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Thomas More and Joseph the Indian

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2011

J. Duncan M. Derrett
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Extract

The purpose of this article is two-fold: firstly, to illustrate by means, particularly, of two examples how far Thomas More based the Second Book of his masterpiece, Utopia, upon Indian, or more strictly, indological sources; and secondly to reintroduce to historians of India Iosephus Indus, “Joseph the Indian.”

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Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 94 , Issue 1-2 , April 1962 , pp. 18 - 34
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Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1962

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References

page 18 note 1 This Joseph is not mentioned byStreit, R., Bibliotheca Missionum, iv (Aachen, 1928).Google Scholar Professor C. R. Boxer kindly provided me with valuable references. For Joseph's very limited rôle in modern ecclesiastical productions see below, p. 24, n. 3. Joseph is not noticed by modern European historians(e.g. Livermore, H. V. in New Cambridge Modern History, i (1957), pp. 426–7)Google Scholar.

page 18 note 2 On Peter Gilles (1486–1533), son of the Assistant Treasurer of Antwerp and himself Chief Secretary, a classical scholar and jurist, seeRogers, E. F., ed., The Correspondence of Sir Thomas More (Princeton, 1947), pp. 76–7.Google Scholar His portrait, by Metsys, reveals sensitivity and acumen. It is reproduced inHarpsfield, N., Life and Death of Sr. Thomas Moore, ed. Hitchcock, and Chambers, (London, E.E.T.S., 1932), opp. p. 137Google Scholar.

page 19 note 1 Lupton, J. H., ed., The Utopia of Sir Thomas More (Oxford, 1895), pp. 26–7.Google Scholar References to Utopia here are to this edition. The more scholarly edition by Marie Delcourt (Paris, Droz, 1936) has long been out of print. The reason for Hythloday's lack of equal learning in Latin is ascribed to his predominant interest in philosophy. Indeed scholars existed, like II Cretico, who had lived in Portugal, were excellent in Greek, but less interested (if able) in Latin: but More hints that he (whose Greek was chiefly book-learnt and far less fluent than his Latin) did not find it easy to interrogate his informant.

page 19 note 2 Utopia, p. 110.

page 19 note 3 The first Italian edition was published in Rome in 1510, and the Latin translation was done by the same Madrignani who translated the Itinerarium (see below) three years previously. It is this version which Simon Grynaeus republished at pp. 189–296 of his Novus Orbis (see below).Jones, J. W., ed. Badger, G. P., The Travels of Ludovico di Varthema … (London, Hakluyt Soc., 1863)Google Scholar.

page 19 note 4 This information is spread between More's letter to Gilles, Utopia, pp. 5–8, and Gilles' to Busleyden, ibid., pp. xcviii-xcix. It is not to be supposed that Gilles' letter was written and published otherwise than in full accord with More's scheme and intention.

page 20 note 1 FrSurtz, Edward L., , S.J., published in 1957 The Praise of Wisdom (Chicago, Loyola University Press)Google Scholar and The Praise of Pleasure (Harvard University Press). In the words ofProfessorDonner, H. W., whose Introduction to Utopia (London, 1946)Google Scholar much clarified More's motives and sources, Fr. Surtz's interpretation is “by far the most authoritative we have”. A. E. Morgan's Nowhere was Somewhere (1946) placed too much faith in the Incas as a source of Utopia.

page 20 note 2 Luís de Matos wrote to me (in August, 1959) that in his doctoral thesis (Paris, 1959) on “Portuguese Expansion in Latin Literature of the Renaissance”, he pointed out the many allusions to Portuguese discoveries in the Second Book of Utopia. Publication is awaited. A correspondent in Paris unfortunately failed to trace the thesis and the author has not been able to supply me with further particulars.

page 20 note 3 See the reproduction facing p. xciv of Lupton's edition. The statement of Gilles that he obtained it from Hythloday does not prove that the costly joke was his idea exclusively. On the contrary Gilles was unlucky in failing to persuade the printer to show each line of the tetrastich complete without a break. The Utopian type was too large. Though the letters have a resemblance to the Ethiopic type designed long before Utopia, they look like an attempt to reproduce a script which is “a lot of Os” (like Malayālam).

page 21 note 1 It is apparently a coincidence that agrama (gibberish like all the words not: shown by me in italics) should be paired with civitatem, when grāma is a common word in various Indian languages for “village”.

page 21 note 2 i.e. “without the aid of Christianity”.

page 21 note 3 The feathered dress of priests is the best example.

page 21 note 4 See Derrett, , “The history of ‘Palladius on the Races of India and the Brahmans’,” Classica et Mediaevalia, xxi, 1960, pp. 64–135.Google Scholar The more “historical” material to be found in Strabo and Plutarch was less influential. For the classical: sources on the gymnosophists seeBreloer, B. and Bonier, F., Forties Hist. Rel. Indicarum (Bonn, 1939),Google Scholar reviewed byTheiler, W., Deutsche Literaturzeitung, lx (1939), ii, 1126–9, esp. at 1127–8.Google Scholar Gymnosophists are still written on.Brown, T. S., “A Megasthenes fragment …,” JAOS., Ixxx (1960), ii, 133–5.Google ScholarZuntz, G., “Zu Alexanders Gespräch …,” Hermes, lxxxviii, 1959, 436–40.Google Scholar They reappear in an experimental indological work,Rao, Raja, Serpent and the Rope (London, John Murray, 1960), p. 73Google Scholar.

page 21 note 5 The Ambrosian version and the Bamberg version of Palladius; the Julius Valerius summary of the Pseudo-Callisthenes tradition; and the Collatio Alexandra cum Dindimo (on which see Derrett, ubi cit., pp. 82–3).

page 21 note 6 On the Historia de Preliis of Archpriest Leo and its progeny and connected versions seePfister, F., Das Nachleben der Überlieferung von Alexander und die Brahmanen, Hermes, lxxvii (1941), pp. 143–169.Google Scholar AlsoCary, G. A., The Mediaeval Alexander, ed. Ross, D. J. A. (Cambridge, 1956).Google Scholar Polydore Vergil speaks of the gymnosophists in De invent, re., i, 15.

page 22 note 1 Derrett, ubi cit., pp. 116, 122, 123, 129: Versio Ornatior ii, §§ 10, 24, 25, 42.

page 22 note 2 For example, artificial incubation of eggs was long attributed to Egyptians. The Utopian interest in printing is a reflexion of the demand for Ethiopic type and a printing-press in Abyssinia made, we know, as early as 1526, and possibly much earlier. Rumours of presses going to other parts of Africa before 1515 remain to be verified.

page 23 note 1 Azevedo, A. E. d'Almeida, As Communidades de Goa (Lisbon, 1890), 179–80Google Scholar.

page 23 note 2 The fisher-caste Indians who had learnt Portuguese had limitations as interpreters. Hythloday “claimed” only to have been in Calicut, but that does not exclude More's actual informant's having been in Goa. Portuguese contact with Brahmans in Malabar could have been limited to dealings (which the sources confirm) with the inevitable Brahman envoy. Kerala was not a good introduction to the essentials of Indian traditional culture. Yet Hythloday's information contained much that relates to the Malabar strip.

page 23 note 3 Barros, Ioão de, Decada Primeira da Asia (Lisbon, 1628), fo. 101 r.Google Scholar The episode appears briefly in Aloysius Cadamustus (Cadamosto), Navigatio, at Novus Orbis, p. 85.

page 24 note 1 The author's interest in Cabral's voyage is clear from ch. cxxix, and he writes knowledgably of India.

page 24 note 2 B.M. shelf-mark C. 32.f.30.Greenlee, W. B., The Voyage of Pedro Álvares Cabral to Brazil and India (London, Hakluyt Society, 1938), p. xxxvi.Google Scholar The edition of 1508 (B.M. shelf-mark G. 6547) was photographically reproduced (without editorial matter) asVespucci Reprints, Texts and Studies VI, by the Princeton University Press (Princeton/London, 1916).Google Scholar The 1512 edition is available at the B.M., shelf-mark C. 32.f.5.

page 24 note 3 Assemanus, J. S., Bibliotheca Orientalis Clementino-Vaticana, iii, 2 (Rome, 1728), p. 439,Google Scholar refers not to the Paesi or the Itinerarium (see below), but to the Novus Orbis, in a late edition. There and at p. 446 he treats the story as sound. Schurhammer, G., The Malabar Church and Rome (Trichinopoly, 1934), pp. 26–31,Google Scholar reproduces passages favouring the subordination of the Syrian Church to Rome, whichFerroli, D., , S.J., The Jesuits in Malabar, i (Bangalore, 1939), p. 68,Google Scholar follows for want of access to an original copy.

page 24 note 4 Brown, Bishop L. W., The Indian Christians of St. Thomas (Cambridge, 1956), pp. 12–13,Google Scholar is inaccurate. He says, “The value of the book (sic) is vitiated by the fact that the editor admitted he could hardly understand Joseph's speech.” This merely follows the comment inA New General Collection of Voyages and Travels, i, (London, Thomas Astley, 1745), p. 48,Google Scholar n. (b): Josephus' account was “very short, and not very satisfactory. Nor is this any Wonder, since Grynaeus, or whoever took the Relation from Josephus's Mouth, tells us, he could scarce understand him; and that this Indian, being a Christian, seldom conversed with his Pagan Countrymen”—which is nonsense (see text printed below, p. 30). Bp.Brown did not see either the Paesi or Novus Orbis himself, and his reproduction of Ferroli at his own p. 13, n. 1, is misleading.

page 24 note 5 Cited above, n. 2, at pp. 97–113.

page 25 note 1 No writer has referred to this work in connection with Joseph the Indian, and muddled references to Simon Grynaeus appear in all the places cited in notes 1 to p. 24, above. The B M. shelf-mark is G. 6988. The translation of Joseph's story appears at fos. Ixxxii r to lxxviii v (for lxxxviii v).

page 25 note 2 De Barros, ubi cit. sup. (p. 23, n. 3), refers to the Novus Orbis, “onde andāo algũas das nossas neuegaçoes, escriptas nao como ellas merecē & o caso passou.” Greenlee, op. cit., p. 97, n. 1.

page 25 note 3 Chambers, R. W., Thomas More (London, 1935), p. 282.Google ScholarRogers, , Correspondence, no. 196, pp. 470 f.Google Scholar Though More and Grynaeus differed in point of religion they remained on excellent terms. G. sent M. his books, and one, autographed Clarissīo Heroi.D. Thomae Moro Patrono D.D. Simon Grynaeus (a first edition of Euclid, 1533), was passed by More to Thomas Clement and is now in the Bodleian (Byw. C3.3). A copy (now at Yale) of the rare Paris, 1532, edition of the Novus Orbis itself was believed by a contemporary to have been given to More and p. 367 bears what looks like More's signature. The same page bears the note Thome More Lib. ex dono Authoris. (I am obliged to Mr. R. S. Sylvester for a photostat.) Moreover, G. dedicated his Plato (1534) to More's son, John.

page 26 note 1 Reverse of sig. αl.

page 26 note 2 Where the Itinerarium erred in the order of chapters this has been corrected, but the whole production is far from faultless.

page 26 note 3 About the date of Novus Orbis he was working on a translation of Plato, an edition of Aristophanes, notes onAristotle's, De mundo, and the Euclid referred to in n. 3, p. 25 aboveGoogle Scholar.

page 26 note 4 Printed by Ioannis Hervagius of Basle. The Paris edition of the same year seems to be a reprint of this.

page 26 note 5 5 An interpolation into ch. cxxxiii contradicting an allegation about the election of a Catholica (sic for Catholicos) by “cardinals” in “Armenia” by authority of the Pope, containing the words, “Haec dixerim, ne quis putet à soliditate petrae Christi esse recedendum. Vnus deus igitur, una fides, una est sancta Romana ecclesia.” Itinerarium, fo. lxxxiii (for Ixxxiv) v; Novus Orbis, p. 146; cf. Greenlee, p. 103.

page 27 note 1 Utopia, II, ch. ix.

page 27 note 2 Ibid., pp. 297–8.

page 27 note 3 Solennes ad ultimum conceptis uerbia preces sacerdos pariter populusque percensent, ita compositas ut quae simul cuncti recitant, priuatim quisque adsemet referat. Ibid., p. 297.

page 28 note 1 Madras University Tamil Lexicon, iii, p. 1753, gives us the Tamil equivalent, the equally interdenominational tambirān.

page 28 note 2 Gundert's, Malayalam Dictionary at p. 430Google Scholar emphasizes this special quality of the word. An interreligious name for God is a curiosity.

page 28 note 3 Note the ambiguous word pariter in the quotation at p. 27, n. 3 above.

page 29 note 1 The text is adapted from the 1507 edition by attempts to complete words, as indicated, by expansions in accord with the 1512 edition, and occasional spellings from that edition which facilitate reading: but no attempt has been made systematically to reconstruct the original text. Each later edition attempted to improve upon the dialect, and one who is not a specialist in Italian had best leave it atone.

page 29 note 2 Apparently to be expanded etiam(!).

page 29 note 3 If the Hindus did have a curtain before the image, did the Syrian Christians (who hang a veil before the sanctuary) suggest this usage ?

page 31 note 1 Utopia, p. 177.

page 31 note 2 The amulet element predominated there also: see the appropriate note ofBecker, W. A., Gallus (trans. Metcalfe, F., London, 1866), pp. 183–4, 196,Google Scholar orPauly-Wissowa, , Real-Encyclopedie, 5th “half-vol.”, coll. 1048–1051 (Mau)Google Scholar.

page 31 note 3 Utopia, pp. 174–6.

page 31 note 4 Material from Columbus, Vespucci, and Peter Martyr published before 1515, and confirmed later (in republications in Novus Orbis) tended to show that natives of the West Indies or the mainland of America did not value gold as highly as any thing that the Portuguese regarded as trash, and made various implements from it, as well as ornaments of a dazzling variety (which no doubt they did value). S. Grynaeus carefully indexes Auri contemptus against a passage from Vespucci's first Voyage (p. 159), which Lupton cites at p. xxxviii.

page 32 note 1 Versio Ornatior ii, § 10: καί δμΨης παραϒενομέης π τόν ποταμν ρχόμενοι, χρυσν πατουτες ὔδωρ πίνομεν … The Versio Ornatior et Interpolate of which More very probably saw a manuscript (the text was not published until S. Grynaeus' friend J. Camerarius brought it out in 1569) does not differ substantially. Some manuscripts add a καί before χρυσν, perhaps to emphasize the paradox.

page 32 note 2 At the end of the passage that next appears. It is not at all clear what Joseph originally meant, if not bathing ghats on the banks of rivers.

page 32 note 3 Whence the tales of gold-bearing sands, gold-mining ants, etc. Herodotus, iii, 102; Ktesias (Photius), Ind. 4 (ed. Henry, p. 62);Lucian, , Gallus s. Somnium, 16 (ed. Teub, . ii, 388).Google ScholarMajumdar, R. C., Classical Accounts of India (Calcutta, 1960), xxv, 3, 266.Google Scholar Apollonius of Tyana asked about these tales (Philostratus, iii, 45).

page 32 note 4 See the three-fold classification in our previous quotation: Naires, Canes, Nuiram (outcaste fisherfolk)—caeteri must include the last as well!

page 33 note 1 Utopia, p. 243.

page 33 note 2 Ibid., pp. 243, 252 f.

page 33 note 3 A comedy was named Condalium, but nothing else is known of it. The word occurs twice in the fourth Act of Plautus' Trinummus in contexts clearly showing its meaning.

page 34 note 1 Compare the position in Utopia (Utop., p. 176) with that described by Marco Polo in “Motfili” (printed “Murfili” in Novus Orbis, p. 407). Compare Strabo II, iii, 4 (Majumdar, op. cit., 284).