Cadamosto has nothing good to say about the Serer, characterizing them as savage idolaters " of great cruelty " ( although we should note at this point his information is being drawn principally from Wolof interpreters ).

Cadamosto attempts a similarly detailed account of the Mandinka people of the Gambia River, making particular note of their abundant cotton ( rare in Wolof areas ), although not nearly as complete, as he did not seem to venture much away from his boats there.

By 1455, the Venezian navigator, Luís de Cadamosto, on visiting Madeira, referred to the excellence of the Madeirense wines, principally the Malvasia castes from the island of Crete, which were being exported in greater numbers.

Cadamosto cruised down the west African coast to the mouth of the Senegal River ( which he calls the Rio do Senega, the first recorded use of that name.

Cadamosto spent nearly an entire month in an inland village, hosted by the prince Bisboror ( Budomel's nephew ), during which time he delighted in observing much about the local country and customs.

Around Cape Vert, in June 1455, Cadamosto came across two Portuguese caravels, one of which was commanded by Antoniotto Usodimare, a Genoese captain in Prince Henry's service, the other by an unnamed squire of Henry's household.

Cadamosto claims he was the one who named the Saloum River as the Rio di Barbacini, the name by which it would remain known on European maps thereafter.

They anchored first on an island which they named Buona Vista ( Boa Vista ), before proceeding on to a larger island, which they named San Jacobo ( Santiago ) ( according to Cadamosto, on account of it being the feast of SS.

A day later, Cadamosto discovered a great river ( grandissimo fiume ), which they named Rio Grande ( the Geba River-more precisely, the wide estuary it forms together with the Corubal River, it doesn't seem they actually entered the river itself ) ().

Cadamosto notes that this spot ( or resgate ) was already used by Portuguese traders.

Cadamosto, Usodimare and the unnamed captain scouted several of the uninhabited islands, believing them to be four in number ( although Cadamosto notes in his account that later explorers would find them to be ten ).

Cadamosto is believed to have brought notes, logs and several nautical maps with him.

Curiously, Cadamosto notes that the Senegal was probably the Niger of ancient geographers ( e. g. Ptolomey ).

The 15th century Venetian navigator Alvise Cadamosto made note of what was probably the Southern Cross on exiting the Gambia River in 1455, calling it the carro dell ' ostro (" southern chariot ").

Alvise Cadamosto or Alvide da Ca ' da Mosto (, also known in Portuguese as Luís Cadamosto ; c. 1432 – July 16, 1483 ) was a Venetian slave trader and explorer, who was hired by the Portuguese prince Henry the Navigator and undertook two known journeys to West Africa in 1455 and 1456, accompanied by the Genoese captain Antoniotto Usodimare.

While at the anchorage, Cadamosto was surprised to be met by the ruler himself, the Damel of Cayor ( whom he calls Budomel ), accompanied by his retinue.

Cadamosto and Usodimare tried to put in there, but quickly decided against it when an interpreter they landed to make contact with the local Serer natives gathered on the beaches was killed on the spot.

It is known that the fleet was back in Portugal before the end of the year, as Antoniotto Usodimare would write a letter dated December 12, 1455, to his creditors back in Genoa, reporting the results of his voyage ( albeit with much exaggeration, and without mentioning Cadamosto ).

Cadamosto mentions interacting with another lord, Guumimensa, whose dominion was closer to the mouth of the river.

It was probably this epidemic that prompted Cadamosto to cut short his stay and leave the Gambia river, back to the ocean, where the fevers seemed to have subsided.

They sent a couple of launches to land to open contact, but being told the king was absent on campaign, Cadamosto did not linger but decided to continue on.

Cadamosto served as Venetian proveditor in Cattaro, then in Corone, and was sent on diplomatic missions to Dalmatia and Herzegovina.

After the fall of Negroponte in 1470, Cadamosto was placed in charge of devising a plan for the defense of Albania against the Ottomans.

In 1481, Alvise Cadamosto was elected captain of the Venetian Alexandria galley fleet, ending his naval career on the same ships where he started.

Cadamosto emphasized the central role of Prince Henry, and was instrumental in building up the image of the Navigator Prince for posterity.

Cadamosto was also long alleged to be the author of the Portolano del mare, a rutter with sailing directions for the Mediterannean coasts, found in the library of St. Mark in Venice, with the publication stamp of Bernardo Rizzo in 1490.

Informed by the visitors of Henry's recent discoveries in Africa, Cadamosto " inflamed with the desire of visiting these newly discovered regions " immediately applied to Prince Henry at his residence at Raposeira to undertake an expedition on his behalf.

Alvise Cadamosto set out on March 22, 1455 on a 43-tonne caravel supplied by Prince Henry, with Vicente Dias as ship master He proceeded to Porto Santo and Madeira, and thereafter weaved his way through the Canary islands, making stops in La Gomera, El Hierro and La Palma before reaching the African coast around Cape Blanc.

After a brief fishing stop on some unnamed islands ( probably Îles des Madeleines ), Cadamosto, Usodimare and the Portuguese squire sailed south, down the Petite Côte until they reached the Sine-Saloum delta, a stretch inhabited by the Sereri ( Serer people ).

At the mouth of the Gambia, Cadamosto made a note of the near-disappearance of the northern Pole Star on the horizon, and roughly sketched a bright constellation to the south, believed to be the first known depiction of the Southern Cross constellation ( albeit wrongly positioned and with too many stars-a more accurate rendition would have to wait until Mestre João Faras in 1500.

Following the instructions of his interlocutors, Cadamosto sailed some 60 Italian miles up the Gambia river, reaching the residence of the Mandinka king he called Battimansa, Mandinka for " king of the Batti ' ( probably Badibu, on the north side of the river ).

Cadamosto encountered that hostility on his first expedition of 1455.

( 1937 ) The Voyages of Cadamosto and other documents on Western Africa in the second half of the fifteenth century, London: Hakluyt.

Urged by their frightened crews ( and probably desirous to keep his human cargo intact-he had been carrying a shipload of slaves since Cayor ), Cadamosto decided to call off venturing further and backed out of the river.

Cadamosto bluntly states that there were no other voyages of exploratory significance by anyone after 1456, until the expedition of Pedro de Sintra in 1462.

Compared to the hagiographic Zurara and the fallible Gomes, historians have relished and lauded the reliability and detail provided by Cadamosto, giving a richer and clearer view of how the Henrican enterprise operated.

Cadamosto is the first known person to refer to the Senegal River by its recognizably modern name ( Rio di Senega ) rather than the " western Nile ".

However, the events in question are poorly recorded in documents from the time, a reasonable alternative would be that some or all of these second set of islands were discovered by Diogo Dias, Diogo Afonso and Alvise Cadamosto.

Pressing south, Cadamosto and Usodimare finally discovered the mouth of the Gambia River in late June or early July, 1455.

However, modern historians, drawing from larger evidence ( including the accounts of Diogo Gomes and Cadamosto ), have generally dismissed this claim and now generally agree that Nuno Tristão only reached as far as the Sine-Saloum delta, still in Senegal, just a few miles south of Cape of Masts ( Cape Naze ) or, at their most generous, the Gambia River.

Resolved to explore further, Antoniotto and Cadamosto sailed south along the previously unknown coast of Guinea, discovering the mouth of the Casamance River, Cape Roxo, the Cacheu River, reaching as far as the estuary of the Geba River and the Bijagos Islands ( modern Guinea-Bissau ).