used a Latinized form of Vespucci’s first name to label the region Amerigo Vespucci had explored.
The Least You Need to Know
Columbus was hardly unique in believing the earth to be round. However, he did set sail and persuade a crew that they would not fall off the edge of a flat world.
Despite the Native Americans’ friendly overtures, the Spanish attacked and suffered retaliation. This inaugurated four hundred years of white-Indian warfare in the Americas.
Columbus derived little benefit from his four voyages; even the land mass he discovered, America, was named for a later explorer, Amerigo Vespucci.
Stats
For your information, the actual circumference of the earth at the equator is 24,902 miles. The distance from the Spanish coast to the Bahamas, via the route Columbus took, is about 3,900 miles.
Voice from the Past
The letter of Christopher Columbus to Luis de Santangel, February 15, 1493:
Sir—
As I know you will be rejoiced at the glorious success that our Lord has given me in my voyage, I write this to tell you how in thirty-three days I sailed to the Indies with the fleet that the illustrious King and Queen, our Sovereigns, gave me, where I discovered a great many islands, inhabited by numberless people; and of all I have taken possession for their Highnesses by proclamation and display of the Royal Standard without opposition.
The land there is elevated, with many mountains and peaks. They are most beautiful, of a thousand varied forms, accessible, and full of trees of endless varieties, so high that they seem to touch the sky, and I have been told that they never lose their foliage. I saw them as green and lovely as trees are in Spain in the month of May. Some of them were covered with blossoms, some with fruit, and some in other conditions, according to their kind. The nightingale and other small birds of a thousand kinds were singing in the month of November when I was there. There were palm trees of six or eight varieties, the graceful peculiarities of each one of them being worthy of admiration as are the other trees, fruits and grasses. There are wonderful pine woods, and very extensive ranges of meadow land. There is honey, and there are many kinds of birds, and a great variety of fruits. Inland there are numerous mines of metals and innumerable people.
Hispaniola is a marvel. Its hills and mountains, fine plains and open country, are rich and fertile for planting and for pasturage, and for building towns and villages. There are many spices and vast mines of gold and other metals in this island. They have no iron, nor steel, nor weapons, nor are they fit for them, because although they are well-made men of commanding stature, they appear extraordinarily timid. The only arms they have are sticks of cane, cut when in seed, with a sharpened stick at the end, and they are afraid to use these.
New Spain, Same Old Spaniards
(1400-1600s)
In the wake of Columbus, the Portuguese scrambled to launch a series of expeditions, including that of Amerigo Vespucci and, in 1500, an expedition to India led by Pedro Alvares Cabral. To put it mildly, Cabral went wide in the South Atlantic and ended up in Brazil.
Yet another Portuguese, Ferdinand Magellan, sailed not under the flag of his native country, but on commission from Spain, charged with proving that the aptly named Spice Islands lay on the Spanish side of the line of demarcation established by the Treaty of Tordesillas.
Magellan sailed west in 1519, found the Strait of Magellan separating the southern tip of South America from Tierra del Fuego, and crossed the Strait into the Pacific. That ocean had been discovered on September 25 or 27, 1513, by Vasco Nunez de Balboa, but it was Magellan who named it. Magellan explored the Philippine Islands and even persuaded the ruler of Cebu, one of the islands, to accept Christianity. That soon embroiled Magellan in a local war, however; and on April 27, 1521, he was killed by natives on Mactan Island. One of Magellan’s captains, Juan Sebastian del Cano, brought his ship, the Victoria, back to Spain, thereby completing (in 1522) the first circumnavigation of the globe.
The voyages of Spain, as well as those of Portugal, were undertaken not for the sake of exploration, but for the purpose of conquest and colonization-and also to convert the “heathen” New World to the cause of Christ. Accordingly, two classes, of professionals were represented among the early Spanish explorers: conquistadors (“conquerors”) and priests.
The Way of the Conquistador
