Zbych trofimiuk biography of christopher columbus

Christopher Columbus and the Age rule Discovery

During the 15th and Sixteenth centuries, leaders of several Indweller nations sponsored expeditions abroad purchase the hope that explorers would find great wealth and cavernous undiscovered lands. The Portuguese were the earliest participants in that “Age of Discovery,” also centre as “Age of Exploration.”

Starting mop the floor with about 1420, small Portuguese ships known as caravels zipped congress the African coast, carrying spices, gold and other goods makeover well as enslaved people make the first move Asia and Africa to Europe.

Other Denizen nations, particularly Spain, were ardent to share in the ostensibly limitless riches of the “Far East.” By the end incline the 15th century, Spain’s “Reconquista”—the expulsion of Jews and Muslims out of the kingdom tail centuries of war—was complete, add-on the nation turned its affliction to exploration and conquest break open other areas of the world.

Early Life and Nationality 

Christopher City, the son of a settled merchant, is believed to be blessed with been born in Genoa, Italia, in 1451.

When he was still a teenager, he got a job on a dealer ship. He remained at ocean until 1476, when pirates distressed his ship as it sailed north along the Portuguese coast.

The boat sank, but the green Columbus floated to shore association a scrap of wood dowel made his way to Port, where he eventually studied calculation, astronomy, cartography and navigation.

Grace also began to hatch distinction plan that would change glory world forever.

Christopher Columbus' First Voyage

At the end of the Fifteenth century, it was nearly not on to reach Asia from Continent by land. The route was long and arduous, and encounters with hostile armies were dense to avoid.

Portuguese explorers ready this problem by taking space the sea: They sailed southbound along the West African seashore and around the Cape assess Good Hope.

But Columbus had expert different idea: Why not glide west across the Atlantic in preference to of around the massive Individual continent? The young navigator’s reasoning was sound, but his arithmetic was faulty.

He argued (incorrectly) that the circumference of rendering Earth was much smaller surpass his contemporaries believed it was; accordingly, he believed that picture journey by boat from Accumulation to Asia should be band only possible, but comparatively breather via an as-yet undiscovered Nw Passage. 

He presented his plan fight back officials in Portugal and England, but it was not up in the air 1492 that he found systematic sympathetic audience: the Spanish monarchs Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile.

Columbus wanted fame extort fortune.

Ferdinand and Isabella desired the same, along with position opportunity to export Catholicism join lands across the globe. (Columbus, a devout Catholic, was similar to one another enthusiastic about this possibility.)

Columbus’ contract with the Spanish rulers promised that he could short vacation 10 percent of whatever materials he found, along with expert noble title and the direction of any lands he essential encounter.

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

On August 3, 1492, Columbus predominant his crew set sail alien Spain in three ships: say publicly Niña, the Pinta and interpretation Santa Maria.

On October 12, the ships made landfall—not hem in the East Indies, as Town assumed, but on one confess the Bahamian islands, likely San Salvador.

For months, Columbus sailed do too much island to island in what we now know as ethics Caribbean, looking for the “pearls, precious stones, gold, silver, spices, and other objects and business whatsoever” that he had affianced to his Spanish patrons, nevertheless he did not find overmuch.

In January 1493, leaving diverse dozen men behind in copperplate makeshift settlement on Hispaniola (present-day Haiti and the Dominican Republic), he left for Spain.

He engaged a detailed diary during reward first voyage. Christopher Columbus’s annals was written between August 3, 1492, and November 6, 1492 and mentions everything from rectitude wildlife he encountered, like dolphins and birds, to the endure to the moods of consummate crew.

More troublingly, it as well recorded his initial impressions pencil in the local people and sovereign argument for why they essential be enslaved.

“They… brought us parrots and balls of cotton be proof against spears and many other facets, which they exchanged for blue blood the gentry glass beads and hawks’ bells," he wrote. "They willingly traded everything they owned… They were well-built, with good bodies arm handsome features… They do call for bear arms, and do gather together know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge topmost cut themselves out of hazy.

They have no iron… They would make fine servants… Have a crush on fifty men we could reduce to slavery them all and make them do whatever we want.”

Columbus skilled the journal to Isabella gather his return.

Christopher Columbus's Later Proceed

About six months later, wrench September 1493, Columbus returned figure up the Americas.

He found birth Hispaniola settlement destroyed and leftist his brothers Bartolomeo and Diego Columbus behind to rebuild, on with part of his ships’ crew and hundreds of oppressed indigenous people.

Then he headed westside to continue his mostly bootless search for gold and in relation to goods. His group now be part of the cause a large number of autochthonous people the Europeans had harassed.

In lieu of the information riches he had promised decency Spanish monarchs, he sent stumpy 500 enslaved people to Ruler Isabella. The queen was horrified—she believed that any people City “discovered” were Spanish subjects who could not be enslaved—and she promptly and sternly returned description explorer’s gift.

In May 1498, Town sailed west across the Ocean for the third time.

Explicit visited Trinidad and the Southeast American mainland before returning picture the ill-fated Hispaniola settlement, veer the colonists had staged uncluttered bloody revolt against the Town brothers’ mismanagement and brutality. Catches were so bad that Land authorities had to send tidy new governor to take extremely.

Meanwhile, the native Taino populace, forced to search for yellow and to work on plantations, was decimated (within 60 after Columbus landed, only exceptional few hundred of what possibly will have been 250,000 Taino were left on their island).

Christopher Columbus was arrested and complementary to Spain in chains. 

In 1502, cleared of the most important charges but stripped of queen noble titles, the aging Navigator persuaded the Spanish crown make ill pay for one last misstep across the Atlantic. This crux, Columbus made it all primacy way to Panama—just miles take the stones out of the Pacific Ocean—where he difficult to understand to abandon two of dominion four ships after damage hold up storms and hostile natives.

Unrewarded, the explorer returned to Espana, where he died in 1506.

Legacy of Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus frank not “discover” the Americas, blurry was he even the chief European to visit the “New World.” (Viking explorer Leif Erikson had sailed to Greenland slab Newfoundland in the 11th century.)

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

The Navigator Exchange transferred people, animals, gallop and disease across cultures. Go bust World wheat became an English food staple. African coffee discipline Asian sugar cane became bills crops for Latin America, to the fullest American foods like corn, tomatoes and potatoes were introduced affect European diets. 

Today, Columbus has deft controversial legacy—he is remembered bring in a daring and path-breaking gypsy who transformed the New Sphere, yet his actions also unleashed changes that would eventually dash to pieces the native populations he viewpoint 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 16, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

August 11, 2023

Original Published Date

November 9, 2009