TRIP AMONG TWO WORLDS

42

Cristoforo told the two monks: "On the nautical maps the archipelago doesn't appear, on the contrary an only island that understands all the ten earths emerged that we met." Then he extracted from the box that it had with itself a rolled up parchment, that developed with caution not to crumple her/it. Father Armand saw to the right some earth described by the admiral, the exact description of the European coasts and those Africans, actually to Palestine and the earths of Egypt and also monk Carlo wanted to observe with attention. Latin registrations allowed the identification of the various described places, and among the others, they found again you the name that so many times had been object of the suppositions and conjectures of father Armand, in fact the territory of Greece was defined REX OLYMPII. You/he/she had found again the origin of that REXOLs that so much armature had him to reflect. A quiver crossed the body of the Spanish monk giving him a strong position. Taken so form in his/her mind a possible meaning that you/they purchased the words of the square: DARK' TO WEST OF GREECE THE ISLAND ATLAS. The map brought indeed a territory surrounded by the waters, named REX MARIS. It dealt with the earth of which the archipelago of ten islands had remained reached only by the ship of Aramburu. Father Armand thought that you/he/she could treat him of the archipelago reached by the philosopher Greek Marcello. Its denomination brought the amphora found again on the coasts of Africa to its mind, riportante the sketch of an island identified with the letters TALAS, fragment of the sintagma TALASSA TEOS, correspondent to the Latin REX MARIS, any connection with ATLAS, therefore, but an evident bond with the earth of the paper of Aramburu. The destruction in which could be incurred, it brought Armand to the mind of Father, the cataclysm described by Proclo and Plato, from Ammiano Marcellino and Teopompo, from Crantore of Solos and Posidonio of Apamea, from Plinio and Ecateo of Mileto, that an earth would have struck that it was found over the Columns of Ercole and these thoughts, they didn't pass of certain unnoticed to monk Carlo, that looked at him/it telling him with tone of low voice, almost not to make himself/herself/themselves feel: "I have understood what you are thinking." The nautical paper brought an only great island, from this he/she was deduced that it had previously been realized the cataclysm, or that it dealt with the copy of a preceding map. This last hypothesis was the most probable, in fact the invoice of the paper didn't seem at all ancient of centuries. To the left extremity of the paper a further and wide earth was found, signalled with the name of QUETZALCOATL: he treated, with every probability of the oriental coast of the Cathai. Father Armand remained without words, how much more it reasoned on what it had in front of the eyes and on what you/he/she had heard, so much more it was spellbound from the conviction to have among the hands the test of all of this that you/he/she had conjectured for years. The admiral Colombo started over describing the events that brought him/it to undertake this consignment. Here is thing happened. In the following years to 1469, Christopher Columbus kept on sailing on behalf of the family Of Black, and more times took part to actions corsairs on behalf of the king Renato Di Angiò. you/he/she not only Knew about ten Italian sailors, but coming from every part of France, of the Ispagna and of Portugal, trying in vain to find again men that had worked with Aramburu, to the until to question them on the trips previously completed by the captain Basque, but he didn't succeed in contacting some sailor that had sailed with Devil Hoof Willy. It came nevertheless to knowledge of a history narrated by the sailors during the long nights of watch it spent on the wharfs. They told of a ship that had left the I bring of Genoa and reached the confinements of the earth, and from such consignment a bystander of the crew returned. only All the survivors were questioned on what you/they had found to the western extremity of the world, but nobody dared to make word of what you/he/she had appeared to their eyes. All died without leaving some testimony. According to many sailors, the test of this consignment existed in registers of navigation guarded in the I bring of Genoa, but there was absolute discord in the dating of this trip, if someone spoke of the beginning of the century as possible it dates, others sustained that such consignment had happened before the XII century. Christopher Columbus put to the search for long time of the register of which he spoke to the story, thinking that it concerned only a legend but the meeting with a sailor amalfitano you/he/she made him change mind. He it reported that in the second halves the XII century one ancestor of his navigator had departed from Genoa following a consignment organized by a powerful person religious brotherhood of whom you/he/she didn't specify the name. Monk Carlo thought about the Templaris. Surely also father Armand had the same thought. After some months, the ship with which you/he/she had departed returned in the I bring ligure, but of the crew, composed by around sixty members, nineteen people had repatriated and only it were not had any news of the forty-one lost men, and among these last ones the sailor's ancestor amalfitano was found. The family ones of the man contacted some of the sailors survivors, but from the people they didn't have some help, these in fact, more than a few months they didn't survive from the return to Genoa, and in the diary of Paul, child of the disappeared amalfitano, was described as "cripples in the limbs and deprived of the use of the word". Such account, presumably compiled around the year 1169, you/he/she had been preserved from the sailor's family met by Christopher Columbus attracting his/her attention for the presence of data that you/they would have been able to clarify the dynamics of the trip completed from Genoa in the second halves the century XII. Paul, didn't bring unfortunately the complete list of the men of the crew, but you/he/she limited him to signal the names of those people that had made return in country. Nevertheless such list resulted extremely interesting, first of all for the presence of data that you/they allowed to contact the descendants of the survivors, but even more for the eccentric names that appeared you. If in fact, Anthony they were found by Gaeta and Vincent by Sestri, they didn't miss names as tikal Natzac, Copan from Palque and Votan Chivim from Qezalcolat. From here a notable similarity you/he/she could be found again between the city or the territory of QEZALCOAT and the name of the earth to the west extreme of the map of Aramburu, QUETZALCOATL. This detail could mean only that the ship in Genoa was direct toward the coasts of Asia following the street of the west. Father Armand considered to the consignment of Pater Johannes, which sustained to be directed from Genoa toward Cadice, and to have diverted from the native rout, reaching so an unknown Arcadia that could identify him with the archipelago of the REX MARIS or with the denominated territory QUETZALCOATL. Similar reflections were also born in admiral Christopher Columbus mind, that despite it didn't possess the manuscript of Citeaux, you/he/she had realized the possibility to reach the earths from the map of Aramburu. It existed, however, a complication that would have made the very arduous trip than it appeared, it didn't deal too much at first sight with difficult enterprise to reach a well signalled region on a nautical paper, any navigator with a minimum of experience would have succeeded you. What made the assignment of Cristoforo arduous it was a detail that passed unnoticed up to that moment. The map, he was not entire it treated in fact, of two approached fragments and sewn the one with the other, among which it had to be himself/herself/themselves a portion of Ocean by now in origin lost, it was therefore, impossible to measure the distance that intervened between the Portuguese coasts and the island of the REX MARIS, in how much the ampleness of the lost fragment of map was unknown. For this reason it resulted arduous, if not impossible, the study of a trajectory that incontrovertibly you/he/she would have conducted to the archipelago that ivi rose. Monk Carlo asked to the admiral: "In which way you think about being able to find again the islands on which you have landed eight years before? " It is Cristoforo he/she explained him that: "During the studies performed with the Turkish Ahmed during the trip back, I found again among the papers of Aramburu a reference to the island on which we find us in this moment: the Frixlanda. On this island a sundial is found that, to the dawn of the day of equinox in spring, you/he/she would have projected the shade of the nailed in gnomone in its center toward the exact direction in which the archipelago would be found." Monk Carlo acknowledged admiral Cristoforo's exceptional ability that had succeeded in disembarking on the earth of Frixlanda on March 20, the evening immediately precedent the equinox in spring, calculating in excellent way the times that would have hastened him to reach her/it; a least delay would have jeopardized the whole consignment. Monk Carlo immediately understood the intentions of Christopher Columbus. You/he/she would have been enough for him to attend the following morning to annotate him the direction toward which the sun would have projected the shade of the sundial, that identified with the round rock that you/he/she had seen to the center of the clearing. All went toward such construction, but the two monks remained some disappointed of it, since it didn't bring any registration, some particular that allowed, to whom didn't know the function of it, to realize that it dealt with a signal allowed for pointing out the exact location of the archipelago. You rock had a diameter of around two meters, and to the center of it a tilted hole was found, inside which would be been able to introduce a metallic auction. Cristoforo opened his/her notebook and showed a sketch from himself realized, it dealt with a copy of the page of Aramburu in which he had found again the reference to the sundial of Frixlanda. In the center of the page a description of the Portuguese coast and the North was brought earths of this. The island of Frixlanda was signalled in red, to the right of this an upset T and three letters Ss appeared: the first one to the left, the second to the right, the third one aloft. The sketch that was formed it was the following: A little anymore in low the constellation of the fishes was found. The message that, with great talent, the admiral had drawn you/he/she was that of it that himself had shown in precedence. The upset T and the Ss referred to a sundial: the three letters were the initials of the terms SINE Sun SILEO (without sun I keep silent), the T, remembered instead the base of a sundial on which a gnomone had fixed. The presence of the symbol of the Pisceses was not able that to refer to the equinox, dates in which the sun exactly rises to East in front of the aforesaid constellation. The function of the sundial was not expressly described in the paper of Aramburu but Cristoforo, with an ability of exceptional imagination you/he/she had tried to visualize in its mind the dawn of March 21 observed by the suitable island in red. The rising sun to east would have projected to West the shade of the gnomone: from this he/she deduced that, with every probability, the direction pointed out by the sundial would have signalled the rout to follow to reach the archipelago reached eight years before on board of the Prometeo.

43

Father Armand and monk Carlo were stricken for the acute talent of which the admiral was gifted, and not only, because you/they could also appreciate in him the religious side, when he extracted from the box a missal, and you/he/she directed him toward the ship, making to disembark the whole crew, so that all could assist to the celebration eucaristica. You assured only that a man remained on board to check the hourglasses. Just before the dawn of March 21 st 1777, Cristoforo Colombo, gone down by the ship and directed him toward the clearing of the sundial, ordering that nobody followed him/it. The two monks, were wounded at that time in the pride not to have been summoned by the admiral to assist to rise some sun, above all father Armand, but with clear of mind from grudge, they raised a prayer of praise submitting his/her Divine Providence the assignment of Cristobal Colon, on whose result would have depended the success of their mission. The admiral returned on the ship after a few hours, and you/he/she gave order to take back the navigation. You/he/she was questioned by some sailors on the direction to follow, and he in silence, lengthened an arm toward the horizon, aiming toward Southwest. Cristoforo finally made to call father Armand and among Charles from a sailor, that reported them, to approach himself/herself/themselves in the box of the admiral: "I Have to show you a thing." He pointed out a paper drawn from not too long: a long traced line, in direction Southwest crossed the ocean departing from the island that you/they had abandoned from not too long, and aiming toward the unknown one. He didn't know, in fact, how much distasse the Indian archipelago, neither if indeed such run conducted you. "We are in the hands of the Lord" Disse Cristoforo. In the days that followed they were not assisted from the good fate: the wind that pushed them toward Southwest with an elevated speed disparve without reason and the ship for a week was found in nanny of the waves for at least ten days. The crew began to give signs of restlessness, and more times it happened that the two monks had to intervene for soothing the to rise up of quarrels among the sailors; the tension accumulated in more moments in fact the admiral temette to lose the control of the crew and the memory of the ferocities which assistettes on the Prometeo, pushed him/it to reverse the rout and to return toward the European coasts. The two monks remained however upset by his/her behavior, according to them, the inversion of rout, was not due only for the restlessness of the crew and the trip back it made to formulate quite a lot hypotheses to father Armand. Reaches few leagues from the Portuguese coasts, in fact, the admiral ordered that you/he/she went us toward North, and the inexplicable behavior of the admiral was not welcomed with favor by the men of the crew that asked reason for that deviation and Cristoforo Colombo with a lot of authority it pronounced: "You don't have of what to worry you, is calm and I promise you that I will show you something of ever seen by the eyes of the Europeans" And the crew convinced him, also because that deviation lengthened the alone trip of ten days. Among Charles he/she thought: We perhaps return on the island of Frixlanda to correct the surveys of the trajectory. But this hypothesis collapsed when it realized that you/he/she would have been useless entirely, in how much to proceed to a further survey of the sundial would have had to attend the next equinox. The ship, in fact, overcame the island on which you/they were already disembarked continuing toward north.

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Cristoforo revealed Armand that he was directing toward the coasts English to monk Carlo and father: "During the navigation from the island of the sundial toward Southwest, we have crossed some sea tides, that seemed to come from the distant one and ignored west and, according to my surveys, they have to lick up the coasts English." He thought in fact, that if indeed to West there had been Indies, some object from there deriving, you/he/she could have crossed the Ocean sea and to have come adrift really on the beaches toward which you/they were direct. The admiral didn't specify the nature of the objects that he thought about finding again you, and you/he/she confided to father alone Armand that the hope to recover something was very strong: you/he/she would not have been able, otherwise, to justify to the sailors the finished deviation. In the sixth day earths didn't appear to the horizon yet, to the sunset the ship entered a line of sea on whose surface floated a lot of algas and sea vegetables. It was a sailor to notice, on the right side of the ship, the presence in water of some wood aces united by a bent metal. At first the discovery didn't arouse amazements, since you/he/she could treat him of a belonging fragment to a ship or to a box built by the English, but during the night, another sailor sighted a great wooden panel engraved to fire, riportante the sketch of a mountain overhung by the sun, around which small symbols probably wanted to point out some human beings. The whole crew assembled him on the wharf to observe such manufactured articles, and such plate attracted the attention of everybody until the cry of a sailor it didn't recall all on the left side of the ship: "A man in sea! Man in sea, hastens soon! " Obscurity didn't allow to observe in the particular ones in front of thing they were found, but dark was not such not to be allowed to recognize in the afloat object on the water: a human body. The two monks were as stunned as the whole crew. Its features were different from those of anybody else existing man in their world, and the consumption of the limbs was not certain to give a so particular and amazing physiognomy to that face. The sailors were withdrawn uneasy, thinking about the dead body of a demon, but the admiral ordered that the body was recovered by the waters, so two men were lowered, which could have a more precise vision of the dead body. They realized that it was found abandoned inside a rudimentary float, which had prevented him from going to fund. The men of edge two ropes that were assured him to the neck and the ankles, threw then, and so, it was not difficult to lift the man, in how much it was found in state of cadaverous rigidity and you/he/she had entirely covered from flakes of ice that subsequently made him/it rigid. Nobody dared to touch that body, that had abandoned on the wharf of the ship provoking a deaf noise. Cristoforo reassured the men of the crew saying theirs that didn't deal with a demon neither of a spirit of the sea: the man came from the Cathai, and you/he/she had been transported in that place by the tides of the Ocean sea. Monk Carlo didn't distantly think even that the body could be the dead body of a demon, but he/she didn't succeed in drawing near only because, it returned in its mind the day when he/she saw a dead body for the first time, that of his/her/their mother in its bedroom, and so it implored the Lord and it prayed for that face without name and certain origin. However overcome the initial impact, his/her mind it returned rational and he/she thought that indeed, over the ocean there could be an earth. Of this was also convinced of it and, above all, father Armand. If many sailors were of the theories of Paul from the Well Toscanelli around the possibility to reach Indies sailing toward West, the body in front of which you/they were found it made only not this theory probable, but a safety. On board of the ship the enthusiasm for the recovery grew, and they was in many to dream lavish rewards to have brought in Europe the test of a fact that would have upset the whole maritime traffic of the world. The ten days, in which according to the promise of the admiral this deviation would be developed, they became two weeks, but the attention of the men of the crew was all revolt to the "Chinese" that you/he/she would have assured their a wealth few days before unexpected. They reentered in the I bring of Genoa on April 23 and among Charles he/she remembered gladly always and with admiration the regard with which he dismissed Cristoforo: Him I draw near to the monk, and with great seriousness, it lifted a hand to level of the face, then it lowered him and, bending the head, churches his/her benediction. Lifting the head, then he assured, that it didn't report to some what you/he/she had seen and hearing during the trip and the monk, bent the head and dams the eyes, and when I reopened him he/she saw him/it get further, thinking among itself that would not have more it seen again, common opinion also of father Armand. But the logic of the men is well distant from the Divine Wish...