The Catalogue of Shipwrecked Books by Edward Wilson - Lee
Columbus and the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria. By the end of this fascinating book you will be gobsmacked about how we ever had the day off for that guy. But this book is about his son Hernando, the founder of the 16th century Google.
Columbus and the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria. By the end of this fascinating book you will be gobsmacked about how we ever had the day off for that guy. But this book is about his son Hernando, the founder of the 16th century Google.
Both like and unlike his dad, Hernando Colon collected the world. Hernando, though, did it by collecting global knowledge. He amassed a library of about 25,000 books and items published around the world. I know this sounds like a "so what". However, a library is more than a building with books on shelves. It is a method by which global knowledge is distilled, organized, distributed and noticed. But libraries in this form did not always exist. Enter Hernando, heir and "illegitimate" son of Christopher Columbus.
He travelled with Columbus on his 4th voyage to the "new" world". He was a life-long witness to the discovery era. In the 16th century countries played a bizarre, massive game of Finders Keepers: if you landed on it it was yours. To this end, Columbus personally claimed financial rights to the places he - well, let's say places he visited. His rather violent tenure as governor of these isles (the places many vacation on today) resulted in his ultimate expulsion therefrom - in chains no less. However, the Columbus family was in the in-crowd and by hook or crook the sons won financial rights and in some cases governance of these lands for many years after the voyages. The story of the fight for these rights is something straight out of a tele-novella - out of wedlock babies, powerful alliances by marriage, lawsuits heard by the Vatican, summits with the Portuguese about how to measure the latitude of the world in order to know who owns what, etc.
Along the way Hernando starts collecting books. At this time books are proliferating like modern-day podcasts. Rome and Venice turnout to be the cultural crossroads where books from many countries are bought and sold. (By the way, at this time Rome is already a tourist trap where Judas' rope and a vial of Mary's milk are on view and already a place where it's careless to go out to dinner without a will. But I digress... as does this book, down many curious side paths.)
To ensure that he doesn't re-purchase the same book, Hernando begins to catalogue his purchases. This then leads to creating the practice of adding indexes to books, to summarizing books so searchers know what it is about, to identifying the author (thereby giving rise to the personalization of academia), to displaying books on their spine as opposed to flat, the creation of the predecessor to the card catalogue which allows for an infinite reshuffling of how to organize information and the valuation of popular culture publications. Hernando's overarching idea is that there is information everywhere, but it won't matter if you don't know where to find it. He and his growing team had to ponder how people look for info. Should "asp" be categorized under "serpents" or "snakes" or "demons"? Should "hemlock" be under "plants" or "poisons"? This is something modern search engines wrestle with everyday. The Big Idea is that the truth of any item can be seen from many vantage points. What Hernando sought to do would only truly become possible in our digital age. (I often think of what Frank Lloyd Wright would have built had he had access to more modern materials. The Guggenheim Museum, of course, gives us a hint.)
Hernando also created epitomes, which were a brief explanation of a book's content. The plan was to distribute these so people knew what information was available. While this created a community of in-the-know people, it of course was not as powerful as the modern day web where recipients can easily share and discover between themselves. But the germ of the modern day web is there.
In addition to organizing books he made localized maps of Spain. Similar to the purpose of the Google camera cars, he sent people out to survey the landscape, had locals verify it and then sent others out to triple check it. He had ships take logs on their journeys so he could collect crowd-sourced data to help with sea navigation. (I mean, I just don't get why we are talking about his father.)
He dies in 1539. Five centuries later Google launches Project Guttenberg, today's version of everything from everywhere in one searchable place.
Some of Hernando's catalogues survive. But of his vast collection, only 4,000 items are extant, signed and annotated by him, along with the date and place of purchase. They are are located in Seville. Truly a reason to visit.
A reason to read this book?
If you want to know about :
Early colonialism
Libraries- it is a true eureka moment to break the Trumpian walls of nationalism in favor of gathering thought, both high and low culture, without regard to religion, language or region.
Spanish history- I thought Ferdinand and Isabella was a love story, but it was really more of a coalition government
New world horticulture - Hernando planted and cultivated many of the plants he brought back from the "new" world, changing the landscape of Seville.
Distinction of academic disciplines
Sack of Rome and Papal goings on
Book collecting
This is dense reading and I recommend the audiobook. Also adding a review in case I have not convinced you to read this one.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/the-story-of-christopher-columbuss-son-the-ultimate-completist/2019/03/12/7438f79e-44f6-11e9-aaf8-4512a6fe3439_story.html#comments-wrapper
https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/the-story-of-christopher-columbuss-son-the-ultimate-completist/2019/03/12/7438f79e-44f6-11e9-aaf8-4512a6fe3439_story.html#comments-wrapper
