Portraits from the Age of Exploration

One of the most ambitious works of Renaissance biography, Andre Thevet's two-volume Vrais pourtraits gave Europeans unique insights into the New World. Portraits from the age of Exploration - each biography chosen for its interest to modern readers - is the first translation of Thevet's work into English and the first to feature reproductions of the original copper-engraved portraits of each subject. The selections, twelve chapters from Thevet's original work, describe the exploits of six famous European explorers and six Native American chiefs. The explorers are Columbus, Magellan, Cortes, Pizarro, Albuquerque, and Vespucci; the chiefs are Montezuma, Atahualpa, Nacol-absou (King of the Promontory of the Cannibals), Paracoussi Satoriona (King of the Platte), and Quoniambec. The biographies of Native Americans represented a first in European literature. Thevet's information came from written and oral sources, from his own experience as a colonist in Brazil, and from other eyewitness accounts. Roger Schlesinger's annotations and introduction link Thevet's work to the body of sixteenth-century exploration literature, and Edward Benson's translation negotiates Thevet's verbal flourishes with skill. The book provides a unique insight into the European mentality of the Age of Exploration. It will be of interest to historians, anthropologists, geographers, those specializing in foreign languages, and readers who enjoy biographies.

Beyond its central premise, the book can be read through the connected lenses of Nonfiction. Those themes offer useful points of attention as the characters, ideas, or world develop, especially where the book complicates the expectations of its primary category.