Why Is Christopher Columbus Considered A Foreign Explorer

When you think of Columbus what comes to mind? A hero? A villain? Most people think he is a hero, but many do not think of the things he did to people such as slavery, beatings, raping, etc. He is most known for discovering America, but he only got to the Bahamas. Columbus was an Italian explorer that sailed the ocean blue in 1492. Columbus Day should not be celebrated because of the awful things that don’t make up for the discoveries that Christopher Columbus did.

They funded and encouraged his journey because they all wanted something out of it. The Pope just wanted to to spread his religion and Catholicism. The King and Queen, however wanted land, slaves, more money and possessions. Columbus could not say no. Whatever the King and Queen said was the law and could not be refused or he would have been executed. The Pope would have done the same thing. Like everyone else during that time he wanted to take an adventure, see new things, and discover more land so he set sail with his crew.

When Granada was finally taken control of, Isabella and Ferdinand began to take notice of Columbus’ proposition. They realized that the outcome would be very beneficial to their kingdom, and it would not cost much money for them to fund the expedition (“Queen Isabella’s Influence in the New World”). They had also recently discovered some islands to the west, so they thought there could be more. They concluded that funding Columbus was worth the effort (In Depth Info).

One of the main reasons that the Spanish Crown funded Columbus’ voyage to find the new trade route was King

After pushing back the Moors after nearly 700 years, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella finally established a firm set of laws and a government. They started with the inquisition act and ordered all arabs or jews to either leave Spain or accept Christianity. As time passed by many of the Jews and Muslims were faking their change to Christianity. So to prevent that King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella asked the pope, if it would be ok to get rid of them by the inquisition and he agreed to that. Several years after the beginning of the inquisition, Spain became very powerful and wanted to conquer more land, so they sent Christopher columbus, who discovered the new world. Once that happened the King and Queen funded many of Columbus’s trips. In the New World, today called Central America, many conflicts began rising between the killing of the Tainos (Native people to the land) and Columbus’s men. Columbus and his men might have done the killing, but overall king Ferdinand and Queen Isabella funded Columbus, even after bringing Taino prisoners and torturing them, as long as Spain was getting wealthy, but still did not punish Columbus after what he did.

Christopher Columbus was an Italian who worked on behalf of, King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella I. The Spanish monarchs’ ultimate goals were to find a trade routine to India, Asia and to spread the Catholic religion to others. They financed Columbus with the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria to find a western route to India. Thinking that it was India, Columbus found land. In his journal, Columbus described his first account of the natives as “they were very friendly to us, and perceived that they could be much more easily converted to our holy faith by gentle means than by force” (“Fordham University”). Also, he plans for them to be great servants so they “may learn our language” (“Fordham University”). He says

On May in 1486 almost a year after Columbus had enter Spain, he was finally allowed to meet with the queen who is said to be known for her great judgment in choosing the right man for the right job. The queen turned down Christopher’s proposals several times before giving it any true thought. The queen sent out her confessor to examine the great project to see if it was feasible. For the next six months Columbus lived the worst days of his life. Christopher was subjected to continuous prejudice even though he knew his great project would open new pathways to maritime achievement and opportunity, but still the public viewed his revolutionary planes as a crackpot idea. Very few of the queen’s staff were in favor of the great quest except for one, Diego de Deza who granted Columbus 12,000 maravedis a year, which was about $83 in gold. It was enough to support a man like Columbus. Columbus had simple tastes.

Christopher Columbus was a well-known traveler who originated from Italy. Christopher Columbus had a legacy that was troubled with disagreements for reason of his treatment towards the native population. His journeys encouraged mass amount of Europeans to obtain interest in taking over the Americas. Throughout his letter written to Sant’ Angel, Columbus explains his emotion in being very satisfied with the results he has revised throughout his first voyage. Christopher Columbus then goes into detail concerning his appreciation to the royal King and Queen, Ferdinand and Isabella as he mentions, “I passed over the Indies with the fleet which the most illustrious King and Queen, our lords, gave to me” (Columbus 8). Christopher Columbus creates a powerful image for the King and Queen because he trusts that the maintenance of Ferdinand and Isabella throughout his journey was an incredible aspect that resulted in his spectacular accomplishment.

The advantage of working with foreign parties from Spain’s point of view is that Columbus was willing to go on the trip, and there was not a Spanish Explorer that would make the trip. King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella believed that they could benefit from Columbus’ journey west. Queen Isabella wanted land and riches and by sending Columbus west she might be able to gain land and riches from Asia through trade and conquering. Spain was mainly a Catholic nation. They had a strong interest in spreading their religion to any land that they controlled. Any new land that Columbus found and claimed would be claimed for Spain. The advantage for Columbus was that he got paid to go on the journey. He was paid less than a Spanish explorer would have been, so King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella hired Columbus instead

First and foremost, Columbus’ experience was of high value to the Spanish monarchy. Despite initially following in the footsteps of his father as a member of the wool weaving industry, Columbus was quick to pick up mapmaking and sailing as studies (Mariners Museum). Columbus was on the sea even as a teen, joining expeditions through the Aegean and Mediterranean seas (Don Quijote). It was difficult to find such an experienced and educated seaman in contemporary Spain. Many of the future influential conquistadors had yet to be born; the oldest was Francisco Pizarro, and even he was only sixteen years of age when Columbus set sail in 1492. With experience being such a valuable commodity, it was difficult for the Spanish monarchy to justify allowing Columbus to simply offer his skills to another country. Columbus’

Christopher Columbus is known for being an explorer and is said to have made one of the most important voyages in world history without even wanting to. Something else that is also believed is that he “opened up” the Americas to European nations, which changed the course of American history. Before he went on his voyage though, he was in need of resources. So he asked Portugal, France, Italy among many other countries but they all denied Columbus and thought his statement was incorrect. Columbus’ statement was that he had found a faster way to get to Asia than the Portuguese had, which was going around the continent of Africa. Columbus lived a majority of his life in Spain, so when it came to setting sail for the west, Spain was one of the first nations he asked for funding. Though it took Columbus a little more than a few years to convince a nation to fund his voyage, Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand from Spain subsequently granted to endow him in 1492. He would then leave for “Asia” on August 3, 1492. There are many unanswered questions and thoughts on why Spain decided to finally fund Columbus’ voyage, especially since he was an explorer that was born in Italy.

Spanish Monarchs, who were funding the voyages, were told of the mistreatment of Spanish colonists in Hispaniola. Columbus held floggings and executions without trial, let his crew rape innocent natives. He oversaw the killings of some Natives, he beat some natives, he was a slaver, capitalist, and a murder. He was charged with oppression, racism, slavery, rape, theft, vandalism, extermination of a tribe, and ecological desolation. When confronted by the King and Queen he accepted the charges and was stripped of his titles, wealth, and power (http://www.nationalreview.com/article/425389/christopher-columbus-hero-or-villain)

Of the many misconceptions Christopher Columbus had about the land he was traveling to, perhaps one of the largest faux pas was the mislabeling of the indigenous people as “Indians”. The famous misconception stems from the norms of Europe at that time. The population referred to Asia as India which sometimes were divided into sub groups. He also assumed that when they landed they must be near the Indies so it stuck. Of course we now know that the people Christopher Columbus made contact with were in-fact a tribe about sixty miles southeast of his original landing zone of San Salvador.

This week's required reading brought great insight towards Christopher Columbus and his accomplishments. Nevertheless, Christopher Columbus journey for exploration started on positive pretense however when King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella “agreed to award him a one-tenth share of any riches he gathered,” may have later changed Columbus’s motivation (Tindall & Shi, 2016, p. 21). To further illustrate this, when Christopher Columbus arrived in the Bahamas his first question would be to ask if any of the patrons of the country had gold. Additionally, Christopher Columbus would take slaves from the local tribes like the Arawaks as tributes to the king and queen of Spain to help motivate them to further finance his trips. Therefore, Columbus was

Why would a monarch from one country be interested in hiring an explorer from a foreign country to achieve a mission of significant importance? Christopher Columbus (1451-1506), born of Genoa, Italy, was raised among his merchant parents. As a teenager he began to get jobs on trading voyages in the Mediterranean and Aegean seas. One of the voyages he took part in to the island of Khios, in modern day Greece, took him the closest he would ever get to Asia. In the 1470s he would sail out into to the Atlantic Ocean where the commercial fleet he was sailing with was attacked by French privateers off the coast of Portugal.