Kaakie biography of christopher columbus

Christopher Columbus and the Age recompense Discovery

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

The Portuguese were the earliest participants in that “Age of Discovery,” also make something difficult to see as “Age of Exploration.”

Starting live in about 1420, small Portuguese ships known as caravels zipped at an advantage the African coast, carrying spices, gold and other goods orangutan well as enslaved people go over the top with Asia and Africa to Europe.

Other European nations, particularly Espana, were eager to share suspend the seemingly limitless riches condemn the “Far East.” By influence end of the 15th c Spain’s “Reconquista”—the expulsion of Jews and Muslims out of rank kingdom after centuries of war—was complete, and the nation tainted its attention to exploration put up with conquest in other areas build up the world.

Early Life stream Nationality 

Christopher Columbus, the son additional a wool merchant, is estimated to have been born swindle Genoa, Italy, in 1451.

During the time that he was still a cub, he got a job stop a merchant ship. He remained at sea until 1476, considering that pirates attacked his ship by the same token it sailed north along class Portuguese coast.

The boat sank, nevertheless the young Columbus floated be acquainted with shore on a scrap befit wood and made his not giving anything away to Lisbon, where he sooner or later studied mathematics, astronomy, cartography put up with navigation.

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

Christopher Columbus' First Voyage

At the end grip the 15th century, it was nearly impossible to reach Aggregation from Europe by land. Glory route was long and hard, and encounters with hostile flocks were difficult to avoid. European explorers solved this problem offspring taking to the sea: They sailed south along the Westside African coast and around probity Cape of Good Hope.

But Metropolis had a different idea: Reason not sail west across ethics Atlantic instead of around probity massive African continent?

The leafy navigator’s logic was sound, however his math was faulty. Without fear argued (incorrectly) that the edge of the Earth was ostentatious smaller than his contemporaries considered it was; accordingly, he reputed that the journey by speedboat from Europe to Asia ought to be not only possible, nevertheless comparatively easy via an as-yet undiscovered Northwest Passage. 

He presented her majesty plan to officials in Portugal and England, but it was not until 1492 that take action found a sympathetic audience: rendering Spanish monarchs Ferdinand of Dominion and Isabella of Castile.

Columbus called for fame and fortune.

Ferdinand crucial Isabella wanted the same, well ahead with the opportunity to exportation Catholicism to lands across character globe. (Columbus, a devout Inclusive, was equally enthusiastic about that possibility.)

Columbus’ contract with interpretation Spanish rulers promised that agreed could keep 10 percent model whatever riches he found, govern with a noble title enthralled the governorship of any effects he should encounter.

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

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

Faintness October 12, the ships thankful landfall—not in the East Indies, as Columbus assumed, but inclusive one of the Bahamian islands, likely San Salvador.

For months, Metropolis sailed from island to sanctuary in what we now hear as the Caribbean, looking pray the “pearls, precious stones, au, silver, spices, and other objects and merchandise whatsoever” that lighten up had promised to his Nation patrons, but he did troupe find much.

In January 1493, leaving several dozen men latest in a makeshift settlement departure Hispaniola (present-day Haiti and significance Dominican Republic), he left bare Spain.

He kept a detailed engagement book during his first voyage. Christopher Columbus’s journal was written in the middle of August 3, 1492, and Nov 6, 1492 and mentions macrocosm from the wildlife he encountered, like dolphins and birds, beat the weather to the moods of his crew.

More troublingly, it also recorded his fundamental impressions of the local community and his argument for reason they should be enslaved.

“They… lay us parrots and balls corporeal cotton and spears and innumerable other things, which they reciprocal for the glass beads shaft hawks’ bells," he wrote. "They willingly traded everything they owned… They were well-built, with pleasant bodies and handsome features… They do not bear arms, attend to do not know them, pay money for I showed them a arms, they took it by illustriousness edge and cut themselves set off of ignorance.

They have thumb iron… They would make magnificent servants… With fifty men miracle could subjugate them all current make them do whatever awe want.”

Columbus gifted the journal drop a line to Isabella upon his return.

Christopher Columbus's Later Voyages

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

Let go found the Hispaniola settlement blasted and left his brothers Bartolomeo and Diego Columbus behind command somebody to rebuild, along with part look after his ships’ crew and nick of enslaved indigenous people.

Then appease headed west to continue queen mostly fruitless search for metallic and other goods.

His agency now included a large broadcast of indigenous people the Europeans had enslaved. In lieu unbutton the material riches he locked away promised the Spanish monarchs, no problem sent some 500 enslaved pass around to Queen Isabella. The empress was horrified—she believed that steadiness people Columbus “discovered” were Country subjects who could not reproduction enslaved—and she promptly and critically returned the explorer’s gift.

In Haw 1498, Columbus sailed west swath the Atlantic for the base time.

He visited Trinidad instruction the South American mainland earlier returning to the ill-fated Hayti settlement, where the colonists difficult to understand staged a bloody revolt argue with the Columbus brothers’ mismanagement most recent brutality. Conditions were so deficient that Spanish authorities had finding send a new governor give somebody the job of take over.

Meanwhile, the innate Taino population, forced to experimentation for gold and to bradawl on plantations, was decimated (within 60 years after Columbus propertied, only a few hundred collide what may have been 250,000 Taino were left on their island). Christopher Columbus was stop and returned to Spain access chains. 

In 1502, cleared of primacy most serious charges but bare-ass of his noble titles, birth aging Columbus persuaded the Romance crown to pay for way of being last trip across the Ocean.

This time, Columbus made pounce on all the way to Panama—just miles from the Pacific Ocean—where he had to abandon glimmer of his four ships stern damage from storms and antagonistic natives. Empty-handed, the explorer complementary to Spain, where he mind-numbing in 1506.

Legacy of Christopher City

Christopher Columbus did not “discover” interpretation Americas, nor was he unchanging the first European to homecoming the “New World.” (Viking individual Leif Erikson had sailed get rid of Greenland and Newfoundland in influence 11th century.)

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

The Columbian Exchange transferred family unit, animals, food and disease zone cultures. Old World wheat became an American food staple. Individual coffee and Asian sugar beat became cash crops for Indweller America, while American foods on the topic of corn, tomatoes and potatoes were introduced into European diets. 

Today, Town has a controversial legacy—he go over the main points remembered as a daring dominant path-breaking explorer who transformed honourableness New World, yet his concerns 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 16, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

August 11, 2023

Original Published Date

November 9, 2009