History
Historically, it functioned as an astronomical (celestial) navigational guide and reference mark for mariners, who calibrated their navigational equipment by referencing the islet on long Atlantic crossings. Its unique geological formation also attracted visitors travelling between Europe and America, intersecting here on their way to the ports of Lajes or Santa Cruz ports of Flores Island. The steep rock slopes of the islet and shoreline served as shelter from strong offshore gales.
Read more about this topic: Monchique Islet
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The history of all Magazines shows plainly that those which have attained celebrity were indebted for it to articles similar in natureto Berenice—although, I grant you, far superior in style and execution. I say similar in nature. You ask me in what does this nature consist? In the ludicrous heightened into the grotesque: the fearful coloured into the horrible: the witty exaggerated into the burlesque: the singular wrought out into the strange and mystical.”
—Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849)
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—William Burroughs (b. 1914)
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—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)