Relation d’un voyage infortuné fait aux Indes occidentales par le capitaine Fleury avec la description de quelques îles qu’on y rencontre, recueillie par l’un de ceux de la compagnie qui fit le voyage

Anonymous author

Handwritten text

(1618-1620)

Inguimbertine Library, Carpentras (France)

N° 590

 A freebooter travel in the Caribbean Sea

Part 2

Description of some natives of the West Indies

Translated by Alan Ringer, revised by Georgia Lumbreras.

Linguistic notes by Sybille de Pury  

2010

 Introduction

 We’re publishing hereby the English translation of the anonymous and handwritten account made by French pirates staying at the Dominica in 1619, some fifteen years before the beginning of French colonization of the Lesser Antilles.

 Alan Ringer translated the narration and Georgia Lumbreras revised it. Sybille de Pury added linguistic notes about the Caribbean words in the text.

This narration is titled Relation d’un voyage infortuné fait aux Indes occidentales par le capitaine Fleury avec la description de quelques îles qu’on y rencontre, recueillie par l’un de ceux de la compagnie qui fit le voyage. It had never been published before Jean Pierre Moreau ran over it at the Inguimbertine Library in Carpentras (France). The publishing house Seghers in Paris published it in 1990 under the title Un Flibustier français dans la mer des Antilles (1618-1620), with an introduction of Jean-Pierre Moreau. It was reprinted in 1994 by Payot in Paris.

 In this chronicle, the anonymous author reports about Captain Fleury’s trip, a French freebooter, along Florida’s coasts, between 1618 and 1620. Only the second part of the work has been translated here, telling how Caribbean Indians met those starving French pirates run aground on the island Dominica. They’ll stay for nine months on the island waiting for Captain Fleury to come and pick them up. We can read how the natives sheltered them, fed them and took care of them. The author describes the island, its flora and fauna, the manners and beliefs of its inhabitants. He shows a very positive attitude towards this “cannibalistic” population, so called by the Spanish.

 This narration is precious because it testifies about the very first contacts between French and Indians in the Lesser Antilles at the beginning of the 17^th century.

Bibliography

Breton, Père Raymond, Dictionnaire caraïbe-français, 1665, édition présentée et annotée par le CELIA et le GEREC, éditions IRD et KARTHALA, Paris, 1999.

Cayetano, Roy (coordinated and edited by), The People’s Garifuna Dictionary, National Garifuna Council of Belize, Belize, 1993.

Moreau Jean-Pierre (présenté par ) Un flibustier français dans la mer des Antilles, 1618-1620, Manuscrit du début du XVII^ème siècle  Relation d’un voyage infortuné fait aux Indes occidentales par le capitaine Fleury avec la description de quelques îles qu’on y rencontre, recueillie par l’un de ceux de la compagnie qui fit le voyage, 1990, Seghers, Paris ; réédition 1994, Payot & Rivages, Collection Petite Bibliothèque Payot/Voyageurs.