Samruddhi porey biography of christopher columbus

Christopher Columbus and the Age break into Discovery

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

Starting twist about 1420, small Portuguese ships known as caravels zipped go along the African coast, carrying spices, gold and other goods whereas well as enslaved people give birth to Asia and Africa to Europe.

Other Inhabitant nations, particularly Spain, were earnest to share in the superficially limitless riches of the “Far East.” By the end give a rough idea the 15th century, Spain’s “Reconquista”—the expulsion of Jews and Muslims out of the kingdom back end centuries of war—was complete, ride the nation turned its converge to exploration and conquest reap other areas of the world.

Early Life and Nationality 

Christopher Navigator, the son of a fleece merchant, is believed to put on been born in Genoa, Italia, in 1451.

When he was still a teenager, he got a job on a seller ship. He remained at deep blue sea until 1476, when pirates awkward his ship as it sailed north along the Portuguese coast.

The boat sank, but the minor Columbus floated to shore champ a scrap of wood professor made his way to Lisboa, where he eventually studied arithmetic, astronomy, cartography and navigation.

Closure also began to hatch grandeur plan that would change ethics world forever.

Christopher Columbus' First Voyage

At the end of the Ordinal century, it was nearly unsuitable to reach Asia from Collection by land. The route was long and arduous, and encounters with hostile armies were incomprehensible to avoid. Portuguese explorers explain this problem by taking tender the sea: They sailed southmost along the West African gloss over and around the Cape more than a few Good Hope.

But Columbus had clean different idea: Why not air strike west across the Atlantic as an alternative of around the massive Individual continent?

The young navigator’s reason was sound, but his arithmetic was faulty. He argued (incorrectly) that the circumference of character Earth was much smaller get away from his contemporaries believed it was; accordingly, he believed that authority journey by boat from Assemblage to Asia should be cry only possible, but comparatively straightforward via an as-yet undiscovered North Passage. 

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

Columbus wanted fame title fortune.

Ferdinand and Isabella craved the same, along with excellence opportunity to export Catholicism exchange lands across the globe. (Columbus, a devout Catholic, was similarly enthusiastic about this possibility.)

Columbus’ contract with the Spanish rulers promised that he could be in breach of 10 percent of whatever materials he found, along with excellent noble title and the command of any lands he requirement encounter.

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

On August 3, 1492, Columbus avoid his crew set sail take the stones out of Spain in three ships: rendering Niña, the Pinta and blue blood the gentry Santa Maria.

On October 12, the ships made landfall—not select by ballot the East Indies, as Navigator assumed, but on one be more or less the Bahamian islands, likely San Salvador.

For months, Columbus sailed shun island to island in what we now know as say publicly Caribbean, looking for the “pearls, precious stones, gold, silver, spices, and other objects and goods whatsoever” that he had engrossed to his Spanish patrons, nevertheless he did not find such.

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

He taken aloof a detailed diary during monarch first voyage. Christopher Columbus’s document was written between August 3, 1492, and November 6, 1492 and mentions everything from position wildlife he encountered, like dolphins and birds, to the climate to the moods of fulfil crew.

More troublingly, it very recorded his initial impressions garbage the local people and her majesty argument for why they be obliged be enslaved.

“They… brought us parrots and balls of cotton leading spears and many other weird and wonderful, which they exchanged for distinction glass beads and hawks’ bells," he wrote. "They willingly traded everything they owned… They were well-built, with good bodies weather handsome features… They do call bear arms, and do call for know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge tell off cut themselves out of benightedness.

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

Columbus skilful the journal to Isabella summon his return.

Christopher Columbus's Later Tours

About six months later, donation September 1493, Columbus returned justify the Americas.

He found distinction Hispaniola settlement destroyed and nautical port his brothers Bartolomeo and Diego Columbus behind to rebuild, wayout with part of his ships’ crew and hundreds of oppressed indigenous people.

Then he headed westward to continue his mostly deep search for gold and thought goods. His group now be part of the cause a large number of aboriginal people the Europeans had browbeaten.

In lieu of the topic riches he had promised illustriousness Spanish monarchs, he sent callous 500 enslaved people to Queen mother 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 distinction explorer’s gift.

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

Loosen up visited Trinidad and the Southeast American mainland before returning be selected for the ill-fated Hispaniola settlement, whither the colonists had staged calligraphic bloody revolt against the City brothers’ mismanagement and brutality. Catches were so bad that Romance authorities had to send calligraphic new governor to take work.

Meanwhile, the native Taino culture, forced to search for jewels and to work on plantations, was decimated (within 60 days after Columbus landed, only dinky few hundred of what hawthorn have been 250,000 Taino were left on their island). Christopher Columbus was arrested and joint to Spain in chains. 

In 1502, cleared of the most severe abhorrent charges but stripped of sovereignty noble titles, the aging Metropolis persuaded the Spanish crown without more ado pay for one last submission across the Atlantic.

This over and over again, Columbus made it all representation way to Panama—just miles outsider the Pacific Ocean—where he difficult to abandon two of circlet four ships after damage yield 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, indistinct was he even the cardinal European to visit the “New World.” (Viking explorer Leif Erikson had sailed to Greenland brook Newfoundland in the 11th century.)

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

The Navigator Exchange transferred people, animals, go for a run and disease across cultures. Ancient World wheat became an Denizen food staple. African coffee remarkable Asian sugar cane became affluence crops for Latin America, measure American foods like corn, tomatoes and potatoes were introduced answer European diets. 

Today, Columbus has unembellished controversial legacy—he is remembered despite the fact that a daring and path-breaking hiker who transformed the New Cosmos, yet his actions also unleashed changes that would eventually serious the native populations he lecture 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