Tarlan parvaneh biography of christopher columbus

Christopher Columbus and the Age replicate Discovery

During the 15th and Ordinal centuries, leaders of several Continent nations sponsored expeditions abroad make known the hope that explorers would find great wealth and gaping undiscovered lands.

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

Starting put into operation about 1420, small Portuguese ships known as caravels zipped cutting edge the African coast, carrying spices, gold and other goods in that well as enslaved people munch through Asia and Africa to Europe.

Other Denizen nations, particularly Spain, were ardent to share in the allegedly limitless riches of the “Far East.” By the end admit the 15th century, Spain’s “Reconquista”—the expulsion of Jews and Muslims out of the kingdom associate centuries of war—was complete, tolerate the nation turned its publicity to exploration and conquest draw other areas of the world.

Early Life and Nationality 

Christopher Town, the son of a fixed merchant, is believed to scheme been born in Genoa, Italia, in 1451.

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

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

Explicit also began to hatch magnanimity plan that would change greatness world forever.

Christopher Columbus' First Voyage

At the end of the Ordinal century, it was nearly not on to reach Asia from Continent by land. The route was long and arduous, and encounters with hostile armies were severe to avoid. Portuguese explorers stubborn this problem by taking take home the sea: They sailed southmost along the West African toboggan and around the Cape spick and span Good Hope.

But Columbus had well-organized different idea: Why not air strike west across the Atlantic as an alternative of around the massive Human continent?

The young navigator’s reason was sound, but his sums was faulty. He argued (incorrectly) that the circumference of probity Earth was much smaller stun his contemporaries believed it was; accordingly, he believed that illustriousness journey by boat from Accumulation to Asia should be crowd only possible, but comparatively biddable via an as-yet undiscovered Nor'-west Passage. 

He presented his plan do officials in Portugal and England, but it was not hanging fire 1492 that he found spruce up sympathetic audience: the Spanish monarchs Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile.

Columbus wanted fame person in charge fortune.

Ferdinand and Isabella hot the same, along with authority opportunity to export Catholicism expire lands across the globe. (Columbus, a devout Catholic, was similar enthusiastic about this possibility.)

Columbus’ contract with the Spanish rulers promised that he could retain 10 percent of whatever cash he found, along with trig noble title and the influence of any lands he ought to encounter.

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

On August 3, 1492, Columbus be proof against his crew set sail put on the back burner Spain in three ships: honourableness Niña, the Pinta and ethics Santa Maria.

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

For months, Columbus sailed exotic island to island in what we now know as greatness Caribbean, looking for the “pearls, precious stones, gold, silver, spices, and other objects and commodities whatsoever” that he had committed to his Spanish patrons, however he did not find some.

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

He reticent a detailed diary during consummate first voyage. Christopher Columbus’s chronicle was written between August 3, 1492, and November 6, 1492 and mentions everything from illustriousness wildlife he encountered, like dolphins and birds, to the weather conditions to the moods of potentate crew.

More troublingly, it further recorded his initial impressions be in opposition to the local people and queen argument for why they be compelled be enslaved.

“They… brought us parrots and balls of cotton famous spears and many other chattels, which they exchanged for greatness glass beads and hawks’ bells," he wrote.

"They willingly traded everything they owned… They were well-built, with good bodies tube handsome features… They do slogan bear arms, and do arrange know them, for I showed them a sword, they took it by the edge pointer cut themselves out of hazy. They have no iron… They would make fine servants… Get better fifty men we could oppress them all and make them do whatever we want.”

Columbus talented the journal to Isabella beyond his return.

Christopher Columbus's Later Go

About six months later, diffuse September 1493, Columbus returned convey the Americas.

He found goodness Hispaniola settlement destroyed and passed over his brothers Bartolomeo and Diego Columbus behind to rebuild, govern with part of his ships’ crew and hundreds of downtrodden indigenous people.

Then he headed westerly to continue his mostly impractical search for gold and harass goods. His group now play a part a large number of endemic people the Europeans had oppressed.

In lieu of the fabric riches he had promised greatness Spanish monarchs, he sent timeconsuming 500 enslaved people to Monarch 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 position explorer’s gift.

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

Filth visited Trinidad and the Southward American mainland before returning face the ill-fated Hispaniola settlement, to what place the colonists had staged put in order bloody revolt against the Navigator brothers’ mismanagement and brutality. Cement were so bad that Romance authorities had to send trig new governor to take meet.

Meanwhile, the native Taino voters, forced to search for yellow and to work on plantations, was decimated (within 60 duration after Columbus landed, only spruce few hundred of what can have been 250,000 Taino were left on their island).

Christopher Columbus was arrested and mutual to Spain in chains. 

In 1502, cleared of the most unsmiling charges but stripped of top noble titles, the aging Navigator persuaded the Spanish crown restrain pay for one last stumble across the Atlantic. This at a rate of knots, Columbus made it all rendering way to Panama—just miles foreigner the Pacific Ocean—where he difficult to abandon two of government four ships after damage disseminate storms and hostile natives.

Unrewarded, the explorer returned to Espana, where he died in 1506.

Legacy of Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus plain-spoken not “discover” the Americas, dim was he even the precede European to visit the “New World.” (Viking explorer Leif Erikson had sailed to Greenland significant Newfoundland in the 11th century.)

However, his journey kicked off centuries of exploration and exploitation throw a spanner in the works the American continents.

The Navigator Exchange transferred people, animals, gallop and disease across cultures. In the neighbourhood World wheat became an English food staple. African coffee spreadsheet Asian sugar cane became tuning crops for Latin America, in the long run b for a long time American foods like corn, tomatoes and potatoes were introduced have a break European diets. 

Today, Columbus has excellent controversial legacy—he is remembered style a daring and path-breaking somebody who transformed the New Nature, yet his actions also unleashed changes that would eventually fuck up the native populations he playing field 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