destroy one that said he was God or as others of them as truely say to recouer the Earth from the Sea which had swallowed it The second World lasted ten Laches and ninetie two thousand and six yeeres in which men were as tall as before and liued a thousand yeeres God did appeare foure times First in a monstrous forme the vpper part a Lion the lower a Woman to represse the pride of one which gaue out himselfe for God Secondly like a poore Bramane to punish a proud King that would by a new-deuised Art fly into Heauen The third time to be reuenged of another King which had slain a poore Religious man he came in the likenesse of a Man named Parcaram and lastly like one Ram the sonne of Giocorat which had slaine Parcaram The third World continued eight Laches and foure thousand yeeres wherein men liued fiue hundred yeeres and God appeared twice in Humane likenesse The fourth Age shall endure foure Laches whereof are alreadie passed foure thousand sixe hundred fourescore and twelue yeeres They say God will also appeare in this Age Others imagine That he hath alreadie appeared and that Echebar is hee Some hold That those ten Appearances were but creatures which had receiued Diuine power They themselues easily perceiue the vanity of these Chimaera's and monstrous opinions but will not leaue them lest they should at the same cast lose their Wealth and Superstition together In the Countrey of the Mogor they haue many fine Carts carued and gilded with two Wheeles drawn with two little Buls about the bignesse of our great Dogs in England and they will runne with any Horse and carry two or three men in one of those Carts They are couered with Silke or fine Cloth and be in vse as our Coaches in England But we will shut vp this too great discourse of the great Mogols Greatnesse in the words of the Worlds Greatest Foot-post He tels vs from the very Mogols Court That this present Prince is a man of three and fiftie yeeres of age of complexion middle betwixt white and blacke in a more expressiue Epitheton Oliue of a feemely composition of bodie of stature little vnequall to Mine but much more corpulent hee neuer trauelled so much on foot nor ten moneths together with fiftie shillings expence His Dominion is little lesse then foure thousand English miles which if it come short of the Turke in Geometricall dimension of ground it is with a great pleonasme supplied by the fertilitie of his Soyle and in the vnion of all his Territories Againe hee exceedeth him in Reuenue a great deale more then M. Coryats reckoning hee presenteth himselfe thrice euerie day at the rising of the Sunne which hee adoreth by the eleuation of his hands at noone and at fiue of the clocke in the euening but he standeth in a roome aloft alone by himself and looketh from a window that hath an embroidered sumptuous Couerture supported with two siluer Pillasters to yeeld shadow vnto him In feeding of his Beasts hee spendeth at the least ten thousand pound sterling a day and keepeth a thousand women for his owne body whereof the chiefe is Normal I haue bin in a Citie in this Country called Detee where Alexander ioyned battell with Porus in token of his victory erected a brasse Pillar which remaineth there to this day There arriued foure English ships at Surat and in the same Sir Thomas Rowe the English Embassador to the Mogol the newes whereof came to Asmere Octob. 8. 1615. and did much resocillate M. Coryats spirits as did M. Brownes verses from Amadavars and so I hope will yours CHAP. VIII Of Cambaya Decan and the neighbouring Nations §. I. Of the Cambayans ALthough we might seem to haue spoken sufficiently of the Cambayans alreadie in our former Mogol-Relations yet both as better knowne and because such was our Order in the former Editions wee haue allowed them a Chapter here by themselues Cambaya is also called Guzarat containing in length from the Riuer Bate to Circam a Persian Region fiue hundred miles of Sea-coast being on other parts enuironed with the Kingdomes of Dulcinda and
it selfe to the Portugall yoke And because we haue in this Chapter mentioned so many Wonders let this also haue place among if not aboue the rest which presently happened Whiles the Portugalls were busie in their Buildings a certaine Bengalan came to the Gouernour which had liued as hee affirmed three hundred thirtie fiue yeeres The old men of the Countrey testified That they had heard their Ancestors speake of his great age and himselfe had a sonne fourescore and tende yeeres old and not at all Booke-learned yet was a speaking Chronicle of those passed times His teeth had sometimes fallen out others growing in their places and his beard after it had beene very hoarie by degrees returned into his former blacknesse About an hundred yeeres before this time he had altered his Pagan Religion into the Arabian or Moorish For this his miraculous age the Sultans of Cambaya had allowed him a stipend to liue on the continuance of which he now sought and did obtaine of the Portugals Friar Ioano dos Santos cells a long story of one yet aliue Ann. 1605. of whom the Bishop of Cochin had sent men to inquire who by diligent search found that hee was then three hundred eightie yeeres old and had married eight times the father of many generations They say his teeth had thrice fallen out and thrice renewed his haire thrice hoary and as oft black againe Hee could tell of nineteene successiue Kings which reigned in Horan his Countrey in Bengala He was also borne a Gentile and after turned Moore and hoped he said to dye a Christian reioycing to see a picture of Saint Francis saying Such a man when he was twentie fiue yeeres old had foretold him this long life But to returne Mamudius successor to Badurius sought with all his forces to driue these new Lords out of Diu as Solyman had done before by a Nauie and Armie sent thither but both in vaine of which Wars Damianus à Goes hath written diuers Commentaries But this whole Countrey is now subiect to the Mogor It was in Alexanders time peopled by the Massani Sodrae or Sabracae Praestae and Sangadae as Ortelius hath placed them where Alexander as in diuers other places he had done erected a Citie of his owne name called Alexandria Daman another Key of this Bay and entrance of the Riuer Indus into the Sea fell to the Portugals share The Land of Cambaya is the fruitfullest in all India which causeth great traffique of Indians Portugals Persians Arabians Armenians c. The Guzarates or Cambayans are the subtillest Merchants in all those parts They haue amongst them many Histories of Darius and Alexander which sometime were Lords of this Indian Prouince The Portugals haue at diuers times conquered diuers of the chiefe Townes in this Kingdome some whereof they keepe still The women in Diu by Art dye their teeth black esteeming themselues so much the more beautifull and therefore go with their lips open to shew the blacknesse of their teeth drawing away the couer of their lips as if they were lip-lesse giuing the prize of Beautie to a double deformitie Blacknesse and a Mouth O Hellish wide When a Cambayan dyeth they burne his body and distribute the ashes vnto the foure Elements of which man consisteth part to the Fire part to the Ayre to the Water also and Earth their due portions as Balby hath obserued M. Patrike Copland Minister in the Dragon with Captaine Best writes that hee rode in this Countrey from Medhaphrabadh to Surat in a Coach drawne with Oxen which is the most ordinary though they haue goodly Horses He saw at once the goodliest Spring and Haruest that euer he had seene Fields joyning together whereof one was greene as a medow the other yellow as gold ready to be cut of Wheat and Rice All along goodly Villages full of trees yeelding Taddy the Palme of which after a new sweet Wine strengthning and fattening A Smith which loued his liquor said hee could wish no other wages but a pot of this Taddy alway at his girdle §. II. Of the Kingdomes of Decan OF the Decans we haue spoken before in the Mogol conquests Decan is the name of a Citie sixe leagues from which is a Hill out of which the Diamond is taken This Hill is kept with a Garrison and walled about Of the Decan Kingdomes Barros hath reported That about the yeere 1300. Sa Nosaradin reigned in Delly or Delin and inuaded the Kingdome of Canara which reacheth from the Riuer Bate North of Chaul vnto the Cape Comori and wonne much from the Ancestors of the King now termed of Bisnaga At his returne he left Habedsa his Lieutenant who added to the former Conquests gathering a Band of all mixtures Gentiles Moores Christians His sonne was confirmed in the Gouernment therefore called Decan and the people Decanins because of this confusion of so many Nations of which his Fathers and His forces consisted for Decanins signifies Bastards He shooke off alleageance to his Lord and acknowledged none Superiour Hee also much encreased his Dominions His name was Mamudsa Hee appointed eighteene Captaines or Commanders allotting to each seuerall Prouinces These Captaines hee made were but slaues that so hee might the easier hold them in subjection He commanded that each of them should build a Palace at Bedir his chiefe Citie and there reside certaine moneths in the yeere his sonne remayning there in perpetuall hostage These in processe of time grew fewer and therefore greater the King holding nothing but his Royall Citie all the Empire being in the hands of these slaues which when the Portugals came thither were no more but Sabay Niza-Malucco Madre Malucco Melic Verida Coge Mecadam the Abessine Eunuch and Cota Malucco The mightiest of them was Sabay Lord of Goa His sonne was Hidalcam Thus Barrius Garcias ab Horto writes That the Mogors had possessed the Kingdome of Delly but a certaine Bengalan rebelling against his Master slue him vsurped his State and by force of warre added this of Canara also to his Dominion he was called Xaholam This King made his sisters sonne his Successor who was much addicted to Forreiners He diuided his Kingdome into twelue parts or Prouinces ouer which he set so many Captaines Idalcam from Angidaua to Cifarda from thence to Negatona Nizamaluco Ouer Balaguate or the vp-hill Countrey for Bala in the Persian language signifieth The toppe and Guate a Hill Imadmaluco and Catalmaluco and Verido c. These all rebelled and captiued Daquem their King at Beder the chiefe Citie of Decan and shared his Kingdome amongst themselues and some Gentiles partners in the conspiracie They were all forreiners but Nizamaluco This and the other names before mentioned were Titles of Honour giuen them with their Offices by the King corrupted by the vulgar in pronouncing Idalcam is Adel-ham Adel in the Persian language signifieth Iustice Ham is the Tartarian appellation signifying a Prince or King which name might well
Countrey amount to three millions of Shariffes one to the Great Turke the second to the Bassa the third for payes and sending forth the Carauan to Mecca The present Bassa is Mahomet a man well in yeeres and of seuere conditions He cut off the heads of foure thousand Spacheis at his first entrance for insolencies and sent the great men to Constantinople strangling such as refused vsing the Arabians which hated the other in his executions Drunkennesse is punished with death If a robberie bee committed they which are appointed to guard that quarter suffer for it which makes them to saue themselues sometimes apprehend innocents who with holes boared through their armes stretcht wide on staues in which are candles stocke burning downe to the flesh are led to execution His rigour made him confine himselfe to the Castle yet so approued of the Grand Seignior that he hath giuen him his daughter in marriage a childe of foure yeeres solemnized with all possible ceremonies He will hardly suffer a Christian to turne Mahumetan thinking perhaps they doe it rather for preferment then deuotion No Citie can be more populous nor better serued with prouision of all sorts then Cairo the fairest Citie in Turkie yet now as it were withered by age and sicknesse in comparison of her yonger and more flourishing times Most of the Inhabitants are Merchants or Artificers All of a trade keepe their shops in one place which they shut about fiue a clocke except Cookes solacing themselues the rest of the day Few but such as haue great families dresse meate in their houses which the men buy readie drest the women being too fine fingered to meddle with huswiferie These ride abroad vpon pleasure on easie-going Asses and tie their husbands to due beneuolence otherwise procuring a diuorcement Many Physitians are in Cairo by reason of the many Simples brought hither They haue a kinde of Roe wherewith they perfume themselues in the morning as a preseruatiue against both Infection and Deuils There are many which get their liuings by shewing feats with Birds and Beasts which teach Rauens to vse their throats and tongues together so that they will make a man admire at their speech Dogs and Goats to goe and turne on the tops of little pillars not aboue the breadth of a mans hand Camels taught to daunce when they are yong by setting them on a hot hearth playing meanewhile on an Instrument the heat then and musicke after causing this motion Asses are not Asses but beyond Bankes his Horse in trickes taught by their suttle Masters But Cairo hath carried vs too farre an Imperious Mistris indeed to our Readers patience Yet will we further adde this short note out of the two Maronites Translators of the Nubian Geographers Metsr is the name of Cairo and all Egypt so called of Mesraim the sonne of Noa as saith Mohamed Sirazita This Citie is gouerned by a Bascia and twentie fiue thousand Spahies and Ianizaries It is rich in Cassia Trees Sugar Canes and Corne many Lands adioyning yeelding haruest twice a yeere Hay foure times Herbs and Pulse in manner alway greene Adde store of Salt very white the water of Nilus inclosed in pits and by the onely heate of the Sunne in three dayes being turned into it In former times it was famous for Balsám plants now remooued to Mecca by command of the Othomans and none are found in all Egypt but seuen shrubs in the Bassa's garden kept with great diligence The leaues are like to wilde Marjoram the juyce is taken by a little incision in the trunke or branch Abu-Chalil-Ben-Aali writes that from the fifteenth to the two and twentieth of Rabij Atthani Iune there falls a dew which leaues no token thereof in the earth yet by vulgar experience is found by weighing the Sand or Earth of Nilus bankes and is an euident token of the encrease of Nilus The Aire also is then made more wholsome Plagues and Feuers cease and those which were sicke of them recouered Alexandria is very vnwholesome as the graue of that Alexandria wee before mentioned Vnder the foundations are great habitations as if they were two Alexandria's built one vpon another Vnder the houses of the Citie are Cisternes sustayned with mightie Arches to receiue the inundation of Nilus belonging saith G. Braun to euery house the cause of much sicknesse to the Inhabitants especially since the diminishing and decay of the Citie most of the Cisternes now being fennie for want of vse When the Saracens had spoyled it it remayned long desolate vntill a subtile Caliph proclaymed that Mahomet had left great indulgences to such as would here inhabite And thus he replenished the Citie with Inhabitants building houses for them as hee did Colledges for the Students and Monasteries for the Religious Here yet remayneth a little Chappell wherein they say that the high Prophet and King Alexander the Great lyes buried to which resort many Piigrimes that adore the same and bestow there their almes The Arabians and their Alcoran also call Alexander Two-horned the reason whereof seemeth to be that his ambitious seeking to bee accounted the sonne of Iupiter Ammon neither doe the vulgar Arabians know him by the name Alexander but by that title of Two-horned And such was his Image in the Cyrenaike coynes This body was taken from Perdiccas by Ptolemaeus Lagi and there intombed in gold which Cybiosartes taking away it was couered with glasse so remayning till the time of the Saracens In old time they had a custome mentioned by Gallen of executing condemned persons which they would quickly despatch to apply to the brest an Aspe and then cause him to walke a few pases and suddenly he is at his long home This he there saw a practice not much vnlike the Athenian draught of Hemlock There is in Alexandria as Master Enesham relateth a pillar of marble called by the Turkes King Pharaos needle foure square in height ninetie foote Master Sandys saith there lyes another by it like vnto it halfe buried in rubbidge both Hieroglyphicall Obeliskes of Theban marble almost as hard and of a deeper red then Porphyr in the same place where Alexanders Palace stood And without the said Citie foure hundred pases another round called Pompeys Pillar standing on a square stone fifteene foote high the compasse of the pillar is seuen and thirtie foote the height an hundred and one causing no small wonder how it should be erected on that stone This happily was set vp in memorie of Great Pompey who by the Egyptian treacherie was slaine at Pelusium almost in the sight of Ierusalem as Eberus noteth and that Countrey of the Iewes which he had vniustly wronged and subdued to Romane seruitude although his hands were purer touching the holy places and treasures which his curious eyes would needes behold then those of perjured Crassus which before had suffered deserued vengeance by Parthian execution Iodocus à Meggen saith that the Channell which
seemed to me to be a deceiuer In Mount Beni Iesseten are many Iron mines and the women in great brauerie weare Iron rings on their fingers and eares Ham Lisnan was built by the Africans and borrowed the name from the Fountayne of an Idoll whose Temple was neere the Towne to which at certayne times in the yeere resorted men and women in the night where after sacrifices the candles were put out and each man lay with the woman hee first touched Those women were forbidden to lye with any other for a yeere after The children begotten in this adulterie were brought vp by Priests of the Temple The Moores destroyed this holy-stewes and the Towne not leauing any mention thereof In Mount Centopozzi are ancient buildings and neere thereto a spacious hole or drie pit with many roomes therein they let men downe into the same by ropes with lights which if they goe out they perish in the pit Therein are many Bats which strike out their lights In the Mountaynes of Ziz there are Serpents so tame that at dinner time they will come like Dogs and Cats and gather vp the crummes not offering to hurt any Thus much of the kingdome of Fez out of Leo a learned Citizen of Fez and great Traueller both in the Places and Authors of Afrike whom Ortelius Maginus Boterus follow commended by Bodinus Posseuinus and others as the most exact Writer of those parts and translated into English by Master Poris from whom if I swarue in diuers things impute it to the Italian copie of Ramusius which differeth not a little especially in these things I haue here set downe from the English I thought good here also to adde out of others some such customs and rites as they obserue in Fez and other parts of this Kingdome Their Circumcision is vsed in their priuate houses Women may not enter the Moschee for their often vncleannesse and because Eue first sinned The eight day after a childe is borne the parents send for a Talby or Priest and some old men and women where after a few prayers said the women wash the childe all ouer with water and giue the name making a banquet But sometimes the circumcision is deferred diuers yeeres after this ceremonie as the Fathers thinke Their Fasts they obserue very strictly not so much as tasting water till the starres appeare Yea diuers haue beene seene by their rigour in this superstition to faint and some to die A certayne Moore in the time of their Lent which continueth thirtie dayes in the companie of an English Gentleman being thirstie with heat and trauell went to a conduit in Marocco where the same Religion is professed as in Fez and there drinking was so reuiled of the people that in a desperate anguish hee slue himselfe with his dagger Yet doth their Law allow an exchange some dayes of this Lent with other dayes in the yeere following if trauell then hinder Their Feasts and Fasts are at the same times and in the same manner that the Turkes obserue of which is before spoken Their Easter they call Rumedan their Whitsuntide Lidlaber their Michaelmasse Lashour their Candlemasse Lidshemaw if it be lawfull thus to paralell those vaine superstitions with Christian obseruations In this last Feast which seemeth to bee the same which Leo calls Mahomets birth-day euery one must haue a candle for himselfe and for euery sonne in his house The King hath that day candles carried to him some like May-poles other like Castles sixe or eight men carrying one of them so artificially composed that some are in making six moneths That night the King doth heare all the Law read the like is done in all other Churches The Talby that cannot reade all their Law in a night is held insufficient for his place They goe saith my Authour sixe times in foure and twentie houres which is once oftner then is written of the Turkes except on their Sabbath to their prayers first washing themselues as they doe also after the offices of nature and after companie with their wiues thinking thereby to be washed from their sinnes Their times of prayer are two houres before day the first when the Monden or Sexten cryeth in the Steeple as you may reade in our Turkish Relations and then may no man touch his wife but prepare himselfe to pray with washing or other deuotions either in his owne house or at Church After their publike prayers the Talby sits downe and spends halfe an houre in resoluing the doubts of such as shall mooue any questions in matters of their Law The second time of prayer is two houres after when it is day The third at noone The fourth at foure of the clocke in the afternoone The fift at the twi-light The last two houres after In the first of these they pray for the day in the second they giue thankes for it in the third time they giue thankes for that it is halfe passed in the fourth they desire the Sunne may well set on them at twi-light they giue thanks after their daily labours the last time they desire a good night They thinke it vnseemely to eate meat with their left hands and hold it vncleane and doe all with their right hand Their Sabbath or Friday is not exempted from worke Onely they are then more deuout in going to Church Their Churches are not so faire generally as in Christendome nor haue seats in them ornaments or bells onely the floores are matted they are also poore for the most part as are their Church men Their Lyturgie is very short not so long as the Pater noster and Creede other set forme they haue not but euery one prayes after his owne pleasure Although the Moore may haue foure wiues and as many concubines as hee can purchase yet few marry foure because the wiues friends will haue a sufficient bill of dowrie for her maintenance which none but rich men can performe and againe the wiues challenge his nights companie and that in course if any be neglected shee complaines to the Magistrate and he forceth the husband to his dutie or else to send her home with her Dower and a Bill of diuorce The Concubines are embraced with more stolne pleasures That bill of Dower holdeth the husband in awe which else would make a slaue of his wife or still change for yonger flesh The Bride is besided before her husband see her and if hee finde her not a Virgin hee may turne her home and keepe her portion by Law For their funerall Rites when one is dead they presently wash him and speedily put him into ground the heat so requiring and after that the women at conuenient times haue a custome to meete and make memoriall of their deceased friends with remembrance of their vertues which they thinke caused men to haue more respect to their good name Their other obsequies are before declared The King vseth to sit in Iudgement on Fridayes in the afternoone and the Mufti sitteth with
to liue long In their Winter they haue much sicknesse and mortalitie The goods of the deceased descend not to his Children but to the Brethren if he haue any otherwise to his Father If it bee a Woman her Husband deliuereth her marriage goods to her brethren When the King dies the Sepulchre is made like a house and as well furnished as if they were aliue being guarded night and day by armed men to bring him any thing which he shall need Their Noses are flat not naturally but by pressing them downe in their Infancie esteeming it a great part of beautie Their hot stomackes can digest raw flesh and therefore Alexander Aphrodisicus and Coelius Rhodiginus that thinke their naturall heate extracted to the outward parts to be the cause of their blacknesse are deceiued They eate the enemies which are slaine in the warres which are very rife amongst those Nations and those which are taken are euerlasting prisoners And in some more important warres which they vndertake they will burne their dwellings before they goe lest either the enemy might possesse them by conquest or themselues become too mindfull of a returne In these warres they prouide themselues of some good light Armour wearing at such times no other apparell Their Women are vnfaithfull Secretaries in Natures most hidden secrets vsing in the sight of men women boyes and girles to be deliuered of their Children whom after they circumcise whether they be of the male or female sexe §. IIII. Of the Marriages Manners Religion Funerals Gouernment and other Rites of the Guineans collected out of a late Dutch Author ANd if we may leaue to follow a Dutch guide well acquainted in these parts whereof he hath written a very large Treatise you may feast with them at their spousals and againe after a view of their liues at their Funerals At the marriages of their Daughters they giue halfe an ounce of Gold to buy Wine for the Bridale the King himselfe giueth no other portion The Bride in the presence of her friends sweareth to be true to her Husband which the man doth not For Adulterie he may diuorce her and the Adulterer payeth to the King foure and twenty Pesos of gold and the husband also may driue him out of Towne but the Dutchmen payd no fine therefore the Women onely were blamed and payd foure Pesos If the husband suspects his wife hee makes tryall of her honesty by causing her to eate salt with diuers Fetisso ceremonies hereafter mentioned the feare whereof makes her confesse They haue many Wiues if they can buy and keepe them each dwelleth in a house by her selfe though there be ten of them they eat and lodge asunder sometimes they will bring their cheere together The Husband closely takes which he will haue lye with him to his roome where their bed is a Mat. The Women after trauell wash themselues and acccompany not with their husbands for three moneths after The Child newly borne hath a cleane cloath wrapped about the middle and is layd downe on a mat The Mothers vse to beare their Children at their backes and so trauell with them none prouing lame notwithstanding that shaking of their bodies they giue them the brest ouer their shoulders When it is a moneth old they hang a net about the body like a shirt made of the barke of a Tree hanged full of Fetissos to secure it from the Diuell who otherwise would they thinke carry it away They hang the haire full of shels and Corals about the necke armes and legges applying diuersi Fetissos or wreathes with superstitious fancies that one is good against Vomiting a second for Falling a third for Bleeding a fourth to make it Sleepe a fifth against wilde Beasts and so on in the rest giuing to each Fetisso a seuerall name They quickly learne them to eate and then leaue them about the house like dogs they soone learne to goe to speake to swim When they are first borne they are not blacke but reddish as the Brasilians Each woman brings vp her owne they teach them no ciuilitie and beat them sometimes cruelly with staues When they are eight or ten or twelue yeeres old they learne them to spinne Bark-threed and make nets after that they goe with their Fathers to fish At eighteene yeeres old they begin to set vp for themselues two or three of them together hiring a house and Canoa and then they couer their priuities grow amorous and their Fathers looke out wiues for them They haue little haire on their face at thirty they weare nayles as long as the joynt of a mans finger as a token of Gentilitie which is also obserued by Merchants they keepe them very cleane and as white as Iuorie They are great in flesh beyond Men of these parts At threescoore and ten or fourescore their blacknesse decaies and they grow yellow They haue small bellies long legges broad feet long toes sharpe sight quicke wit Estridge mawes are spitefull curiously neat Drunkards Theeues Lecherous and subject to the Pockes whereof they are not ashamed as neither of shewing their nakednesse Yet it is holden shame with them to let a fart which they wondered at in the Hollanders esteeming it a contempt The Women goe long naked are libidinous and would boast of their filthinesse if they could haue their pleasure with the Dutch decking themselues of purpose They weare beades about their neckes and straw Fetissos about their feet The Mulato women in Mina cut their haire short for brauerie They cut three gashes on their fore-head an inch long and likewise on their cheekes neere their eares which they suffer to swell and colour it with painting They make also white strakes vnder their eyes They curle and fold the haire of their head making a hill in the middest like a hat with frizzles round about They vse long combes with two teeth onely each a finger length these they vse also for salutation plucking them out and in as heere men put off or on their hats they make also white spots on their faces which afarre off shew like pearles They rase their armes and brests with diuers cuts on which euery morning they lay colours which cause them to shew like blacke silke doublets cut and pinked They haue earings and bracelets of Copper the vnmarried Maides weare thirty or forty on each arme of Iron the common Queanes weare copper rings with bels on their legs These women are strong nimble well proportioned good house-wiues home-keepers and cookes not very fruitfull The riches of the Guineans are store of Wiues and Children They take great pride of white teeth which therefore they rub with a certaine wood they shew like Iuorie Their garment is a fadome or more of Linnen cloth which they weare about their bodies from beneath the brests to the knees vpon which they girt a piece of blue or yellow cloth whereon hang their kniues and keyes and diuers wispes of straw or Fetissos When
neere the Cape of Good-hope the Aethiopians haue no hope or hap of good colour whereas the hotter Countreys of Libya and in manner all America notwithstanding the Sunnes strait looking and neerenesse not allowing them a shaddow to attend them in the greatest height of his bounty know not this blacke tincture in the Naturals thereof But to returne and who will not returne to the Mines There are other Mines in the Prouinces of Boro and Quiticui in which and in the Riuers is found Gold not so pure The people are carelesse and negligent to get and the Moores which traded with them were faine to giue their wares in trust with promise by such a time to pay them in Gold and the people would not faile in their word Other Mynes are in Toroa wherein are those buildings which Barrius attributeth to some forren Prince and I for the reasons before alledged to Salomon It is a square Fortresse of stone the stones of maruellous greatnesse without any signe of morter or other matter to ioyne them The wall fiue and twenty spannes thicke the height not holding proportion Ouer the gate are letters which learned Moores could neither reade nor know what letters they were There are other buildings besides of like fashion The people call them the Court for an Officer keepes it for the Benomotapa and hath charge of some of his women that are there kept They esteeme them beyond humane power to build and therefore account them the workes of Deuils and the Moores which saw them said the Portugals Castles were no way to bee compared to them They are fiue hundred and ten miles from Sofala Westward in one and twenty degrees of Southerly Latitude in all which space is not found one building ancient or later the people are rude and dwell in Cottages of Timber All the people of this Region is of curled hayre and more ingenious then those which are against Mosambique Quiloa and Melinde among whom are many that eate mans flesh and let their Kine blood to satisfie their thirst These seeme prone to receiue the Faith for they beleeue in One GOD whom they call Mozimo and haue no Idols nor worship other thing They punish nothing more seuerely then Witchcraft whereunto other Negros are exceedingly addicted no such person escapeth death The like detestation they conceiue against Adultery and Theft Euery one may haue as many wiues as they will but the first is principall the other serue her and her children are heires A woman is not mariageable with them till her naturall purgation testifie for her abilitie to Conception and therefore they entertaine the first fluxe thereof with a great Feast In two things they are Religious in obseruation of dayes and Rites concerning their dead Of dayes they obserued the first day of the Moone the sixt the seuenth the eleuenth the sixteenth the seuenteenth the twentieth and the eight and twentieth because in that day their King was borne The Religion is in the first sixt and seuenth all the rest are repetitions aboue ten When any is dead after his bodie is eaten his neere kindred or his wife which hath had most children by him keepe the bones with some signes whereby to know whose they were and euery seuenth day they obserue Exequies in the same place where they are kept They spreade many clothes and set thereon tables furnished with bread and sodden flesh which they offer to the dead with prayers and supplications And the principall thing they request of them is the good successe of their Kings affaires These prayers they make being cloathed in white garments after which the good man and his family eate their offerings The Benomotapa must weare cloathes of the same Country for feare of infection others may weare forren cloth He is serued on the knee and when he drinketh or cougheth all they which are about him make a shout that all the Towne may know None may cough in his presence also euery one must sit in token of reuerence to stand is a signe of dignity which he affordeth the Portugals and Moores and is the chiefe honour can bee yeelded any The second honour is to sit on a cloth in his house the third that a man may haue a doore in his house which is the dignity of great Lords For meaner persons they need not feare to haue any thing stolne out of their open houses seeing the seuerity of Iustice doth secure them Doores are not for necessity but for honour Their houses are of pyramidall or steeple forme all the timbers meeting in the middest at the top couered with earth and straw Some of them are made of timbers as long and as bigge as a great ships mast the greater they are the more honorable The Benomotapa hath musicke whithersoeuer he goeth with singers and more then fiue hundred iesters which haue their Captain or Master of Reuels The royall Ensigne is a little plow-share with an Iuory point which he carrieth alway at his girdle by which is signified peace and husbanding of the ground He beareth likewise one or two swords in token of Iustice and defence of his people The Country is free and giues him no other payments but presents when they come to speake with him and certaine dayes seruice No inferiour comes before his superiour without some present in token of obedience and courtesie The Captaines of warre with all theirs bestow seuen dayes in thirty in his husbandry or other businesse Hee must confirme all sentences of Iudgement in his owne person there needs no Prison for matters are presently dispatched according to the allegations and testimonies that are brought And if there bee not sufficient testimonies then the matter is tryed by oath in this manner They beat the barke of a certaine tree and cast the powder thereof in water which the party drinketh and if he doe not vomit he is cleared if he vomit he is condemned And if the accuser when the accused party vomiteth not will drinke of the same and doth not vomit he is then acquitted and the matter dispatched If any sue to him he speedeth not but by mediation of a third person which also sets down the summe that the King must haue somtime at so deare a rate that the suter rather refuseth the Kings grant They haue no Horse and therefore warre on foot the spoyles are generally shared amongst all When he marcheth in the place where he is to lodge they make a new house of wood and therein must continuall fire be kept without euer going out saying that in the ashes might be wrought some witcheries to the indamagement of his person And when they goe to the warres they neuer wash their hands nor faces till they haue obtained victory They haue their wiues with them which are so loued and respected that if the Kings sonne meet with one of them in the street hee giues her way Benomotapa hath more then a thousand women but the first is
a Cap of the same the haire inwards a Rats skin about their priuities some of them haue soles tyed about their feet their neckes adorned with Chaines of greasie Trypes or guts also in many doubles which they would sometimes pull off and eate stinking and raw they did also eate the entrayles by vs throwne away halfe raw and would scramble for it like hungry Dogges lothsomely besmeared with the bloud they weare Bracelets of Copper or Iuory about their armes with Ostrich feathers and shels The habit of women is like the former which at our first comming seemed shamefast but at our returne would impudently vncouer that which here must bee couered with silence their brests hang downe to their middles Their haire is curled Copper with them is Gold and Iron Siluer their Houses little Tents in the Fields made of skins at their pleasure remoued On the high Hill called the Table may be seene an hundred miles about some ascended and thence tooke obseruation of many Bayes and Riuers Hee thinkes these parts might be profitably planted with an English Colony One sayth of this people that they are idle not so much as hauing a Canow nor knowing to take eyther fowle or fish whereof they haue store theeuish and swiftly running away with that which they haue stolne By trading with the Dutch and English their prices of things are raysed as you here see to some more Copper or Iron then at the first Discoueries Their Beasts are large their Sheepe smooth and short haired not woolly like a young Calfe with long and broad eares hanged like Hounds their hornes short and tender easily broken their tayles greater then any part of a mans legge some weighing 40. pounds Their Beeues are large and most of them leane The men haue but one stone the other being cut away when they are young the reason seemes to bee some reasonlesse Superstition towards the Sunne which they point vnto being demanded thereof The Hector brought thence one of these Saluages called Cory which was carryed againe and there landed by the Newyeeres gift Iune 21. 1614. in his Copper Armour but returned not to them whiles the Ships continued in the Road but at their returnes in March was twelue-moneth after he came and was ready to any seruice in helping them with Beeues and Sheepe The wilde beasts are dangerous in the night as Lions Antilopes and others some of which in one night carried away twelue pieces of meate laid in the Riuer to water couered with a stone of two hundred weight which was remooued also a very great distance The Pengwins in the Iland neere to Soldania haue stumps in stead of wings and with their feet swimme fast There are Seales a thousand sleeping in an Heard on the Rockes Myce and Rats and Snakes innumerable The weather in the midst of Winter is there temperate Penguin Iland is North Northwest and an halfe West three leagues from Soldania and this fourteene leagues North Northeast from Cape Bona Speranza and ten leagues North by West from Cape Falso which is Eastwards from the former The habitation of the Soldanians seemes moueable and following the best pastures There are fallow Deere Porcupines Land Tortoyses Snakes Adders wild Geese Duckes Pellicans Crowes with a white band about their necks Pengwins Guls Pintados Alcatrasses Cormorants Whales Seales c. HONDIVS his Map of Congo CONGI REGNŪ CHAP. IX Of the Kingdome of Congo and the other Kingdomes and Nations adioyning §. I. Of Angola THe Kingdome of Congo vnderstanding so much by the name as in times past hath beene subiect thereto hath on the West the Ocean on the South the Caphars and mountaynes of the Moone on the East those Hills from which the Riuers issue and runne into the Fountaynes of Nilus and on the North the Kingdome of Benin Of these Countries Pigafetta from the Relation of Odoardo Lopez a Portugall hath written two bookes out of whom P. du Iarric Botero and others haue taken most of their reports And in this we will begin with the most Southerly parts in which wee first come into the Kingdome of Matama this is the Kings proper name who being a Gentile ruleth ouer diuers Prouinces named Quimbebe This is a Kingdome great and mightie extending from Brauagal to Bagamidri the ayre thereof is wholsome the earth outwardly furnished with store of fruits inwardly with mines of Crystall and other metalls The Signiories toward the Sea-coast are very meane and want Hauens Angola sometime a Prouince of the Kingdome of Congo is now a great Kingdome it selfe and very populous They speake the same language with small difference of dialect that is vsed in Congo whose yoake they cast off since the Congois became Christians Diego Can first discouered these parts for the Portugals An. 1486. And the Portugals vsed to trade quietly with the Angolans but some of them trading as high into the Countrey as Cabazza the Royall Citie which is an hundred and fiftie miles from the Ocean were there by order from the King put to the sword vnder pretence of intended treason This was done 1578. Paulo Dias to whom the King Sebastian had giuen the gouernment of these parts with licence to conquer three and thirtie leagues alongst the Coast to him and his heires to reuenge himselfe for this despight done to his people armed such Portugals as hee had and with two Gallies and other Vessels which he kept in the Riuer Coanza hee went on both sides the Riuer conquering and subduing many Lords vnto him The King of Angola raysed a mightie Armie of a million of men as is supposed For they vse to leaue none at home that is fit to carrie a weapon and make no preparation for victuall but such as haue any carrie it vpon the shoulders of their seruants and therefore no maruell if their foode being soone consumed their camps be soone dissolued Small likewise is their prouision of armour for offence and for defence much lesse Diaz sent to the King of Congo for aide who sent him sixtie thousand men with which and his owne Nation he made his partie good against the confused rabbles of the Angolans The trade of Angola is yet continued and from thence the Portugals buy and carry to Brasil and other parts yeerly a world of slaues which are bought within the Land and are captiues taken in their warres Paulo Diaz at his death bequeathed to the Iesuites as much as might maintayne fiue hundred of that Societie in these parts Master Thomas Turuer one that had liued a long time in Brasil and had also beene at Angola reported to me that it was supposed eight and twentie thousand slaues a number almost incredible yet such as the Portugals told him were yeerly shipped from Angola and Congo at the Hauen of Loanda He named to me a rich Portugall in Brasil which had ten thousand of his owne working in his Ingenios of which he had eighteene
there an Idol called Gumbiri and a holy House called Munsa Gumbiri kept and inhabited by an old woman where once a yeere is a solemne Feast which they celebrate with Drummes Daunces and Palme-wines and then they say hee speaketh vnder the ground The people call him Mokissa Cola or a strong Mokisso and say That he comes to stay with Chekoke the Idol of Banza That Chekoke is a Negro-Imoge made sitting on a stoole a little house is there made him They annoint him Ticcola which is a red colour made of a certaine Wood ground on a stone and mixed with water wherewith they dayly paint themselues from the waste vpwards esteeming it great beauty otherwise they account not themselues ready It is for like purpose carried from hence to Angola Sometimes it fals out that some Man or Boy is taken with some sudden Enthusiasme or rauishment becomming mad and making a whooping and great clamours They call them Mokisso-Moquat that is taken of the Mokisso They cloath them very handsome and whatsoeuer they bid in that fit for it lasteth not very long they execute as the Mokissos charge Morumba is thirty leagues Northwards from hence in the Mani Loango's Dominion where he liued nine moneths There is a House and in it a great Basket proportioned like to a Hiue wherein is an Image called Morumba whose Religion extendeth far They are sworne to this Religion at ten or twelue yeares old but for probation are first put in a House where they haue hard diet and must be mute for nine or ten dayes any prouocation to speake notwithstanding Then doe they bring him before Morumba and prescribe him his Kin or perpetuall abstinence from some certaine meat They make a cut in his shoulder like to an halfe Moone and sprinkle the bloud at Morumbas feet and sweare him to that Religion In the wound they put a certaine white powder in token of his late admission which so long as it continueth doth priuiledge him to take his meat and drinke with whomsoeuer he pleaseth none denying him the same at free cost They also haue their fatall Tryals before this Image where the accused partie kneeling downe and clasping the Hiue saith Mene quesa cabamba Morumba signifying That he comes thither to make tryall of his innocence and if he be guiltie he fals downe dead being free he is freed Andrew Battell saith hee knew sixe or seuen in his being there that made this tryall §. II. Of the Anzigues BEyond the Countrey of Loango are the Anzigues the cruellest Canibals which the Sunne looketh on For inother places they eate their enemies or their dead but here they take and eate their kinsfolkes and Country-folkes They keepe Shambles of mans flesh as with vs of Beefe and Muttons They eate their enemies Their slaues if cut out they will yeeld them more in the seuerall Ioynts or Pieces then to bee sold aliue they kill though it be but to saue a halfe-peny Some of them for wearinesse of life and some oh crueltie of vaine-glory euen for valour of courage in contempt of Death and esteeming it an honorable proofe of their fidelitie and manhood will offer themselues to the Butcherie as faithfull subiects vnto their Princes of them to bee consumed and eaten that with their death and after their death they may doe them seruice These Anzichi stretch from Zaire to Nubia They haue many Mines of Copper and great quantitie of Sanders red and gray wherewith mixed with the Oyle of Palme-tree they anoint themselues The Portugals temper it with Vineger for the healing of the French Pocks by the smoke thereof they driue away the head-ache It is incredible or at least would so seeme to vs which Lopez reporteth that they carrying their arrowes which are short and slender of very hard Wood in the Bowe-hand will shoot off eight and twenty so many they hold at once before the first of them fall to ground and with a short Hatchet with a sudden whirling themselues about breake the force of the enemies Arrowes and then hanging this Hatchet on their shoulder discharge their owne Arrowes They are of great simplicitie loyaltie and fidelitie and the Portugals more trust them then any other slaues They are yet sauage and beastly and there is no conuersing with them but they bring slaues of their own Nation and out of Nubia to Congo to sell for which they recarrie Salt and Shels which they vse for Money Silkes Linnen Glasses and such like They circumcise themselues and besides that both men and women of the Nobility and and Comminaltie from their childhood marke their faces with sundry slashes made with a knife I asked saith Lopez of their Religion and it was told mee that they were Gentiles which was all I could learne of them They worship the Sunne for the greatest God as though it were a man and the Moon next as though it were a woman Otherwise euery man chuseth to himselfe his owne Idol and worships it after his own pleasure The Anzichi haue one King principall which hath many Princes vnder him Of Ambus and Medera Northerne Regions little besides the names is knowne Biafar is inhabited with people much addicted to Enchantments Witchcrafts and all abominable Sorceries §. III. Of the Giacchi or Iagges OF the Giacchi we haue made often mention and of their incursions into Congo These in their owne Language are called Agag as Lopez testifieth and liue on both side of Nilus in the borders of the Empire of Mohenhe-Muge They vse to marke themselues about the lip and vpon their cheekes with certaine lines which they make with iron instruments and with fire Moreouer they haue a custome to turne their eye-lids backwards so that their blacke skins white eyes and cauterized markes seeme to conspire a dreadfull and gastly deformitie in their faces They hold warre with the d supposed Amazones and of late yeeres haue inuaded the neighbour-Nations Their weapons are Darts their food humane flesh without all humanity deuoured Thus Lopez reporteth by reports Andrew Battel liued by occasion of the Portugals treachery with the Iagges a longer time then euer any Christian or White Man had done namely sixteene moneths and serued them with the Musket in their warres neither could Lopez saith he haue true intelligence whence they came For the Christians at that time had but vncertaine coniectures of them neither after had the Portugals any conuersing but by way of commerce but he being betrayed fled to them for his life and after by stealth escascaped from them the onely European that euer liued in their Campe He saith they are called Iagges by the Portugal by themselues Imbangolas which name argues them to be of the Imbij Galae before mentioned and came from Sierra Liona That they are exceeding deuourers of mans flesh for which they refuse Beefe and Goats whereof they take plenty They haue no setled habitation but wander in an vnsetled course They rise in
Haruest and inuading some Country there stay as long as they find the Palmes or other sufficient meanes of mayntenance and then seeke new aduenture For they neyther plane or sowe nor breed vp Cattle and which is more strange they nourish vp none of their owne children although they haue ten or twenty wiues a man of the properest and comeliest slaues they can take But when they they are in trauell they digge a hole in the Earth which presently receiueth in that darke prison of death the new borne Creature not yet made happy with the light of life Their reason is that they will not bee troubled with education nor in their flitting wanderings be troubled with such cumbersome burthens Once a secret Prouidence both punisheth the Fathers wickednesse and preuenteth a viperous Generation if that may bee a preuention where there is a succession without Generation and as Plinie saith of the Esseni Gene aeterna est in qua nemo nascitur For of the conquered Nations they preserue the Boyes from ten to twenty yeeres of age and bring them vp as the hope of their succession like Negro Azimogli with education fitting their designes These weare a Collar about their necke in token of slauery vntill they bring an Enemies head slaine in battaile and then they are vncollared freed and dignified with the title of Souldiers If one of them runnes away he is killed and eaten So that hemmed in betwixt hope and feare they grow very resolute and aduentrous their Collars breeding shame disdaine and desperate fury till they redeeme their freedome as you haue heard Elembe the great Iagge brought with him twelue thousand of these cruell Monsters from Sierra Liona and after much mischiefe and spoyle settled himselfe in Benguele twelue degrees from the Line Southwards and there breedeth and groweth into a Nation But Kelandula somtime his Page proceeds in that beastly life before mentioned and the people of Elembe by great troupes runne to him and follow his Campe in hope of spoyle They haue no Fetisso's or Idols The great Iagge or Prince is Master of all their Ceremonies and is a great Witch I haue seene this Kelandula sayth our Author continue a Sacrifice from Sun to Sun the rites whereof are these Himselfe sat on a stoole in great pompe with a Cap adorned with Peacockes feathers which fowles in one Countrey called Shelambanza are found wild and in one place empaled about the graue of the King are fifty kept and fed by an old woman and are called Iugilla Mokisso that is Birds of Mokisso Now about him thus set attended forty or fifty women each of them weauing continually a Zebras tayle in their hands There were also certaine Gangas Priests or Witches Behind them were many with Drummes and Pipes and Pungas certaine Instruments made of Elephants teeth made hollow a yard and halfe and with a hole like a Flute which yeeld a lowd and harsh sound that may bee heard a myle off These strike and sound and sing and the women weaue as is said till the Sunne be almost downe Then they bring forth a pot which is set on the fire with leaues and roots and the water therein and with a kind of white powder the Witches or Gangas spot themselues one on the one cheeke the other on the other and likewise their foreheads temples brests shoulders and bellies vsing many inchanting tearmes which are holden to be Prayers for Victory At Sun-set a Ganga brings his Kissengula or War-hatchet to the Prince this weapon they vse to weare at their girdles and putting the same in his hand bids him be strong their God goes with him and he shall haue victory After this they bring him foure or fiue Negros of which with a terrible countenance the great Iagge with his Hatchet kils two and other two are killed without the Fort. Likewise fiue Kine are slaine within and other fiue without the Fort and as many Goats and as many Dogs after the same manner This is their Sacrifice at the end whereof all the flesh is in a Feast consumed Andrew Battle was commanded to depart when the slaughter began for their Deuill or Mokisso as they said would then appeare and speake to them This Sacrifice is called Kissembula which they solemnize when they attempt any great enterprize There were few left of the naturall Iagges but of this vnnaturall brood the present succession was raysed §. IIII. Of the Lakes and Riuers in these parts of Africa NOw that we haue thus discoursed of these former Nations let vs take view of the more in-land and Easterly borders which abut on Congo where wee shall finde the great Lake Aquilunda which with her many Riuers aforesaid watereth all that great Countrey assisted therein by a farre greater Lake called Zembre great Mother and chiefe Ladie of the Waters in Africa As for the Mountaynes of the Moone now called Toroa there is a Lake called Gale of no great quantity whence issueth a Riuer named Comissa and by the Portugals the sweet Riuer disembarquing at the False Cape an arme whereof had before entred the Sea in 32. degrees 40. minutes of Infante one of Dias his companions in the first Discouery of those parts called Infanto because hee there went first on Land But from those Hils of the Moone the Lake whence Nilus springeth hath no helpe Neyther are there two Lakes East and West distant from each other about foure hundred and fifty miles as Ptolemey describeth for then the one should be in the Confines of Congo and Angola the other about Sofala and Monomotapa where is found but one Lake for Aquilunde is no tributary to Nilus This Lake is betweene Angola and Monomotapa and contayneth in Diameter 195. miles There is indeed another Lake which Nilus maketh in his course but standeth Northward from the first Lake Zembre and not in East or West parallel Neyther doth Nilus as some affirme hide it selfe vnder the ground and after rise againe but runneth through monstrous and Desart Valleyes without any setled channell and where no pleople inhabited from whence that fabulous opinion did grow This Lake is situate in twelue degrees of Southerly Latitude and is compassed about like a Vault with exceeding high Mountaynes the greatest whereof are called Cafates vpon the East and the Hils of Sal-Nitrum and the Hils of Siluer on another side and on the other side with diuers other Mountaynes The Riuer Nilus runneth Northwards many hundred miles and then entreth into another great Lake which the Inhabitants doe call a Sea It is much bigger then the first and contayneth in breadth two hundred and twenty miles right vnder the Equinoctiall Line Of this second Lake the Anzichi giue certaine and perfect intelligence for they traffique into those parts And they report That in this second Lake there is a people that sayleth in great ships and can write and vseth number weight and measure which they haue not in the parts of
whiles others attended and at last led him with a firebrand in stead of a Torch to his lodging When they intend any wars the Weroances or Kings consult first with the Priests and Coniurers And no people haue there beene found so sauage which haue not their Priests Gods and Religion All things that are able to hurt them beyond their preuention they after their sort adore as the Fire Water Lightning Thunder our Ordnance Peeces Horses Yea I haue heard Captaine Smith say that they seeing one of the English Bores in the way were striken with awfull feare because he brisled vp himselfe and gnashed his teeth and took him for the god of the Swine which was offended with them The chiefe god they worship is the Diuell which they call Okee They haue conference with him and fashion themselues vnto his shape In their Temples they haue his Image ill-fauouredly made painted adorned with Chaines Copper and Beads and couered with a skinne By him is commonly the Sepulchre of their Kings whose bodies are first bowelled then dryed on a hurdle and haue about the ioynts chaines of Copper Beads and other like trash then lapped in white skinnes and rowled in mats and orderly entombed in arches made of mats the remnant of their wealth being set at their feet These Temples and Bodies are kept by their Priests For their ordinarie burials they digge a deepe hole in the earth with sharpe stakes and the corps being wrapped in skins and mats with their iewels they lay them vpon sticks in the ground and couer them with earth The buriall ended the women hauing their faces painted with blacke coale and oyle sit foure and twenty houres in the houses mourning and lamenting by turnes with yellings and howlings Euery Territory of a Weroance hath their Temples and Priests Their principall Temple is at Vttamussack in Pamaunk where Powhatan hath a house vpon the top of certaine sandie hils in the woods There are three great houses filled with Images of their Kings and Diuels and Tombes of their Predecessors Those houses are neere threescore foot long built after their fashion Arbour-wise This place is in such estimation of holinesse that none but the Priests and Kings dare enter yea the Sauages dare not passe by in Boats without casting Copper Beads or somewhat into the Riuer Heere are commonly resident seuen Priests the chiefe differed from the rest in his ornaments the other can hardly be knowne from the common people but that they haue not so many holes at their eares to hang their Iewels at The High-Priests head-tire is thus made They take a great many Snakes skinnes stuffed with Mosse as also of Weasils and other vermines skins which they tye by their tayles so that all the tayles meet on the top of their head like a great tassell The faces of their Priests are painted as vgly as they can deuise in their hands they haue Rattles some Base some Treble Their deuotion is most in songs which the chiefe Priest beginneth the rest following sometime he maketh inuocations with broken sentences by starts and strange passions and at euery pause the other giue a short grone It cannot be perceiued that they haue any set Holy-dayes onely in some great distresse of want feare of enemies times of triumph and of gathering their fruits the whole Countrey Men Women and Children assemble to their solemnities The manner of their deuotion is somtimes to make a great fire all singing and dancing about the same with Rattles and shouts foure or fiue houres sometime they set a man in the middest and dance and sing about him he all the while clapping his hands as if he would keepe time after this they goe to their Feasts They haue certaine Altar-stones which they call Powcorances standing from their Temples some by their houses others in the woods and wildernesses vpon which they offer bloud Deere-suet and Tobacco This they doe when they returne from the warres from their huntings and on other occasions When the waters are rough in stormes their coniurers runne to the waters sides or passe in their boats and after many hellish out-cries and inuocations cast Tobacco Copper Pocones or such trash into the water to pacifie that god whom they thinke to be very angry in those stormes Before their dinners and suppers the better sort will take the first bit and cast it into the fire which is all the grane they are knowne to vse In some part of the Countrey they are said which since is found false to haue yeerely a sacrifice of children such a one was performed at Quiyoughcohanock some ten miles from Iames Towne in this manner Rapahannock Werowance made a Feast in the woods the people were so painted that a Painter with his pensill could not haue done better Some of them were blacke like Diuels with hornes and loose haire some of diuers colours They continued two dayes dancing in a circle of a quarter of a mile in two companies with antick tricks foure in a ranke the Werowance leading the dance they had Rattles in their hands all in the middest had black hornes on their heâ—ds and greene boughes in their hands next them were foure or fiue principall men diuersly painted which with bastinadoes beat forward such as tired in the dance Thus they made themselues scarce able to goe or stand When they met together they made a hellish noise and euery one flinging away his bough ranne clapping their hands vp into a tree and tare it to the ground and fell into their order againe thus they did twice Fourteene well-fauoured children or if you had rather heare Captaine Smith fifteene of the properest yong Boyes betweene ten and fifteene yeeres of age they painted white H uing brought them forth the people saith he spent the forenoone in dancing and singing about them with Rattles in the afternoone they put these children to the root of a tree all the men standing to guard them each with a Bastinado of Reeds bound together in his hand Then doe they make a lane betweene them all along thorow which there were appointed fiue yong men White cals them Priests to fetch these children Each of these fetched a child the guard laying on with their Bastinadoes while they with their naked bodies defend the children to their great smart All this time the women weepe and cry out very passionately prouiding mosse skinnes mats and dry wood vnknowne to what purpose When the children are in this manner fetched away the guard teares downe trees branches and boughes making wreathes for their heads or bedecking their haire with the leaues What else was done with the children was not seene but they were all cast on a heape in a Valley as dead where was made a great feast for all the company William White relating this Rite saith That they remoued them from tree to tree three times and at last carried them into a Valley where the King sate where
ye haue heard The whole history written by one of his company Aluaro Nunez is extant in Ramusius out of which I haue inserted such things as I hold most fit As their landing in Cuba at la Trinita a tempest by land and sea assailed them so furious that it ouerthrew all the houses and Churches making them to fly with no lesse feare of the Trees falling on them and holding sixe or seuen together lest the wind should haue lifted them into the aire they heard also or feare so phantasied the noise of bels cryes flutes and other instruments making this dreadfull musicke to which the hils trees and houses thus danced and after found one of the ship-Boats vpon the trees the ships being perished The first towne in Florida they came to was Apalachen which had not aboue fortie small low cottages so built by reason of continuall tempests From thence they trauelled to Aute by the way encountring a Giant-like people with bowes as big as ones arme eleuen or twelue spannes long wherewith they shot both exactly and forcibly piercing good armours A long time they held on an vnprofitable march till many of them were slaine or consumed by sicknesse and famine which made them bethinke them of building vessels there to transport them But their hard hap pursued them at Sea and besides outward tempests assaulted them with one inward more implacable of thirst which forced them to drinke the sea-water and that so greedily that some died therewith presently Neither would the Sea continue this hospitalitie howsoeuer in hospitall but hauing satisfied himselfe in the persons of some and goods of all betrayed the rest to the barbarous Indians through many Nations of which they trauelled with as hard disaduentures as euer Virginia yeelded euen when it was at worst and let out most clamorous excepters bee Iudges Cold which then attended the Winter was exceeding sharpe and they naked and yet Famine was more terrible then cold which made fiue of their companie eate vp each other till only one remayned And no maruell for famine which will be a traueller and soiourner in all places hath seemed to fixe his habitation in these and to hold all the nations adioyning vnder his lawlesse law and tyrannicall subiection The first Indians they met with had one and some both of their teats bored thorow in the hollow whereof with no little gallantry they weare a Reede two spans and a halfe long and two fingers thicke and likewise for greater brauerie weare another lesse Reede thorow their nether lip They liued in these parts two moneths which was the season of certaine rootes growing vnder the water which they then liued on at other times in other places with fish and what they can finde When one of them hath a sonne dead all of the kinred and people mourne for him a yeere at morning and noone then burie him These exequies they obserue to all but the old folkes of which they hold no such account as hauing alreadie liued out their time They haue amongst them Physicians or Prists whose dead bodies they burne with great solemnitie and make powder of the bones which the kinsmen a yeere after drinke These may haue more wiues the rest but one When any brother or sonne is dead those of that house in three months space seeke not abroad for their foode though they die of famine leauing that care to their kinsfolkes and neighbors which sometimes almost starue their cures The Physicians vsed to heale with breathing on the sicke and touching them they beleeuing that if stones and herbs haue such facultie being applyed much more Man as a more excellent creature they would needes haue these Spaniards such Physicians who if you beleeue them did many cures with great admiration but could not cure their Famine and captiuitie in many yeeres This our Author fled from these to the Queuenes and Marianes which three moneths in the yeere leaue their former habitations to goe seeke a kind of fruit called Tune of the bignesse of an egge blacke and of good taste These are festiuall moneths to these fastiuall nations eating and drinking the iuyce of these Tune yea many months afore comforting their present famine and pacifying their croking entrailes with hope of the approaching Tune-season and thus with words they solaced Aluaros impatient hunger sixe months before he could thus indeed satisfie it Their houses are Mats vpon foure Arches shifted euery second or third day to seeke foode They sowe nothing hauing as well a dogs ease as hunger yea like some of Duke Humfreys gallant guests they set a good face on the matter and passe the time in mirth and dancing when somtimes their teeth dance not in foure daies together They doted so superstitiously on their dreames that vpon this dreame-warning they would kill their sonnes and without so much would leaue their daughters to be deuoured of beasts lest said they they should grow vp as the times then were by marriages with them to increase the number of their enemies They haue two or three kindes of bad Rootes and sometime Fish or Venison but all rare They eate Ants egs Wormes Serpents Frogs Earth Wood Dung of wilde beasts and keepe the Bones of Fishes and Serpents to grinde and eate afterwards Their women and olde men are put to beare their burthens and drudgeries They are molested with three sorts of flies whose biting leaues a seeming leprie they vse smokie fires in their roomes almost with the price of their eyes sauing their skins others carrie fire-brands in their hands and therewith set all things as they passe on fire both to preuent them to hunt their game into fittest places for their taking the same They haue Kine as big as in Spaine with small hornes and long haire 400. leagues alongst the countrey Much like was the state of the Canagadi Camoni Auauares Malicones and other Floridian nations These keepe no reckoning of time by the Sunne or Moone but like Plautus his Parasite by the bellie which is Magister artis in obseruing the seasons of their fruits and fish They tell strange things of an euill Spirit which in fearfull apparitions did astonish them and cut their flesh All these Indians haue a custome not to lye with their wiues after they know them once conceiued till two yeares after their deliuerie and their mothers giue them sucke he saith till they be twelue yeeres old and are able to get food for themselues which they did because of the famine in those parts whereby they would otherwise haue died If any sicken by the way they leaue him there to die except he hath a father or brother which wil carry him in this their fleeting habitation on their necks They vpon any discontent diuorce themselues and marry to others except they haue had children together and in mutuall contentions they come to buffets and bastinadoes till wearinesse or their wiues part them but neuer deale with deadly
same things not else-where found in India They make their teeth white with an herbe which all the day they chew in their mouthes CHAP II. Of Cumana and Paria §. I. Of the People and strange Creatures in Cumana CVmana is a Prouince named of a Riuer called Cumana where certayne Franciscans Anno 1516. built them a Monasterie and the Spaniards were very diligent in the fishing for Pearles About that time three Dominicans went fourescore miles West from thence to preach the Gospell and were eaten of the Indians which hindered not but others of the same order founded them a Monasterie in Ciribici neere Maracapana Both these Orders tooke paines with the Indians to conuert them and taught their children to write and read and to answer at Masse and the Spaniards were so respected that they might safely walke alone through all the Country but after two yeeres and a halfe the Indians whether for their too much imployment in the Pearle-fishing or for other cause rebelled and killed a hundred Spaniards slue the Friers one of which was then saying Masse and as many Indians as they found with them which the Spaniards of Domingo soone after reuenged The losse of Cumana hindered their Trade for Pearles at Cubagua and therefore the King sent Iames Castilion to subdue them by force which hee did and began the Plantation of New Caliz for the Spaniards to inhabit there Cubagua was called by Columbus the Finder the Iland of Pearles situate in twelue degrees and a halfe of Northerly Latitude and containes twelue miles in circuit This little Iland is exceeding great in commoditie that accreweth by those Pearles which hath amounted to diuers millions of gold They fetch their Wood from Margarita an Iland foure miles to the North and their Water from Cumana which is two and twentie miles thence they haue a Spring of medicinall Water there in the Iland The Sea there at certaine times of the yeere is very red which those Pearle-oysters by some naturall purgation are said to cause There are Fishes or Sea-monsters which from the middle vpwards resemble men with Beards Haire and Armes The people of Cumana goe naked couering only their shame At Feasts and Dances they paine themselves or else anoint themselues with a certaine Gumme in which they stick Feathers of many colours They cut their haire aboue the Eares and will not suffer it to grow on any places of their bodies esteeming a bearded man a Beast They take great paines to make their teeth blacke and account them women which haue them white They blacke them with the powder of the leaues of a certaine Tree called Gay these leaues they chew after they are fifteene yeeres old they mixe that powder with another of a kinde of Wood and with Chalke of white shels burned in manner as the Easterne Indians vse their Betele and Arecca with Chalke of Oysters and this mixture they beare continually in their mouthes still chewing it that their teeth are as blacke as coales and so continue to their death They keepe it in Baskets and Boxes and sell it in the markets to some which come farre for it for Gold Slaues Cotton and other Merchandize This keepeth them from paine and rotting of the teeth The Maides goe naked only they bind certain bands hard about their knees to make their hips and thighes seeme thicke which they esteeme no small beautie The married Women liue honestly or else their husbands will diuorce them The chiefe men haue as many Wiues as they will and if any stranger come to lodge in one of their houses they make the fairest his Bed-fellow These also shut vp their Daughters two yeeres before they marrie them all which time they goe not forth nor cut their haire After which there is made a great feast and very many bidden which bring their varietie of cheere also wood to make the new Spouse a house A man cuts off the Bridegroomes haire before and a woman the Brides and then they eate and drinke with much excesse till night This is the lawfull wife and the other which they marry afterwards obey This. They giue their Spouses to be defloured to their Piaces so they call their Priests which these reuerend Fathers account their Preeminence and Prerogatiue the Husbands their honour the Wiues their warrant The men and women weare Collars Bracelets Pendants and some Crownes of Gold and Pearls the Men weare Rings in their Noses the Women Brooches on their brest whereby by at first sight the sexe is discerned The Women Shoot Runne Leape Swim as well as the Men their paines of trauell are small they till the Land and looke to the house whiles the men Hunt and Fish They are high-minded treacherous and thirstie of reuenge Their chiefe weapons are poisoned Arrowes which they prepare with the bloud of Snakes and other mixtures All of both sexes from their infancy learne to shoot Their meat is whatsoeuer hath life as Horse-leeches Bats Grashoppers Spiders Bees Lice Wormes raw sodden fried and yet their Countrey is replenished with good Fruits Fish and Flesh This Diet or as some say their Water causeth spots in their eyes which dimme their sight They haue as strange a Fence or hedge for their Gardens and possessions namely a threed of Cotton or Bexuco as they call it as high as a mans Girdle and it is accounted a great sinne to goe ouer or vnder the same and he which breakes it they certainly beleeue shall presently die So much safer is their threed wouen with this imagination then all our stone-wals The Cumanois are much addicted to Hunting wherein they are very expert and kill Lyons Tygres Hogs and all other foure-footed Beasts with Bowes Nets Snares They take one Beast which they call Capa that hath the soles of his feet like a French shoo narrow behinde broad and round before Another called Aranata which for the Physnomie and subtiltie seemes to be a kinde of Ape it hath mouth hands and feet like a man a goodly countenance bearded like a Goat They goe in Heards they bellow loud runne vp Trees like Cats auoid the Huntsmans Arrow and cast it with cleanly deliuerie againe at himselfe Another Beast hath a long snout and feedeth on Ants putting his tongue into a hollow Tree or rather place where the Ants are and as many of them as come thereon hee licks in The Friers brought vp one till the stinke thereof caused them to kill it snouted like a Foxe rough-haired which voided in the excrements long and slender Serpents which presently dyed This Beast stinking while he liued and worse now dead yet was good food to the Indians They haue one which will counterfeit the voice of a crying child and so cause some to come forth and then deuoure them The like is written of the Hyana That shee will call the Shepheards by their names and then destroy them when they come forth They haue Parrots as
in water thicke and white the next day in fresh and the day after saw two Islands in the mouth of Amazones accounting themselues fortie Leagues vp the Riuer May 22. they were in the Riuer of Wiapogo which they called Caroleigh in three degrees and halfe Northward from the Line The people were ready to giue them entertainment The Iayos and Capayos offered them their owne houses and gardens already planted two of which he accepted with some gardens vndertaking to defend them against the Charibes and their other enemies They desired him to send into England for some to teach them to pray and gaue fiue pledges to be sent thither He after intending for England dyed aboord his ship of the Flux They intoxicate the fish with a strong sentedwood called Ayaw whereby they easily take them on the top of the water Their bread is Cassaui of which chewed they also make drinke They are much troubled with a Worme like a Flea the Spaniards call it Niguas which creepes into the flesh of their toes vnder the nailes and multiply there with much multiplication of torment except they vse speedie preuention One was so pestred with them that for remedie they were faine to hold his feet vpwards and powre thereon melted Wax hot which being cold they plucked off and therewith seuen or eight hundred Niguas The people are of modest countenance naked but would weare clothes if they had them Huntly returned for England and left there fiue and thirtie which should haue bin succoured it Discord had suffered Anno 1605. a ship was sent for supply but the Mariners and Land-men quarelling these were left on Land at Saint Lucia an Island in twelue degrees of Northerly Latitude to the number of threescore and seuen and most of them slaine a by the Ilanders These Indians go naked haue long blacke haire their bodies painted red with three strokes also of red from the eare to the eye Eleuen of our men after much miserie and famishment which killed some of them in the way got to Coro and after good and bad entercourse of fortunes with the Spaniards some returned home The Spaniards there as Iohn Nichol one of this companie testifieth told them of a Vision of Christ on the Crosse appearing to our King and reuoking him from his error at the sight whereof three of our Bishops fell into a trance and so continued three dayes after which they became Catholikes and preached and the King had sent to the Pope for learned men to perfect this Conuersion These were the Spanish tricks with faithlesse tales to peruert these men to their faith The Mariners gaue names to the places which they left according to their conceits of these men Rogues Bay Cape Knaue Riuer of Rascals They came as farre as Comana or Cumana where they obserued the weather hot till noone and then a coole breeze and thunder without raine by windes and current they were detained from Wiapogo which they sought A Fleming there told them fabulous rumours of Warres with Spaine Another ship of Amsterdam to disgrace our men told the Indians of Wiapoco that they came to inhabit there and to oppresse them as the Spaniards did See what gaine can doe without godlinesse A ship of Middleburgh came thither with Negros to sell thither came also a ship of Saint Malos The Indians of these parts as Wilson reporteth choose their Captaines at their drunken Feasts in this sort They set the nominated person in the midst with his hands lifted ouer his head making Orations to him to bee valiant after which they whip him with a whip that fetcheth bloud at euery stroke for tryall of his courage he neuer mouing thereat They haue commerce with the Deuill For they told vs of three ships in the Riuer of Amazons and that One two moneths after would visit vs They call this Deuill Peyae with whom the men haue often conference the women neuer that they could perceiue they suffer not meane-while a childe in the house When any bee sicke they thus consult of their recouerie and if their Oracle answer death they will giue no Physicke if life they vse their best helpes For an Axe they would trauell with them two or three moneths or finde them so long victuals at home The Iayos are proud ingenious giuen to flouting The Arwakos of better carriage The Saspayes craftie The two former hate the Spaniards as much as the Caribes Their houses haue doores at each end the men keepe at one end the women at the other they are like Barnes but longer some hundred and fiftie paces long and twentie broad an hundred of them keepe together in one No raine commeth in notwithstanding that store which falleth in Aprill May Iune and most of Iuly They paint them when they goe to feasts Against the time of trauell the women haue as roome apart whereto they goe alone and are deliuered without helpe which done shee cals her husband and deliuers it to him who presently washeth it in a pot of water and paints it with sundry colours I could not heare saith Wilson the woman so much as grone all the time of her trauell When one dyes they make great moane ten or twelue dayes together and sometimes longer Here are store of Deere Hares Conies Hogs Monkeyes Leopards Lyons Porke-pines Parrots as big as Hennes blue and red very beautifull c. He returned with the rest in a ship of Amsterdam the Indians being loth to part with them They often inquired of Sir Walter Raleigh and one came from Orenoque to aske of him alledging his promise of returne The like remembrances of him are mentioned by Master Harcourt in his late published Voyage to Guiana This worthy Gentleman An. 1608. with Gentlemen and others to the number of 97. set forth for Wiapoco The ninth of May they fell into the Current of that great and famous Riuer of Amazones of which they drunke fresh and good being 30. leagues from Land the tenth day the water became muddy whitish and thicke the eleuenth day they made Land and their Pinnace being left dry vpon the Ebbe by the next floud comming on was almost spoyled Thence they stood along the Coast to Wiapoco whither they came May the seuenteenth and setled themselues at Caripo Hee tooke possession in his Maiesties name as Captaine Leigh had also done of this spacious Countrey of Guiana bounded on the North with Orenoque and the Sea on the East and South with the Riuer of Amazones on the West with the Mountaines of Peru The Charibes are the Ancient Inhabitants the Other later Incrochers There is no setled gouernment amongst them only they acknowledge a superioritie which they will obey as long as they please They commonly punish Murther Adulterie by death which are the only offences punished amongst them and certaine persons are appointed to execute those punishments The better sort haue two or three wiues or more the rest but one
and Deuils to men whom they deuoure and see if in the lower Countries wee can find higher and nobler spirits CHAP IIII. Of Brasil §. I. The Discouerie and Relations thereof by MAFFAEVS c. AS Guiana is bounded with those mighty Riuers of Orenoque and Maragnon so Brasil extendeth it selfe North and South betweene Maragnon and the Riuer of Plata or Siluer which there we haue already shewed to be the greatest Riuers in the World The Westerne borders are not so well discouered The Easterne are washed by the Sea Maffaeus hath largely described the same whose words Bertius Maginus and Gasper Ens haue transcribed the summe whereof Iarric and Boterus haue inserted into their French and Italian Relations Petrus Aluarius Capralis being sent by Emanuel King of Portugall in the yeere 1500. vnto the East-Indies to auoid the calmes on the Guinnee shore fetched a further compasse West and so discouered the Continent which now of that Red Wood there plentifully growing is called Brasil but by him was named the Land of the Holy Crosse because hee had there erected a Crosse with much ceremony since vsually named Brasil of the store of Brasil-Wood there growing This Brasil was soone after by Americus Vesputius at the charges of the said King further discouered The Region is pleasant and wholesome the Hils and Valleyes equally agreeing in their vnequalnesse the soyle fat and fertile there are plentie of Sugar-Canes a kind of Balme expressed out of the Herbe Copaibas the Zabucals which yeild a kind of Nuts growing in great hard cups of taste like a Chesnut the Auanaz excellent in scent and taste the Pacouere a tree so tender that it may bee cut with a knife a fadome high the leaues two foot broad seuen foot long the fruit a foot long like a Cucumber called Pacoua thirtie or fortie together in clusters neuer hearing fruit but once the like is in the East-Indies as Theuet our Authour affirmeth and many other fruits which the Countrey naturally produceth besides those which our Europe hath communicated Many sorts there are of Beasts as a kind of Swine which liue in both Elements their fore-feet being short in proportion to the hinder make them slow in running and therefore being hunted commit themselues quickly to the water Antae resembling a Mule but somwhat lesse slender-snowted the nether chap very long like a Trumpet with round eares and short tailes hiding themselues in the day-time and feeding in the night the flesh tasteth like Beefe there is also the Armadillo the Tygre which being hungry is very hurtfull being full will flee from a Dogge There is a deformed beast of such slow pace that in fifteene dayes it will scarce goe a stones cast It liueth on the leaues of trees on which it is two dayes in climing and as many in descending neither shouts nor blowes forcing herto amend her pace The Tamendoas are as big as a Ramme with long and sharpe snowts a tayle like a Squirrell twice as long as the body and hairy where-under they hide themselues will put out their tongue two foote out of the mouth as round as an Oyle-cruze to gather plentie of Ants into their mouthes hauing scraped vp the places where they keep with their pawes The Portugals haue there raised plentie of Horses and Sheepe The men worship no God at all but are giuen to South-sayings The men and women goe altogether naked are flat-nosed make themselues blacke with the fruit Genipapi weare their haire hanging from the hinder part of the head not suffering it else-where to grow in their nether lips weare long stones for a gallantry which being remoued they seeme in deformed manner to haue a double mouth they goe together by companies with great silence the Wife going before her Husband which some say is done for iealousie They entertain and welcome Strangers at first with weeping and deepe sighes pittying their tedious iourney and presently drie their eyes hauing teares at command Women in trauell are deliuered without great difficultie and presently goe about their houshold businesse the Husband in her stead keepeth his bed is visited of the neighbours hath his broths made him and iunkets sent to comfort him They are ignorant of numbring and Letters some Tradition they are said to haue touching Noe and the Floud Vnder the same Roofe which is like a Boat with the Keele vpwards liue many Families they lye in Nets or beds hanging aboue the ground which is vsuall in a great part of the Indies to auoid hurtfull creatures they minde the day and are not carefull for the morrow easily communicate what they haue are very patient of labour and hunger feasting if they haue wherewith from morning till night and fasting other-whiles when they want three dayes together In swimming they are miraculously skilfull and will diue whole houres to search any thing vnder the water They beleeue not any reward or punishment after this life ended but thinke that as men die so they goe to the other World maimed wounded sicke or whole and therefore bury the bodies with a Net to lye in and food for some dayes thinking that they both sleepe and eate They are excellent Archers and what enemies they take in their warres they feed well many dayes and then kill and eate them for great Dainties They dwell in Houses scattered and separated from each other their Language is almost generally the same they haue no Lawes nor Magistrates the women call certaine things by one name and the Men by another They haue no vse of three Letters in the Alphabet L F R a reason whereof some haue wittily giuen because they haue no Law Faith nor Ruler They are vnmindfull of good turnes and too mindfull of iniuries impotent of Lust and Rage and in summe more like beasts then men Thus farre Maffaeus In the yeere 1503. Giouanni da Empoli a Florentine sayled thither with the Portugals who reporteth the like of their nakednesse irreligion and of their man-eating saying that they dry it in the smoke as we doe Bacon The same doth Albericus Vesputius report that he had seene amongst them and that he had heard one of them boast that hee had in his time eaten three hundred men He weighed the long stones which they vsed to weare in their faces seuen in number about sixteene ounces He saith they liue an hundred and fiftie yeeres and that their Women are out of measure luxurious that they alway haue an Easterly wind which tempereth their Aire Let vs in the next place heare such as haue liued in the Countrie of which Lerius and Theuet two Frenchmen and Ioannes Stadius a Germane haue written seuerall Treatises But none hath more fully described them then a Portugall Frier and Anthonie Kniuet our Countriman §. II. More full Relations by STADIVS LERIVS and PETER CARDER IOannes Stadius in the yeere 1554. was Prisoner to the Tuppin Imbas and because he serued the Portugals should haue beene
at mans estate they cut bigger with a Cane and weare therein a greene stone otherwise they esteeme a man no Gallant but a Pesant They haue no Religion vse Polygamie but the women are tied to one husband except hee giue her publike leaue When they goe to warre the wiues carrie all the prouision That wife whom hee giueth his hunted prey is his bed-fellow that night and she goeth to the water and washeth her selfe after which she lyeth downe in the net and commandeth all the rest to attend on her for that day When they are in trauell they goe to the doore and being deliuered the father lyeth downe and is visited as before is said No Indian will kill any female creature whiles his wife is with childe thinking that would be the death of his childe They trauell with great store of Tobacco and haue continually a leafe thereof along the mouth betweene the lip and teeth the rheume running out at the lip-hole They war against the Portugals and all others eating all and take so many new names as prisoners They thinke mans flesh makes them valiant Their houses are two hundred yards long without partition they hang their nets on beames wash euery morning both men women and children they part their grounds They haue Serpents amongst them with bodies like trees which strike two fins out of their fore-quarters that kill whatsoeuer they call them d Iaboya They haue foure legs and a taile like an Aligator or Crocodile which they hide when they lye in the woods for their prey They haue Monkies as big as a water-dog faced like a man with long broad beards which goe twentie together on a tree and one of them will alway walke vp and downe with his hand on his beard making a great noyse the rest harkening still an houres space The Maraquites are betweene Fernambuc and Baya other Indians call them Tapoyes that is wilde men which name all but these and the Vaanasses which are like them account a disgrace The men are of good stature the women very proper and fight with their bowes as well as the men They haue no dwelling Religion nor friendship with any Nation yet he left them in peace with the Portugals They haue holes in their lips but carue not their bodies vse Polygamie are swift neuer come into the field to fight but keepe in the Mountaines they eate mans flesh without ceremonies The Topimambazes inhabite from R. de S. Franc. to Baya de todos Sanctos they are and speake like the Petowares but the women are of better complexion The men let their beards grow long From Baya to Eleoos are the Waymoores men of great stature and swift as a Horse fiue or sixe of them will set on a Sugar-house with an hundred therein I haue seene one saith our Author take a man aliue and defend himselfe with this his prisoner as it were with a Target They haue long haire are without Townes or Houses and care not where they come presuming of their swiftnesse They are greedie Man-eaters and are alwaies foule with durt and dust by lying on the ground and ashes Iarric writes that they are without Gouernours euery one doing what seemes good in his owne eyes only he is accounted most Noble that hath slaine most enemies with whom for any of them to speake is punished with death They roue vp and downe in vncertaine dwellings and therefore cannot by warre be conquered This wandring is common to many of these Brasilian Saluages The Tomomymenos dwell at Spirito Sancto haue settled Townes with great stones set about like pales of a good height and within walls of clay and stone they make the sides of their houses with loope-holss to shoot out at They deck their bodies with feathers and paint themselues blacke and red One of these tooke the Portugall Captaine Martin de Sa and in spite of all his company carried him a stones cast and threw him into a Riuer but hee was rescued by Petummyen another Sauage The Portugals tooke sixteene thousand slew the tenth parf and parted the rest destroying the Country downe the Riuer Paraeyua The Waytaquazes dwell on the North and South sides of Cape Frio They are of greater stature then the Waymoores we took thirteene of them and whiles we searched for more they burnt their cords from their hands and fled Their women warre with bowes and arrowes They lye on the ground like Hogs with a fire in the midst hold no peace with any but eate all they can get Heere the mountaines were full of Crablice which sticked so fast on their skins that they were faine to take dry straw to singe themselues Abausanga-retam was Captaine of a kinde of Tamoyes an hundred and twenty yeeres old which being taken ranne amongst the enemies where being shot in one and twenty places he fell then desired Baptisme after which within foure houres he died his haughtie courage could not brooke captiuitie The Wayanasses keepe at Ila Grande they are low great bellied cowards not carued glory not to eate mans flesh the Women vgly with bigge bodies and are well faced painted red with Vrucu which growes in a cod like a Beane the crownes of both Sexes are shauen like Friers the rest of their haire long The Topinaques haue their dwelling at Saint Vincents are of good stature and complexion the women painted with diuers colours eate mans flesh adore nothing onely when they kill a man paint themselues with a fruit called Ianipano and with feathers on their heads great stones in their lips Rattles in their hands dance three dayes together drinking a filthy liquor whereto they said Tobacco made them fresh Among them is great store of Gold in many hils by the Sea The Pories dwell an hundred miles within Land are low like the Wayanasses liue on Pine-nuts and small Cocos as big as Apples with shels like Wall-nuts but harder they call them Eyrires they warre with none eate not mans flesh if they haue other meat lye in nets of barke haue no houses but two or three boughs tyed together couered with Palme-leaues for a knife or combe they will giue fiue or sixe gallons of Balsame-oyle The Molopaques inhabite heere the Riuer Paradiua are like Dutchmen in bignesse faire of complexion bearded ciuill couer their priuities their Towns circled with wals of earth and great logges haue a King called Moriuishann which had thirteene wiues They haue store of Gold which they esteeme not nor vse it but to tye on their fishing lines this is in the Riuer Para fourescore leagues beyond Paraeyua They take none but what the rayne washeth from the Mountaines which are of blacke earth without Trees The Women are goodly and faire like English women modest neuer seene to laugh and of good capacitie They tye their haire about their middle with barke and couer therewith their nakednesse their haire also is of diuers colours and
which I haue obserued in this long and tedious Pilgrimage there is some sparke left of Religion euen in the acknowledgement of a Deuill and of eternall rewards and punishments §. II. Of their Priests or Magicians THis is further confirmed by that which is written of certaine Magicians or Priests amongst them which perswade the people that they haue dealings with Spirits that by their meanes they haue their Roots and sustinance and may by them haue fortitude I saith Lerius was present at one of their Assemblies where sixe hundred were gathered together which diuided themselues into three parts the men went into one house the women into a second the children into a third The Cariabes forbade the women and children to depart their houses but to attend diligently to singing and we saith he were commanded to abide with the women Anon the men in one house fell to singing He He He answered by the women in the other with the same They howled it out for a quarter of an houre shaking their brests and foming at the mouth and as if they had had the falling sicknesse some falling downe in a swoune the Deuill in seeming entring into them The children also followed in the same harsh deuotions After this the men sung pleasantly which caused me to goe thither where I found them singing and dancing in three seuerall Rings in the middest of each three or foure Caraibes adorned with Hats and Garments of Feathers euery one hauing a Maraca or Rattle in both his hands These Rattles are made of a fruit bigger then an Ostriches Egge out of which they said that the Spirit would speake and they continually shooke them for the due consecration These Caraibes danced to and fro and blowed the smoke of Petum on the standers by saying Receiue yee all the Spirit of Fortitude whereby yee may ouercome your Enemies This they did often the solemnitie continued two houres the men ignorant of Musicke and yet rauishing my spirit with the delight I conceiued in their Song Their words sounded this that they were grieued for the losse of their Progenitors but were comforted in the hope that they should one day visit them beyond the Hils and then threatned the Ouetacates which dwell not far from them and are at enmitie with all their Neighbours as swift as Harts wearing their haire to the buttockes eating raw flesh and differing from all others in Rites and Language and now prophesied their destruction at hand Somewhat also they added in their Song of the floud that once had drowned all the World but their Ancestors which escaped by climbing high trees That day they feasted with great cheere This solemnitie is celebrated euery third yeere and then the Caraibes appoint in euery Family three or foure Maraca to bee adorned with the best Feathers and sticked in the ground with meate and drinke set before them and the people beleeue they eate it They minister vnto their Maraca fifteene dayes after which in a superstitious conceit they think that a Spirit speakes to them while they rattle their Maraca They were exceedingly offended if any tooke away any of this Prouision as the French sometimes did for which and denying other the Caraibes lyes those Priests hated them exceedingly Yet doe they not adore their Maraca or any thing else Peter Carder saith he could obserue no Religion amongst them but the worship of the Moone specially the New Moone whereat they reioyced leaping singing and clapping of hands Stadius tels as you heard that they ascribed his taking to the prediction of Maraca Hee tels of their consecration that the Paygi so hee cals them enioyne that euery one should carry their Tamaraka to the house where they should receiue the faculty of speech Euery ones Rattle is pitched in the ground by the steele or stalke and all of them offer to the Wizard which hath the chiefe place Arrowes Feathers and Eare-rings he that breathes Petum on euery Rattle puts it to his mouth shakes it and saith Nec Kora that is Speake if thou be within anon followeth a squeaking voyce which I saith Stadius thought the Wizard did but the people ascribed it to the Tamaraka Then those Wizards perswade them to make warres saying that those spirits long to feed on the flesh of Captiues This done euery one takes his Rattle and builds vp a Roome for it to keepe it in where he sets victuals requireth and asketh all necessaries thereof as we doe of God and these as Stadius affirmeth are their Gods These Paygi doe initiate Women vnto Witchcraft by such Ceremonies of smoke dancing c. till shee fall as in the Falling sicknesse and then hee sayth hee will reuiue her and make her able to foretell things to come and therefore when they goe to the Warre they will consult with these Women which pretend conference with Spirits Andrew Theuet which was in this Antarctike France with Villagagnon agreeth in many of the former Reports he addeth that for feare of Aignan they will not goe out but they will carry fire with them which they thinke forceable against him He writes that they acknowledge a Prophet called Toupan which they say makes it thunder and raine but they assigne no time nor place to his worship They tell of a Prophet which taught them to plant their Hetich or Root which they cut in pieces and plant in the Earth and is their chiefe food of which they haue two kinds The first Discouerers they much honoured as Caraibes or Prophets and as much haue distasted the Christians since calling them Mahira the name of an ancient Prophet detested by them But Toupan they say goeth about and reuealeth secrets to their Caraibes Theuet addes that they obserue Dreames and their Payges or Caraibes professe the interpretation of them which are also esteemed as Witches which conferre with Spirits and vse to hurt others with the poyson called Ahouay a kind of Nut. They doe a kind of worship to these Payages and will pray them that they may not bee sicke and will kill them if they promise falsly In their consultations they will prouide a new lodging for the Wizard with a cleane white bed and store of Cahouin which is their ordinary drinke made by a Virgin of ten or twelue yeeres old and of their Root-food into the which they conuey him being before washed hauing abstained nine dayes from his Wife Then doth he lye on that Bed and inuocate none being with him in the House and rayseth his Spirit called Hauioulsira which sometimes as some Christians affirmed to our Authour appeareth so as all the people may heare though they see him not And then they question him of their successe in their enterprises They beleeue the soules Immortality which they call Cherepiconare with rewards to the valiant Man-eaters in goodly Paradises and Agnans punishments to others But his boldnesse makes me the lesse bold in following him in these and other things which I
like is noted in the East Indies at the Hils of Balegate where that Ridge parteth Winter and Summer in the same neernesse to the Sunne at the same time and a few miles distant The Raines in the Hils are cause why they call it Winter and the deawes or mysts in the Plaines so that when the Raines fall most in the Hils it is cleere weather in the Plaines and when the deaw falleth in the Plaines it is cleere on the Hils and thus it commeth to passe that a man may trauell from Winter to Summer in one day hauing Winter to wash him in the morning and ere night a cleere and dry Summer to scorch him Yea in some places sayth Alexandro Vrsino within sixe miles space both heate and cold are intolerable and enough to kill any man From Saint Helen to Copiapo it neuer raineth which Coast extends forty miles in some places fiftie in breadth and twelue hundred leagues in length §. II. Of the first Inhabitants their Quippos Arts Marriages ABout the point of Saint Helena in Peru they tell that sometimes there liued Giants of huge stature which came thither in Boates the compasse of their knee was as much as of another mans middle they were hated of the people because that vsing their women they killed them and did the same to the men for other causes These Giants were addicted to Sodomie and therefore as the Indians report were destroyed with fire from Heauen Whether this be true or no in those parts are found huge and Giantlike bones Cieza writes that Iohn di Holmos at Porto Vicio digged and found teeth three fingers broad and foure long Contrariwise in the Valley of Chincha they haue a Tradition that the Progenitors of the present Inhabitants destroyed the natiue people which were not aboue two Cubits high and possessed their roomes in testimonie whereof they alledge also that bone-argument Concerning the Indians conceit of their own originall we haue mentioned their opinion of a floud and the repeopling of the World by them which came out of a Caue They haue another Legend that all men being drowned there came out of the great Lake Titicaca one Virococha which stayed in Traguanaco where at this day is to bee seene the ruines of very ancient and strange buildings and from thence came to Cusco and so beganne Mankinde to multiply They shew in the same Lake a small Iland where they faine that the Sunne hid himselfe and so was preserued and for this reason they made great Sacrifices vnto him in this place both of Sheepe and Men. They held this place sacred and the Inguas built there a Temple to the Sunne and placed there Women and Priests with great treasures Some learned men are of opinion that all which the Indians make mention of is not aboue foure hundred yeeres which may bee imputed to their want of writing In stead of writing they vsed their Quippos These Quippos are Memorials or Registers made of cords in which there are diuers knots and colours signifying diuers things these were their Bookes of Histories of Lawes Ceremonies and accounts of their affaires There were officers appointed to keepe them called Quipocamayos which were bound to giue account of things as Notaries and Registers They had according to the diuersitie of businesse sundry cords and branches in every of which were so many knots little and great and strings tyed to them some red some greene and in such varietie that euen as wee deriue an infinite number of words from the Letters of the Alphabet so doe they from these kinds and colours And at this day they will keepe account exactly with them I did see sayth Acosta a handfull of these strings wherein an Indian woman did carrie as it were written a generall confession of all her life and thereby confessed herselfe as well as I could haue done in written paper with strings for the circumstances of the sinnes They haue also certaine wheeles of small stones by meanes whereof they learne all they desire by heart Thus you shall see them learne the Pater-noster Creed and the rest and for this purpose they haue many of these wheeles in their Church-yards They haue another kinde of Quippos with grains of Mays with which they wil cast hard accounts which might trouble a good Arithmetician with his Pen in the Diuisions They were no lesse wittie if not more in things whereto they apply themselues then the men of these parts They taught their young children all Arts necessary to the life of men euery one learning what was needfull for his person and family and not appropriating himselfe to one profession as with vs one is a Tayler another a Weauer or of other Trade Euery man was his owne Weauer Carpenter Husbandman and the like But in other Arts more for ornament then necessitie they had Gold-smiths Painters Potters and Weauers of curious workes for Noblemen and so of the rest No man might change the fashion vsed in his owne Countrey when hee went into another that all might be knowne of what Countrey they were For their Marriages they had many Wiues but one was principall which was wedded with Solemnitie and that in this sort The Bridegroome went to the Brides House and put Ottoya which was an open Shooe on her foot this if shee were a Mayd was of wooll otherwise of Reeds and this done he led her thence with him If she committed Adulterie shee was punished with death when the Husband dyed shee carried a mourning Weed of blacke a yeere after and might not marry in that time which befell not the other Wiues The Ingua himselfe with his own hand gaue this woman to his Gouernours and Captaines and the Gouernours assembled all the young men and Mayds in one place of the Citie where they gaue to euery one his Wife with the aforesaid Ceremonie in putting on the Ottoya the other Wiues did serue and honour this None might marry with his Mother Daughter Grandmother or Grand-childe and Yapangui the Father of Guaynacapa was the first Ingua that married his Sister and confirmed his fact by a Decree that the Inguas might doe it commanding his owne children to doe it permitting the Noblemen also to marrie their Sisters by the Father side Other Incest and Murther Theft and Adulterie were punished with death Such as had done good seruice in warre were rewarded with Lands Armes Titles of honour and Marriage in the Inguas Linage They had Chasquis or Posts in Peru which were to carrie tidings or Letters for which purpose they had houses a league and a halfe asunder and running each man to the next they would runne fifty leagues in a day and night §. III. The Regall Rites Rights Workes and of RVMINAGVI and ALVARADO WHen the Ingua was dead his lawfull heire borne of his chiefe Wife succeeded And if the King had a legitimate Brother he first inherited and then the Sonne of the first Hee
the Ministers of his Holies durst enter nor touch the wals of the House Three hundred leagues they came thither on Pilgrimage with rich Offerings first speaking to the Doore-keeper who went in and consulted with the Idoll concerning them and returned his answere His Priests were of his owne appointment and might not approch to him without preparations of fasting and abstinence from their wiues Thorow all the streets of the Citie and on the principall Gates and round about the Temple were many Idols of Wood which they worshipped All the Countrey about payed a yeerely tribute hereunto The Spaniards told them this their God was a Deuill and taught them to defend themselues from him with the signe of the Crosse Neere to this Temple was an House or Oratorie of the Sunne on an high place engirt about with fiue wals At Tichicasa was a Temple and Oracle of the Sunne which had aboue sixe hundred men and a thousand women that did seruice therein and made Chica there Much Gold and wealth was here offered In some part of Peru as at Old Port and Puna they vsed the detestable sinne against Nature yea the Deuill so farre preuayled in their beastly Deuotions that there were Boyes consecrated to serue in the Temple and at the times of their Sacrifices and Solemne Feasts the Lords and principall men abused them to that detestable filthinesse And generally in the Hill-countries the Deuill vnder shew of holinesse had brought in that vice Euery Temple or principall house of adoration kept one man or two or more which went a tired like women euen from the time of their child-hood and spake like them imitating them in euery thing Vnder pretext of holinesse and Religion their principall men on principall dayes had that hellish commerce A Frier dealt with two of these Ganimedes about the filthinesse of this Vice and they answered that they held it no fault for from their childhood they had beene placed there by their Caciques both for that employment as also to bee Priests and to keepe the Temple Thus farre had they banished Nature to entertaine Religion and thus farre had they exiled the soule of Religion retayning onely a stinking Carkasse At Ganada in Caximalca the Inguas built a Temple in honour of the Sunne There were Virgins kept which intended nothing but to weaue and spinne and dye clothes for their Idolatrous seruices The like was in other places In Guanuco was a stately Palace of great stones and a Temple of the Sunne adioyning with a number of Virgins and Ministers which had thirtie thousand Indians for the seruice thereof The seruice which most of them did is like to be the tilling of the ground feeding of Cattell and such like before mentioned which they were bound to doe for the Inguas and also for the Guacas that is Idols and Idol-houses But it were a wearisome Pilgrimage to goe and leade my Reader with mee to euery of their Temples which for the most part had the same Rites according to that proportion of mayntenance which belonged to them §. II. Of their Nunnes Sorcerers Confessions and and Penances Gomara reporteth that their houses of women were as Cloysters or Monasteries enclosed that they might neuer goe forth They gelded Men which should attend on them cutting off also their Noses and Lips that they should haue no such appetite It was death for any to be found false and incontinent The men that entred into them were hanged vp by the feet These made Robes for the Idols and burned the ouerplus with the bones of white sheepe and hurled the Ashes into the Ayre towards the Sun If they proued with childe and sware that Pachacama did it the issue was preserued Of these Monasteries or Nunneries thus writeth Acosta There were in Peru many Monasteries of Virgins but not any for men except for the Priests and Sorcerers at the least one in euery Prouince In these were two sorts of women one ancient which they called Mamacomas for the instruction of the young the other of young Maydens placed there for a certaine time after which they were drawne forth eyther for the Gods or for the Ingua They called this House or Monastery Aclaguagi that is the House of the Chosen Euery Monastery had his Vicar or Gouernour called Appopanaca who had libertie to chuse whom he pleased of what qualitie soeuer being vnder eight yeeres of age if they seemed to be of a good stature and constitution The Mamacomas instructed these Virgins in diuers things needfull for the life of man and in the Customes and Ceremonies of their Gods Afterwards they tooke them from thence being aboue fourteene sending them to the Court with sure Guards whereof some were appointed to serue the Idols and Idol-Temples keeping their Virginitie for euer some other were for ordinary Sacrifices that were made of Maydens and other extraordinary Sacrifices they made for the health death or warres of the Inguas and the rest serued for Wiues and Concubines to the Ingua or such as hee gaue them to This distribution was renued euery yeere These Monasteries possessed rents for the maintenance of these Virgins No Father might refuse his Daughter if the Appopanaca required her yea many Fathers did willingly offer their Daughters supposing it was a great merit to be sacrificed for the Ingua If any of these Mamacomas or Aollas were found to haue trespassed against their honour it was an ineuitable chastisement to bury them aliue or to put them to death by some other cruell torment The Inguas allowed a kind of Sorcerers or Sooth-sayers which they say tooke vpon them what forme and figure they pleased flying farre thorow the Ayre in a short time They talke with the Deuill who answered them in certaine stones or other things which they reuerence much They tell what hath passed in the furthest parts before newes can come In the distance of two or three hundred leagues they would tell what the Spaniards did or suffered in their ciuill warres To worke this diuination they shut vp themselues vp into a house and became drunke till they lost their senses a day after they answered to that which was demanded Some affirme they vse certaine vnctions The Indians say that the old women doe commonly vse this office of Witchcraft especially in some places They tell of things stolne or lost The Anaconas which are the seruants of the Spaniards consult with them and they make answere hauing first spoken with the Deuill in an obscure place so as the Anaconas heare the sound of the voyce but vnderstand it not nor see any body They vse the Herbe Villea with their Chica drinke made of Mayz and therewith make themselues drunke that they may bee fit for the Deuils conference The conference with these Witches is one of the greatest lets to the proceeding of the Gospel amongst them Among their Religious persons I may reckon their Confessors They held opinion that
receiuing cut in pieces giuing to euery man a portion which hee kept vntouched the whole yeere for a holy Relique esteeming that house in danger of Fire and Whirle-winds that is not preserued with this reserued piece of Cake They seemed sometimes to heare a voyce from their Zemes whether by the illusion of the Priests or the Deuill which the Priests interpreted by their behauiour for if they danced and sung all was well but if they went sorrowfully the people went forth sighing and gaue themselues to fasting euen to extreme faintnesse with weeping vntill they thought their Zemes reconciled In this Iland they had as many wiues as they were able to sustaine the Cacique Beheccius had thirtie two of which were buried with him perforce Some of them were addicted to lusts of Sodomie and others more if more may be vnnaturall Generally they were very luxurious both men and women yet they abstained from Mother Sister and Daughter other degrees they spared not thinking that such Incest would bring them to an euill death In their buying and selling they weighed not the worth of things but onely their owne fancie as we see in Children Theeues they cruelly punished empaling them on sharpe stakes aliue Touching the originall of man thus they fable There is in the Iland a Region called Caunana where they faine that Mankind came first out of two Caues of a Mountayne called Cauta and that the biggest sort of men came forth of the mouth of the biggest Caue and the least sort out of the least Caue this Caue they name Amaiauna the greater Cazibaxagua Before men might come out of the Caue the mouth thereof was kept and wa ched nightly by a man whose name was Machochael who departing further to looke abroad was by the Sunne the sight of whom he was forbidden turned into a stone They faine the like of others turned into trees for going so farre a fishing in the night that they could not returne before the rising of the Sunne A certaine Ruler also called Vagoniona sent one forth of the Caue a fishing who by the Sunnes surprisall was turned into a Nightingale which therefore in the night bewayleth his misfortune Vagoniona sore troubled with this losse leauing the men in the Caue brought forth the women and sucking children and leauing the women in an Iland of that Tract called Mathinino carried the children away with him which being oppressed with famine fainted and remayned on the bankes of a certaine Riuer where they were turned to Frogs and cryed toa toa as children with them vse to cry for the dugge And hence also come those pittifull cryings of the Frogs in the Spring-time As for Vagoniona he by speciall priuiledge was not transformed wandering in diuers places he descended to a certaine faire woman whom he saw in the bottome of the Sea and receiued of her bright plates of Laten and a kind of stones which their Kings greatly esteemed Another Caue they had for the former tale is endlesse as Superstition commonly is called Iouanaboina adorned with Pictures of a thousand fashions In the entrance were two grauen Zemes whereof one was called Binthaitel and the other Marohu Out of this Caue they say the Sunne and Moone first came to giue light to the World They made as Religious concourse to these Caues as they which goe on Pilgrimage to Rome Compostella or Ierusalem They had a superstitious conceit of their dead who they thought walked in the night and eate the fruit Guannaba which is like to a Quince and that they would deceiue women in taking the shape of men making as though they would haue to doe with them and suddenly vanish away If any feeling a strange thing in his bed made doubt whether it were a dead bodie he might be resolued by feeling on his belly because these Ghosts could take all other members of mans bodie but not the nauell as some with vs imagine that the Deuill can take the whole shape of a man onely his clawes excepted these dead men they say often met them by the way and if a man were not afraid they vanished but if hee were afraid they would assault him and many hereby haue beene taken with the losse of their limbes These Superstitions were left them by tradition in Rithmes and Songs from their fore-fathers which it was lawfull for none to learne but onely the Kings Sonnes They sung them before the people on solemne Feasts playing on an instrument like a Timbrel Their Boitij or Priests instruct them in these Superstitions these are also Physicians making the people beleeue that they obtaine health for them of the Zemes. They tye themselues to much fasting and outward cleanlinesse and purging especially where they take vpon them the cure of great men for then they drunk the powder of a certayne herbe which brought them into a furie wherein they said they learned many things of their Zemes. Much adoe they make about the sicke partie deforming themselues with many gestures breathing blowing sucking the forehead temples and necke of the patient sometimes also saying that the Zemes is angry for not erecting a Chappell or dedicating to him a Groue or Garden or the neglect of other holies And if the sicke partie dye his Kinsfolkes by Witchcraft enforce the dead to speake and tell them whether he dyed by naturall destinie or by the negligence of the Boitij in not fasting the full due or ministring conuenient medicine so that if these Physicians be found faulty they take reuenge of them They vsed in ministring their Physicke to put certayne stones or bones in their mouthes which if the women can get they keepe religiously beleeuing them to be profitable for them in trauell and honour them as they doe their Zemes. When their Kings dyed they buried the best beloued of their Concubines with them who also had other women buried for their attendants together with their Iewels and Ornaments They had in the Sepulchre beside them a cup full of water and some of their Cassaui-bread Hispaniola is sayth Herera in 19. degrees and an halfe hath ten Spanish Townes and hath sometime had in it fourteene thousand Castilians Ouiedo reporteth of a Huricano or Tempest which 1508. threw downe all the houses except some which were built of stone in Domingo and the whole Towne of Buona Ventura changed his name into Mala Ventura being hereby quite ouerthrowne Twentie Sayle and more were lost in the Harbour of Domingo Many men were lifted vp and carried in the Ayre many Bowshots some being thereby miserably bruised In Iuly the next yeere happened another more terrible then the former But now sayth hee these Huracanos are nothing so fierce since the Sacrament is placed in the Churches §. III. Of the Bermudas or Sommers Ilands HAuing thus wearied you wi h this long stay in Hispaniola by which yee may guesse of the neighbouring Ilands we will haste homeward and not touching in any Iland by the way for we
it is little wonder they liue so poorely yet the plenty of this Country and their contented courser diet affords them a liuing vntill they die then some are burned and their ashes cast into the next Riuer others buried sitting crosse-legged in either of which kind I next relate my owne sight of two womens voluntary sufferance yet vnresolued whether their loue to their dead husbands be more to be admired or pitied It is amongst these Indians a receiued history that there was a time when wiues were generally so luxurious that to make way for their friends they would poyson their husbands which to preuent a Law was made that the husbands dead the wiues should accompany them in the same fire and this Law stands yet in force in the Iland of Baly not far from Iaua but from this necessity of dying there ensued so great a reformation that the succeeding age abolished the rigour of this Law and the dead mans wife was onely adiudged to a perpetuall widowhood as it is at this day Yet are there some few left that in pure loue to their deceased husbands die voluntarily in solemnizing their Funerals beleeuing their soules shall keepe company in their transmigrations Of the two which I haue seene the first was wife to a Weauer who being dead and by his profession to be buried she a young woman about 20. yeeres of age would needs goe with him and in this order She was clothed in her best garments and accompanied with her neerest Kindred and friends seated on a greene banke by a great ponds side there enterayning such as came to looke and take leaue on her with Bettele a herbe which they much eat meerely accommodating her words actions and countenance to the Musicke which stood by and plaid no dumps but in the same measure and straine they were occasioned at wedding newes hereof being brought to our house three of vs took horse and posted a mile out of Towne to be partakers of this spectacle but comming into her sight before we came at them they fearing by our speed we had bin sent from the Gouernour to hinder their proceedings hastened to her death and was then couering with earth when wee came in first sitting downe by her husband embracing his dead body and taking leaue of all her friends they standing round about the graue with each of them a basket of earth buried her at once Yet after we came in one of them stroke vpon the Graue laying his head close vnto it and calling her by her name and told vs she answered and expressed her content in the course she had taken Ouer whom there was erected a little thatcht couer and her Kindred not a little glorified in being allied to so resolute and louing a wife The other was a Campowaroes wife and she after the same solemne preparation fetching her run and crying all the way Bama Narina Bama Narina leapt into the pit where her husband lay burning vpon whom her by-standing friends threw so many logs that she felt not so much fire for the fewell Vnto whom I adde a third a Gold-smiths wife whose husband being dead and she willing to accompany him came attended with her frinds and kindred vnto the Cotwall who was then with me at the English house with much importunity desiring his consent alledging her husbands death and the few friends she had left behind whereunto the Cotwall replyed that hee himselfe would prouide for her at his owne house diswading her by what other arguments he could vse from so desperate a course but she neglecting them and his offer he also denied her request and she departed discontent vttering these words that he could not hinder her to dye by some other meanes and within a short time after I heard she had hanged her self this hapned in Musulipatnam where the Officers being all Mahumetans restraine the Gentiles especially in these cruel heathenish customes A fourth I haue wholy by Relation yet from an English Factor of good account in that place who trauelling in the Country about such affaires as were imposed vpon his performance and being well attended according to the custome of that Country espied not far out of his way a concourse of people vnto whom he made and being come neere hee was enformed by his Seruants that it was a woman about to burne with her dead husband he presently drawing his Sword rode in amongst them whereupon they all fled but the woman herselfe whom he perswaded to liue promising to secure her against her friends if their importunities had wrought her to this course but she besought him not to interrupt her it was her owne most earnest desire wherein we did constantly persist whereupon he put vp and her friends came in and presently in his sight with the like ceremony duty formerly recited she became the same ashes with him to whom she had bin one flesh And here abruptly in the ordering and imperfectly in the Relation I leaue them their customes intending onely to touch at their marine trade the commodities of that country transported to other parts First of Diamonds lately discouered in this Kingdome most men say by this accident A silly Goat-herd keeping his flock amongst those mountaines stumbled by chance vpon a stone that shined somewhat bright which he carelesly tooke vp not much valuing sold it to a Committy for meales Rice the Committy againe for no great profit and so forward vntill it came to those owners which knew the worth who questioning the last seller traced out from one to another the true originall and making further triall thereabouts found in the bowels of the earth a plentifull myne whereof the King being aduertized he tooke order for the safe keeping and rumour thereof being blazed Iewellers of all the neighbouring Nations resorted to the place and some store of Diamonds began to be dispersed and exposed to sale Insomuch that Sir Andreas Socory Gouernour of the Fort Guide in Pallecat Sir Adolfe Thomason a free Merchant and my selfe resolued to make a Voyage thither to see at least the place and order of it so that after foure dayes trauell thorough a desolate mountaynous Country we came at last to the place and found it distant from Musulipatnam about twelue Gentine leagues which is 108. English miles where we harboured our selues in a handsome Hogstie and according to custome addressed our selues to visit the Gouernour who was a Bramene named Ray Raw and lay there for the King as well to receiue his profits as to administer Iustice to the Rabblement of different Nations that frequented this place from whom we receiued indifferent good respect with the sight of certaine faire Diamonds appertayning to the King and amongst them one of 30. Carracts pointed but not perfect and after knowledge of our seuerall qualities and our purpose only to see the Mine he dismissed vs and we next day went thither distant from the Towne about
their Rites 587 Their dispositions ibid. Adams his Voyage thither 588. seq Captaine Saris his Voyage 590 Their hatred of Chinois ibid. Their gouernment 590. Their desperatenesse and crueltie 591 Their executions crossing and crucifying 592. Their Sects 592 593. Taicosoma and Quabacondonoes crueltie and vanitie there 591. 593. Their Bonzij 594. Colosses ibid. Feasts 595 Confession 597. Idols and Temples 597. 598. Funerals 599 Earthquakes 599. Polos reports 600. Schismes 601. Iesuites there ibidem Ilands adioyning 601. 602. The Map of Iapan 588 Iarchas chiefe Brachmane 478 479 Iason the Story of him and his Fleece 347 Iaua greater and lesse 579. 609 Eight Kingdomes in Iaua Minor 609 Iaua Maior the cruell Rites ibidem The diuers Kingdomes therein 610. The old King and his wiues custome ibidem Their Religion Comoedies c. 611. seq Acts of Iauan slaues in Patane 495. 496. In Banda 578 607 Iberians of Thubal 37 Ineria the situation and description thereof 346 Ibis a Bird-god 642 Icaria 823 Ice fortification 974 Ice many leagues long 712. Ilands of Ice 907 Ichneumon an African Beast described 624 Icthyophagi 794 Idolatry 29. 45. 53. 57. 79. 123 124. 242. 415. 428. 460. 461 597. Reade the whole Story of Aegypt The Authors and originall thereof 45. 95. 96. 123 How monstrous 79. 213. The strange Idols of the Tartars 415 By Idolaters whom vnderstood 428. 429 Idols in China 461. In Iapan 597. 598. In Aegypt 635. Virginia 839 Idols in Golchonda 999. 1000 Idumaea how situate and whence so called 85 Iebussulem 94 Iehouah the name of God 2. 3. 4 Written Ioua and Iehueh ibid. Whither the word fit to bee pronounced 101 Ierusalem 93. 94. New Ierusalem 96. 97. The holy Citie 102 The glory and ruine thereof 137 Taken by Antiochus 73. By Titus and Adrian 94. By Ptolemey 108. Iewish dreame thereof 145. 146 Ieremy the Prophet worshipped 644 Ieselbas Tartars 424. 425 Iesuits impudence 76. Reports of Miracles 395. 396. Strict obedience 158. Babels bablers 586 Deuisers of lyes 395. Veteratores and yet Nouellers 412 Their being and acts in China 474. 475. seq In Siam 490 Their Reuenewes at Goa 545 546. When they first entred the Mogols Countrey 515. Their Iesuitisme there 527. 528. their pranckes in Asia 586 Iethroes counsell 96. 97 Iewish dreamer 30. Priuiledges 89. Apostasie 90 Iewes compared to Gideons fleece 90. Why and when so called 91. Their three Courts 98. Punnishments 99. 100. Computation of dayes houres watches moneths yeares 105 106. seq Their Tekupha 107. Feasts 107. Sabboath 106. 107. New Moone and Passeoner 107. 108. Pentecost Trumpets Reconciliation Tabernacles ibid. 109. 110 111. 112. Feast of Lots 114 Of Wood-carrying Dedication and other Feasts and Fasts 114 115. Oblations Gifts and Sacrifices of the Iewes 115. 116 Tithes and first-fruits 117. 118 Personall Offerings 119. 120 Their Priests and Leuits and First-borne 121. 122. Their Sects 123. 124. 125. Washings 127. Temple vide Temple The Iewes distinguished into Hebrewes Graecians and Babylonians 124. Into Karraim Rabbinists 125. 126. Hatred of the Samaritans 136. 137. Odious to all people 140. Destroyed by Titus 140. 141. By Adrian 141. 142. Forbidden to looke into Iudaea 142. Their Rebellion vnder Traian 143. Their Barcosba 142. Their Pseudo-Moses and Andrew 143. Their false Christs 143. 144. The dispersions of Iewes and destruction in Asia Africke Europe Germany 144. 145. in France Spaine Barbary 145. 146. In Zant Solinichi ibidem Their estate and dispersions in the time of Beniamin Tudelensis 146 147. 148. 149. Iewes lately found in China 150. In England 151. The manner of their life gouernment in England 152. Their Villanies there ibid. Chronologie 153. 154. The Iewish Talmud and Scripture 155. 159. Their conceits of the Traditionall Law ibidem When and by whom written 157. Preferring it before the Law written ibid. Paralelled with Papists 158. 159. By whom this Tradition passed ibidem Absurdities thereof 160. Of the Iewish Cabala and Cabalists 161. 162. The three Parts of the Cabalisticall Arte ibidem Testimonies of Iewes against themselues 163. Their Blasphemie of Christ 164. Of their Rabbines and the Rites of their Creation 164. seq Of their Rabbinicall Titles Dignitie diuers Rankes Degrees Academies 165. 166 sequitur Their yeeres sitted to diuers Sciences c. 167. The Iewes dealing in and with the Scriptures their Interpretations c. 168. 169. sequitur Letters and Prickes and Masoreth 170 The Moderne Iewish Creed 170. 171. Their Interpretation of the same 172. Their Affirmatiue and Negatiue Precepts 173. The Negatiue Precepts Expounded by the Rabbines 174. The Affirmatiue vnfolded 175. 176 Their Absurde Exposition of Scriptures 177. sequitur Their Dreames of Adam 178. Iewesses Conception Trauell and Tales of Lilith 179. The Iewish manner of Circumcision 179. 180. If Female Children 180. 181 Of the Iewish Purification Redemption and Education 181. 182. Dreames of Sucking Going Bare Vngirt c. ibidem Iewish Prayers at Morning 183. Their Rising Clothing Washing 134 Of their Zizis and Tephillim and holy Vestments 184 185. Of their Schoole or Synagogue 185. Of their Prayers and an hundred Benedictions 186. sequitur Redeeming of Sacrifices ibidem Of their Echad and other Prayers 187 188. Superstition in place and gesture and their Litanie ibidem Why they keepe Cattell 188. Their washing and preparing to meat behauiour at meat opinion of Spirits attending their meates and Graces 188. 189 Their Euen song Nocturnes ibidem Their Mundayes and Thursdayes 190. Their Law-Lectures 191. Their selling Offices womens Synagogue ibid. their preparations to the Sabbath 192 Their Sabbataery Superstitions opinions 192. 193. Fables of Sunne and Moone Sabbatary soules ibid. Of the Iewish Passeouer and the Preparation therevnto 194. 195. The Rites in obseruation thereof ibid. Their Pentecost and Tabernacles 196. 197 Their New-moones New yeeres day Iudgement day Saint-worship 196. 197. Their Confession Lent Cock-superstition and Penance 197. 198. Of their Cookerie and Butchery 200. 201. Of their manifold coozenage ibid. Of their Espousals and Marriage 201. 202. Marriage duties and Diuorce 203. 204. Of the Iewish Beggars 205. Diseases ibidem Iewish Penances ibid. Their Ceremonies about the sicke about the dead in the house at the Graue and after the Buriall with all their Funerall Rites 206. 207. Iewish Purgatory ibid. Their two Messiasses and the signes of the comming of their Messias 207. 208. 209 Acts of Messias Ben Ioseph ibid. Iewish tales of monstrous Birds Fishes and Men 210. Their Messias his Feast 211. the hopes and hinderances of the Iewes Conuersion 212. 213. seq Scandals to the Iewes ibid. A merry tale of a Iew of his fellowes deluded 580. 581. Their trauell to the Sabbaticall Riuer ibid. Iezid sonne of Muaui the 8. Chalifa 021. Iezid sonne of Abdulmelic the 16. Chalifa 1025 Was giuen to women playes and spectacles ibid. Ignatius Loyala the Iesuite-founder 158 Ilands adiacent to Asia 577. seq Ilands peculiar to one sexe 578 Ilands adiaceat
signifie to the parties prosperitie and abundance At parting euery one hath a cup of wine giuen them Eight dayes after neither partie goeth out of the house and many youthes come and make merry with the Bridegrome imitating they thinke Sampson herein Some say that the man taketh the espoused Bride home to his house to be both witnesse and keeper of her virginity till the marriage solemnitie The day before the marriage the Bride must wash her in that absolute manner before described certaine women ringing with somewhat when shee goeth in and out of the water some of them also leaping and dancing The Bridegrome sends the Bride a wedding girdle embossed with gold and shee him another with siluer studs On the wedding day the Bride adornes her selfe in the best Iewish dresse with her marriage attire and by women singing their sweetest Epithalamia is conueyed into a chamber and their placing her on a faire seate braid her haire into goodle curles and put a vaile ouer her eyes in imitation of Rebeccas modestie singing meane-while dancing and expressing the greatest signes of ioy thinking they therein please God as being taught by their Rabbines that God vsed the like curling singing and dancing when he presented Eue to Adam yea refused not to serue that new couple and with his owne hands made the canopie vnder which they were to receiue their marriage blessing the Angels with pipes and trumpets making musike to leade the dance That which Moses saith God built a woman The Talmud interpreteth Hee made curles and hee brought her to Adam to wit with leaping and dancing When the marriage benediction is to bee solemnized foure boyes beare a canopie on foure poles into the place appointed which is some street or garden abroad in the open aire the people sounding their acclamations Blessed be he which commeth The Bride being led by others goeth three time about the Bridegrome as a cocke goeth about a hen and that forsooth to fulfill that Prophecie A woman shall compasse a man hee also must fetch one compasse about her The people also besprinkle the Bride with wheat crying out Increase and multiply according to that of the Psalmist He filleth thee with the fat of wheat In some places they mingle money with the wheat which the poore Iewes gather vp The Bride stands on the right hand for it is written Thy wife standeth on thy right hand with her face also to the South for then she shall be fruitfull The Rabbi which marrieth them taketh the end of the Vestment about the Bridegromes necke they call it Talles and puts it on the Brides head after the example of Boaz and Ruth and then takes a glasse filled with wine ouer which hee vttereth the marriage blessing praysing God by whose instinct these persons were espoused and so reacheth the glasse to them and bids them drinke This glasse if she bee a Virgin hath but a narrow mouth at Wormes they vse an earthen pot Now the Rabbi receiuing a Ring of pure gold without any Iewell in it sheweth it to some witnesses asking them if it bee good and worth the money it cost and then puts it on the Brides finger and with a loud voice pronounceth the spousall letters After this he takes another glasse of wine and blesseth God that the Bridegrome and Bride haue accepted of each other and giues it them to taste This done the Bridegrome breaketh the former glasse against the wall or ground in remembrance of the destruction of Ierusalem in which respect in some places they put ashes on the Bridegromes head He weareth for this cause a black-hood on his head like a mourner and the bride likewise weareth a black cloth fit to terrifie children with the deformitie Thus do they mixe mirth and mourning as Dauid warneth Reioyce vnto him in trembling This ended they sit downe at table and then must the Bridegrome make trial of his brest in singing a long prayer others in the meane time call to make ready the hens Then is there a hen and an egge set before the Bride of that the Bridegrome carueth her a piece and then presently all the company men and women teare the hen amongst them like hungrie hounds snatching out of each others hands and mouthes all to glad the new married couple The egge is not sodde but in another scene of mirth one casteth it in the face of another of some Christian especially if any bee present at the nuptials In the same is a mysterie included for the Bride that she shall haue as easie trauell in child-birth as the hen layeth her egges After this they fall to their cheere and dances one they call the Mitzuah or commandment-dance as if GOD had enioyned it The chiefe ghest takes the Bridegroome by the hand another him and so on through the companie likewise the chiefe woman takes the Bride another her and so one another then doe they dance in a long row with a tumultuous noyse and so end the nuptiall sports Among all their other blessings the Bridegrome is to say one Vbi perspexerit sanguinem virgineum to vse the words of Genebrard who expresseth it being borrowed from some words of the Canticles fleshly abused by such application The Marriage commonly lasteth eight dayes and on the Sabbath they dance the Iustiest of all doing the Sabbath herein a singular honour because that also is called a Bride It is prohibited to bid any vncircumcised ghest to this banquet for Salomon saith The stranger doth not intermeddle with his ioy Yea the good Angels seeing such there will depart and the euill will come and raise strifes and contentions For they thinke no place emptie from the earth to the skie but all full of good or bad Angels flying or standing in the same The marriage is in publike lest whoredome should be couered vnder that pretext pretending themselues married when they were not §. IIII. Of Coniugall Duties LEt it not grieue you to heare somewhat of the Duties betwixt man and wife The Husband oweth ten things to the Wife three according to the Law her nourishment her cloathing and her time namely of due beneuolence to bee performed and seuen things according to the words of the Scribes The first whereof is the foundation of dowrie viz. two hundred denarij if she bee a virgin otherwise an hundred The other concerne the condition of the dowrie The woman which rendereth not her husband his due is rebellious and refractarie and hee is bidden to expell her without a dowrie The conditions of the dowrie were first to cure her in sickenesse secondly to redeeme her being captiue thirdly to burie her being dead fourthly to nourish her out of his owne goods and that she dwell in his house in her widdow-hood fifthly to keepe her daughters till marriage sixtly that her sonnes inherit They appoint not onely loue but honour to the wife as Peter also
enioyneth to this weaker vessell which honour they say is in meate and drinke and goodly garments for which hee shall this was a womans friend haue fauour with God The Author of Arbaa Turim addeth That a man should loue his wife as his owne bodie and honour her aboue his bodie and keepe her as one of his members For the wife is the other halfe of man and a man without a wife is but halfe a man And let him take heed of striking his wife said another or to bee virulent in termes against her For for her teares how pittifully easie are they to some his punishment is neere And howsoeuer since the destruction of the Temple the doore of Prayers hath beene shut yet the doore of teares hath not beene shut as saith Dauid Bee not thou silent at my teares And should not a man honour his wife Yes saith R. Hauina for a man hath no blessing but for his wife as it is written Hee blessed Abraham for her Let a man cloath himselfe I would not haue women heare it beneath his abilitie his children according to his abilitie and his wife aboue his abilitie Let the wife honour her husband as her father and feare to displease him and let him spare her in his anger remembring that shee was taken out of his ribbes But for the wiues choyse A man ought saith one to sell all that hee hath and buy a wife the daughter of a wise Disciple if he finde not such an one let him take a daughter of the Great men of his time if not such the daughter of a Synagogue-Ruler in that defect let him take the daughter of one which gathereth Almes if not then of a Schoole-master and not the daughter of the people of the Land of whom the Scripture saith Cursed bee he that lyeth with a Beast They say that a man ought not to lodge in the same chamber no not with his Sister Daughter or daughter in Law yea there Wise men forbid conference with a woman altogether §. V. Of Diuorce and other Marriage obseruations THe bill of diuorce is still practised among the Iewes it must bee written in twelue lines it is therefore called Get neither more nor lesse and deliuered to the woman before three credible witnesses vnder their hands and seales Then doth the husband deliuer it to her saying Loe woman the bill of thy Diuorce take it of mee by it being diuorced from mee bee thou free to another husband The tenor of this bill is this The second day of the weeke the eight and twentieth of the moneth N. in the yeere of the world 5363. as we heere at Mentz vpon Rhene vse to reckon I Isaac sirnamed Eckendorf sonne of R. Abr. now dwelling at Mentz of my free will without constraint thee Sara sir-named Turmmerle daughter of R. Leui which hitherto hath beene my wife haue determined to free forsake and diuorce And now to forsake free and put thee from me that thou mayest bee thine owne and at thine owne free will and pleasure mayest depart whither thou wilt and none from hence-forth for euer shall prohibite thee And thou art so freed that thou mayest marrie to any other man This diuorce may not bee done in euery place but they haue some speciall place appointed noted and knowne situate on some knowne Riuer whereto certaine chiefe Rabbines are called by writing if there bee none there dwelling which consummate the businesse By the old Law a woman might be reconciled to her husband before the Bill of diuorce giuen not after The obseruation of the brother to marrie the wife of his brother deceased without issue or else to lose the inheritance which was testified by pulling off his shooe and spetting in his face is now thus ruled by the Rabbins that none shall marrie such a widdow but rather suffer the premised ignominie which is performed in this sort She comes before the chiefe Rabbi with fiue witnesses where the Rabbi demands if she haue been three months a widdow if her husband had a brother vnmarried if the partie conuented bee he c. and lastly if shee be fasting for otherwise she might not spet in her brothers face Of him also the Rabbi asketh like questions and receiuing a denyall of marriage there is brought a shooe of singular fashion for that purpose which hee putteth on his right foot bare and then setteth himselfe against a wall The woman comes and disclaiming his affinitie stoopeth and with her right hand for if she want a right hand it putteth the Rabbines out of their right wits to skan whether with her teeth or how else it may be done vnlooseth the shooe and taking it off spets in his face so that the fiue witnesses may see it saying Thus it shall be done with him which will not build the house of his brother In the time of her vncleannesse a woman may not enter into the Synagogue nor pray nor name the Name of GOD nor handle any holy booke which if they obserue the Rabbines promise them longer life As soone as she knoweth of her vncleannesse she presently seperateth her selfe from her husband the space of seuen dayes not touching him nor sitting on the same seate nor eating in the same dish or on the same cloath nor may drinke out of the same cup nor stand against him nor speake in his face If one will giue any thing to the other one layeth it on a bench or table and goeth away and the other commeth and taketh it They say it procureth the Leprosie in the Children which are then gotten which they obiect to Christians When shee hath numbred seuen dayes of her vncleannesse shee proceedeth to number as many of her purification after which time finding her selfe pure shee cloatheth her selfe in white and taking a woman with her washeth her selfe in cold water some in winter put in warme water to it which others in the coldest season refuse and leaues not a hayre of her head vnwashed as before is described Some fast till they haue done it lest the flesh in the teeth should hinder the water from comming to them for mouth and eyes must bee open and they must stoope that the pappe keepe not away the water from the brest and if they haue a playster on a sore it must off and their nayles must bee pared They write that if any shall exceed twentie yeeres and not marrie or if hee shall marrie a wife which is barren he sinneth as much as if hee had slaine a man and deserueth the punishment of Onan whom GOD slew Prouided if hee addict himselfe to the studie of the Law and findeth no need of a wife but if he finde concupiscence preuaile hee ought to marrie notwithstanding And this necessitie remaineth till he hath begotten a sonne and a daughter §. VI. Of the Iewish Beggers Diseases and Penances THe poorer Iewes on the Friday night and euery Festiuall