Christopher Columbus Biography

Christopher Columbus was born in Genoa, Italy on August 25th 1451, and he died in Valladolid Spain on May 20th 1506. His life is filled with mystery and controversy. Even though there has been contevercy about his birth date and this birthplace, the historians have narrowed it down to this date and place. His childhood is another mystery. It is said that Columbus was the oldest of five children to poor “wool weavers”. His son has stated that Columbus had attended the University of Pavia, Columbus was a good observer and very well read.

In 1476 Columbus traveled to Lisbon, Portugal were there he an established Genoese population, including Bartolome, he was a noted to be a mapmaker. After a couple of years Columbus sailed with the Portuguese through the Mediterranen and the Atlantic as far south as La Mina (Present day Elmaina , Ghana) and as far north as England. Columbus also made a voyage to Iceland in 1477.

In 1479 Columbus married the Portuguese noblewomen Dona Felipa e Perestrello e Moriz and established land in Porto Santo were his son Diego was born in 1480. When his wife died somewhere between 1481 to 1485, Columbus returned to Lisbon. As early as 1484 Columbus got a plan to sail west from the Canary Islands to the Indies (now East Indies) and the island kingdom of Cipangu (modern day Japan). When King John II declined Columbus’s “Enterprises to the Indies” he decided to go to the Spanish monarch. Columbus traveled to Cordoba, in 1488 he and his mistress had another son. Columbus presented his plan to King Ferdinan and Queen Isabella two different times but both times a counsel of experts rejected his project. Columbus’s ideas were made fun of by many in the court. However he received support from other powerful people, for example “Luis de Santagel”, “chancellor of the royal household of Aragon and prior Juan Prez (the Queen’s confessor). As a result of this Queen Isabella approved to Columbus’s project. Columbus’s first was to find a short voyage to the Indies by sailing west, and the second goal was to convert any foreign inhabitance to Christianity.

There were three ships the first was the Santa Maria, which can hold up to forty sailors, The second ship is the Pinta, which held up to twenty-six sailors, and the Nina, which held twenty-four sailors. On October 12 1482 a seaman on the Pinta claimed “he spotted land”, his name was Rodrigo de Triana.