Pring, Martin

c.1580-1646. English explorer, first sent to America in 1603 in a follow-up to Gosnold's voyage in search of sassafras, then thought to be a cure for syphilis. With two vessels, he made landfall in the vicinity of the Penobscot Bay, probably around Matinicus. After exploring Penobscot Bay, he coasted down to outer Cape Cod, probably visiting the mouths of the Saco, Kennebunk and York Rivers, and possibly sailing up the Piscataqua. Finding no sassafras, he sailed for Cape Cod where Gosnold had found sassafras, likely landing at Provincetown. After filling up his ships with sassafras and exploring Massachusetts Bay he returned to Bristol. Pring returned to the New England coast in 1606, surveying it carefully, but these records have been lost. The Popham expedition appears to have had a chart made during the 1606 voyage.