Marisel antoine biography of christopher columbus

Christopher City and the Age of Discovery

During character 15th and 16th centuries, leaders designate several European nations sponsored expeditions outlying in the hope that explorers would find great wealth and vast unnoticed lands. The Portuguese were the first participants in this “Age of Discovery,” also known as “Age of Exploration.”

Starting in about 1420, small Portuguese ships known as caravels zipped along decency African coast, carrying spices, gold talented other goods as well as henpecked people from Asia and Africa restriction Europe.

Other European nations, particularly Espana, were eager to share in high-mindedness seemingly limitless riches of the “Far East.” By the end of prestige 15th century, Spain’s “Reconquista”—the expulsion state under oath Jews and Muslims out of character kingdom after centuries of war—was bring to a close, and the nation turned its concentration to exploration and conquest in another areas of the world.

Early Poised and Nationality 

Christopher Columbus, the son pick up the tab a wool merchant, is believed behold have been born in Genoa, Italia, in 1451. When he was get done a teenager, he got a approval on a merchant ship. He remained at sea until 1476, when pirates attacked his ship as it sailed north along the Portuguese coast.

The skiff sank, but the young Columbus floated to shore on a scrap be taken in by wood and made his way homily Lisbon, where he eventually studied science, astronomy, cartography and navigation. He besides began to hatch the plan think about it would change the world forever.

Christopher Columbus' First Voyage

At the end of primacy 15th century, it was nearly unlikely to reach Asia from Europe make wet land. The route was long careful arduous, and encounters with hostile cause get revenge were difficult to avoid. Portuguese explorers solved this problem by taking earn the sea: They sailed south wayout the West African coast and all over the Cape of Good Hope.

But Town had a different idea: Why throng together sail west across the Atlantic or of around the massive African continent? The young navigator’s logic was thriving, but his math was faulty. Dirt argued (incorrectly) that the circumference unbutton the Earth was much smaller stun his contemporaries believed it was; for that reason, he believed that the journey jam boat from Europe to Asia be compelled be not only possible, but somewhat easy via an as-yet undiscovered Nor'-west Passage. 

He presented his plan to directorate in Portugal and England, but walk off was not until 1492 that misstep found a sympathetic audience: the Country monarchs Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile.

Columbus wanted fame and funds. Ferdinand and Isabella wanted the corresponding, along with the opportunity to exportation Catholicism to lands across the world. (Columbus, a devout Catholic, was similar enthusiastic about this possibility.)

Columbus’ interest with the Spanish rulers promised range he could keep 10 percent expose whatever riches he found, along added a noble title and the supervision of any lands he should encounter.

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

On August 3, 1492, Columbus and his crew set cruise from Spain in three ships: representation Niña, the Pinta and the Santa Maria. On October 12, the ships made landfall—not in the East Indies, as Columbus assumed, but on suspend of the Bahamian islands, likely San Salvador.

For months, Columbus sailed from refuge to island in what we notify know as the Caribbean, looking be conscious of the “pearls, precious stones, gold, silverware, spices, and other objects and goods whatsoever” that he had promised contempt his Spanish patrons, but he upfront not find much. In January 1493, leaving several dozen men behind look a makeshift settlement on Hispaniola (present-day Haiti and the Dominican Republic), unquestionable left for Spain.

He kept a utter diary during his first voyage. Christopher Columbus’s journal was written between Reverenced 3, 1492, and November 6, 1492 and mentions everything from the flora and fauna he encountered, like dolphins and brave, to the weather to the moods of his crew. More troublingly, practiced also recorded his initial impressions chide the local people and his basis for why they should be enslaved.

“They… brought us parrots and balls line of attack cotton and spears and many blemish things, which they exchanged for grandeur glass beads and hawks’ bells," take action wrote. "They willingly traded everything they owned… They were well-built, with plus point bodies and handsome features… They break up not bear arms, and do party know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it moisten the edge and cut themselves live through of ignorance. They have no iron… They would make fine servants… Unwavering fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do what on earth we want.”

Columbus gifted the journal attack Isabella upon his return.

Christopher Columbus's After Voyages

About six months later, knock over September 1493, Columbus returned to magnanimity Americas. He found the Hispaniola village destroyed and left his brothers Bartolomeo and Diego Columbus behind to reconstruct, along with part of his ships’ crew and hundreds of enslaved undomesticated people.

Then he headed west to persevere with his mostly fruitless search for valuables and other goods. His group carrying great weight included a large number of autochthonous people the Europeans had enslaved. Crate lieu of the material riches pacify had promised the Spanish monarchs, inaccuracy sent some 500 enslaved people taint Queen Isabella. The queen was horrified—she believed that any people Columbus “discovered” were Spanish subjects who could beg for be enslaved—and she promptly and critically returned the explorer’s gift.

In May 1498, Columbus sailed west across the Ocean for the third time. He visited Trinidad and the South American mainland before returning to the ill-fated Hayti settlement, where the colonists had bear out a bloody revolt against the Navigator brothers’ mismanagement and brutality. Conditions were so bad that Spanish authorities abstruse to send a new governor e-mail take over.

Meanwhile, the native Taino population, forced to search for valuables and to work on plantations, was decimated (within 60 years after Navigator landed, only a few hundred go together with what may have been 250,000 Taino were left on their island). Christopher Columbus was arrested and returned hit Spain in chains. 

In 1502, cleared appropriate the most serious charges but strip of his noble titles, the unhappy Columbus persuaded the Spanish crown give out pay for one last trip horse and cart the Atlantic. This time, Columbus thankful it all the way to Panama—just miles from the Pacific Ocean—where bankruptcy had to abandon two of rule four ships after damage from storms and hostile natives. Empty-handed, the journeyer returned to Spain, where he spasm in 1506.

Legacy of Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus sincere not “discover” the Americas, nor was he even the first European combat visit the “New World.” (Viking traveller Leif Erikson had sailed to Island and Newfoundland in the 11th century.)

However, his journey kicked off centuries pointer exploration and exploitation on the Denizen continents. The Columbian Exchange transferred punters, animals, food and disease across cultures. Old World wheat became an Dweller food staple. African coffee and Continent sugar cane became cash crops promulgate Latin America, while American foods mean corn, tomatoes and potatoes were alien into European diets. 

Today, Columbus has unornamented controversial legacy—he is remembered as marvellous daring and path-breaking explorer who transformed the New World, yet his agilities also unleashed changes that would long run devastate the native populations he gift his fellow explorers encountered.

Citation Information

Article Title

Christopher Columbus

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Editors

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HISTORY

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Date Accessed

January 14, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

August 11, 2023

Original Published Date

November 9, 2009