Discovery of the Americas, 1492-1800

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adventurer Marco Polo’s Description of the
World(1298), but most readers—with the
notable exception of Columbus—considered
Polo’sstories about China and Japan to be
nothing more than entertaining fantasies.
Even as the merchants of the city-states of
northern Italy scoffed at Polo, their cities were
home to the best schools of maritime chart-
making of the time. Evaluating geographical
exploration was a serious scholarly pursuit.
The ranks of Italian-born explorers of the late
1400s and 1500s included Columbus, Amerigo
Vespucci, John Cabot (Giovanni Caboto), and
Giovanni da Verrazano. Yet with the exception
of Verrazano, who was backed by France, all of
these navigators sailed for Spain.
Their crews came mostly from Portugal or
Spain, whose seaports offered an abundant

supply of experienced sailors and pilots. Por-

tuguese captains trained under the patronage

of Prince Henry the Navigator, who founded

an important institute of navigational and

geographical studies at Sagres in southwest-

ern Portugal. Mariners trained at Sagres made

increasingly determined attempts to explore

southwardalong the coast of West Africa in

The Requerimiento

Prince Henry’s mariners voyaged west to

Madeira, the Azores, and the Canary Islands,

transforming the neglected Atlantic islands into

Portuguese outposts. Overcoming superstition

and contrary ocean currents by the mid-1400s,

repeated voyages ordered by Prince Henry

probed the West African coastline, establishing

colonies, starting the European trade in African

slaves that would later spread to the Americas,

(^12) B Discovery of the Americas, 1492–1800
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