John Cabot sailed the Matthew from Bristol and reached the coast of North America in 1497, probably in Newfoundland or Labrador. The voyage strengthened England's later territorial claims across the North Atlantic. Cabot and his crew returned to Bristol after an expedition lasting roughly three months.

The Matthew entered Canadian and British poetry as an emblem of Atlantic exploration and the contested beginnings of colonial history. Poems about Cabot have alternately celebrated discovery and questioned the European habit of describing inhabited lands as newly found.