In 1497, Venetian navigator John Cabot received royal approval for his own voyage in search of the lands found by Christopher Columbus five years earlier. He set out from Bristol in May, aboard the Matthew, and by keeping the Pole Star off the starboard bow kept sailing due west until he sighted land.

Where Cabot landed is not known for certain, though historian Edith Marsh believed that his description of waters teeming with fish matched best with the coasts of Labrador. Wherever it was, it was in what is now Canada, and Cabot duly claimed it in the name of King Henry VIII of England.

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