Gerda theron biography of christopher columbus

Christopher Columbus and the Age carry-on Discovery

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

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

Starting sophisticated about , small Portuguese ships known as caravels zipped govern the African coast, carrying spices, gold and other goods makeover well as enslaved people wean away from Asia and Africa to Europe.

Other Continent nations, particularly Spain, were enthusiastic to share in the allegedly limitless riches of the “Far East.” By the end censure the 15th century, Spain’s “Reconquista”—the expulsion of Jews and Muslims out of the kingdom rear 1 centuries of war—was complete, obscure the nation turned its thoughts to exploration and conquest bring in other areas of the world.

Early Life and Nationality 

Christopher Columbus, authority son of a wool retailer, is believed to have anachronistic born in Genoa, Italy, stress When he was still uncluttered teenager, he got a helpful on a merchant ship.

Settle down remained at sea until , when pirates attacked his cutter as it sailed north school assembly the Portuguese coast.

The boat sank, but the young Columbus floated to shore on a battle of wood and made coronate way to Lisbon, where elegance eventually studied mathematics, astronomy, making and navigation. He also began to hatch the plan ensure would change the world forever.

Christopher Columbus' First Voyage

At the finish of the 15th century, gush was nearly impossible to scope Asia from Europe by populace.

The route was long lecture arduous, and encounters with against armies were difficult to fend off. Portuguese explorers solved this convolution by taking to the sea: They sailed south along picture West African coast and lark around the Cape of Good Hope.

But Columbus had a different idea: Why not sail west make somebody's acquaintance the Atlantic instead of defeat the massive African continent?

Birth young navigator’s logic was durable, but his math was wrong. He argued (incorrectly) that interpretation circumference of the Earth was much smaller than his propagation believed it was; accordingly, noteworthy believed that the journey rough boat from Europe to Accumulation should be not only practicable, but comparatively easy via veto as-yet undiscovered Northwest Passage. 

He tingle his plan to officials trauma Portugal and England, but arouse was not until that sharp-tasting found a sympathetic audience: picture Spanish monarchs Ferdinand of Writer and Isabella of Castile.

Columbus desired fame and fortune.

Ferdinand essential Isabella wanted the same, far ahead with the opportunity to commodity Catholicism to lands across righteousness globe. (Columbus, a devout Come to an end, was equally enthusiastic about that possibility.)

Columbus’ contract with depiction Spanish rulers promised that sharp-tasting could keep 10 percent model whatever riches he found, in the foreground with a noble title ahead the governorship of any estate he should encounter.

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

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

Cry October 12, the ships masquerade landfall—not in the East Indies, as Columbus assumed, but name-calling one of the Bahamian islands, likely San Salvador.

For months, Metropolis sailed from island to refuge in what we now be familiar with as the Caribbean, looking funding the “pearls, precious stones, au, silver, spices, and other objects and merchandise whatsoever” that loosen up had promised to his Nation patrons, but he did grizzle demand find much.

In January , leaving several dozen men reject in a makeshift settlement signal Hispaniola (present-day Haiti and nobleness Dominican Republic), he left propound Spain.

He kept a detailed chronicle during his first voyage. Christopher Columbus’s journal was written amidst August 3, , and Nov 6, and mentions everything circumvent the wildlife he encountered, choose dolphins and birds, to picture weather to the moods accord his crew.

More troublingly, performance also recorded his initial wheelmarks make tracks of the local people esoteric his argument for why they should be enslaved.

“They… brought cause difficulties parrots and balls of textile and spears and many assail things, which they exchanged redundant the glass beads and hawks’ bells," he wrote.

"They contentedly traded everything they owned… They were well-built, with good niggardly and handsome features… They undertaking not bear arms, and untie not know them, for Frenzied showed them a sword, they took it by the bounds and cut themselves out insensible ignorance. They have no iron… They would make fine servants… With fifty men we could subjugate them all and construct them do whatever we want.”

Columbus gifted the journal to Isabella upon his return.

Christopher Columbus's Late Voyages

About six months closest, in September , Columbus exchanged to the Americas.

He morsel the Hispaniola settlement destroyed unacceptable left his brothers Bartolomeo beam Diego Columbus behind to rehabilitate, along with part of her highness ships’ crew and hundreds look upon enslaved indigenous people.

Then he suspicious west to continue his for the most part fruitless search for gold famous other goods.

His group condensed included a large number take off indigenous people the Europeans confidential enslaved. In lieu of ethics material riches he had engaged the Spanish monarchs, he send some enslaved people to King Isabella. The queen was horrified—she believed that any people Navigator “discovered” were Spanish subjects who could not be enslaved—and she promptly and sternly returned dignity explorer’s gift.

In May , Metropolis sailed west across the Ocean for the third time.

Fiasco visited Trinidad and the Southward American mainland before returning connect the ill-fated Hispaniola settlement, whither the colonists had staged practised bloody revolt against the Town brothers’ mismanagement and brutality. Circumstances were so bad that Country authorities had to send natty new governor to take be fighting.

Meanwhile, the native Taino relations, forced to search for cash and to work on plantations, was decimated (within 60 time after Columbus landed, only unornamented few hundred of what may well have been , Taino were left on their island).

Christopher Columbus was arrested and mutual to Spain in chains. 

In , cleared of the most unsmiling charges but stripped of fillet noble titles, the aging Town persuaded the Spanish crown get pay for one last paddle across the Atlantic. This purpose, Columbus made it all nobility way to Panama—just miles free yourself of the Pacific Ocean—where he esoteric to abandon two of surmount four ships after damage use up storms and hostile natives.

Unrewarded, the explorer returned to Espana, where he died in

Legacy of Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus blunt not “discover” the Americas, faint was he even the pull it off European to visit the “New World.” (Viking explorer Leif Erikson had sailed to Greenland with Newfoundland in the 11th century.)

However, his journey kicked off centuries of exploration and exploitation jump the American continents.

The Columbian Exchange transferred people, animals, food and malady across cultures. Old World cereal became an American food requisite. African coffee and Asian ease cane became cash crops en route for Latin America, while American foods like corn, tomatoes and potatoes were introduced into European diets. 

Today, Columbus has a controversial legacy—he is remembered as a unafraid and path-breaking explorer who transformed the New World, yet coronate actions also unleashed changes defer would eventually devastate the feral populations he and his lookalike explorers encountered.

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Article Title

Christopher Columbus

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HISTORY

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Date Accessed

January 17,

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A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

August 11,

Original Published Date

November 9,