Álvaro Velho

Who is Álvaro Velho?

Álvaro Velho was a Portuguese writer who participated as a sailor or soldier in the expedition of discovery of sea route to India led by Vasco da Gama in 1497. He was the attributed author of an anonymous logbook, main direct source known describing the expedition. The "Diário de bordo de Álvaro Velho", or "roadmap to India", survived incomplete, and the original manuscript was lost. A copy is in the Biblioteca Pública Municipal do Porto. It was published in Porto in 1838, with the name "Road Trip on the Discovery of India by the Cape of Good Hope by D. Vasco da Gama in 1497." After this trip, Álvaro Velho spent eight years in Guinea.