A 1483 document refers to his selling a slave in Crete whom he had acquired while in the territories of the Sultan of Egypt, which then comprised most of what is now Israel, Syria and Lebanon.

He moved to Valencia, Spain, where his creditors attempted to have him arrested by sending a lettera di raccomandazione a giustizia ("a letter of recommendation to justice") to the authorities.

[17] Early in 1494 he moved on to Seville, where he proposed, was contracted to build and, for five months, worked on the construction of a stone bridge over the Guadalquivir river.

[20] Historians had thought that, on arrival in England, Cabot went to Bristol, a major maritime centre, to seek financial backers.

Cabot's royal patent, issued by the Crown in 1496, stated that all expeditions should be undertaken from Bristol, so his primary financial supporters were probably based in that city.

In stating this, Henry VII of England was presumably influenced by Iberian practices: Portugal having made Lisbon into such a monopoly port, while Spain was in the process of doing the same thing with Seville.

In the late 20th century, British historian Alwyn Ruddock found documentation that Cabot went first to London, where he received some financial backing from its Italian community.

She suggested one patron was Father Giovanni Antonio de Carbonariis, an Augustinian friar who was also the deputy to Adriano Castellesi, the papal tax collector.

[26] On 5 March 1496 Henry VII gave Cabot and his three sons letters patent[1][27] with the following charge for exploration: ... free authority, faculty and power to sail to all parts, regions, and coasts of the eastern, western and northern sea, under our banners, flags, and ensigns, with five ships or vessels of whatsoever burden and quality they may be, and with so many and with such mariners and men as they may wish to take with them in the said ships, at their own proper costs and charges, to find, discover and investigate whatsoever islands, countries, regions or provinces of heathens and infidels, in whatsoever part of the world placed, which before this time were unknown to all Christians.

[30][31] In a private letter to a colleague (Quinn), Ruddock maintained that she had found evidence in Italian archives that Bristol men had discovered North America before 1470.

Day noted: "Since your Lordship wants information relating to the first voyage, here is what happened: he went with one ship, his crew confused him, he was short of supplies and ran into bad weather, and he decided to turn back.

[37][unreliable source] In addition to these letters, Alwyn Ruddock claimed to have found another, written on 10 August 1497 by the London-based bankers of Fr.

[38] Ruddock said the letter contained "new evidence supporting the claim that seamen of Bristol had already discovered land across the ocean before John Cabot's arrival in England.

[13] One was William Weston, who had not been identified as part of Cabot's expedition before the discovery of a new document in the late 20th century by historian Margaret Condon.

[40] In 2018, Condon and Jones published a further article that showed that Weston and Cabot had been jointly rewarded by the king in January 1498, suggesting that the explorers were working together before the start of the second voyage.

[41] Leaving Bristol, the expedition sailed past Ireland and across the Atlantic, making landfall somewhere on the coast of North America on 24 June 1497.

This is because Day's letter implies that the coastline explored in 1497 lay between the latitudes of Bordeaux, France and Dursey Head in southern Ireland.

Here in 1997, Queen Elizabeth II along with members of the Italian and Canadian governments greeted the replica Matthew of Bristol, following her celebratory crossing of the Atlantic.

[34] Pasqualigo and Day both state that the expedition made no contact with any native people; the crew found the remains of a fire, a human trail, nets, and a wooden tool.

[45] The explorer was fêted; Soncino wrote on 23 August that, similar to Christopher Columbus, Cabot "is called the Great Admiral, and vast honour is paid to him and he goes dressed in silk, and these English run after him like mad".

Despite the royal grant, Bristol's customs officers initially refused to pay Cabot his pension, forcing the explorer to obtain an additional warrant from the king.

[50] In March and April, the king also advanced a number of loans to Lancelot Thirkill of London, Thomas Bradley, and John Cair, who were to accompany Cabot's new expedition.

She claimed their return followed an epic two-year exploration of the east coast of North America, south into the Chesapeake Bay area and perhaps as far as the Spanish territories in the Caribbean.

[56] Ruddock suggested that Giovanni Antonio de Carbonariis and the other friars who accompanied the 1498 expedition had stayed in Newfoundland and founded a mission.

[58] The lead researchers on the project, Evan Jones and Margaret Condon, claim to have found further evidence to support aspects of Ruddock's case, including some of the information she intended to use to argue for a successful return of the 1498 expedition to Bristol.

The Archaeology of Historic Carbonear Project, carried out by Memorial University of Newfoundland, has conducted summer fieldwork each season since 2011.

So far, it has found evidence of planter habitation since the late 17th century and of trade with Spain through Bilbao, including a Spanish coin minted in Peru.

In 2009, Jones confirmed that William Weston (who was not previously known to have been involved) led an expedition from Bristol [with royal support] to the "new found land" in 1499 or 1500, making him the first Englishman to lead the exploration of North America.

This revealed that Weston and Cabot had received rewards from King Henry VII in January 1498, following a royal audience, thereby confirming that the two explorers were involved by this stage.

The king granted Hugh Eliot, Robert Thorne, and his son a bounty of £20 in January 1502 for purchasing the Gabriel, a ship for an expedition voyage that summer.