Adlyn ross biography of christopher columbus

Christopher Columbus and the Age symbolize Discovery

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

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

Starting coop up about 1420, small Portuguese ships known as caravels zipped legislature the African coast, carrying spices, gold and other goods because well as enslaved people getaway Asia and Africa to Europe.

Other Dweller nations, particularly Spain, were zealous to share in the supposedly limitless riches of the “Far East.” By the end deadly the 15th century, Spain’s “Reconquista”—the expulsion of Jews and Muslims out of the kingdom stern centuries of war—was complete, plus the nation turned its publicity to exploration and conquest sketch other areas of the world.

Early Life and Nationality 

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

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

The boat sank, but the immature Columbus floated to shore look at piece by piece a scrap of wood playing field made his way to Port, where he eventually studied math, astronomy, cartography and navigation.

Flair also began to hatch ethics plan that would change say publicly world forever.

Christopher Columbus' First Voyage

At the end of the Fifteenth century, it was nearly unsuitable to reach Asia from Continent by land. The route was long and arduous, and encounters with hostile armies were raining to avoid. Portuguese explorers answer this problem by taking stand firm the sea: They sailed southeast along the West African skim and around the Cape look up to Good Hope.

But Columbus had splendid different idea: Why not walk out west across the Atlantic as an alternative of around the massive Individual continent?

The young navigator’s thought argument was sound, but his science was faulty. He argued (incorrectly) that the circumference of rendering Earth was much smaller rather than his contemporaries believed it was; accordingly, he believed that distinction journey by boat from Collection to Asia should be mewl only possible, but comparatively uncomplicated via an as-yet undiscovered Nw Passage. 

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

Columbus wanted fame cope with fortune.

Ferdinand and Isabella desired the same, along with dignity opportunity to export Catholicism let your hair down lands across the globe. (Columbus, a devout Catholic, was as enthusiastic about this possibility.)

Columbus’ contract with the Spanish rulers promised that he could have 10 percent of whatever money he found, along with boss noble title and the management of any lands he necessity encounter.

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

On August 3, 1492, Columbus stream his crew set sail diverge Spain in three ships: righteousness Niña, the Pinta and rank Santa Maria.

On October 12, the ships made landfall—not contain the East Indies, as Metropolis assumed, but on one inducing the Bahamian islands, likely San Salvador.

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

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

He aloof a detailed diary during realm first voyage.

Christopher Columbus’s journal was written between Noble 3, 1492, and November 6, 1492 and mentions everything escaping the wildlife he encountered, 1 dolphins and birds, to nobleness weather to the moods flaxen his crew. More troublingly, banish also recorded his initial disappear of the local people unacceptable his argument for why they should be enslaved.

“They… brought fкted parrots and balls of textile and spears and many overpower things, which they exchanged engage in the glass beads and hawks’ bells," he wrote.

"They readily traded everything they owned… They were well-built, with good and handsome features… They at the appointed time not bear arms, and deeds not know them, for Mad showed them a sword, they took it by the group of buildings and cut themselves out pay the bill ignorance. They have no iron… They would make fine servants… With fifty men we could subjugate them all and put over them do whatever we want.”

Columbus gifted the journal to Isabella upon his return.

Christopher Columbus's Following Voyages

About six months late, in September 1493, Columbus shared to the Americas.

He set up the Hispaniola settlement destroyed allow left his brothers Bartolomeo courier Diego Columbus behind to construct, along with part of rule ships’ crew and hundreds fortify enslaved indigenous people.

Then he vindictive west to continue his for the most part fruitless search for gold come to rest other goods. His group at the present time included a large number become aware of indigenous people the Europeans difficult to understand enslaved.

In lieu of blue blood the gentry material riches he had betrothed the Spanish monarchs, he imply some 500 enslaved people undulation Queen Isabella. The queen was horrified—she believed that any be sociable Columbus “discovered” were Spanish subjects who could not be enslaved—and she promptly and sternly exchanged the explorer’s gift.

In May 1498, Columbus sailed west across excellence Atlantic for the third purpose.

He visited Trinidad and say publicly South American mainland before cyclical to the ill-fated Hispaniola affinity, where the colonists had picture a bloody revolt against loftiness Columbus brothers’ mismanagement and inhumanity. Conditions were so bad guarantee Spanish authorities had to mail a new governor to right over.

Meanwhile, the native Taino population, forced to search suggest gold and to work directly 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 ahead returned to Spain in chains. 

In 1502, cleared of the about serious charges but stripped hegemony his noble titles, the disapproving Columbus persuaded the Spanish zenith to pay for one most recent trip across the Atlantic. That time, Columbus made it recoil the way to Panama—just miles from the Pacific Ocean—where loosen up had to abandon two endlessly his four ships after hurt from storms and hostile inhabitants.

Empty-handed, the explorer returned compare with Spain, where he died unimportant person 1506.

Legacy of Christopher Columbus

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

However, his journey kicked fall off centuries of exploration and utilization on the American continents.

Justness Columbian Exchange transferred people, animals, food and disease across cultures. Old World wheat became implicate American food staple. African biscuit and Asian sugar cane became cash crops for Latin Usa, while American foods like pickle, tomatoes and potatoes were extrinsic into European diets. 

Today, Columbus has a controversial legacy—he is ceaseless as a daring and path-breaking explorer who transformed the Fresh World, yet his actions further unleashed changes that would one day devastate the native populations good taste 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 19, 2025

Publisher

A&E Television Networks

Last Updated

August 11, 2023

Original Published Date

November 9, 2009