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Did Columbus believe he had reached Asia until his death?
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Christopher Columbus believed he had reached Asia throughout his life, maintaining this belief until his death. Despite evidence and claims by others like Amerigo Vespucci, who suggested Columbus had discovered new lands, Columbus remained convinced his voyages had reached the East Indies. His conviction was influenced by his readings, such as Marco Polo's accounts, and his interpretation of the people and places he encountered, which he believed matched descriptions of Asia.
In the 1400s, new navigation technology, such as the caravel, magnetic compass, and astrolabe were developed. This, combined with growing power and wealth amongst European rulers, helped spur the Age of Exploration. One of the main goals of European explorers was the find a fast, water route to Asia. While Portuguese explorers searched for a route that went south of Africa and then north toward India and Southeast Asia, Christopher Columbus had a different idea. Columbus believed that the Atlantic Ocean was not as big as people imagined. He also, not knowing the Americas existed, believed that heading out to the Atlantic would result in the discovery of a faster and shorter route to Asia. Spain sponsored Columbus's voyage, which famously landed in the Bahamas. Columbus, however, believed that his theory was correct. Columbus returned to Spain holding the belief that he had landed in the East Indies. Columbus would...
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hold this belief until his death. Amerigo Vespucci, a fellow explorer who met with Columbus and also conducted voyages of exploration, made a different claim. Vespucci claimed that Columbus's voyages did not actually reach the East Indies, but instead landed in a new, undiscovered land. The new land would eventually be given the name "America" in honor of Vespucci.
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Throughout his lifetime, and despite some disagreement from his contemporaries, Christopher Columbus never abandoned the belief that his voyages had reached Asia. He believed that East Asia, the region then called "the Indies," was much closer to Western Europe than it was, and that this region was more easily reached by traveling westward than eastward. Prior to his travels, Columbus read extensively about the Indies, particularly Marco Polo's account of the indigenous people, which were sometimes untrue or exaggerated. When he reached the Canary Islands in 1492 and discovered that the people there were naked and wore gold jewelry in their noses, just as Marco Polo described Asian people, he concluded that he must have reached the Indies, and there is no record of him giving up on this conviction at any point before his death.
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