João de Trasto

João de Trasto is alleged to have captained in 1415 the first exploratory expedition dispatched by Prince Henry the Navigator of Portugal. Probably departing from the port of Lagos, the Portuguese nobleman was forced by foul weather to part of the Grand Canary island called Telli. Returning to Portugal, he again encountered a fierce storm and only with great difficulty arrived in port.

The only record of João de Trasto or this expedition is a brief mention in the personal memoirs of Diogo Gomes, a former Henrican captain. Gomes was not an eyewitness to the event (he was not born until the 1420s) and his memoirs were dictated many decades later, at the end of his life, and are known to contain numerous small errors of dates and facts. As a result, many historians have doubted the existence of 'João de Trasto' and this expedition, and suggested that Diogo Gomes probably meant to refer to D. Fernando de Castro, who is indeed recorded to have led a failed expedition to Gran Canaria for Henry in 1424.

References

• Major, Richard Henry. The Life of Prince Henry of Portugal surnamed the Navigator and Its Results from Authentic Contemporary Documents. Ed. John Ralph Willis. Second Edition. London: Frank Cass & Co. Ltd., 1967. Pages 64–65.