Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus was an Italian explorer and navigator from the Republic of Genoa who completed four Spanish transatlantic voyages for the Catholic Monarchs. His journeys in the late 15th century led to the first known European contact with the Caribbean, Central America, and South America, opening the way for widespread European exploration and colonization of the Americas.

Growing up near the coast of Liguria, Columbus learned to sail at a young age and traveled far and wide. He later married and had a son, and developed a plan to find a western sea route to the East Indies to access valuable goods like spices. With support from Queen Isabella I and King Ferdinand II, he set sail in 1492 and reached an island in The Bahamas that the native people called Guanahani.

Columbus made three more voyages, exploring more of the Caribbean and the coasts of Central and South America. His expeditions began a long period of European involvement in the Americas, leading to major changes for the people already living there. The exchange of plants, animals, and ideas between Europe and the Americas that followed his voyages is known as the Columbian exchange.

Early life

Further information: Origin theories of Christopher Columbus

Most scholars believe Christopher Columbus was born in the Republic of Genoa between 25 August and 31 October 1451. His father, Domenico Colombo, was a wool weaver, and his mother was Susanna Fontanarossa. Columbus had three brothers—Bartholomew, Giovanni Pellegrino, and Giacomo—and a sister named Bianchinetta. Bartholomew worked in a cartography workshop in Lisbon.

Columbus began working for wealthy Genoese families in 1473. He travelled to places like the Greek island Chios and may have visited Bristol, England, and Galway, Ireland. In 1478, he married Felipa Perestrello e Moniz on the island of Porto Santo, and they had a son named Diego. After Felipa passed away, Columbus moved to Castile and had another son, Fernando Columbus, with Beatriz Enríquez de Arana. He studied many books about geography and history, which helped shape his later voyages.

Quest for Asia

During the time of the Mongol Empire, Europeans used the Silk Road to reach places like India, China, and Maritime Southeast Asia for valuable goods. However, when the Ottoman Empire captured Constantinople in 1453, this safe land route was closed to Christian traders.

In the late 1400s, explorer Christopher Columbus wanted to find a quicker way to reach Asia by sailing west across the Atlantic Ocean. He believed this would allow Europeans to access gold, spices, and other treasures more easily. Columbus faced many challenges, including incorrect calculations about the size of the Earth and the distance to Asia. Despite these obstacles, he eventually gained support from King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain for his voyage in 1492. His idea was risky and many thought it impossible, but it opened new paths for European exploration of the Americas.

Voyages

Main article: Voyages of Christopher Columbus

Between 1492 and 1504, Columbus completed four voyages between Spain and the Americas. These trips, supported by the Crown of Castile, marked the start of European exploration and colonization of the continent, and began what is known as the Columbian exchange. His journeys played a key role in shaping the Age of Discovery, Western history, and human history overall.

On his first voyage in 1492, Columbus set sail from Palos de la Frontera with three ships: the Santa María, Pinta, and Niña. He reached lands in the Bahamas, which he named San Salvador. Columbus met many Indigenous groups, including the Taíno and Arawak peoples. His later voyages took him to parts of Central and South America, where he explored more of the new lands for Spain.

Later life, illness, and death

In his later years, Columbus became more religious and wrote two books with the help of his son and a friend. He asked the Spanish Crown for a share of the wealth from the lands he discovered, but they refused because he was no longer governor. His family later argued with the Crown over rewards and profits.

Columbus faced many health problems, including severe pain and frequent illness. Modern experts think he may have had a condition called reactive arthritis, which causes joint pain and inflammation. He continued to fight for his rights until he passed away in Valladolid, Spain, on May 20, 1506, at the age of 54.

Location of remains

Christopher Columbus's remains have been moved several times since his death. Initially buried in Spain, his remains were later transferred to what is now the Dominican Republic. Some of his remains are believed to rest in a cathedral in Seville, Spain, while others are kept in a special building called the Columbus Lighthouse in Santo Domingo Este. Scientists have studied the bones in Seville and found evidence linking them to Columbus's family. However, the exact location of all his remains remains a mystery.

Commemoration

Further information: List of places named for Christopher Columbus and List of monuments and memorials to Christopher Columbus

Columbus became an important symbol in the history of the United States. Early American leaders used his story to help create a sense of national identity. His name inspired many places, like Columbia, South Carolina, and even the personification of the United States called Columbia.

To honor the 400th anniversary of Columbus's voyage in 1892, many celebrations took place. The World's Columbian Exposition was held in Chicago, and special commemorative stamps were issued. Today, many countries, including those in the Americas, Spain, and Italy, celebrate Columbus Day on October 12 to remember his journey.

Legacy

The voyages of Columbus are considered a turning point in human history, marking the beginning of globalization and accompanying demographic, commercial, economic, social, and political changes.

His explorations resulted in permanent contact between the two hemispheres, and the term "pre-Columbian" is used to refer to the cultures of the Americas before the arrival of Columbus and his European successors. The ensuing Columbian exchange saw the massive exchange of animals, plants, fungi, diseases, technologies, mineral wealth and ideas.

In the first century after his endeavors, Columbus's figure largely languished in the backwaters of history, and his reputation was beset by his failures as a colonial administrator. His legacy was somewhat rescued from oblivion when he began to appear as a character in Italian and Spanish plays and poems from the late 16th century onward.

Columbus was subsumed into the Western narrative of colonization and empire building, which invoked notions of translatio imperii and translatio studii to underline who was considered "civilized" and who was not.

The Americanization of the figure of Columbus began in the latter decades of the 18th century, after the revolutionary period of the United States, elevating the status of his reputation to a national myth, homo americanus. His landing became a powerful icon as an "image of American genesis". From the 1990s onward, a narrative of Columbus being responsible for the genocide of Indigenous peoples and environmental destruction began to compete with the then predominant discourse of Columbus as Christ-bearer, scientist, or father of America. This narrative features the negative effects of Columbus' conquests on native populations. Exposed to Old World diseases, the Indigenous populations of the New World collapsed, and were largely replaced by Europeans and Africans, who brought with them new methods of farming, business, governance, and religious worship.

Originality of discovery of America

Main articles: Pre-Columbian transoceanic contact theories and Norse colonization of North America

Though Christopher Columbus came to be considered the European discoverer of America in Western popular culture, his historical legacy is more nuanced. After settling Iceland, the Norse settled the uninhabited southern part of Greenland beginning in the 10th century. Norsemen are believed to have then set sail from Greenland and Iceland to become the first known Europeans to reach the North American mainland, nearly 500 years before Columbus reached the Caribbean. The 1960s discovery of a Norse settlement dating c. 1000 at L'Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland, partially corroborates accounts within the Icelandic sagas of Erik the Red's colonization of Greenland and his son Leif Erikson's subsequent exploration of a place he called Vinland.

America as a distinct land

Historians have traditionally argued that Columbus remained convinced until his death that his journeys had been along the east coast of Asia as he originally intended (excluding arguments such as Anderson's). On his third voyage he briefly referred to South America as a "hitherto unknown" continent, while also rationalizing that it was the Earthly Paradise (Eden) located "at the end of the Orient". Columbus continued to claim in his later writings that he had reached Asia; in a 1502 letter to Pope Alexander VI, he asserts that Cuba is the east coast of Asia. On the other hand, in a document in the Book of Privileges (1502), Columbus refers to the New World as the Indias Occidentales ('West Indies'), which he says "were unknown to all the world".

Shape of the Earth

Further information: Myth of the flat Earth

Washington Irving's 1828 biography of Columbus popularized the idea that Columbus had difficulty obtaining support for his plan because many Catholic theologians insisted that the Earth was flat, but this is a popular misconception which can be traced back to 17th-century Protestants campaigning against Catholicism. In fact, the spherical shape of the Earth had been known to scholars since antiquity, and was common knowledge among sailors, including Columbus. Coincidentally, the oldest surviving globe of the Earth, the Erdapfel, was made in 1492, just before Columbus's return to Europe from his first voyage. As such it contains no sign of the Americas and yet demonstrates the common belief in a spherical Earth.

In 1492, Columbus correctly measured Polaris's diurnal motion around true north as having a diameter of almost 7°. In 1498, while sailing west through the doldrums 8° north in July and again in August sailing the trade winds 13° north, Columbus reported seeing Polaris with a diurnal motion of 10° in diameter. He accounted for the shift by concluding that Earth's figure is pear-shaped, with the 'stalk' portion (comparing this to a woman's breast) being nearest Heaven and upon which was centered the Earthly Paradise. Although Columbus's later readings were incorrect, 20th-century satellite data happens to indicate that the Earth has a slight pear shape.

Criticism and defense

Columbus has been criticized both for his brutality and for initiating the depopulation of the Indigenous peoples of the Caribbean, whether by imported diseases or intentional violence. Other scholars defend Columbus's actions or allege that the worst accusations against him are not based in fact while others claim that "he has been blamed for events far beyond his own reach or knowledge".

As a result of the protests and riots that followed the murder of George Floyd in 2020, many public monuments of Christopher Columbus have been removed.

Navigational expertise

Biographers and historians have a wide range of opinions about Columbus's expertise and experience navigating and captaining ships. One scholar lists some European works ranging from the 1890s to 1980s that support Columbus's experience and skill as among the best in Genoa, while listing some American works over a similar timeframe that portray the explorer as an untrained entrepreneur, having only minor crew or passenger experience prior to his noted journeys. According to Morison, Columbus's success in utilizing the trade winds might owe significantly to luck.

Physical appearance

Christopher Columbus was described as taller than average, with light skin that often got sunburned, blue or hazel eyes, high cheekbones, and a freckled face. He had an aquiline nose and blond to reddish hair and beard, which turned white around the age of 30. While many artworks claim to show Columbus, no authentic portraits from his time exist.

One famous image is by Sebastiano del Piombo, painted in 1519, which shows a large man with auburn hair but was likely painted after Columbus's death. Another notable depiction is in The Virgin of the Navigators by Alejo Fernández, created between 1531 and 1536 for a chapel in Seville. At the World's Columbian Exposition in 1893, many portraits of Columbus were displayed, but most did not match the descriptions from his time.