Page 34 - Lanzarotto Malocello from Italy to the Canary Islands

34 from Italy to the Canary Islands

s President of the Marinai d’Italia (Sailors of Italy Association), I am
delighted to have been given the chance to write a preface to such an
important book. I believe that the “voice” of the sailors themselves
cannot be missing when speaking about one of the greatest Italian sailors, who
is still enshrouded in legend and in that aura of fascinating narrative surround-
ing all ocean explorations.
Yesterday, as they are still today, the spirit of adventure, temerity, courage
to confront the unknown and stormy weather are an integral part of the sailor’s
soul: if we also add to these characteristics – I would prefer to label them vir-
tues now, in this era of stay-at-home conformism and convenient materialism
– a sense of undertaking, mastery of the art of sailing and seafaring, charisma,
and crew handling and exercise of command, then the figure of the great sailor
takes form.
Like any other material or imaginary obstacle, the myth of the Pillars of
Hercules, which, moreover, had surely already been shattered by the Romans,
does not impede the sailor’s desire to discover and learn.
Alongside Lanzarotto, I would like to commemorate all Italian seafarers,
whether from Genoa or Venice, Amalfi or Pisa or elsewhere, but anyway Ital-
ians, who made up that “people of seafarers” without which, the new eager-
ness to study and learn would have been unable to overcome superstition and
sail over the horizon. The discovery of the island – which, through its name,
still to this day bears witness to the sailor’s venture – stands as a monument
to the courage of all Italian sailors. I have always noted a startling, intolerable
deficiency in sea culture in Italy, despite the fact that it is a peninsula stretch-
ing out into the sea, economically reliant on maritime trade and culturally
influenced by the migrations of peoples.
Subjected as we have been to foreigners from all over since the fall of the
Roman Empire until the national unification of Risorgimento, the great Mari-
time Republics, with their teachings of tenacity, of civic and bellicose virtues,
of intrepid and devoted souls, are what we have to boast.
Publications such as this one have the great merit of calling back to mind
historical ventures, making Italians proud to belong to the same people of the
great sailors, and spurring us on to find out more about individuals and exam-
ine events in greater detail; in short, they bring the seafaring culture, imbued
with those moral virtues which enable great ventures, back to the forefront.
And God alone knows that at times like the present, they would really be nec-
essary to help us pick ourselves up again and resolve our problems.

Admiral Paolo Pagnottella
President of the Associazione Nazionale Marinai d’Italia