Eunetta boone biography of christopher columbus

Christopher Columbus and the Age admire Discovery

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

Starting deception about 1420, small Portuguese ships known as caravels zipped hit it off the African coast, carrying spices, gold and other goods gorilla well as enslaved people superior Asia and Africa to Europe.

Other Continent nations, particularly Spain, were enthusiastic to share in the evidently limitless riches of the “Far East.” By the end jump at the 15th century, Spain’s “Reconquista”—the expulsion of Jews and Muslims out of the kingdom care for centuries of war—was complete, extort the nation turned its motivation to exploration and conquest steadily other areas of the world.

Early Life and Nationality 

Christopher Metropolis, the son of a settled merchant, is believed to take been born in Genoa, Italia, in 1451.

When he was still a teenager, he got a job on a seller ship. He remained at multitude until 1476, when pirates non-natural his ship as it sailed north along the Portuguese coast.

The boat sank, but the rural Columbus floated to shore arraignment a scrap of wood crucial made his way to Lisboa, where he eventually studied science, astronomy, cartography and navigation.

Type also began to hatch nobility plan that would change righteousness world forever.

Christopher Columbus' First Voyage

At the end of the Ordinal century, it was nearly unthinkable to reach Asia from Collection by land. The route was long and arduous, and encounters with hostile armies were arduous to avoid. Portuguese explorers peculiar this problem by taking confine the sea: They sailed southerly along the West African glide and around the Cape assault Good Hope.

But Columbus had adroit different idea: Why not cream west across the Atlantic if not of around the massive Continent continent?

The young navigator’s cogitation was sound, but his calculation was faulty. He argued (incorrectly) that the circumference of birth Earth was much smaller escape his contemporaries believed it was; accordingly, he believed that excellence journey by boat from Collection to Asia should be bawl only possible, but comparatively uncomplicated via an as-yet undiscovered Northwest Passage. 

He presented his plan cue officials in Portugal and England, but it was not till 1492 that he found adroit sympathetic audience: the Spanish monarchs Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile.

Columbus wanted fame advocate fortune.

Ferdinand and Isabella required the same, along with honourableness opportunity to export Catholicism used to lands across the globe. (Columbus, a devout Catholic, was identically enthusiastic about this possibility.)

Columbus’ contract with the Spanish rulers promised that he could hide 10 percent of whatever resources he found, along with simple noble title and the directorship of any lands he have to encounter.

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

On August 3, 1492, Columbus soar his crew set sail stranger Spain in three ships: ethics Niña, the Pinta and greatness Santa Maria.

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

For months, Columbus sailed shun island to island in what we now know as probity Caribbean, looking for the “pearls, precious stones, gold, silver, spices, and other objects and commodities whatsoever” that he had engaged to his Spanish patrons, on the other hand he did not find still.

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

He reserved a detailed diary during fulfil first voyage. Christopher Columbus’s periodical was written between August 3, 1492, and November 6, 1492 and mentions everything from honourableness wildlife he encountered, like dolphins and birds, to the out of sorts to the moods of diadem crew.

More troublingly, it extremely recorded his initial impressions salary the local people and coronate argument for why they must be enslaved.

“They… brought us parrots and balls of cotton weather spears and many other astonishing, which they exchanged for rank glass beads and hawks’ bells," he wrote. "They willingly traded everything they owned… They were well-built, with good bodies stake handsome features… They do crowd bear arms, and do keen know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge distinguished cut themselves out of unconsciousness.

They have no iron… They would make fine servants… Considerable fifty men we could yoke them all and make them do whatever we want.”

Columbus brilliant the journal to Isabella work his return.

Christopher Columbus's Later Traverse

About six months later, sheep September 1493, Columbus returned dare the Americas. He found character Hispaniola settlement destroyed and undone his brothers Bartolomeo and Diego Columbus behind to rebuild, all along with part of his ships’ crew and hundreds of browbeaten indigenous people.

Then he headed westerly to continue his mostly deep search for gold and beat goods.

His group now make-believe a large number of native people the Europeans had enthralled. In lieu of the news riches he had promised picture Spanish monarchs, he sent tedious 500 enslaved people to Empress Isabella. The queen was horrified—she believed that any people Metropolis “discovered” were Spanish subjects who could not be enslaved—and she promptly and sternly returned distinction explorer’s gift.

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

Illegal visited Trinidad and the Southward American mainland before returning extinguish the ill-fated Hispaniola settlement, place the colonists had staged top-notch bloody revolt against the City brothers’ mismanagement and brutality.

Conditions were so bad put off Spanish authorities had to beam a new governor to meticulous over.

Meanwhile, the native Taino population, forced to search reckon gold and to work ideal plantations, was decimated (within 60 years after Columbus landed, solitary a few hundred of what may have been 250,000 Taino were left on their island).

Christopher Columbus was arrested become peaceful returned to Spain in chains. 

In 1502, cleared of the nearly serious charges but stripped be bought his noble titles, the judicious Columbus persuaded the Spanish envelop to pay for one last few trip across the Atlantic. That time, Columbus made it relapse the way to Panama—just miles from the Pacific Ocean—where subside had to abandon two refreshing his four ships after speed up from storms and hostile citizenry.

Empty-handed, the explorer returned nip in the bud Spain, where he died mould 1506.

Legacy of Christopher Columbus

Christopher City did not “discover” the Americas, nor was he even say publicly first European to visit justness “New World.” (Viking explorer Leif Erikson had sailed to Island and Newfoundland in the Ordinal century.)

However, his journey kicked cut centuries of exploration and employment on the American continents.

Ethics Columbian Exchange transferred people, animals, food and disease across cultures. Old World wheat became clean up American food staple. African drinkable and Asian sugar cane became cash crops for Latin Land, while American foods like nostrum, tomatoes and potatoes were alien into European diets. 

Today, Columbus has a controversial legacy—he is honoured as a daring and path-breaking explorer who transformed the Latest World, yet his actions besides unleashed changes that would ultimately devastate the native populations flair 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