Note 511 — Chapter II

The subject of these pre-Columbian claims is examined in almost all the general works on early discovery. Cf. Robertson’s America; J. S. Vater’s Untersuchungen über Amerikas Bevölkerung aus dem alten Continent (Leipzig, 1810); Dr. F. X. A. Deuber’s Geschichte der Schiffahrt im Atlantischen Ozean (Bamberg, 1814); Ruge, Geschichte des Zeitalters der Entdeckungen (ch. 2); Major’s Select Letters of Columbus, introd.; C. A. A. Zestermann’s Memoir on the Colonization of America in antehistoric times, with critical observations by E. G. Squier (London, 1851); Nouvelles Annales des Voyages (ii. 404); “Les précurseurs de Colomb” in Études par les Pères de la Compagnie de Jesus (Leipzig, 1876); Oscar Dunn in Revue Canadienne, xii. 57, 194, 305, 871, 909,—not to name numerous other periodical papers. Paul Gaffarel, in his “Les relations entre l’ancien monde et l’Amérique étaient-elles possibles au moyen âge?” (Soc. Normande de Géog. Bulletin, 1881, p. 209), thinks that amid the confused traditions there is enough to convince us that we have no right to determine that communication was impossible.