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Updated: June 23, 2025
This we take to be the fine harbor and river situated west of Point Curiana; its distance corresponds with that run by Columbus from Caravelas Grandes, which we have supposed identical with Port San Salvador. Leaving Rio de Mares the 30th of October, Columbus stood to the N. W. for fifteen leagues, when he saw a cape, to which he gave the name of Cabode Palmas.
In obedience to the royal decree he coasted along this shore, leaving behind him the provinces of Cumana and Manacapana, and thus arrived at a country called by its inhabitants Curiana, where he discovered a harbour quite similar to that of Cadiz.
Farther on, at a place which they named Curiana, they procured some gold, both wrought and in its native state, with monkeys and beautiful parrots. In the course of this voyage, they are said to have procured 150 marks, or 1200 ounces of pearls, all very beautiful, and of a fine water, some as large as hazel-nuts, but ill bored, owing to the imperfect tools of the natives.
About the year 1500 Christopher Guerra made a voyage to the coast of Venezuela: "They came to an anchor before a town called Curiana, where the Indians entreated them to go ashore, but the Spaniards being no more than thirty-three in all durst not venture.... At length, being convinced of their sincerity, the Spaniards went ashore, and being courteously entertained, staid there twenty days.
Hanging over the door of one of the chieftains in Curiana, the Spaniards found the head of a cannibal, which was regarded as a sort of standard or helmet captured from the enemy, and constituted a great honour for this chief. There is a district on the coast of Paria, called Haraia, which is remarkable for a peculiar kind of salt found there.
He sailed into an immense gulf noted by Columbus as remarkable for its fresh waters, the abundance of fish, and the many islands it contained. It is situated about thirty miles east of Curiana. Midway in this course Cumana and Manacapana are passed; and it is at these places, not at Curiana, where the most pearls are found.
Some people claim that Nuñez did not find these pearls at Curiana, which is more than one hundred and twenty leagues distant from Boca de la Sierpe, but in the little districts of Cumana and Manacapana near by the Boca and the island of Margarita. They declare that Curiana is not rich in pearls. This question has not been decided; so let us treat of another subject.
Each evening the stars which mark the north pole disappeared, so near is that region to the equator; but it was not possible to calculate precisely the polar degrees. The natives are sensible and not suspicious, and some of the people of Curiana passed the entire night in company with our men, coming out in their barques to join them. Pearls they call corixas.
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