View source for Madre de Deus

{{Short description|Portuguese ship}}
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{{for|the ship sometimes called the Madre de Deus that was sunk in 1610 in Japan|Nossa Senhora da Graça incident}}
{{use dmy dates|date=April 2022|cs1-dates=y}}
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{{Infobox ship image
| Ship image = Carrack Madre de Deus.jpg
| Ship caption = Model of the Portuguese carrack ''Madre de Deus'', in the [[Maritime Museum (Lisbon)]]
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{{Infobox ship career
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| Ship country = [[Kingdom of Portugal|Portugal]]
| Ship flag = [[File:Flag Portugal (1495).svg|60px]]
| Ship name = ''Madre de Deus'', ''Mãe de Deus'' and ''Madre de Dios''
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| Ship builder = Lisbon shipyards, Kingdom of Portugal
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| Ship in service = {{start date text|1589}}
| Ship out of service = {{end date text|1592}}
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| Ship fate = [[Battle of Flores (1592)|Captured by the English]]
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{{Infobox ship characteristics
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| Ship class = [[Carrack]]
| Ship displacement = 1600 tons
| Ship tons burthen = 900 tons
| Ship length = {{cvt|100|ft|2|order=flip}} keel, {{cvt|165|ft|2|order=flip}} (beakhead to stern)<ref>{{Cite book |last=Hakluyt |first=Richard |url=https://archive.org/details/principalnavigat07hakl/page/104/mode/2up?q=madre |title=The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques & Discoveries of the English Nation Made by Sea or Over-land to the Remote and Farthest Distant Quarters of the Earth at Any Time within the Compasse of these 1600 Yeeres |publisher=J. MacLehose and Sons |year=1904 |volume=7 |location=[[Glasgow]] |pages=116–117 |language=en |via=[[Internet Archive]]}}</ref>
| Ship beam = {{convert|46|ft|10|in|m|2|order=flip}}
| Ship draught = {{cvt|31|ft|2|order=flip}}{{efn-lg|The draught as stated by Hakluyt is {{cvt|31|ft|2|order=flip}} in loaded weight and {{cvt|26|ft|2|order=flip}} after some of the cargo has been transferred, but this is manifestly absurd considering that it would be deeper or equal with [[First-rate|1st rate ships]] of the 18th–19th centuries. Jordan noted a supposed frigate named ''Madre de Deus'' with {{cvt|5.12|m|1}} draught, he noted that this ship's depth is unusually deeper when compared with other frigates and might be an error in transcription.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Jordan |first=Brian |date=2001 |title=Wrecked ships and ruined empires: an interpretation of the Santo António de Tanna's hull remains using archaeological and historical data |url=https://www.academia.edu/2172023 |journal=International Symposium on Archaeology of Medieval and Modern Ships of Iberian-Atlantic Tradition |language=en |pages=301–316 |access-date=2022-03-26 |via=[[Academia.edu]]}}</ref>}}
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| Ship sail plan = [[Full-rigged ship|Full-rigged]], main mast is {{cvt|121|ft|2|order=flip}} high
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| Ship complement = 600–700 men
| Ship armament = At least 32 guns
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'''''Madre de Deus''''' (''Mother of God''; also called ''Mãe de Deus'' and ''Madre de Dios'', referring to [[Mary, Mother of Jesus|Mary]]) was a [[Portugal|Portuguese]] ocean-going [[carrack]], renowned for her capacious cargo and provisions for long voyages. She was returning from her second voyage East under Captain Fernão de Mendonça Furtado when she was captured by the English during the [[Battle of Flores (1592)|Battle of Flores]] in 1592 during the [[Anglo–Spanish War (1585)|Anglo–Spanish War]]. Her subsequent capture stoked the [[Kingdom of England|English]] appetite for trade with the Far East, then a Portuguese monopoly.

==Description==
Built in Lisbon in 1589, she was {{convert|165|ft|order=flip}} in length, had a beam of {{convert|47|ft|order=flip}}, rated 1,600 tons, and could carry 900 tons of cargo.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Smith |first=Roger |date=1986 |title=Early Modern Ship-types, 1450–1650 |url=http://www.newberry.org/smith/slidesets/ss06.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080720094650/http://www.newberry.org/smith/slidesets/ss06.html |archive-date=2008-07-20 |access-date=2014-03-11 |publisher=[[The Newberry Library]]}}</ref> She had seven decks, and her [[Draft (hull)|draft]] was {{convert|26|ft|m}} at her arrival in Dartmouth. Her several decks; consisted of a main [[orlop]], three main decks, and a [[forecastle]] and a [[Spar (sailing)|spar]] deck of two floors each. The length of the [[keel]] was {{convert|100|ft|m}}, the [[Mast (sailing)|main-mast]] was {{convert|121|ft|m}}, and its [[circumference]] at the partners was just over {{convert|10|ft|m}}. The [[Yard (sailing)|main-yard]] was {{convert|106|ft|m}} long.<ref>{{cite book|first=Richard|last=Hakluyt | author-link=Richard Hakluyt|title=The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation|year=1598|page=570|url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.03.0070%3Anarrative%3D570 }}</ref> She was armed with thirty-two guns in addition to other arms, with 600 to 700 crew members, a gilded superstructure and a hold filled with treasure.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Whymper |first=Frederick |url=https://archive.org/details/seaitsstirringst12whymrich/page/n10/mode/1up |title=The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism. Volume 1 and 2 |publisher=Cassell Petter & Galpin |year=1877 |location=London, Paris, & New York}}</ref>{{Rp|294}}

==Capture==
{{main|Battle of Flores (1592)}}
In 1592, by virtue of the [[Iberian Union]], the [[Anglo-Portuguese Treaty of 1373]] was in abeyance, and as the [[Anglo–Spanish War (1585)|Anglo–Spanish War]] was still ongoing, Portuguese shipping was a fair target for the [[Royal Navy]].

On 3 August 1592,<ref>{{Cite book |last=Raleigh |first=Walter |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/42039468 |title=The letters of Sir Walter Raleigh |date=1999 |publisher=[[University of Exeter Press]] |isbn=978-0-85989-527-9 |editor-last=Latham |editor-first=Agnes Mary Christabel |editor-link=Agnes Latham |location=[[Exeter]] |page=78 |oclc=42039468 |editor-last2=Youings |editor-first2=Joyce A.}}</ref> (sources vary as to the date) a six-member English naval squadron fitted out by the [[George Clifford, 3rd Earl of Cumberland|Earl of Cumberland]] and [[Walter Raleigh]] set out to the [[Azores]] to intercept [[Spain|Spanish]] shipping from the [[New World]] when a Portuguese fleet came their way near [[Corvo Island]].{{efn-lg|The [[Gulf Stream]] and the [[Westerlies]] converge near the Azores, where ships coming from both areas would pass.}} The ''Roebuck'' under [[John Burgh (officer)|John Burgh]] finally took her after a fierce day-long battle near [[Flores Island (Azores)|Flores Island]].

Among these riches were chests filled with jewels and pearls, gold and silver coins, [[ambergris]], rolls of the highest-quality cloth, fine tapestries, 425 tons of [[Cubeb|pepper]], 45 tons of [[clove]]s, 35 tons of [[cinnamon]], 3 tons of [[Nutmeg#Mace|mace]], 3 tons of [[nutmeg]], 2.5 tons of [[Benzoin resin|benjamin]] (a highly aromatic balsamic resin used for perfumes and medicines), 25 tons of [[cochineal]] and 15 tons of [[ebony]].{{efn-lg|An inventory was taken, and the report produced mentions "Gods great favor towards our nation, who by putting this purchase into our hands hath manifestly discovered those secret trades & Indian riches, which hitherto lay strangely hidden, and cunningly concealed from us". It also speaks of the following goods aboard, besides jewels: "spices, drugs, silks, calicos, quilts, carpets and colors, &c. The spices were pepper, cloves, maces, nutmegs, cinnamon, greene, [[ginger]]: the drugs were benjamin, [[frankincense]], galingale, mirabilis, aloes zocotrina, [[Camphor Laurel|camphire]]: the [[silk]]s, [[damask]]s, [[Taffeta|taffatas]], scarceness, alto bassos, that is, counterfeit, cloth of gold, unwrought China silk, sleeved silk, white twisted silk, curled [[cypress]]e. The [[Calico (textile)|calicos]] were book-calicos, calico-launes, broad white calicos, fine starched calicoes, course white calicos, brown broad calicos, brown course calicos. There were also canopies, and course diapertowels, quilts of course sarcenet and of calico, carpets like those of [[Ottoman Empire|Turkey]]; whereunto are to be added the pearl, [[musk]]e, [[civet (perfumery)|civet]], and [[Ambergris|amber-griece]]. The rest of the wares were many in number, but less in value; as [[elephant]]s teeth, [[Chinese porcelain|porcelain vessels]] of China, [[Coconut|coco-nuts]], hides, ebenwood as black as jet, bested of the same, cloth of the rind’s of trees very strange for the matter, and artificial in workmanship".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Kessel |first=Elsje van |date=July 2020 |title=The inventories of the Madre de Deus: Tracing Asian material culture in early modern England |url=https://academic.oup.com/jhc/article-abstract/32/2/207/5479429 |journal=[[Journal of the History of Collections]] |language=en |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |volume=32 |issue=2 |pages=207–223 |doi=10.1093/jhc/fhz015 |issn=0954-6650 |url-access=subscription |access-date=2022-04-09|hdl=10023/23036 |hdl-access=free }}</ref>}}
[[File:The Earl of Cumberland and the Madre de Dios.jpg|thumb|Battle between the Earl of Cumberland and the Madre de Dios]]
There was also a document, printed at [[Portuguese Macau|Macau]] in 1590, containing valuable information on the [[Ming dynasty|China]] and [[Tokugawa shogunate|Japan]] trade; [[Richard Hakluyt|Hakluyt]] observes that it was "enclosed in a case of sweet Cedar wood, and lapped up almost an hundredfold in fine Calicut-cloth, as though it had been some incomparable jewel".

==Aftermath==
The carrack whilst anchored at [[Dartmouth, England|Dartmouth]] was subject to theft by curious locals; it attracted all manner of traders, dealers, cutpurses, and thieves from miles around. By the time Walter Raleigh had restored order, a cargo estimated at half a million [[Pound sterling|pounds]] (nearly half the size of England's treasury and perhaps the second-largest treasure ever after the Ransom of [[Atahualpa]]) had been reduced to £140,000.

==See also==
* [[The Armada Service]]
* [[List of longest wooden ships]]
* [[Santa Catarina (ship)|''Santa Catarina'' (ship)]], her capture by the Dutch increased [[Dutch East India Company|VOC]] capital by more than 50%
* [[Santa Anna (1522 ship)]]
* [[São João Baptista (galleon)]]
* [[Cinco Chagas (1559)]]
* [[Djong (ship)]]
* [[Baochuan]]

==Notes==
{{notelist-lg}}

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Further reading==
* {{Cite book |last=Landes |first=David Saul |title=[[The Wealth and Poverty of Nations]] |publisher=W. W. Norton & Company |date=1999 |isbn=0-393-31888-5 |author-link=David Landes}}
* {{Cite journal |last=Puga |first=Rogério Miguel |author-link=Rogerio Miguel Puga |date=December 2002 |title=The Presence of the "Portugals" in Macau and Japan in Richard Hakluyt's ''Navigations'' |url=https://redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=36100506 |journal=Bulletin of Portuguese/Japanese Studies |language=en |volume=5 |pages=81–116 |issn=0874-8438 |access-date=2022-03-26 |via=[[Redalyc]]}}

{{World's largest wooden ships}}

{{Authority control}}

[[Category:1592]]
[[Category:16th-century ships]]
[[Category:Age of Discovery ships]]
[[Category:Age of Sail merchant ships of Portugal]]
[[Category:Carracks]]
[[Category:Elizabeth I]]
[[Category:History of the Royal Navy]]
[[Category:Maritime history of Portugal]]
[[Category:Piracy in the Atlantic Ocean]]
[[Category:Ships attacked and captured by pirates]]