Volume 12 , Issue 41

This Day In History - 12 October

Just celebrating a three-day weekend in honor of Columbus Day, we find it appropriate to bring you some insight into Columbus' sailing across the Atlantic Ocean.

This Italian explorer, Christopher Columbus, sighted a Bahamian island, believing he had reached East Asia. His expedition went ashore the same day and claimed the land for Isabella and Ferdinand of Spain, who sponsored his attempt to find a western ocean route to China, India, and the fabled gold and spice islands of Asia.

Columbus was born in Genoa, Italy, in 1451. He worked as a seaman and then a maritime entrepreneur. He became obsessed with the possibility of pioneering a western sea route to Cathay (China), India, and the gold and spice islands of Asia. At the time, Europeans knew no direct sea route to southern Asia, and the route via Egypt and the Red Sea was closed to Europeans by the Ottoman Empire, as were many land routes.

Contrary to popular legend, educated Europeans of Columbus' day did believe that the world was round, as argued by St. Isidore in the seventh century. However, Columbus, and most others, underestimated the world's size, calculating that East Asia must lie approximately where North America sits on the globe. They did not yet know that the Pacific Ocean existed.

Columbus thought, with only the Atlantic Ocean lying between Europe and the riches of the East Indies, he met with King John II of Portugal and tried to persuade him to back his "Enterprise of the Indies," as he called his plan.

Columbus was rebuffed and went to Spain, where he was also rejected at least twice by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella. However, after the Spanish conquest of the Moorish kingdom of Granada in January 1492, the Spanish monarchs, flush with victory, agreed to support his voyage.   |  View or Add Comments (0 Comments)   |   Receive updates ( subscribers)  |   Unsubscribe

---