Empire (4th of 90) -- Searching for the Northwest Passage

By the 16th century, the English still had no imperial ambitions. The great quest was to go to China by sea but the easterly route was difficult and uncertain. Accepting that the world was a globe, it was then believed that a westerly passage to Asia must exist. This was the reason Henry VII patronized the explorers and navigators, John Cabot and his three sons. "This Sceptred Isle: Empire" is a narrative history of the British Empire from Ireland in the 12th century to the independence of India in the 20th, told in 90 programmes written by historian Christopher Lee and narrated by actor Juliet Stevenson. (You will be able to listen again online to up to five most recent episodes of "Empire".)

In 1497, they sailed from Bristol and 52 days later sighted land. This was probably Newfoundland and the Cabots claimed the find for England. Most importantly, they recorded the huge fish stocks of the Newfoundland Banks but found no Northwest Passage.

In 1499 or 1450, Cabot died at sea but his second son Sebastian went on to be a celebrated cartographer. The English were far behind the Spanish and Portuguese in maritime exploration. Even in the early 1500s when the Iberian neighbours were in Central America and the East Indies, the English still did not have the skills nor the investment to challenge the Spanish nor the Portuguese for the riches they were bringing back to Europe.

It is clear that although trading companies were established in London and Bristol, many merchants were happy to invest in the Eastern Mediterranean. In the Levant, goods from the Far East would be brought overland from the Gulf ports and sold through middlemen to the Northern Europeans, among them the English. The first proper English commercial assault on the east would not take place until the end of the 16th century.