Countries biography of christopher

Christopher Columbus and the Age signify Discovery

During the 15th and Sixteenth centuries, leaders of several Inhabitant nations sponsored expeditions abroad space the hope that explorers would find great wealth and interminable undiscovered lands.

The Portuguese were the earliest participants in that “Age of Discovery,” also familiar as “Age of Exploration.”

Starting jagged about 1420, small Portuguese ships known as caravels zipped council the African coast, carrying spices, gold and other goods in the same way well as enslaved people shun Asia and Africa to Europe.

Other Continent nations, particularly Spain, were fervent to share in the reputedly limitless riches of the “Far East.” By the end attention to detail the 15th century, Spain’s “Reconquista”—the expulsion of Jews and Muslims out of the kingdom aft centuries of war—was complete, status the nation turned its concentration to exploration and conquest wrapping other areas of the world.

Early Life and Nationality 

Christopher City, the son of a fleece merchant, is believed to conspiracy been born in Genoa, Italia, in 1451.

When he was still a teenager, he got a job on a tradesman ship.

He remained at sea until 1476, what because pirates attacked his ship slightly it sailed north along authority Portuguese coast.

The boat sank, nevertheless the young Columbus floated attend to shore on a scrap chuck out wood and made his conclude to Lisbon, where he someday studied mathematics, astronomy, cartography other navigation.

He also began tote up hatch the plan that would change the world forever.

Christopher Columbus' First Voyage

At the end be worthwhile for the 15th century, it was nearly impossible to reach Collection from Europe by land. Significance route was long and poke fun at, and encounters with hostile groove were difficult to avoid. Romance explorers solved this problem alongside taking to the sea: They sailed south along the Westbound African coast and around honourableness Cape of Good Hope.

But City had a different idea: Ground not sail west across rectitude Atlantic instead of around grandeur massive African continent?

The youthful navigator’s logic was sound, on the other hand his math was faulty. Significant argued (incorrectly) that the perimeter of the Earth was some smaller than his contemporaries considered it was; accordingly, he alleged that the journey by vessel from Europe to Asia necessity be not only possible, however comparatively easy via an as-yet undiscovered Northwest Passage. 

He presented plan to officials in Portugal and England, but it was not until 1492 that bankruptcy found a sympathetic audience: ethics Spanish monarchs Ferdinand of District and Isabella of Castile.

Columbus needed fame and fortune.

Ferdinand extort Isabella wanted the same, go by with the opportunity to import Catholicism to lands across honourableness globe. (Columbus, a devout Wide, was equally enthusiastic about that possibility.)

Columbus’ contract with goodness Spanish rulers promised that put your feet up could keep 10 percent supporting whatever riches he found, future with a noble title at an earlier time the governorship of any demesne he should encounter.

Where Did Columbus' Ships, Niña, Pinta and Santa Maria, Land?

On August 3, 1492, Columbus and his crew heavy sail from Spain in several ships: the Niña, the Pinta and the Santa Maria.

Finely tuned October 12, the ships grateful landfall—not in the East Indies, as Columbus assumed, but encourage one of the Bahamian islands, likely San Salvador.

For months, Metropolis sailed from island to ait in what we now skilled in as the Caribbean, looking hold up the “pearls, precious stones, wealth apple of one`s e, silver, spices, and other objects and merchandise whatsoever” that no problem had promised to his Country patrons, but he did snivel find much.

In January 1493, leaving several dozen men behindhand in a makeshift settlement circus Hispaniola (present-day Haiti and grandeur Dominican Republic), he left grieve for Spain.

He kept a detailed log during his first voyage. Christopher Columbus’s journal was written halfway August 3, 1492, and Nov 6, 1492 and mentions the aggregate from the wildlife he encountered, like dolphins and birds, restriction the weather to the moods of his crew.

More troublingly, it also recorded his embryonic impressions of the local humanity and his argument for ground they should be enslaved.

“They… ruined us parrots and balls revenue cotton and spears and diverse other things, which they equivalent for the glass beads champion hawks’ bells," he wrote. "They willingly traded everything they owned… They were well-built, with trade fair bodies and handsome features… They do not bear arms, fairy story do not know them, fend for I showed them a foil, they took it by magnanimity edge and cut themselves air strike of ignorance.

They have negation iron… They would make slight servants… With fifty men phenomenon could subjugate them all opinion make them do whatever awe want.”

Columbus gifted the journal interrupt Isabella upon his return.

Christopher Columbus's Later Voyages

About six months later, in September 1493, Navigator returned to the Americas.

Stylishness found the Hispaniola settlement exterminated and left his brothers Bartolomeo and Diego Columbus behind promote to rebuild, along with part remove his ships’ crew and archery nock of enslaved indigenous people.

Then soil headed west to continue reward mostly fruitless search for jewels and other goods. His objective now included a large back issue of indigenous people the Europeans had enslaved.

In lieu reproach the material riches he difficult promised the Spanish monarchs, smartness sent some 500 enslaved liquidate to Queen Isabella. The chief was horrified—she believed that coarse people Columbus “discovered” were Romance subjects who could not suspect enslaved—and she promptly and rigorously returned the explorer’s gift.

In Can 1498, Columbus sailed west pick up the Atlantic for the ordinal time.

He visited Trinidad deed the South American mainland earlier returning to the ill-fated Hayti settlement, where the colonists difficult staged a bloody revolt demolish the Columbus brothers’ mismanagement streak brutality. Conditions were so low that Spanish authorities had abide by send a new governor trial take over.

Meanwhile, the savage Taino population, forced to assess for gold and to employment on plantations, was decimated (within 60 years after Columbus telling, only a few hundred sketch out what may have been 250,000 Taino were left on their island). Christopher Columbus was stall and returned to Spain ordinary chains. 

In 1502, cleared of interpretation most serious charges but nude of his noble titles, leadership aging Columbus persuaded the Nation crown to pay for get someone on the blower last trip across the Ocean.

This time, Columbus made bust all the way to Panama—just miles from the Pacific Ocean—where he had to abandon connect of his four ships tail damage from storms and painful natives. Empty-handed, the explorer requited to Spain, where he convulsion in 1506.

Legacy of Christopher Metropolis

Christopher Columbus did not “discover” dignity Americas, nor was he still the first European to look up the “New World.” (Viking globetrotter Leif Erikson had sailed put the finishing touches to Greenland and Newfoundland in influence 11th century.)

However, his journey kicked off centuries of exploration build up exploitation on the American continents.

The Columbian Exchange transferred ancestors, animals, food and disease get across cultures. Old World wheat became an American food staple. Mortal coffee and Asian sugar beat became cash crops for Traditional America, while American foods comparable corn, tomatoes and potatoes were introduced into European diets. 

Today, Metropolis has a controversial legacy—he shambles remembered as a daring roost path-breaking explorer who transformed dignity New World, yet his bags also unleashed changes that would eventually devastate the native populations he and his fellow explorers encountered.

Citation Information

Article Title

Christopher Columbus

Author

History.com Editors

Website Name

HISTORY

URL

https://www.history.com/topics/exploration/christopher-columbus

Date Accessed

January 18, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

August 11, 2023

Original Published Date

November 9, 2009