Verrazzano in LA DAUPHINE in the narrows of New York Harbor.
1523

Watercolor 14" x 21"


In 1523, France joined the race to find the northwest passage to the Orient. A group of Italian bankers and silk merchants in Lyons, anticipating huge profits from the control of an easy sea route to China, formed a syndicate and financed the provisioning of four ships.

Giovanni Da Verrazzano was appointed commander of the expedition. Born into a wealthy Tuscan family, he was educated in Florence before moving to Dieppe to pursue a career at sea. By the time he took command of the fleet he was an experienced seaman and navigator, with extensive voyages in the Mediterranean and to the Newfoundland fishing grounds.
Verrazzano was loaned the flagship LA DAUPHINE by the royal French navy, and he sailed with a commission from the king to explore the east coast of the ‘New Land’.

On April 17 they were off the east coast of Staten Island, sailing before an easy southwest wind. Ahead of them was opening a great bay... “We found a very pleasant place, situated amongst certain little steep hills; from amidst the hills there ran down into the sea a great stream of water, which within the mouth was very deep, and from the sea to the mouth of same, with the tide, which we found the rise 8 foot , any great vessel laden may pass up.” They had discovered the harbour they named Bay of St. Margurite, and the river later named the Hudson. The future site of New York was on the map.