His Claim
The Jesuit missionary Pedro Paez is widely regarded by historians as having been the first European to reach the site; Bruce, however, disputed his claim and suggested that the relevant passage in Paez's memoirs had been fabricated by Athanasius Kircher. Later the source of the Blue Nile was visited by Fr. Jeronimo Lobo; Bruce sought to discredit the writings of Fr. Lobo, but more recent research has shown that Lobo's description of the source was perfectly correct in details. Bruce went as far as to claim (wrongly), that Lobo seemed to be able to sail on land and also denied the existence of a spitting cobra described by Lobo. The Greek Strates is arguably another European that reached the source of the Nile; however, in the eighteenth century, Greece was politically part of the Ottoman Empire, not Europe.
Read more about this topic: James Bruce
Famous quotes containing the word claim:
“Chippenhook was the home of Judge Theophilus Harrington, known for his trenchant reply to an irate slave-owner in a runaway slave case. Judge Harrington declared that the owner’s claim to the slave was defective. The owner indignantly demanded to know what was lacking in his legally sound claim. The Judge exploded, ‘A bill of sale, sir, from God Almighty!’”
—For the State of Vermont, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me.”
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)