Christopher Columbus
Four voyages across the Atlantic by Italian explorer and navigator Christopher Columbus (1451—1506) opened the way for the European exploration and colonization of the Americas.
Norse navigators reached Labrador and Newfoundland around four hundred years earlier. Still, the Columbus expeditions represent the first documented European contact with the Caribbean, Central America, and South America.
The son of a Genoese wool comber or weaver, Columbus reputedly went to sea at age fourteen. He travelled extensively before settling in Lisbon to seek support for a voyage that would reach India by sailing westward across the Atlantic.
After the Portuguese authorities rejected the scheme, he turned to Spain, where Ferdinand and Isabella of Castile eventually funded the voyage.
Columbus' three-ship expedition sailed in August 1492 and reached the Bahamas via the Canary Islands just over two months later. After visiting Cuba and planting a small colony on Hispaniola (Haiti), Columbus returned to Spain in mid-March 1493.
A second voyage (1493-96) broke down in quarrels with his associates and a long illness in Hispaniola. His third voyage (1498-1500) resulted in the discovery of the South American mainland before a newly appointed royal governor sent Columbus and his brother home in chains.
Restored to royal favour, his last voyage (1502-04) tracked along the south side of the Gulf of Mexico amidst great hardship.
After Columbus died in Spain, he was buried in a monastery near Seville. His remains were taken to Santa Domingo in 1536, returned to Spain in 1899 and finally interred in Seville Cathedral in 1902.
See here for a more detailed biographical sketch which attempts to unravel strands of a life that subsequently became entwined with rumour, accusation and counter-accusation, speculation and controversy.
