Portraits of Black Canadians – Episode 2 - a podcast by RCI | English

Mathieu Da Costa

Mathieu Da Costa, the first black man to arrive in Canada, is said to have been born in the Azores. Da Costa was a free black man who in the early 1600s was employed as a translator by French and Dutch traders and explorers. He spoke several languages including French, Dutch and Portuguese, as well as"pidgin"Basque, a language used by fishermen on the Atlantic coast that was a mix of a French-Basque dialect and First Nations languages including Mi'kmaq.

Duration 2:28https://www.rcinet.ca/en/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2020/02/2-Mathieu_Da_Costa.mp3

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