Hakluyt
Name: Hakluyt, Richard
ACHIEVEMENTS: Promoting overseas exploration by spreading cartographic knowledge
NICKNAME/ALIAS: None.
DATE/PLACE OF BIRTH: c.1552, Hertforshire, England.
DATE/PLACE OF DEATH/AGE AT DEATH: 23rd^ November 1616, London, England. Aged c.64.
DISCIPLINE: Geographer.
FIELD: Exploration.
EDUCATION: Westminster School, London; Christ Church, University of Oxford.
MAJOR WORK: "The Principal Navigations, Voyages and Discoveries of the English Nation", (1598-1600).
LIFE AND TIMES:
In 1570, at a time when world exploration was at its height, Hakluyt attended Christ Church in Oxford, to study geography. He gained his MA and was appointed Lecturer in Geography in 1577, the same year that he met the Flemish map publisher, Ortelius*.
During Hakluyt’s youth, London merchants were reading "A Treatise of the New India" which challenged the right of the Spaniards to keep the rich trade in the Caribbean to themselves. By the 1560's, Queen Elizabeth encouraged privateers like John Hawkins to sail to the Spanish Main and Hawkins' cousin, Francis Drake, made over six return voyages during the next thirty years.
The current challenge was to find a Northeast and Northwest Passage to the Orient and its fabled riches. Hakluyt talked to the explorers Sir Humphrey Gilbert and Martin Frobisher and he was also in touch with important men at court, like Cecil* and Walsingham*.
At this time, he became a consultant for national geographical enterprises, corresponding with Mercator*, the leading European geographer, with a query about currents off the Siberian coast, in 1580.
Hakluyt’s own speciality was the exploration of the temperate zones of North America as part of the search for a Northwest Passage. He set out his policy in the preface to John Florio's translation of an account of a voyage to Canada, by the Frenchman, Jacques Cartier.
This policy included the establishment of England's claim in North America, based on the voyages of John and Sebastian Cabot at the end of the fifteenth century, under the English flag.
He also advocated a policy to start colonisation and promote national trade, echoed in his publication, "Divers Voyages Touching the Discovery of America", 1552. This was commissioned by Raleigh* and Hakluyt dedicated it to Sidney*.
In 1584, he wrote up his latest research in "A Particular Discourse concerning Western Discoveries," which restated the advantages of colonising Virginia and urged state support for the venture. A copy was presented to Queen Elizabeth* and she rewarded Hakluyt with an ecclesiastical appointment in Bristol.
Over the next few years, he concentrated on collecting material for his major work, "The Principal Navigations, Voyages and Discoveries of the English Nation," published in 1589.
In 1590, he settled as Rector of Wetheringsett in Suffolk, England until his wife died in 1597. He then revised and published an enlarged second edition of "Voyages" in three volumes between 1598 and 1600. The following year, the Queen gave him an ecclesiastical position at Westminster and he continued in his capacity as geographical consultant, preparing a report for the East India Company* on the most important places for trade in the East Indies.
In 1606, having been remarried for two years, Hakluyt was one of the chief promoters of a petition to King James for authority to colonise Virginia, and he became a major shareholder in the London Virginia Company.
He continued writing, and published a translation of the discoveries of the Portuguese Ferdinand de Soto, "Virginia Richly Valued"(1609). The remainder of his life was spent backing the North American colonists, particularly after the return of de la Warr*, whose expedition to the Virginian colony in 1610-11 saved it from extinction. In 1612, four years prior to his death, Hakluyt became a member of the Northwest Passage Company.
ASSESSMENT: Hakluyt was an expert adviser on the practical aspects of exploration such as colonisation and trade, who spread his knowledge among his contemporaries.
EXTRA CONNECTIONS: He consulted experimenter William Gilbert*.
He published the account of Dudley’s* exploration.
His work was publicized by Lindschoten*
ONELINER: Richard Hakluyt, Elizabethan cartographer
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Parks, George Bruner, Richard Hakluyt and the English Voyages, Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., Inc., New York, 1961.