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 The men had been trying to enter mainland Europe by travelling to the Canary Islands in the Eastern Atlantic, which are Spanish territory. (These islands are where the first ethnic cleansing by Europeans began - when the Norman Jean de Bethencourt invaded Lanzarote in 1402.) But the boat missed its intended destination of the Canaries, and was carried by the current and prevailing winds, taken a westward course to the Caribbean. This route was taken by European sailing ships, from the time of Columbus onwards. The pattern of 'trade winds', in a clockwise direction enabled Europeans to transport enslaved Africans to the Americas and made it easier for lands there to be seized. A newspaper article explaining this tragic story is at: After four months at sea, ghost ship with 11 petrified corpses washes up in Barbados (Guardian, 26 May 2006) |
updated:
16 Jul
2006