| json_metadata | "{"app":"Musing","appTags":["columbus"],"appCategory":"columbus","appTitle":"Where did Columbus receive his experience as a sailor and geographer?","appBody":"<p><br></p>\n<p><img src=\"f\" /></p>\n<p>Columbus knew, like many of the Jewish navigators of Genoa, that there was a Terra Incongnita not so far from Europe.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>From June 19 of year 240 before Christ, that is to say for 1732 years, the true navigators, who did not bow before the Plana proclaimed by the Pope in turn, knew the size of the circumference of the Earth. It had been calculated by the Greek astronomer Eratosthenes. In spite of the time in which they were realized, their calculations were quite approximated. Eratosthenes was a versatile man for being a cartographer, geographer and mathematician as well.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>These calculations were used first by the Greeks, the Romans, and by Christianity they were \"lost\" with the Church in order to sustain the theory of the Flat Earth. The Earth had to be flat so that all the inhabitants of the planet could see the second arrival of Christ, that is to say the Parousia, at the same time, something that if the planet was spherical, it would not be possible.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Immediate background</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>The Templars, of French origin, before Philip the Fair came up with the brilliant idea of accusing them of heresy for not paying them what they owed, had the best overseas cargo fleet for the time.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>They knew that the Earth's circumference was about 252,000 stadiums (about 40,000 km). Columbus as navigator, and geographer knew something of those who, apparently, were lost by the Yucatan Peninsula before Columbus. They were knights crossed.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>If Columbus went to one of the two main emerging powers of the time, to ask them to finance the trip to Terra Incognita, it is very likely that the Catholic Kings had kicked them out and sent him to sell almanacs. Instead he proposed to them how to get species to conserve meat without having to go through the lands or waters infested by Ottomans and Arabs.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>From Genoa he went to the Atlantic and settled in Portugal, where he had taken refuge 250 years before the remains of the Templarios fleet, from where he traveled to England, Iceland and Guinea, and later appeared in Andalusia.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Meanwhile he was reading books on his own including The Wonders of Marco Polo and The Imago Mundi of the Cardinal of Ailly, and studying astronomy, geometry and cosmography, as well as learning how to use navigation instruments and design maps. From all the above, Columbus created the idea of reaching the West Indies. but I could not ignore the enormous distance to travel if there was no land or archipelagos in the middle.</p>\n<p>Ángeles Irisarri said:</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"Father Bartolomé de las Casas, who transcribed the so-called Diario de Colón, a work that unfortunately was lost, speaks in his Historia de las Indias (1559) of the\" anonymous pilot \", holding that a ship carrying goods, to sell in Flanders He was surprised by a terrible storm and diverted from his route, so that he came to some islands, which had no name and were unknown to the expert sailors.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>The ship was shipwrecked and almost all of its crew died, except for a few, among them the anonymous pilot, a Spaniard, who answered by the name of Alfonso Sánchez de Huelva. Adds Las Casas, that this man managed to save himself and return, very battered, to the city of Porto Santo, the capital of Madeira, where Columbus lived with his wife and son, and that he attended to the shipwrecked and gave him bed and table . Whether or not this story is true, the pilot corresponded to the favors of Columbus and indicated the direction he should follow to reach the Cathay by the West, or Terra Incognita that they assumed was Cathay, but that in no way was that far.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>It is very likely that the pilot told you about which currents to ride to have only 15 weeks and not months of navigation.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Another element to keep in mind that Columbus knew that he was not going to Catay but to Terra Incognita is that both in Portugal and in Spain, the respective monarchs commissioned a meeting of wise men to study the project of Columbus; in Portugal they were mathematicians, and in Spain they were cosmographers and astronomers. The meetings, calculated that the trip was unrealizable.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>If historical investigators agree on anything, it is that, before beginning their journey, Columbus did not ask for money, but ships, crew and enough food to be able to reach the Indies:</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"Columbus did not ask for entry money, although he asked the Kings for the freight of the ships, the more ships and more crews the better, because he had to travel the unknown sea, that sea, namely interminable, called the Dark Sea for thousands of years. years \", explains Ángeles Irisarri, author of Isabel, the Queen.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"Money in itself, did not ask, the cost of travel, which was obviously money: three ships, three crews, for a long time and an adventure, in a way, risky.\"</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"Christopher Columbus was already an expert sailor in navigations, that is to say, very experienced when he went to present his project both to King Juan of Portugal, and to the Catholic Monarchs, he had sailed since he was 14 years old and by then, he had already traveled the seven He had crossed the whole Mediterranean in the service of corsairs or lords, like Renato de Anjou, both harassing the Valencian coasts, and the Greek islands.</p>\n<p>Columbus was not stupid and he knew that this trip with three ships of small size was literally impossible. They had to navigate 5,300 nautical miles (26,000 km) away, or 2/3 of the circumference. Simply ridiculous.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Where did the Catholic Monarchs get that money to finance the first steps of Columbus' journey? Of a man, Santángel, and of a city, Palos. Ángeles Irisarri explains it this way:</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"Isabel paid the first trip of Columbus with the money that Santángel anticipated and with the amount of the fine he had imposed on the town of Palos (for looting Portuguese ships in peacetime), whose inhabitants had not paid it.\"</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>The Queen exchanged the money for the crews for the three caravels. Queen Elizabeth would not have been able to do all these things if Columbus had told her that she was going to a land she knew from the traditions of navigators 170 years earlier.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"He asked for a lot, but not so much in money as in privileges and concessions,\"</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>said the historian Villarroel. It seems to be, Teresa Cunillera explained, that on the horizon of Columbus not only were the Indies, but also the Court:</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"He wanted to belong to the high nobility.\"</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>That is why he did not hesitate to ask the kings for the granting of the title of Grand Admiral. Title, as Cunillera says, for example, that only had the uncle of Fernando El Católico, who did not like the subject:</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"It was one of the nobility's greats (...) It was something that had an impact, of course Fernando did not feel well at all\".</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>However, Columbus got his way, because he carefully concealed what he knew and got the Capitulations of Santa Fe to grant him that and something else:</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"Christopher Columbus agreed with the representatives of the Catholic Monarchs, who, after arriving at the Catay, would receive 10% of the amount of all the goods that he found or won or trochar, whether gold, silver, spices or other things; admiral for life all the lands and islands that he discovered, with the right to have his sons inherit the title, and be named viceroy \".</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Why the change of opinion? Why did Isabel and Fernando finally give in to the demands of the Genoese navigator?</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Teresa Cunillera again believes that behind this decision lies a question of faith:</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"It seems that the strongest argument that Columbus presented to the Catholic Monarchs was that they could expand the faith, because they were supposed to find many inhabitants whom they could convert to Christianity.\"</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Irisarri, however, has a much more \"twisted\" version:</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>\"His Highnesses granted him everything he wanted, perhaps because they doubted that the Genoese came to the Cathay from the west and that, once there, he continued his journey by land until he reached Jerusalem, where King Fernandopara would join him, among the two, and their people, rescue the tomb of the Lord from unfaithful hands. \"</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Twisted or not, Colon wore the same shirt as Los Pobres Caballeros de San Juan, and the red crosses that identified them ... For what?</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Other historians of the discoverers, but on this side of the Atlantic, believe that the possibility of new lands or even islands, moved the imagination of Isabel, who apparently was much more determined and impulsive than her spouse.</p>\n<p><br></p>\n<p>Finally and conclusively, Christopher Columbus, as a good sailor, knew that he could not do 5,300 sea leagues (to reach Cathay) in 10 weeks, so it is certain that he did know that he was not in the East Indies.</p>","appDepth":2,"appParentPermlink":"p3ec5rd95","appParentAuthor":"abu3443","musingAppId":"aU2p3C3a8N","musingAppVersion":"1.1","musingPostType":"answer"}" |
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