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THE FOUR EXPLORATIONS OF |
"The greatest event in world
history, excepting the birth and death of Christ..." |
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Perhaps the most famous explorer was Christopher Columbus.
Born in Genoa, Italy, in 1451 to a weaver, young Columbus first
went to sea at the age of fourteen. Shipwrecked near the Portuguese coast
in 1476, he made his way to great port City of Lisbon, where his
younger brother, Bartholomew was an expert chart maker. As a young
man, he settled in Portugal and married a woman of noble background,
Dona Felipa, who died soon after his son, Diego, was born (c.1480). In
1485, Columbus and his young son
Diego
moved to Spain.
Like most learned men of his time, Columbus knew the world was round and shared the theory that a ship could eventually reach the Far East from the opposite direction. Mapmakers had no knowledge of North and South America or the Pacific Ocean. They did accept Marco Polo's erroneous location for Japan--2,400 km (1,500 mi) east of China -- and Ptolemy's underestimation of the circumference of the Earth and overestimation of the size of the Eurasian landmass. Columbus believed that Japan was about 4,800 km (3,000 mi) to the west of Portugal --a distance that could be sailed in existing vessels. Engaged as a sugar buyer in the Portuguese islands off the west coast of Africa by a Genoese mercantile firm, he met pilots and navigators who believed in the existence of islands farther west.
Thus Columbus was but one among many who believed one could reach land by sailing west. His uniqueness lay rather in the persistence of his dream and his determination to realize this “Enterprise of the Indies,” as he called his plan.
By the 1400s, the passages to the East were denied to the Christian West by the Muslims who controlled the main overland routes to the Orient. Bandits, desert heat and sand storms, as well as other hazards eventually made Europe's alternate overland routes too dangerous and expensive. A new route, by sea, was the challenge.
For a decade, Columbus approached the Portuguese king and the Spanish monarchs to obtain a grant to explore possible trade routes to the west.
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| Contrary to many stories, Queen Isabella did not have to pawn her jewelry to finance the expedition |
By the late 13th century, the Spanish Christian kingdoms of Castile and Aragon had reconquered most of the Muslim-controlled territory. In 1479 the two kingdoms were united as a result of the marriage of Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella of Castile. The last Muslim kingdom, Granada, was reconquered in 1492.
After turning him down many times, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella reconsidered as Columbus was preparing to take his enterprise to France. Columbus promised to bring back gold, spices, and silks from the Far East, to spread Christianity, and to lead an expedition to China. Contrary to popular belief, the Queen did not have to sell any jewelry to fund the exhibition.
The voyage was financed in part by a syndicate of seven noble Genovese bankers resident in Seville (the group was linked to Américo Vespucci, who managed funds belonging to Lorenzo di Pier Francesco de Medici ). The shipbuilding family from Palos, the Pinzons, besides fulfilling a town obligation to the crown by providing two ships, were also obligated by Columbus to put up a 1/8 share.
1st
Voyage 
Only 90 men made the first voyage of discovery from Palos Spain.
The ships were quite tiny by modern standards -- no longer than a tennis
court, and less than 30 feet wide. The Santa Maria had 40 men
aboard, the Pinta, 26, and the Nina, 24. The Nina
was captained by Martin Alonzo Pinzon. The Pinta, a was captained
by Pinzon's brother, Vicente Yanez. Columbus' flagship, the Santa Maria,
was a large nao with a round hull compared to the lightly
built caravels with narrow hulls. The Santa Maria was slow and unwieldy
during the long ocean voyage.
Early on the morning of October 12th land was indeed sighted, and a landing party arrived on an island in the Bahamas and named it San Salvador. It had been thirty-three days since the three ships had left the Canary Islands, off the Atlantic coast of Africa. The natives must have been surprised to hear that their island now belonged to Spain. Over the next few weeks landings were also made on Cuba, named Juana by Columbus, and Española, now known as Hispaniola and shared by the Dominican Republic and Haiti.
Martin Pinzon was unwilling to acknowledge Columbus' authority during the famous voyage. On 21 November, 1492, he deserted Columbus off Cuba, hoping to be the first to discover the imaginary golden island of Osabeque. He was the first to discover Haiti (Hispaniola), and the river where he landed (now the Porto Caballo) was long called after him the River of Martin Alonso. He carried off thence four men and two girls, intending to steal them as slaves, but he was compelled to restore them to their homes by Columbus, whom he rejoined on the coast of Haiti on 6 January, 1493.
Columbus' ships covered approximately 150 miles a day. His seafaring instincts were extraordinary. Columbus, relied on "dead reckoning," which used not only navigational instruments but also experience, intuition, observations, and guesswork to determine his ships' positions
Christopher Columbus departed Spain on September 25, 1493, on his second voyage to the New World. 17 assorted vessels and over 1200 men made up "The Grand Fleet" in an attempt to establish a permanent Spanish colony. His destination was La Navidad, off the north coast of Haiti, where, during his first voyage he had left 39 men in a fortress built from the wreckage of the Santa Maria. Arriving nearly two months later, on November 28, 1493, Columbus found the makeshift fortress burned and all his men dead, probably killed by the fierce Carib Indians who often raided coastal settlements.
During his second voyage, Columbus was told by the Indians of
Espanola (Haiti), that Black people had been to the island before his
arrival. 
"there had come to Hispaniola people who have the tops of their
spears made of a metal which they call quanin, of which he had sent
samples to the Sovereigns to have them assayed, when it was found that of
32 parts, 18 were gold, six of silver and eight of copper." These
spears, sent back to Spain on a mail boat, were identical to the
proportion then being forged in African Guinea.
Columbus during a stopover in the Canary Islands on the first voyage.
The Libro de Armadas in the Archivo Generale de Indias in
Seville mentioned that the ship carried 10 breech-loading swivel guns,
called bombardas. The Nina made 4 more voyages to the new
world after the 1492/93 trip. The original Captain, during the first
voyage, was Vincente Yanez Pinzon, but after the loss of the Santa Maria,
Columbus became the captain. Vincente
Yanez later discovered the Amazon on an independent voyage. Her
given name was 'Santa Clara'
but was always called 'Nina', after her master-owner Juan Nino of
Moguer. She was with Colombus on his second and
third voyage, and carried some cargo to Espagnola/Hispagnola on two other
occasions. In 1499, the historical caravel was sold.
Carnaval
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