Columbus
Columbus, Christopher (1451-1506), was an outstanding navigator and organizer of expeditions. He achieved fame by sailing west across the Atlantic Ocean in search of a sea route to Asia. But he did not accomplish this goal. Instead, he encountered islands in the Caribbean Sea. At that time, the people of Europe and the Americas did not know of each other's existence. During his four voyages westward--between 1492 and 1504--Columbus explored what are now the West Indies and the coasts of Central and South America.
Columbus was not the first European to reach the Western Hemisphere. The Norse (also called the Vikings) had settled for a time on the coast of North America about A.D. 1000. But that contact did not last, and most Europeans of the 1400's did not know it had taken place. Columbus' voyages led to enduring links between the Eastern and Western hemispheres.
The world of Columbus
The Europe into which Columbus was born in 1451 was struggling against the growing power of the Ottoman Turks, who had conquered much of southeastern Europe. In 1453, the Ottomans took control of Constantinople (now Istanbul, Turkey), a major centre of trade between Europe and Asia. The Ottomans made Constantinople the capital of their empire, cutting off easy European access to Asian goods. The only alternative to a difficult, dangerous land journey was a sea route--either around Africa or westward across the Atlantic.
The desire for a sea route to Asia launched a remarkable wave of exploration. European explorers combined the seafaring skill of the Italians with the resources of the Portuguese and the Spanish. Europe constantly improved its ships and navigational aids, as well as its arms and firepower. Europeans also had other qualities that encouraged overseas exploration, including a passion for trading and a desire to preach Christianity throughout the world.
Elizabethan seaman, born in Crowndale, Devon, SW England, UK. In 1567 he commanded the Judith in his kinsman John Hawkyns's ill-fated expedition to the West Indies, and returned there several times to recover the losses sustained from the Spaniards, his exploits gaining him great popularity in England. In 1577 he set out with five ships for the Pacific, through the Straits of Magellan, but after his fleet was battered by storm and fire, he alone continued in the Golden Hind. He then struck out across the Pacific, reached the Pelew Is, and returned to England via the Cape of Good Hope in 1580. The following year, the queen visited his ship and knighted him. In 1585 he sailed with 25 ships against the Spanish Indies, bringing home tobacco, potatoes, and the dispirited Virginian colonists. In the battle against the Spanish Armada, which raged for a week in the Channel (1588), his seamanship and courage brought him further distinction. In 1595 he sailed again to the West Indies, but died of dysentery off Porto Bello.
Nansen
Explorer, born near Oslo, Norway. He studied at Oslo University and later at Naples. In 1
Magellan
Magellan, Ferdinand (1480?-1521), was a Portuguese sea captain who commanded the first expedition that sailed around the world. His voyage provided the first positive proof that the earth is round. Magellan did not live to complete the voyage, but his imaginative planning and courageous leadership made the entire expedition possible. Many scholars consider it the greatest navigational feat in history.
Early life
Magellan was born in about 1480 in northern Portugal. His name in Portuguese was Fernao de Magalhaes. His parents, who were members of the nobility, died when he was about 10 years old. At the age of 12, Magellan became a page to Queen Leonor at the royal court. Such a position commonly served as a means of education for sons of the Portuguese nobility.
At the court, Magellan learned about the voyages of such explorers as Christopher Columbus of Italy and Vasco da Gama of Portugal. He also learned the fundamentals of navigation. In 1496, Magellan was promoted to the rank of squire and became a clerk in the marine department. There, he helped fit out ships for trade along the west coast of Africa.
Magellan first went to sea in 1505, when he sailed to India with the fleet of Francisco de Almeida, Portugal's first viceroy to that country. In 1506, Magellan went on an expedition sent by Almeida to the east coast of Africa to strengthen Portuguese bases there. The next year, he returned to India, where he participated in trade and in several naval battles against Turkish fleets.
In 1509, Magellan sailed with a Portuguese fleet to Melaka, a commercial centre in what is now Malaysia. The Malays attacked the Portuguese who went ashore, and Magellan helped rescue his comrades. In 1511, he took part in an expedition that conquered Melaka. After this victory, a Portuguese fleet sailed farther east to the Spice Islands (also called the Molucca Islands). Portugal claimed the islands at this time. Magellan's close personal friend Francisco Serrao went along on the voyage and wrote to Magellan, describing the route and the island of Ternate. Serrao's letters helped establish in Magellan's mind the location of the Spice Islands, which later became the destination of his great voyage.
Magellan returned to Portugal in 1513. He then joined a military expedition to Morocco. On this expedition, Magellan suffered a wound that made him limp for the rest of his life.
Voyage around the world
Planning the expedition. After returning to Portugal from Morocco, Magellan sought the support of King Manuel I for a voyage to the Spice Islands. The best maps available had convinced Magellan that he could reach the Spice Islands by sailing south of South America. Magellan believed such a route would be shorter than the eastward voyage around the southern tip of Africa and across the Indian Ocean. However, Manuel disliked Magellan and refused to support the proposed voyage.
Magellan then studied astronomy and navigation for about two years in Porto in northern Portugal. In Porto, he met Ruy Faleiro, an astronomer and geographer who strongly influenced his ideas. Magellan and Faleiro concluded from their studies that the Spice Islands lay in territory that had been awarded to Spain in 1494 (see LINE OF DEMARCATION). For that reason, Magellan decided that he would seek support for his plans from the king of Spain.
In 1517, Magellan went to Spain. There, he presented his proposal for visiting the Spice Islands as part of a westward circumnavigation of the earth. The next year, Magellan convinced Charles I of Spain to support such a voyage. The king promised Magellan a fifth of the profits from the voyage to the Spice Islands, plus a salary.
Preparations for the expedition took more than a year. The Spaniards became suspicious of Magellan, partly because he recruited many Portuguese sailors to crew his ships. As a result, the king forced Magellan to replace most of the Portuguese sailors with Spanish crew members.
Armstong
Armstrong, Neil Alden (1930-...), a United States astronaut, was the first person to set foot on the moon. On July 20, 1969, Armstrong and Edwin E. Aldrin, Jr., landed the Apollo 11 lunar module on the moon, left the module, and explored the lunar surface. See SPACE EXPLORATION.
Armstrong made his first space flight aboard Gemini 8 in 1966 with David R. Scott. He and Scott performed the first successful docking of two vehicles in space. However, Gemini 8 and the unmanned target vehicle suddenly began to roll violently. The two men responded calmly to the first United States emergency in space and landed their craft safely.
Armstrong was born in Wapakoneta, Ohio, and graduated from Purdue University. He was a Navy pilot from 1949 to 1952. Armstrong was a civilian test pilot assigned to test the X-15 rocket aeroplane before becoming an astronaut in 1962. He resigned from the astronaut programme in 1970. Armstrong continued to work for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) until 1971. From 1971 to 1979, he served as an engineering professor at the University of Cincinnati. In 1980, Armstrong became chairman of Cardwell International, a supplier of oil-drilling equipment. In 1986, he was named co-chairman of the presidential commission investigating the explosion of the space shuttle Challenger.
Livingstone
Livingstone's discoveries. David Livingstone was born in Blantyre, Scotland, near Glasgow. He received a medical degree from the University of Glasgow and joined the London Missionary Society. The society sent him to southern Africa. There he worked to convert Africans to Christianity and to end the business of selling captured Africans as slaves.
Livingstone made several difficult journeys into the interior, mapping the land and searching for navigable rivers that British missionaries and traders could use. In 1849, he arrived at Lake Ngami, in what is now Botswana. In 1851, Livingstone travelled to the Zambezi River, on the border between present-day Zambia and Zimbabwe.
He became the first European to cross Africa during an amazing journey between 1853 and 1856. On this trip, Livingstone started at the Zambezi and went north and west across Angola to Luanda on the Atlantic Ocean. On the return journey, he followed the Zambezi to its mouth, in what is now Mozambique. In 1855, during the return, Livingstone became the first European to sight Victoria Falls on the Zambezi River. He named the falls after Queen Victoria of Great Britain.
Between 1859 and 1863, Livingstone led a large expedition across Africa's interior. He became the first European to see Lakes Nyasa and Chilwa, in what is now Malawi. In the late 1860's, Livingstone began to explore the Lake Tanganyika region. He learned more about African customs, geography, and the slave trade than any other European of his day. His discoveries led to a great competition among European nations for control of Africa.
Stanley and Livingstone were two British explorers who excited the Western world with their travels in Africa. Henry Morton Stanley (1841-1904) went to Africa to find David Livingstone (1813-1873) in 1869. Livingstone was known to be exploring the interior of the continent. But no one had heard from him in several years, and so the New York Herald sent Stanley to find him. Stanley's search ended on November 10, 1871, when he met Livingstone at the town of Ujiji, on Lake Tanganyika. Stanley greeted him with the now-famous words: "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"
Shackelton
Explorer, born in Kilkea, Co Kildare, Ireland. He was a junior officer in Scott's National Antarctic Expedition (1901--3), and nearly reached the South Pole in his own expedition of 1909. In 1915 his ship Endurance was crushed in the ice, and he and five others made a perilous journey of 1300`m/800`i to bring relief for the crew. Knighted in 1909, he died at South Georgia during a fourth expedition
Cook
Cook, James (1728-1779), was a British navigator and one of the world's greatest explorers. He commanded three voyages to the Pacific Ocean and sailed around the world twice. His voyages led to the establishment of colonies throughout the Pacific region by several European nations.
During his historic voyage in HMS Endeavour, Cook raised the British flag in New Zealand in 1769. In 1770, he became the first European to visit the eastern coast of Australia. He claimed possession of the land for Great Britain, naming it New South Wales. As a result of his voyage, Australia became a British colony in 1788.
During his three voyages to the Pacific. Cook developed charts that added greatly to knowledge of the geography of the region. A seaman and mapmaker of wide experience, he is rated highly among the world's great maritime explorers. Cook has been called Columbus of Australia. His murder by Hawaiian islanders on Feb. 14, 1779 was a great loss to Britain.
Early life
James Cook was born on Oct. 27, 1728, in the small village of Marton in Yorkshire, England. He was the second of seven children of a Scottish farm labourer. After a brief elementary education, he became an assistant to a grocer and haberdasher in the coastal village of Staithes. In 1746, he was apprenticed to a firm of shipowners at Whitby. His new employers were engaged in the coal trade.
In 1755, Great Britain was preparing for war. Cook enlisted in the navy as an ordinary seaman. He displayed considerable skill in surveying and charting the St. Lawrence River. This work played an important part in General James Wolfe's capture of Quebec. It also brought Cook to the notice of the Admiralty, and his report of an eclipse was published by the Royal Society of London.
The first voyage
The transit of Venus. In 1767, the Royal Society was making elaborate preparations to observe a transit of the planet Venus across the sun's face. The transit was to take place in June 1769. King George III took a personal interest in the project. The King ordered the Admiralty to provide a ship to carry the scientific expedition to Tahiti. Cook was promoted to lieutenant and was given command of a ship. This historic voyage to the South Seas to observe the transit began his career as an explorer.
The Endeavour, a converted collier of 374 metric tons, was bought by the Admiralty for the voyage. By modern standards, the three-masted bark Endeavour was unbelievably small for a long voyage through uncharted seas. Its overall length was 32 metres, and its breadth was 9 metres. But its shallow draught made it ideal for coastal exploration. The ship was altered extensively to accommodate the expedition's scientific staff. This included botanist Joseph Banks and the Swedish naturalist Daniel Carl Solander. Together with their assistants, they shared the great cabin. Charles Green was the astronomer.
Tahiti was Cook's first destination. The Endeavour sailed from Plymouth in August 1768. It had on board 94 people, nearly 18 months' provisions, and 10 carriage guns. Cook travelled by way of Rio de Janeiro and around Cape Horn into the Pacific Ocean. The ship anchored in Matavai Bay, Tahiti, on April 13, 1769. Having observed the transit and explored the island, Cook and his party left Tahiti after a stay of three months. A Tahitian named Tupia sailed with them and later acted as interpreter among the Maoris.
Secret instructions were given to Cook by the Admiralty before he left England. These instructions ordered him to search for an unknown southern continent. Geographers had always believed such a continent must exist to balance the world. Cook sailed south. But after he reached a latitude of 40° without finding any land mass, he followed his secret orders. These orders told him to proceed in search of land to the westward "until you discover it or fall in with the eastern side of the land discovered by Tasman and now named New Zealand." In 1642, Abel Tasman, a Dutch navigator, became the first European to sight New Zealand.
New Zealand was reached by Cook's expedition in early October 1769. The sailors landed at Poverty Bay. There they first encountered the warlike Maoris. Cook spent four months sailing around the North Island, landing frequently. Maoris at Queen Charlotte Sound proved less hostile. But the Englishmen were shocked to find that they were cannibals, and that they preserved their enemies' heads as trophies.
Cook then circled the South Island, proving New Zealand to be two large islands, and not part of a southern continent. He sailed around both islands in six months. Experts have marvelled at Cook's speed and thoroughness in surveying New Zealand.
Australian exploration. Cook set a westerly course from New Zealand. He intended to pick up Tasman's route where the Dutch navigator left Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania). But a southerly gale drove the Endeavour towards the then unknown east coast of Australia. Early in the morning of April 20, 1770, the officer on watch, Zachary Hicks, sighted land. This sighting occurred near the present border of Victoria and New South Wales. Cook named the spot Point Hicks. Turning north, he proceeded to chart and name the main features along Australia's eastern seaboard. Later, he called the whole area of land New South Wales because he thought it looked like the shore of Wales.
Botany Bay was the site of Cook's first landing.
Fuchs
Fuchs, Sir Vivian Ernest (1908-...), is a British geologist and Antarctic expert. He headed the British Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition in 1957 and 1958. Sir Edmund Hillary led the New Zealand party. The expedition, the first known party to cross Antarctica, covered 3,473 kilometres in 99 days, and made geophysical observations. Fuchs became director of the British Antarctic Survey in 1958. See also ANTARCTICA (International cooperation).
Polo
Polo, Marco (1254-1324?), an Italian trader and traveller, became famous for his travels in central Asia and China. He wrote a book that gave Europeans some of their earliest information about China.
Early life. Marco Polo was born in Venice. His father, Nicolo Polo, was a merchant. Nicolo and his brother, Maffeo Polo, had left on a trading mission shortly before Marco's birth. Marco's mother died when he was a young boy, and an aunt and uncle raised him. They trained Marco to be a merchant. In addition to reading, writing, and arithmetic, Marco learned about using foreign money, judging products, and handling cargo ships.
Nicolo and Maffeo Polo returned to Venice in 1269. On their travels, the brothers had been to eastern Asia and had met the Mongol ruler Kublai Khan in China. The Khan had invited them to visit China again, and so they prepared for another expedition--one that would include Marco.
Journey to China. In 1271, Marco Polo--then 17 years old--and his father and uncle sailed from Venice to Acre (now Akko), a port in Palestine. From there, they rode camels to the Persian port of Hormuz, which is now in Iran. The Polos wanted to sail to China from Hormuz, but the ships available there did not seem seaworthy. The travellers continued by camel across the deserts and mountains of Asia. More than three years after leaving Venice, they reached Kublai Khan's summer palace in Shangdu (also spelled Shang-tu), near what is now Kalgan. The Khan gave the Polos a hearty welcome.
Kublai Khan valued the experience and knowledge of his guests. Marco knew four languages, and the Khan sent him on many official tours of the kingdom. These tours took Marco to China's southern and eastern provinces and as far south as Burma. Marco served as a government official in the Chinese city of Yangzhou (also spelled Yang-chou) for three years.
As time passed, the Polos began to worry about returning home safely. Kublai Khan did not want the Polos to leave China, but they believed that if Kublai Khan were to die before they left China, his enemies might capture them. Finally, in 1292, their chance came. The Khan's great-nephew, the Mongol ruler of Persia, had sent representatives to China to bring back a bride whom the Khan had selected for him. The representatives asked the Polos to accompany them on their return to Persia. Kublai Khan reluctantly agreed. That same year, the Polos and a fleet of 14 junks sailed from Zaitun (now Quanzhou, also spelled Ch"uan-chou), a port in southern China.
The fleet sailed to what is now Singapore. From there, it travelled north of Sumatra and then around the southern tip of India. The Polos crossed the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman to Hormuz. There, they left the wedding party and travelled overland to the Turkish port of Trebizond (now Trabzon) on the Black Sea. They sailed to Constantinople (now Istanbul) and from there to Venice, arriving in 1295. Their journey to China and back probably totalled about 24,000 kilometres. The men had been gone for 24 years.
Later life. The Polos returned from China with many riches. Kublai Khan had given them ivory, jade, jewels, porcelain, silk, and other treasures. When they arrived in Venice, the city was at war with Genoa, its long-time rival. In 1296, the Genoese captured and jailed Marco Polo. Historians do not know the details of his capture. In prison, Polo decided to write about his travels. Aided by his notes, he dictated the story to a popular writer, Rustichello of Pisa. Rustichello translated it into Old French, the literary language of Italy at the time. The book was completed in 1298.
In his book, called Description of the World, Polo told about Kublai Khan's prosperous, advanced empire. He described the Khan's postal system, which consisted of a network of courier stations throughout the kingdom. Riders on horseback relayed messages from one station to another.
Polo commented on many Chinese customs, such as the mining and use of coal as fuel. Coal had not yet been used in Europe. Polo called coal black stones. He also marvelled at the Chinese use of paper money, which bore the seal of the emperor. At that time, Europeans traded with heavy coins, which were made of copper, gold, or lead.
Printing had not yet been invented in Europe, and so scholars copied Polo's book by hand. Description of the World was widely read in Europe. Historians believe it may have influenced many explorers. The book influenced Christopher Columbus's estimate of the distance between Spain and Asia.
Description of the World also stimulated European interest in Asia and helped bring to Europe such Chinese inventions as the compass, papermaking, and printing. Genoa and Venice made peace in 1299. Polo was freed and returned to trading in Venice.
BIOGRAPHY