Potatoes, Tobacco and Sharks
Potatoes were first imported to the British Isles (probably to Ireland) in either 1563 or 1565 (sources differ) by Hawkins.
Some scholars suggest that it was John Hawkins who introduced tobacco into Britain. Some accounts say this was in 1569, others in 1564. The latter is more likely, since he mentions "Ltobaccoj" (meaning tobacco) in his journals of the second voyage.
The Oxford English Dictionary notes that the word shark appears to have been introduced by Hawkins' sailors, who brought one back and exhibited it in London in 1569. It has recently been suggested that the derivation is from xoc, the word for "fish" in a Mayan language spoken in Yucatán.
Read more about this topic: John Hawkins
Famous quotes containing the words tobacco and/or sharks:
“No matter what Aristotle and the Philosophers say, nothing is equal to tobacco; it’s the passion of the well-bred, and he who lives without tobacco lives a life not worth living.”
—Molière [Jean Baptiste Poquelin] (1622–1673)
“Nobody had ever instructed him that a slave-ship, with a procession of expectant sharks in its wake, is a missionary institution, by which closely-packed heathen are brought over to enjoy the light of the Gospel.”
—Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811–1896)