The Basque Whaling Establishments in Labrador 1536-1632 - A Summary

Abstract

... Basque whaling was essentially coastal. The Basques had practised whaling along their own coasts from at least the twelfth century and probably before. It is clear that during the sixteenth century the Biscay whale was still by no means exterminated, and well into the seventeenth century Basques continued to send small whaling crews out to Asturias and Galicia for shore-based whaling operations. However, by the 1540s, simultaneously with this winter whaling along the Cantabrian coast, there had been established along the southern shore of Labrador a far more important Basque whaling industry. ...