e preserved. This
will not only supply interesting information but also, which is more to
be desired, it will be useful for navigation and new discoveries, by
which God our Lord may be served, the territories of the crown of Spain
extended, and Spaniards enriched and respected. As I have not yet
finished the particular description of this land, which will contain
everything relating to geography and the works of nature minutely dealt
with, in this volume I shall only offer a general summary, following the
most ancient authors, to recall the remains of those lands which are now
held to be new and previously unknown, and of their inhabitants.

The land, which we read of as having existed in the first and second age
of the world, was divided into five parts. The three continents, of
which geographers usually write, Asia, Africa, and Europe, are divided
by the river Tanais, the river Nile, and the Mediterranean Sea, which
Pomponius calls "our" sea. Asia is divided from Europe by the river
Tanais[22], now called Silin, and from Africa by the Nile, though
Ptolemy divides it by the Red Sea and isthmus of the desert of Arabia
Deserta. Africa is divided from Europe by "our" sea, commencing at the
strait of Gibraltar and ending with the Lake of Meotis. The other two
parts are thus divided. One was called, and still ought to be called,
Catigara[23] in the Indian Sea, a very extensive land now distinct from
Asia. Ptolemy describes it as being, in his time and in the time of
Alexander the Great, joined on to Asia in the direction of Malacca. I
shall treat of this in its place, for it contains many and very precious
secrets, and an infinity of souls, to whom the King our Lord may
announce the holy catholic faith that they may be saved, for this is the
object of his Majesty in these new lands of barbarous idolatry. The
fifth part is or was called the Atlantic Island, as famous as extensive,
and which exceeded all the others, each one by itself, and even some
joined together. The inhabitants of it and their description will be
treated of, because this is the land, or at least part of it, of these
western Indies of Castille.

[Note 22: The Don.]

[Note 23: Marinus of Tyre, quoted by Ptolemy, gave an enormous
extension to eastern Asia, and placed the region he called Catigara far
to the S.E. of it. Catigara was described by Marinus of Tyre as an
emporium and important place of trade. It is not mentioned in the
Periplus of the Erythrae