Cartographic update (December 2008)
In 1595, de Houtman landed to the east of the Cape of Good Hope to let his crew recuperate. Three new names resulted from this: Vlais bay, Vis bay and Mossel bay [see Günter Schilder and James Welu, The world map of 1611 by Pieter van den Keere. Wall-maps of the 16th and 17th centuries, 3 (Amsterdam: Nico Israel, 1980) p. 20]. These names are not included by Llewellyn.

Later that year, de Houtman spent a month on Madagascar, at what they named Hollandsch Kerkhof (now Nosy Manitsa), where several crewmen were buried. Llewellyn does not include that or any names that can be associated with de Houtman [personal communication from James Armstrong, June 2006].

Indeed, with the present state of knowledge it seems that the Llewellyn atlas carries no direct evidence of that Dutch voyage, besides the de Tayda information it brought back. The atlas is based throughout on Portuguese work, even if nothing like it has survived.

W.A.R. Richardson (2006, 1991, 1989), in his analyses of the process of toponymic corruption, has demonstrated how the Lodewijcksz chart (and likewise the relevant sheet of Llewellyn's atlas) turn two small rivers in Sunda Strait and the westerly peninsula into three imaginary towns (Jssebongor, Issesucar, Juncalan) arranged along a mythical south-inclining Java coast. Richardson describes how 'two charts, on different scales and partially overlapping, were joined at a completely wrong angle by a compiler' (1989, p.9). This presumably provides evidence of how the de Tayda information was bolted onto the standard Portuguese outline. Richardson illustrates Java and the islands to its east (2006, fig.26), and (p.71) notes that Llewellyn 'has most of the same Sunda Strait names [as on Lodewijcksz], although wrongly sited on Java's north coast between Bantam and Jacatrall [Jacatra]'. This may indicate that the Dutch received notes or verbal information instead of charts from de Tayda [the account said only that he had 'promised' to show them charts], which caused this confusion. It is unlikely that de Tayda did not himself understand the local geography.

Pedro de Tayda update (January 2009)
Pedro da Tayda (d.1596). Also known as Taydo, Tayde, Ataide, or Truide and, apparently, Pedro Teixeira, he was born in either Goa or Malacca, a pilot and/or a merchant, knowledgeable about the topography and hydrography of the East Indies and, in one account, a skilled astronomer. His murder, 'by some slaves at the instigation of the Portuguese', is agreed to have taken place on 16 August 1596. Hakluyt reproduces the account of Barent Langenes (Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation Vol. 10, p. 143) [via explorion.net ] with just a few lines on de Tayda [Lodewicksz's account has more]. [There are numerous online references via Google and Google Books, mostly to Dutch texts.]

Richard Hakluyt update (January 2009)
Hakluyt, Richard (1552?-1616). No confirmed connection has yet been found between Llewellyn and the great collector of travel narratives, who published the much enlarged second edition of his Principal Navigations in 1598-1600. Hakluyt was an adviser to the East India Company about maps and travel accounts of the East, from at least late 1599. Following a meeting in January 1601, as the new company was preparing to fit out the first English fleet for the East, Hakluyt was commissioned to produce a report on the trading possibilities. Two manuscript versions of that have been published.

For the earlier report, see Heidi Brayman Hackel and Peter C. Mancall, 'Richard Hakluyt the Younger's Notes for the East India Company in 1601: a Transcription of Huntington Library Manuscript EL 2360', Huntington Library Quarterly 67, 3 (2004): 423-36 (transcription pp.432-5); for the slightly later version from the Company archives the most accessible transcription is in John Bruce, Annals of the honorable East-India Company, 3 vols (London, 1810), 1:115-21, available via Google Books. While the list of 'authors and witnesses' he cites includes references to the surviving crewmen of some previous voyages, there is no entry that could plausibly be construed as a reference to Llewellyn. However, if Llewellyn was a survivor of the de Houtman voyage (and conceivably the Raymond and Lancaster expedition as well) it seems highly likely that Hakluyt would have sought out the Steward's first-hand account of a voyage so important for English planning, particularly the details of the working of the Bantam pepper market. The relevant section of his report listed as sources the 'Englishmen that haue bin personallie in the Molucos, Jaua and in manie places of ye Portingale Indies'.

In February 1601 Hakluyt was paid for supplying three maps, whose identity is still a matter for conjecture. [An earlier commentator, confused by the use of Hakluyt's alternative name, Hackett, attributed this incident to 'Alderman' Hackett.]

Coincidentally, Hakluyt had been at both Westminster and Christ Church [like Martin Llewellyn Jr (who was born in the year of Hakluyt's death) and perhaps also Martin's unknown patron some time before].

(Sir) Thomas Smythe update (February 2009)
There are significant triangular connections between (Sir) Thomas Smythe (1558?-1625), Llewellyn and St Bartholomew's Hospital. Besides the narrative account in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, the following details (with New Style dates) are provided in Rev. Alfred B. Beaven, The Aldermen of the City of London (London: Eden Fisher & Co., Ltd, 1913), Vol II: 'Chronological List of Aldermen. Notes on the Aldermen':

"Sir Thomas Smythe (Smith), Haberdasher. Farringdon Without 1599-1601; 1604.
Sheriff 1600-1. Elected Sheriff 1587.
Knighted 13 May 1603; M.P. Dunwich 1604-11, Sandwich 1614, Saltash 1620-2; Receiver Duchy Cornwall 1604; Ambassador to Russia; Auditor 1597-8; Treasurer St. Bartholomew's Hospital 1597-1601; Committee E.I.C. 1600-1, 1603-22 (Governor 1600-1, 1603-5, 1607-21); Governor Russia Company; Treasurer Virginia Company 1600-20; Master Haberdashers 1583-4, 1588-9, 1599-1600. Died 4 Sep 1625; Will (PCC 107 Clark) 31 Jan 1622; proved 12 Oct 1625."

From other sources the following can be added. That Smythe went as trade commissioner to negotiate with the Dutch in 1596 (when he would certainly have learnt about de Houtman's voyage) and 1598; that Thomas Hood taught mathematical geography and navigation at his house in the 1580s; and that in 1616 Smythe engaged Edward Wright to lecture to the East India Company on navigation and mathematics.

A man, then, of considerable standing in the City of London, whose consistent interest in navigation and foreign trade led to his being chosen as the first Governor of the East India Company at its foundation in1600.

His involvement with St Bartholomew's Hospital was also long and deep, although the details remain unclear. Beaven includes the ambiguous passage: "Auditor 1597-8; Treasurer St. Bartholomew's Hospital 1597-1601". The Barts Archives apparently cannot confirm that statement, although there is a record that Thomas Smythe 'haberdasher' was a governor and almoner of the Hospital. At his death in 1625 he left them £640, the largest of his legacies. The Sir Thomas Smythe Charity was set up, presumably with that sum, and was certainly extant in 1923.

In 1603 [1604 New Style?] Llewellyn borrowed the large sum of £100 from Smythe, to be paid back personally on the following 22 February at Smythe's house [British Library Egerton Charter 7293]. In 1607 he signed a second bond with Smythe [Egerton Charter 7328], concerning an executorship involving Llewellyn's brother Maurice and somebody called Wheeler [possibly Ambrose Wheeler, one of those who signed a bill of adventure in the East India Company in 1601-2].

It is against that background we should view the meeting on 27 August 1597, at which Llewellyn's request for the post of Hospital Steward was accepted (for an unspecified future date) and he was immediately awarded the lesser post of Renter. The meeting, which was not a general court of governors, was attended by just nine individuals. They are not in alphabetical order but the first named is Thomas Smythe [he was to be knighted five years later]. Does that mean he was in the chair? And was he then the Hospital Treasurer [Beaven dates his appointment to that same year]? [As an aside, two of the others who attended that 1597 meeting, John Newman and William Quarles, were 1601-2 EIC 'Adventurers', as also was 'Morrice Llewellin' - see 'British History Online.]

None of the above weakens the growing body of circumstantial evidence pointing to the likelihood that Smythe was Llewellyn's patron in 1597. They certainly remained in contact for at least the next ten years. If this proves to be the case, the most likely reason, surely, would be that Llewellyn possessed materials from which an atlas could be constructed of the region to the east of the Cape of Good Hope that was of particular interest to the first English Fleet.

[For help with the above note thanks are due to Sarah Tyacke and Katie Ormerod, Deputy Archivist, St. Bartholomews' Hospital Archives & Museum].