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The Treaty of Tordesillas =
At the time of Columbus’s voyages, Spain and Portugal were the two European
countries most actively engaged in exploration by sea. To avoid political con-
flict, Pope Alexander VI wasted no time in proposing the division of the newly
discovered Western Hemisphere between these Catholic nations. On June 4,
1494, the two maritime powers signed the Treaty of Tordesillas (named after the
town in north-central Spain where it was signed), agreeing to divide the known
world along a vertical line about 1,300 miles west of the Cape Verde Islands.
Both countries continued to try to find new routes to the Orient. The practical
effect of the treaty, however, assigned to Portugal rights of exploration—and
exploitation—of Africa, India, Brazil, and Newfoundland. This left the islands of
the Caribbean and still-undiscovered lands of Central America, western South
America, and North America open to Spanish explorers.
In ink on paper, the Treaty of Tordesillas represented a neat division of newly
discovered lands between Portugal and Spain. In reality, the two countries
remained suspicious of each other, a situation that remained uneasy due to inac-
curate maps and the lack of geographical knowledge about South America. A
desire to learn exactly what each power felt entitled to through the treaty encour-
aged leaders of both nations to sponsor new exploration and to dispute territo-
ries not anticipated by the original line. Meanwhile, non-Catholic countries such
as England and the Netherlands saw no need to obey the pope, so the Tr eaty of
Tordesillas never really had much effect on exploration or territorial claims.\
longer lasting consequence came from the
Spaniards’ impression of Indian homes built
on wooden piles, suspended above lake water.
The homes reminded the Europeans of Venice,
so they named the region “Little Venice,” or
Venezuela.
Vicente Yáñez Pinzón, who had served as
captain of Columbus’s caravel the Niña,
sighted Brazil in 1500, but the land was claimed
on April 22 of that year by Pedro Álvares Cabral
on behalf of Portugal. As had other Portuguese
mariners, Cabral had sailed westward to catch
strong southeasterly currents and winds that
would propel his ships to the bottom of the
African continent, en route to India. Cabral,
however, went so far west that he sailed to the
mouth of the Rio Buranhém in the present-day
Brazilian state of Bahia. Cabral considered thenew land only a diversion from his real inten-
tion of reaching India. His ships explored the
coast for just nine days before resuming his
eastward voyage. He named the land he left
behind Isle de Vera Cruz. Subsequent European
settlers renamed it Brazil, after the red dye-
wood they found and exported.
The travels of such explorers—including
Columbus on his final voyage, Ojeda, Juan de la
Cosa, Amerigo Vespucci, Vicente Yáñez Pinzón
and others—swiftly accumulated knowledge
about the northern coastline of South America.THE MYSTERIOUS
VESPUCCI
Amerigo Vespucci, born in Florence, Italy, and
employed in Seville as an agent of the power-(^40) B Discovery of the Americas, 1492–1800
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