The Discovery Of Christopher Columbus

To start of, why do we celebrate Columbus Day? Americans have created many pros to why we should celebrate Columbus Day. One of these pros is up until Columbus’s voyage to the Americas, the overwhelming majority of the seafaring community was more than a little bit nervous about sailing West – so much so that the ships would make terribly dangerous voyages through some of the rough seas just to avoid “falling off the edge of the world”. Columbus showed that not only could you sail West without falling off the edge of the planet, but that there was an entire new section of the world open and available for exploration. Although some might say that he helped advance trade, others say it is impossible to downplay the brutality that Christopher Columbus and following Europeans inflicted upon the indigenous people of the Americas when they came over. This wasn’t an idyllic relationship between the indigenous people and the Europeans, and Columbus landing on this new continent really led to genocide. As you can see, many people say that Columbus advanced trade, but he was very brutal to the Native Americans, which brings up the main question of this essay: do you think we should be celebrating Columbus Day?

Columbus’s big plan for Hispaniola since the beginning was to take advantage of the natives and take their land, and the gold he believed was located there. He built the first fort in the Western Hemisphere, and left some of his men to find and store gold there. Columbus had to ask for a little more help from their majesties, he convinced them by saying he would take them “as much gold as they need ... and as many slaves as they ask” (Zinn,6 ) Columbus’s plans affected the natives, in many ways; first of all they were going to lose their land, and also they were going to be taken captive for slave labor.

The second Monday in October is celebrated across America as Columbus Day. It is a celebration of the man who discovered America. In school, children are taught that Christopher Columbus was a national hero. In actuality, the man was a murderer. It is true that he found a land that was unknown to the "civilized" world, yet in this discovery, he erased the natives inhabiting the land. With slavery, warfare, and inhumane acts, Christopher Columbus and the men who accompanied him completely destroyed a people, a culture, and a land. These are not actions that should be heralded as heroic.

“In fourteen-hundred ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” As alluded to in this popular classroom rhyme, Christopher Columbus was an Italian explorer whose motivation was to find a western sea route to Asia from Europe, as the terrain between the continents was treacherous, in addition to his selfish desire for fortune and fame. The rhyme above simplifies Christopher Columbus’ first voyage to the Americas in 1492, in which he stumbled across America, in which Columbus expressed the illusion of surfacing in India, and discovered it. In honor of this achievement, on the second Monday in October of every year, the United States of America celebrates Columbus Day, in which Columbus is regarded as heroic. The U.S. should denounce Columbus

Many argue that Christopher Columbus doesn't deserve to be celebrated because he was a murderer and rapist, but because of Columbus we get to call America our home. Although he wasn't the first person to discover America he did take action and bring our men here, he began trading, and bridged the gap between the Old and New World. If it weren’t for Columbus, America wouldn’t be what it is today, and would have taken a different turn. Columbus should continue to be celebrated this day for his

When you were a kid, you were taught that Christopher Columbus was this great explorer and person. That’s why we celebrate Columbus Day, but little did you know that he was a really twisted and corrupted person. Columbus should be remembered in a bad way because he led to the enslavement of the Native American people, slaughtered them, but a cultural exchange with the “New World” and the Europeans was started because of him.

Columbus Day is a widely celebrated day each year to recognize our country being found. Little do most people know, it is hardly an occasion to be celebrated. Columbus didn’t stumble on vast empty land, he stumbled upon the home of millions of Indians. He had two objectives: slaves and gold. He was willing to do anything to get it even if that meant enslaving, killing, torturing, and spreading disease upon the people there. The Indians greeted Columbus with great kindness and generosity, rescuing his boat and offering him what he pleased. He took advantage of their kindness and used it against them leading to their demise. Most people know none of this or only a scratch at the surface of the horrors that really took place to form what is now a Super Country. Since most people don’t know, in a sense means that they are celebrating this day innocently. It’s almost like wearing a band shirt to signify that you listen to the band but in actuality if someone were to ask you the name of the lead singer you would have no clue. Aside from the fact that the person usually wears the shirt to appear

America’s history is filled with heroes and icons that built a foundation for and play a part in what America is today. As a country we praise these icons to show how proud we are to be a part of such a complex and intelligent society. However, we bury the facts of how America was found in order to not destroy that perfectly created image of the perfectly created country. As a child on Columbus Day, all we hear is “In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue”, and we get a day off from school, which is sufficient for children in elementary and middle school. Columbus’ actions after he gets off his boat are what lead people to believe that Columbus should not be held on the pedestal he is on. Christopher Columbus and his men raped, enslaved, and killed about three million natives from

When growing up kids are taught the rhyme that tells us Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492 and told that he discovered America. This is not actually true. We celebrate a federal holiday every October for a man who did not even discover our country and harmed the people that inhabited it. As time goes on historians have proceeded to learn and write more about the real life of Christopher Columbus and how what we learned as kids isn’t all the truth. When they did this the controversy that has come up is over whether there is validity of honoring this explorer as a hero and if it’s true that he was the founder. There has been a lot of proof of all the damage that was created by Columbus and his crews, this has lead to an uproar over how much emphasis is placed upon studying and celebrating him in schools and public celebrations.

Ever since we were children we were taught the story of Christopher Columbus, of how he valiantly ventured into the unknown, discovered new lands, enhanced trade, and inspired many other explorers. He seemed a hero back then, a man of great accomplishments. Our country wouldn’t be here without him, after all. However, we are rarely taught about the other side of the story, about the abuse of the native people of the lands Columbus “discovered” and about the greed and violence tied in with his voyages. Christopher Columbus was not a man that should be celebrated, despite his success in inspiring an age of exploration and expansion.

In the article “Christopher Columbus stole credit for discovering America” by David Millward. Millward talks about how Columbus stole the credit of the discovered of America from the Pinzon brothers. In addition the brothers Vincente and Martin Pinzon providing ships, after Columbus’s original ship was destroyed by the people of Palos in Andalusia. The Pinzon brothers, on the other hand, were veteran mariners who had little difficulty in recruiting crew to take part in what was potentially a dangerous voyage and Columbus had already the crew for the dangerous voyage. He mention that Columbus may have been a brilliant navigator and politician but he was not a sea captain because Columbus ship sank in December 1492, after hitting reef of the

In modern day Christopher Columbus is still very germane today as teachers edify students with history mentioning Columbus. Because of this, Columbus is a very well-known person and people recollected him as the man who discovered that the Earth wasn’t flat. During the year 1492, Christopher Columbus has set a twelve-year period voyage and later discovered the Caribbean, Central, and South America. The purpose of his voyages is to find a sea route to the East to benefit Europe since it was a cheaper way to transport goods and riches rather than the route in Asia. He also wanted the natives to convert to Christianity. Many Europeans during that era considered Columbus a hero and that even today America recognize him with a holiday so people can celebrate his achievements. Yet, in contrast, Catalina De Erauso (Lieutenant Nun) seems that many people do not know her. She wasn’t taught by teachers, unlike Columbus. But in her memoir she had to do more than just discover the New World. She had to become a different person. To adapt and reconstitute her own identity by being masculine. Many times she was placed in dreadful situations where she murders men and endeavors to absquatulate from the law. Catalina also had to take different job offerings to survive the world she’s living in. Many might express Columbus effortlessly didn’t have to try because of his gender identity and that Catalina had to do so because she is a woman. In a society we live in today we’ve always been told

Millions of people in the US have mixed historical and traditional interpretation about the legacy of Christopher Columbus. The history of the famous explorer has been rewritten many times. He was one of the first of many Europeans to land in the New World. He is an Italian explorer whose discovery of the New World— Caribbean– with his crewmen marked the beginning of decades of colonization and trans-Atlantic invasion on the American soil. Columbus sighted the New World, as he intended to sail west hoping to reach Asia through a water path from Europe in August 3, 1492 . He wanted to find a quicker direction to reach the countries in the East that provided the gold desired in Europe, due to the difficult route from Europe to Asia by land. Today, his legacy has sparked controversies among people. In the United States, the second Monday of October is dedicated to him. To some, Columbus Day is a great day, but others find the day offensive. His supporters remember him as a heroic explorer who transformed the New World to what it is today— America— and that we must respect his accomplishment; however his critics focus on the devastating actions by him and the Spanish towards the Indian population they conquered. I personally go in favor of his critics because one cannot celebrate an evil sailor. Christopher Columbus should be remembered in history for his exploration of what the New World is now, however his day should be criticized for his severe actions towards the Native

Since Christopher Columbus’s first voyage in 1492, several systems of labor have entered and exited through Latin America. Beginning with the Encomienda, established by King Ferdinand, continuing on to Repartimiento, the abolition of slavery and ensuing of a contract of forced labor, and arriving ultimately at the transatlantic slave trade, responsible from flourishing slavery throughout Latin America. Each labor system had flaws and weren’t extremely well thought out; as such, the systems all eventually met their demise (Martin.) The system of encomienda began to decline as the Crown used principles of favoritism to assign landowners, as well as disease struck. The system of the Repartimiento due to the mass exploitation, was weak from civil wars, the fleeing of natives, and disease. The system of slavery for plantation ended due to inhuman treatment, as well as inequality, and a ‘harsh hierarchy’, as Eakin says. Although, all three labor systems were motivated by the idea of colonizing new land, the end of their respective systems were due to similar and differing factors (Eakin.)

Christopher Columbus, an Italian explorer on a mission to find a direct route to India, made four voyages. In his search for a market for spices in India, Columbus traveled to the Caribbean and South America in a period between 1492 and 1504. In the first trip, he sailed in honor of King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella of Spain in three ships, namely the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria, and he landed in San Salvador. The second, third and fourth trips took him to Hispaniola, Trinidad and Venezuela, and Mexico,