LINSCHOTEN

Jan Huygen van LINSCHOTEN,(1563-1611), was a celebrated Dutch traveller and writer.  He went to India in 1583, spending five years in Goa. 

When Linschoten returned from Goa to his home in the Netherlands, the people of northern Europe and particularly his countrymen, were interested in what he had to report concerning the trading activities of the Portuguese in the East.

Because trade in the Far East was dependent on routes via America or Africa, his work eventually encompassed the entire globe, including Spanish and Portuguese activities in America. He supported Dutch attempts to find the North East passage to Cathay, taking part in  Barent's second voyage to the Kara Sea, 1594-5. 


Linschoten published his work at a time when exploration was rapidly opening up the world, hence the complex publication history of his travels, with successive editions of the History of America and the Itinerario merging into each other as new discoveries were made, and different versions of the same maps appearing in different works.

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