The Similarities And Differences Between Christopher Columbus And Celestial Navigation

Christopher Columbus is a name that has been spoken in every history class across the nation. He is known as one of the most important sailors in history. Columbus primarily sailed by using a type of navigation known as “Dead Reckoning”. Dead Reckoning is a type of navigation in which a sailor marks his or her position by recording the distance sailed and by starting at a known point (Pickering, Keith A. “Columbus and Dead Reckoning (DR) Navigation” The Columbus Navigation Homepage). Though he used dead reckoning most of the time, he did occasionally use celestial navigation. Celestial Navigation is when a sailor uses celestial bodies such as the stars and the planets to navigate and measure his latitude, because Columbus had visited several other lands where new navigation techniques were being discovered he was a little more familiar with them than other sailors in his era were. (Pickering, Keith A. “Columbus and Celestial Navigation” The Columbus Navigation Homepage) Columbus used a variety of different tools to try and navigate with celestial navigation. Two of the tools he used were the quadrant and the astrolabe. After several attempts with both of the devices, however, he was still unsuccessful with all of his attempts. (Pickering, Keith A. “Columbus and Celestial Navigation” The Columbus Navigation Homepage)
Christopher Columbus’s first voyage

However, for an unknown reason, they never settled there. Several people have come up with theories as to why; one of the most popular is that they were fearful of the Native Americans who were already there. (“Viking Discovery of America-Conclusion” Viking Source) The discovery of America by Columbus could be more accurately be titled a “rediscovery”. Even though he did not technically discover it first, his was the first recorded discovery, which most people would argue makes his the most