Christopher+Columbus

[|Smith, Columbus.mp3]media type="file" key="Smith, Columbus.mp3"

Columbus was born Cristoforo Colombo, the son of Domencio Colombo and Suzanna Fontanarossa in Genoa, Italy, some time in the fall of 1451. For at least three generations his family had lived in Genoa, where they manufactured and traded woolen fabrics. Little is known about Columbus's early life. He, his three brothers, and their sister possibly received some education through their father's guild. More than likely, Columbus was ashamed of his humble origins. In 1479, to improve his social status, he married Felipa Perestrello de Moniz, a Portuguese noblewoman with modest wealth. She died soon after giving birth to a son, Diego. Years later Columbus and Beatriz Enriquez de Harana, a much younger woman, were parents of Ferdinand, Columbus's biographer, though the couple never married.

Goes to sea as a teenager By his own account, Columbus became a seaman at a young age, probably in his early teens. By his twenties, he was a skilled sailor with enough knowledge to pilot his own boat. In May 1476 Columbus was a crew member in a convoy attacked by French pirates near the southern Portuguese port of Lagos. Columbus's ship was wrecked and many of the crew killed; fortunately Columbus was able to swim six miles to shore. After recuperating, Columbus traveled to Lisbon, Portugal, where his younger brother Bartholomew operated a book and map store. Columbus educated himself in the store, studying navigation and the art of cartography, or mapmaking.

A devout Catholic, Columbus also studied religion, as an explorer. He saw God's hand at work on Earth, and when he made his voyage across the Atlantic Ocean he felt God's hand guiding him; in fact he saw absorbing ideas that would determine his later view of himself himself as God's messenger in the New World. Columbus interpreted events in his life—being saved from shipwreck and landing near the Rock of Sagres, the home of the academy for sailors founded by Prince Henry the Navigator—as signs of God's plan.

Formulates “great idea” Columbus participated in a voyage to Iceland and beyond in February of 1477. In 1478 he served as captain of a merchant ship that sailed to the island of Madeira on an unsuccessful trading mission. Sometime in the early 1480s he made a voyage to the Portuguese trading fortress of Sâo Jorge da Mina in what is now Benin on the west coast of Africa. On his return Columbus began to formulate his “great idea”: that it would be faster and easier to travel to Asia by sailing westward across the Atlantic than by sailing around Africa and across the Indian Ocean, as the Portuguese were then trying to do. Contrary to legend, all educated fifteenth-century Europeans knew that the earth was a sphere, but no one had any idea about the size of the earth, and most theories underestimated the earth by one-third its actual size. In making his arguments, Columbus guessed at the distances between landmasses, making them much closer than they actually are. Columbus also assumed the Asian continent was much wider than it is, but this was an understandable error. In the fifteenth century geographers believed the earth was one huge landmass, consisting of Europe, Africa, and Asia, surrounded by water. For example, he claimed that the distance from Lisbon to Japan would be about 2,400 nautical miles. It is actually more than 10,000. Columbus named his plan “The Enterprise of the Indies,” because sailing west would lead to the eastern shore of Asia. This idea did not originate with Columbus, and the thought of sailing across the Atlantic Ocean, known as the “green sea of gloom,” was full of danger and risk, although success would guarantee fame and glory. Besides the obvious physical risk of such a voyage, the mental and emotional strain was apparent too. Yet the belief in a distant land full of unlimited supplies of gold outweighed the dangers.

Starting in 1484, Columbus tried to persuade the Portuguese king, João II, of the workability of his idea; the king consulted his court advisers, who concluded Columbus's estimates of distance were far too inaccurate. By this time, Columbus's wife had died, and he left Portugal with his son Diego. They traveled by ship to the Spanish port of Palos de la Frontera near the Portuguese border. Columbus placed Diego in a boarding school run by Franciscan monks at the monastery of La Rábida while he traveled around Spain trying to arrange an audience with the Spanish court. The Franciscans, who were interested in establishing foreign missions, gave Columbus a letter of introduction to an influential Spanish nobleman, the count of Medina Celi. Columbus traveled to the city of Córdoba in January 1486 but missed the Spanish king and queen. He found support among the Genoese colony in the city. He also met a young peasant woman named Beatriz Enriquez de Harana, who became his mistress; two years later they had a son named Ferdinand. When the Spanish monarchs returned to Córdoba in May 1486, Queen Isabella agreed to receive Columbus. Known as the “Catholic Sovereigns,” Isabella I and Ferdinand II through marriage brought together Castile and Aragon as they worked to make Spain a Catholic nation. In 1492 they would conquer the Moors in Granada and by royal decree would expel all Jews who refused to convert to Catholicism. They would also support the Spanish Inquisition, aimed at converting, punishing, or even killing all those who disagreed with the Roman Catholic church, including nonbelievers and Jews. Columbus's plans fit into their scheme to make Spain an imperial power, and Isabella shared Columbus's enthusiasm for spreading Christianity.

In April 1492 Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand signed an agreement with Columbus, called the Capitulations, to sponsor him on a voyage of exploration. Columbus would be named admiral, would become the governor of any lands he discovered, and would have the right to 10 percent of any merchandise obtained in the new lands, free of taxes; these rights would be hereditary in his family. Columbus returned to the port of Palos and secured three ships—the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria—with a crew of about 90 men and boys. The Santa Maria, at 100 feet in length, was the largest of the three ships; the Niña and the Pinta were 70-foot caravels. The fleet sailed on Friday morning, August 3, 1492, passing the entrance to the Tinto River at 8:00 A.M.

His initial 1492 voyage came at a critical time of growing national [|imperialism] and [|economic competition] between [|developing nation states] seeking wealth from the establishment of [|trade routes] and [|colonies]. In this [|sociopolitical] climate, Columbus's far-fetched scheme won the attention of [|Queen Isabella] of Spain. Severely underestimating the [|circumference] of the [|Earth], he hypothesized that a westward route from [|Iberia] to [|the Indies] would be shorter and more direct than the overland [|trade route] through [|Arabia]. If true, this would allow Spain entry into the lucrative [|spice trade] — heretofore commanded by the [|Arabs] and [|Italians]. Following his plotted course, he instead landed within the [|Bahamas Archipelago] at a locale he named //San Salvador//. Mistaking the [|North-American] island for the [|East-Asian] mainland, he referred to its inhabitants as "Indians". Academic consensus is that Columbus was born in [|Genoa], though there are [|other theories]. The name //Christopher Columbus// is the Anglicisation of the [|Latin] //Christophorus Columbus//. The name is rendered in modern Italian as //Cristoforo Colombo//, in [|Portuguese] as //Cristóvão Colombo// (formerly //Christovam Colom//), and in Spanish as //Cristóbal Colón//. The anniversary of Columbus' 1492 landing in the Americas ([|Columbus Day]) is observed throughout the Americas and in Spain on October 12.
 * Christopher Columbus** (1451[|[1]] – May 20, 1506) was an [|Italian] [|navigator], [|colonizer] and [|explorer] whose voyages across the [|Atlantic Ocean] led to general European awareness of the [|American continents] in the [|Western Hemisphere]. Though not the first to reach the Americas from [|Afro-Eurasia] — preceded some five hundred years by [|Leif Ericson], and [|perhaps by others] — Columbus initiated widespread contact between [|Europeans] and [|indigenous Americans]. With his several hapless attempts at establishing a settlement on the island of [|Hispaniola], he personally initiated the process of [|Spanish colonization] which foreshadowed general [|European colonization] of the "[|New World]." (The term "[|pre-Columbian]" is sometimes used to refer to the peoples and cultures of the Americas before the arrival of Columbus and his European successors.)

__**//CHRTOPHER COLUMBUS, MARINER//**__ -One of the greatesst american exporation stories of all time -christopher columbus was a sailor born and raised in Genoa -went to portugal -wanted to find a western route to the indies -got approval for this voyage form queen Isabella and king ferdinand -sailed for many days and had thought to be at the indies but was just on the the coast of the bahamas -he had found the new world although he thought it was the indies -made 4 journeys to the new world

Columbus sailed for King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella of Spain. On his first trip, Columbus led an expedition with three ships, the Niña (captained by [|Vicente Yáñez Pinzon]), the Pinta (owned and captained by [|Martin Alonzo Pinzon]), and the Santa Maria (captained by Columbus), and about 90 crew members. They set sail on Aug. 3, 1492 from Palos, Spain, and on October 11, 1492, spotted the Caribbean islands off southeastern North America. They landed on an island they called Guanahani, but Columbus later renamed it San Salvador. They were met by the local Taino Indians, many of whom were captured by Columbus' men and later sold into slavery. Columbus thought he had made it to Asia, and called this area the Indies, and called its inhabitants Indians. While exploring the islands in the area and looking for gold to loot, Columbus' men traveled to the islands of Hispaniola (now divided into Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Cuba, and many other smaller islands. On the return trip, the Santa Maria was wrecked and the captain of the Pinta sailed off on his own to try to beat Columbus back. Columbus returned to Spain in the Nina, arriving on March 15, 1493.
 * The First Trip:**

On a second, larger expedition (Sept. 25, 1493-June 11, 1496), sailed with 17 ships and 1,200 to 1,500 men to find gold and capture Indians as slaves in the Indies. Columbus established a base in Hispaniola and sailed around Hispaniola and along the length of southern Cuba. He spotted and named the island of Dominica on November 3, 1493. On a third expedition (May 30, 1498-October 1500), Columbus sailed farther south, to Trinidad and Venezuela (including the mouth of the Orinoco River). Columbus was the first European since the Viking [|Leif Ericsson] to set foot on the mainland of America. On his fourth and last expedition (May 9, 1502-Nov. 7, 1504), Columbus sailed to Mexico, Honduras and Panama (in Central America) and Santiago (Jamaica). Columbus is buried in eastern Hispaniola (now called the Dominican Republic).n Panama. Columbus learned from the natives of gold and a strait to another ocean. After much exploration, in January 1503 he established a garrison at the mouth of the [|Rio Belen]
 * The Second Trip:**
 * The Third Trip:**
 * The Fourth Trip:**

U.X.L Biographies 2.0

Cohen, J.M Christopher columbus. Retrieved September 30, 2008, from Wikipedia Web site: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Columbus#Voyages

Morison, Samuel Eliot (1942). //Christopher Columbus, Mariner//. Canada: Little, Brown & Company Limited.

Christopher columbus: Explorer. Retrieved September 30, 2008, from Enchanted Learning Web site: http://www.enchantedlearning.com/explorers/page/c/columbus.shtml

__//**Script**//__ -my person for this podcast is Christopher Columbus -many of you but just know him as the man who discovered America. -Although this is his greatest achievement he is so much more then that -now to tell you about his general history and achievements -Columbus was born with the name of Cristoforo Colombo, the son of Domencio Colombo and Suzanna Fontanarossa in Genoa, Italy, during the fall of 1451 -his family lived in Genoa for at least 3 generations -not much is known about Columbus's early life, him his brothers and sisters probably just received an education from their father's guild -It was very likely that Columbus was ashamed by his humble origins. -to improve his social status, he married Felipa Perestrello de Moniz, a very wealthy Portuguese noble woman -she died shorty after giving birth to Columbus's first son Diego -Columbus went to sea at a very young age most likely his early teens -he was well educated and a devote catholic -he felt Gods work in everything, and when he said he could feel Gods hand guiding him as he crossed the Atlantic. -during his way home from a voyage to Iceland is when he had his "great idea" -his idea was that he was going to find a faster easier route to Asia (specifically India) by traveling west -In 1484 he started trying to persuade the king of Portugal to let him pursue his idea. -April 1492 Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand signed an agreement with Columbus, called the "Capitulations", to sponsor him on his exploration -Columbus was to be named admiral, would become the governor of any lands he discovered, and would have the right to 10 percent of any goods aquired in the new lands -the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria were his 3 ships and he had a crew of almost 90 men and boys! The Santa maria was Columbus's boat -The three ships set sailed on Friday morning, August 3, 1492, passing the entrance to the Tinto River -after many days of sailing on October 11, 1492, they spotted the Caribbean islands off of southeastern North America -They landed on an island that the natives called Guanahani, but Columbus later renamed it San Salvador -while there they met the local Taino Indians, many of which were taken against there will by Columbus' men and later sold into slavery. Columbus had thought he had made it to Asia, and called this area the Indies, and called its inhabitants Indians. -While exploring the islands in the region and searching for gold to take, Columbus' men traveled to the islands of Hispaniola now divided into Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Cuba, and many other small islands -On the return trip, the Santa Maria was totaled and the captain of the Pinta sailed off on his own to try to beat Columbus back so he could have all the glory. Columbus returned to Spain in the Nina, arriving on March 15, 1493. -he was treated like a hero and gained many benefits from the voyage -On a second, larger expedition (Sept. 25, 1493-June 11, 1496), he sailed with 17 ships and 1,200 to 1,500 men to search for gold and take the Indians from their native homes as slaves in the Indies -On a third expedition (May 30, 1498-October 1500), Columbus sailed even further south, to Trinidad and Venezuela (including the mouth of the Orinoco River). Columbus was the first European since the Viking [|Leif Ericsson] to land on the mainland of America. -On his fourth and final expedition (May 9, 1502-Nov. 7, 1504), Columbus sailed to Mexico, Honduras and Panama (in Central America) and Santiago (Jamaica). - Columbus learned much from listening to the natives of gold and a strait to another ocean. After much exploration, in January 1503 he created a garrison at the mouth of the [|Rio Belen] -which was later attacked -during his days as governer he was acused of many different crimes -the main crime he was acusedof was that he used barbaric acts very often to torture and govern Hispaniola.[|[] -Columbus and his brothers stayed in jail for six weeks before the busy King Ferdinand ordered their release -On May 20, 1506, at about the age of 55, Columbus died in [|Valladolid], semi wealthy from the gold his men had found in Hispaniola. When he died he was still convinced that his journeys had been along the east coast of Asia -There is contraversy whether chistopher columbus' remains are birried in Sevilla or Santo Domingo. -there was a Dna test in june 2003 but that didnt prove much so there are still questions to where he is buried. -we celebrate columbus day on the same day he landed in the new world october 12 the end[|Smith, Columbus.mp3]