Christopher Columbus

in the fact that he yearns for the unknown; and Portugal faced the Atlantic Ocean, that immense unexplored "Sea of Darkness" as it was then called.

been striving for centuries to drive out the Moors, whom they considered the arch enemies of Christian Europe. Portugal, being equally near to Africa, was also overrun by Moors, and for ages the Portuguese had been at war with them, finally vanquishing the

rls, spices, rare woods-naturally set Europe to thinking that the lands producing them must be the most favored part of the world, and "the Indies" stood for wealth of all kinds. No one knew precisely

t was with this division of "India" that the Portuguese Prince Henry hoped to establish a trade; not, at first, by rounding Africa and sailing up its east coast to Abyssinia, but by merely cruising down the coast of Western Africa till Abyssinia's Atlantic shores were reached; for so vague was the geography of that far-away day that Abyssinia was supposed to stretch from Ethiopia to the Atlantic. "If," reasoned Prince Henry, "my sailors can feel their way down Africa till they come to Prester John's territory, not only could our nation secure the rich trade which now goes to the Moors, but we could form a treaty with the African Christians and ask them to come to Europe and help us should the Moors ever again advance again

own to Europe, but not the Atlantic coast. There was an ancient belief that ships could not enter tropic seas because the intensely hot sun drew up all the water and lef

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, the most westerly point of Europe and the most southwesterly point of Portugal. To this observatory the prince invited the most learned astronomers, geographers, and instrument-makers then living, that they might all work together with him; an

lands in the west, so westward some of them sailed and found the Azores and the Madeira Islands. These last had been known to Engl

pe was to decide which one should own it. But the Crusades were unsuccessful, and so the question of ownership of land outside of Europe never came up until Prince Henry sent out his discoverers. Then, in order to make Portugal's claim very sure to whatever she might find, Pope Martin V. issued an order that all land which might be discovered between Cap

ther south, down past Guinea and the mouth of the Congo, always asking for the India of Prester John; but the savage blacks at whose coasts they touched had never heard of it. Finally Bartholomew Dias rounded the Cape of Good Hope and proved that the African India had no Atlantic coast; and he also proved that

oute to India, he died knowing that the Madeiras and the Azores existed out in the open sea, while Africa stretched far south of the Equator. His devotion to navigation had imbued his countrymen

y understand why Lisbon was a magnet to the ambitious Christopher Columbus; and we may feel sure that had the brave, intelligent "Protector of Studies in Portugal" been still alive when Columbus formed his plan for discovery, the int

ich the pirates interrupted off Cape St. Vincent. Many writers consider that it was in Iceland where he heard rumors of "land in the west." If the

g. But these northern peoples did not entirely lose sight of their discoveries, for they sang about them from century to century in quaint and beautiful ballads called sagas. It was not until after Columbus revealed the west to European eyes that these sagas were published; nevertheless, it is not improbable that, if Columbus landed in Iceland, some inhabitant w

Ponent (where the sun sets); I have seen what is called T

pheres, and inscribing upon them in the proper places cities, rivers and mountains, isles and ports." He appears to have tried to earn a little money by commerce as well as by map-making. We have no exact record of this, but it is thought that he borrowed capital for trading purposes from rich Genoese merchants settled in Lisbon, and lost it. This

which was later attributed to Columbus, but which Columbus himself, until his return from his first voyage of discovery, never even mentioned. Whether he and Martin Behaim talked together about the route to India we shall never know. Probably they did not; for when Christopher importuned later for ships, it was only for the purpose of discovering "lands in the west" and not for finding a short route to India. Columbus, though he knew how to draw maps and design spheres, really possessed but