Message #160333

[Autolocus]

44 ST. BRENDAN'S ISLANDS

century maps, notably the Atlante Mediceo 14 of 1351. Also the
Book of the Spanish Friar, 15 dating from about the middle of that
century, contains in his enumeration of islands the words
"another Desierta, another Lecname, another Puerto Santo."
It would seem to have been a familiar appellation about 1350
or earlier, and the suggestion naturally occurs that it may have
originated in the tradition of the visit and blessing of the Irish
saint. At any rate, the Portuguese, in the fifteenth-century re-
discovery, can have had nothing to do with conferring it.

ANIMAL AND BIRD NAMES OF ISLANDS

Concerning such names as Canaria, Capraria, etc., which, by
reason of other associations, appear oddly out of place in this
group, the more general question is raised of the tendency to
apply animal and bird names to Eastern Atlantic islands. Goat,
rabbit, dog, falcon, dove, wolf, and crow were applied to various
islands long before the Portuguese visited the Madeiras and
Azores, finding them untenanted; these names long held their
ground on the maps, and some of them are in use even now. The
reason for their adoption piques one's curiosity. If they could be
taken as throwing any light on the fauna of these islands in 1350,
they might also instruct us as to the probability of prior human
occupancy or previous connection with the mainland. But, of
course, in any significant instances some fancied resemblance of
aspect may have suggested the name.