Lesson 1: Voyages of Columbus

Lesson Focus

Driven by the desire for a westward trade route to Asia, Europeans embarked on voyages across the Atlantic. We will explore how these expeditions, instead of reaching Asia, connected two hemispheres, forever changing the world.

People to Know

Christopher Columbus, Ferdinand Magellan

Learning Objectives

• Compare the goals and outcomes of Columbus's four voyages to the Americas, which he believed to be Asia.

Landing of Lcif Eriksson, by Edu'ard Monin, 1898

Long before Columbus, the first Europeans to reach the Americas were Norse seafarers from Scandinavia. Between A.D. 800 and 1100, they sailed west and established settlements in Iceland, Greenland, and even a place they called Vinland in North America. These early settlements ultimately failed due to conflicts with native peoples and a lack of support from their home. Their accomplishments were mostly forgotten, remembered only in heroic stories known as sagas.

Seeking a faster trade route to Asia, Christopher Columbus believed he could sail west across the Atlantic. After securing funding from Spain, he departed in August 1492 with three ships. On October 12, 1492, his crew spotted land in the Bahamas. Believing he had reached the East Indies, Columbus called the native people Indians. His reports of gold and new lands sparked immense excitement in Europe, launching an age of exploration.

Principal Voyages of Exploration

Columbus’s discovery created fierce competition between Spain and Portugal for new territories. To prevent war, the Pope created a line of demarcation in 1493, dividing the non-Christian world between the two nations. Portugal objected, leading to the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494, which moved the line farther west. This treaty is why Portugal later claimed Brazil after Pedro Alvares Cabral landed there by accident in 1500.

Explorers soon realized the lands Columbus found were not Asia. In 1499, navigator Amerigo Vespucci explored South America and argued it was a “New World,” and mapmakers later named the continents “America” in his honor. This was confirmed in 1511 when Vasco Núñez de Balboa crossed the isthmus of Panama. He became the first European to see the Pacific Ocean, proving a huge continent separated Europe from Asia.

Balboa’s discovery inspired Ferdinand Magellan to find a western sea route to Asia. His Spanish-funded expedition sailed in 1519 and found a strait at the tip of South America. After a brutal Pacific crossing where Magellan died, one ship returned to Spain in 1522. Pay special attention to this: his crew were the first to circumnavigate, or sail completely around, the globe, revealing the true size of the Earth.