Beyond the shadow of a doubt
by Niven Sinclair
Introduction
I would like to turn to the "proofs" of the Sinclair voyage of 1398 to North America. Fourteen points will be offered, each based upon fact which I have carefully researched.
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Contingency plans
Before Henry Sinclair left on his voyage, he made certain dispositions of his lands to his brothers, John and David. He assigned the lands of Pentland to his brother John, whilst transferring the lands of Auchdale and Newburgh in Aberdeenshire to David.
To his eldest daughter, Elizabeth, who married Sir John Drummond of Cargill, he left his lands in Norway, provided he died without a male heir. This would suggest that he took his three sons with him on the voyage, as they were alive at the time and of an age when they would have been considered able to accompany a military or naval force.
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The Zeno Map
A map of the North Atlantic was drawn up by the Zeno brothers. In 1393, Henry Sinclair sent Nicolo Zeno to carry out a survey of Greenland. Nicolo returned to Orkney in 1395, where he died from prolonged exposure to the Arctic weather. He was succeeded as Henry's admiral by his brother, Antonio Zeno.
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Accuracy attested & confirmed
For the next several centuries, the Zeno Map was used by such well-known cartographers as Ruscelli (1561), Mercator (1569) and Ortelius (1574). And even subsequent maps made by Hondius (1597), Danckwertz, Corneille, and Tevernier (1628), and Bellini (1765) were, save for the orientation, inferior to the Zeno map. The authority for this statement is from Professor Hobbs of Michigan University.
The so-called Zeno Map had been compared by Professor Hapgood to an aerial survey of Greenland, carried out recently by the United States Air Force. Professor Hapgood found 37 points of identity with the Zeno Map. This is an incredible degree of accuracy.
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The Zeno Narrative
In the Words of Professor Taylor of London University, "The authenticity of the Zeno account has been challenged, but on very flimsy grounds. It appears to the present writer (Prof. Taylor) that it would be quite out of the question for any author to invent a story which in every detail reflects fact about which it would be quite impossible for him to have been aware. Such is the story of Markland, which Antonio Zeno, then in the Faeroes, sent back to his brother Carlo in Venice and which a descendant edited and published in 1558. The later Zeno was personally known to Ramusio, the great authority of his day on voyages and discoveries, whom he could have hardly have deceived."
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Zeno had never been to Rosslyn
The Zeno Narrative speaks of the "spring of pitch" which the reconnaissance party of 100 soldiers found at Stellarton and which they reported back to Prince Henry at Guysborough, both places in Nova Scotia. On hearing this, Prince Henry considered it was "good omen" because there was a similar "spring of pitch" at his home at Rosslyn in Scotland. The "pitch" had been used as medicine against the Black Death. It is reputed to have saved the Sinclairs from the scourges of that particular plague, so much so that they erected a shrine over its site.
Now this story is faithfully recounted in the Zeno Narrative, although Antonio Zeno had never been to Rosslyn. In other words, he could only have heard of the "spring of pitch" of Rosslyn from Henry as they both stood listening to the report of the returning soldiers in Nova Scotia.
Incidentally, the number of men Henry sent out was 100. Those of us who have been in the army will know that if you can afford to send out a reconnaissance party of this size, the base camp must have comprised many times that number.
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My personal inspection
I have visited all these places where Prince Henry is understood to have visited. You could too. If I had to describe the places visited, my description would have been almost identical to the words used in the Zeno Narrative.
http://www.clansinclaircanada.ca/articles/beyond.htm#map