View source for Juan de Fuca

{{short description|Greek explorer in service of Spain}}
{{about|the 16th-century explorer|the ocean strait between Vancouver Island, BC, Canada and Washington, USA|Strait of Juan de Fuca|other uses}}
{{distinguish|John Phokas|Jean Focas}}
{{Infobox person
| name               = Juan de Fuca
| image              = 
| imagesize          = 400px
| caption            = Bust of Juan de Fuca, created by Cephalonian sculptor Spiros Hourmouzis
| birthname          = Ioannis Fokas
| birth_date         = {{birth date|1536|6|10|df=y}}
| birth_place        = [[Cephalonia]], [[Ionian Islands under Venetian rule|Venetian Ionian Islands]] (now [[Greece]])
| death_date         = {{death date and age|1602|7|23|1536|6|10|df=y}}
| death_place        = Cephalonia
| occupation         = [[Sailor]]
| nationality        = [[Greeks|Greek]]
| footnotes          = 
}}
'''Juan de Fuca''' (10 June 1536 {{nbsp}}{{ndash}} 23 July 1602)<ref name=dcbo>{{cite DCB |title=Fuca, Juan de |first=Thomas |last=Dunbabin |volume=1 |url=http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/fuca_juan_de_1E.html}}</ref><ref name=consulate>Greek Consulate of Vancouver, "[http://www.vancouver.grconsulate.ca/english/pioneers/index.cfm?Directory=Pioneers&Page=4 Greek Pioneers: Juan de Fuca]". {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070315163753/http://www.vancouver.grconsulate.ca/english/pioneers/index.cfm?Directory=Pioneers&Page=4 |date=March 15, 2007 }}</ref> was a [[Greeks|Greek]] [[sailor]] and explorer under the patronage of [[Philip II of Spain|Philip{{nbsp}}II]] of [[Spanish Empire|Spain]]. He is best known for his claim to have explored the [[Strait of Anián]]{{mdash}}now known as the [[Strait of Juan de Fuca]]{{mdash}}between [[Vancouver Island]] (now part of [[British Columbia]], [[Canada]]) and the [[Olympic Peninsula]] (northwestern [[Washington (state)|Washington state]] in the [[United States]]).

{{anchor|Names}}
==Name==
"Juan de Fuca" is a [[Spanish language|hispanicization]] of the [[Greek language|Greek]] name {{nowrap|'''Ioannis Fokas'''}} or '''Phokas''' ({{lang|el|Ἰωάννης Φωκᾶς}}), [[Latin language|latinized]] as {{nowrap|Johannes Phocas}}. However, his exact name is somewhat uncertain. Some sources state that his actual name was Apostolos Valerianos ({{lang|el|Ἀπόστολος Βαλεριάνος}}). It is possible that he was [[baptismal name|baptized as]] Apostolos and later adopted the name Ioannis or Juan because ''{{linktext|Apóstol}}'' is not a common [[Spanish name]]. It is known that his father and grandfather bore the name Focas, so it seems likely that Valerianos was a nickname or [[epithet]] borrowed from [[Valerianos|the village where he grew up on Cephalonia]].

==Family and early life==
De Fuca's grandfather Emmanouil Fokas ({{lang|el|Ἐμμανουὴλ Φωκᾶς}}) fled [[Constantinople]] when it [[fall of Constantinople|fell]] to Ottoman forces in 1453, accompanied by his brother Andronikos ({{lang|el|Ἀνδρόνικος}}). The two settled first in the [[Peloponnese]], where Andronikos remained, but in 1470 Emmanouil moved to the island of [[Cephalonia]]. Ioannis's father Iakovos ({{lang|el|Ἰάκωβος}}) established himself in the village of [[Valerianos]] on the island and came to be known as "the Valeriano Fokas" ({{lang|el|Φωκᾶς ὁ Βαλεριάνος}}, ''Fokas ho Valerianos'') to distinguish him from his brothers.<ref name=consulate /> De Fuca was born in Valerianos on 10 June 1536. Little is known about his life before he entered the service of Spain some time around 1555.<ref>Fokas in 1596 claimed to have been some forty years in the King of Spain's service.</ref>

==Early career==
De Fuca's early voyages were to the [[Far East]], and he claimed to have arrived in [[New Spain]] in 1587 when, off [[Cabo San Lucas]] in [[Baja California peninsula|Baja California]], the English [[privateer]] [[Thomas Cavendish]] seized his [[galleon]] ''Santa Ana'' and deposited him ashore. De Fuca was a well-traveled seaman, perfecting his skill as a pilot in the Spanish fleet. He claimed that King [[Philip II of Spain]] recognized him for his excellence and made him pilot of the Spanish navy in the West Indies (a title he held for forty years), but there is no record in any surviving Spanish archives of his name or position or of his visit to the royal court.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.nosracines.ca/page.aspx?id=266418&qryID=06801d05-b1d6-4b2f-a023-38857c50d744 |title=''British Columbia: From the Earliest Times to the Present'', Chapter II, ''The Apocryphal Voyages'', pp. 19-31, Ethelbert Olaf Stuart Scholefield, publ. S.J. Clarke, Vancouver, 1914 |access-date=2020-02-09 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20120912084440/http://www.nosracines.ca/page.aspx?id=266418&qryID=06801d05-b1d6-4b2f-a023-38857c50d744 |archive-date=2012-09-12 |url-status=dead }}</ref> Before he made his famous trip up the northwest coast of the North American continent, he sailed to China, the Philippines and Mexico. The [[Strait of Juan de Fuca]] between the United States of America and Canada was named for him by British Captain [[Charles William Barkley|Charles Barkley]] because it was at the same latitude that Juan de Fuca described as the location of the [[Strait of Anián]].<ref>[http://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/Website/Classroom%20Materials/Curriculum%20Packets/Indians%20&%20Europeans/Documents/1.html Center for the Study of the Pacific Northwest]</ref>

==Voyages to the north==
[[Image:CapeFlatteryWashington.jpg|thumb|300px|right|Fuca Pillar at [[Cape Flattery, Washington]], beside the Strait of Juan de Fuca]]
According to de Fuca's account, he undertook two voyages of exploration on the orders of the [[Viceroy]] of New Spain, [[Luis de Velasco, marqués de Salinas]], both of which were intended to find the fabled Strait of Anián, believed to be a [[Northwest Passage]], a sea route linking the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. The one voyage saw 200 soldiers and three small ships under the overall command of a [[Spanish Army|Spanish]] [[Captain (OF-2)|captain]] (with de Fuca as pilot and [[Captain (nautical)#master|master]]) assigned the task of finding the Strait of Anián and fortifying it against the English. This expedition failed when, allegedly due to the captain's malfeasance, the soldiers [[mutiny|mutinied]] and returned home to California.<ref name=consulate /> (Note that in this period, Spanish doctrine divided control of ships and fleets between the military commander, who was an army officer, and the sailing and navigation commander, who was a mariner.)

De Fuca's second voyage, in 1592, was more successful. Having sailed north with a [[caravel]], a [[full rigged pinnace|pinnace]], and a few armed marines, he returned to [[Acapulco]] and claimed to have found the strait, with a large island at its mouth, at around 47° north [[latitude]]. The Strait of Juan de Fuca is in fact at around 48° N, although Fuca's account of sailing into it departs from reality, describing a region far different from what actually existed there.<ref name=Williams2003>{{cite book
  | last = Williams
  | first = Glyndwr
  | title = Voyages of delusion: the quest for the Northwest Passage
  | url = https://archive.org/details/voyagesofdelusio00glyn
  | url-access = registration
  | publisher = Yale University Press
  | year = 2003
  | location = New Haven
| isbn = 9780300098662
 }}</ref> During the voyage, De Fuca also noted a "high pinnacle or spired rock", which may have been [[Fuca Pillar]], a tall, almost rectangular rock on the western shore of [[Cape Flattery]] at the northwestern extremity of the [[Olympic Peninsula]], in what is now the U.S. state of [[Washington (state)|Washington]], beside the Strait of Juan de Fuca – although De Fuca noted it being on the other side of the strait.<ref name=Williams2003/>

Despite Velasco's repeated promises, however, De Fuca never received the great rewards he claimed as his due. After two years, and on the viceroy's urging, De Fuca traveled to Spain to make his case to the court in person. Disappointed again and disgusted with the Spanish, the aging Greek determined to retire to his home in [[Kefallonia]], but was in 1596 convinced by an Englishman, [[Michael Lok]] (also spelled "Locke" in English and French documents from the period), to offer his services to Spain's archenemy, [[Elizabeth I of England|Queen Elizabeth]]. Nothing came of Lok and De Fuca's proposals, but it is through Lok's account that the story of Juan de Fuca entered English letters.<ref name=consulate />

==Controversy==
[[File:The great probability of a North West Passage- deduced from observations on the letter of Admiral de Fonte, who sailed from the Callao of Lima on the discovery of a communication between the South Sea (14761095391).jpg|thumb|1768 map showing Juan de Fuca's strait, between [[New Albion]] and an island roughly corresponding to the later British Columbia and Alaska, as the entrance of the [[Northwest Passage]]]]
Because the only written evidence for De Fuca's voyages lay in Lok's account&nbsp;&mdash; researchers being unable to find records of the expedition in Spanish colonial archives&nbsp;&mdash; there was long much controversy over his discovery and indeed whether he had ever even existed as a real person; several scholars have dismissed Juan de Fuca as entirely fictitious, and the 18th-century British explorer [[James Cook|Captain Cook]] strongly doubted that the strait De Fuca claimed to have discovered even existed<ref name=dcbo-barkley>{{cite DCB |title=Barkley, Charles William |first=Barry M. |last=Gough |volume=6 |url=http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/barkley_charles_william_6E.html}}</ref> (although Cook actually sailed past the Strait of Juan de Fuca without entering it, and did stop at [[Nootka Sound]] on the west coast of Vancouver Island). With later English exploration and settlement of the area, however, De Fuca's claims seemed much more credible.

In 1859, an American researcher, with the help of the U.S. [[Consul (representative)|Consul]] in the [[Ionian Islands]], was able to demonstrate not only that De Fuca had lived but also that his family and history were well-known on the islands.<ref name=consulate /> In 2003, Samuel Bawlf posited that "Fuca's story was nothing more than a fabrication designed to extract money from the English government". According to Bawlf, De Fuca story's would have in fact been based on [[Francis Drake]]'s 1579 exploration of the [[Northwest Passage]] at its western end. De Fuca would have learnt about the strait from a pilot named Morera, who was part of the Drake expedition. Morera miraculously returned on his own before getting arrested by the Spanish.<ref>{{cite book | title=The Secret Voyage of Sir Francis Drake, 1577-1580, Chapter Postscript | last=Bawlf | first=R. Samuel | publisher=Douglas & McIntyre | year =2003 | isbn = 978-1-55054-977-5}}</ref>

==Legacy==
When the English captain [[Charles William Barkley]], sailing the ''[[Imperial Eagle (ship)|Imperial Eagle]]'' in 1787, (re)discovered the strait De Fuca had described, he renamed it the ''Strait of Juan de Fuca''. The [[Juan de Fuca Ridge]] and the [[Juan de Fuca Plate]], a [[tectonic plate]] underlying much of the coastline he explored, are in turn named for the Strait of Juan de Fuca. [[Juan de Fuca Provincial Park]] on [[Vancouver Island]]'s West Coast is also named for the strait, as is the [[Juan de Fuca Marine Trail|hiking trail]] of the same name.

==See also==
* [[Phokas (Byzantine family)]]

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

== Further reading ==
{{Commons category}}
*[https://archive.org/stream/hakluytusposthu15purcgoog#page/n446/mode/2up/search/%22Michael+Lok%22 ''A note made by me, Michael Lok the Elder, touching the strait of sea commonly called Fretum Anian, in the South Sea, through the northwest passage of Meta Incognita''], in [[Samuel Purchas]], Pilgrims, London, 1625, Vol III, page 849
*[https://archive.org/details/memoirhistorical00gree_0/page/42 <!-- quote="Juan de Fuca" Purchas Pilgrimage. --> ''Memoir, Historical and Political, on the Northwest Coast of North America''], Robert Greenhow, 1840, P 174
*[https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Journals/Hutchings_California_Magazine/1859/September/Memorials_of_Juan_de_Fuca*.html ''Memorials of Juan de Fuca''], A. S. Taylor, in ''Hutchings' California Magazine'', Sep.-Oct. 1859, pp116-122, 161-167
*[http://www.nosracines.ca/page.aspx?id=266418&amp;qryID=06801d05-b1d6-4b2f-a023-38857c50d744 ''British Columbia: From the Earliest Times to the Present'', Chapter II, ''The Apocryphal Voyages'', pp. 19-31, Ethelbert Olaf Stuart Scholefield, publ. S.J. Clarke, Vancouver, 1914]
* "Ioannis Apostolos Focas Valerianos (Juan de Fuca). The Kefallonian adventurer of the 16th c.", by Evridiki Livada Duca, Kefallonia 2001, published by the Municipality of Elios - Pronnoi.
* "The Straits of Chimera", by Evridiki Livada Duca, New York 2014, published by the FEDERATION OF CEPHALONIAN AND ITHACIAN SOCIETIES and presented in Queens College (CUNY), and Rutgers University in October and November 2014. (In English and in Greek as: "Στα Στενά της Χίμαιρας", Ευρυδίκη Λειβαδά Ντούκα, Αθήνα 2007, Έκδοση: ΚΕΔΡΟΣ. Spanish translation by [[:es:Pedro Olalla|Pedro Olalla]] ("El Paso de la Quimera", 2017) for the Ouranis Foundation, unpublished)

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fuca, Juan de}}
[[Category:1536 births]]
[[Category:1602 deaths]]
[[Category:People from Cephalonia]]
[[Category:16th-century people from the Republic of Venice]]
[[Category:Spanish explorers]]
[[Category:Explorers of North America]] 
[[Category:16th-century Greek people]]
[[Category:Greek explorers]]
[[Category:Venetian Greeks]]
[[Category:17th-century people from the Republic of Venice]]
[[Category:Emigrants from the Republic of Venice]]
[[Category:Immigrants to Spain]]