Columbus

Introduction Introduction Christopher Columbus who was born on 1451 and died on 1506 was an Italian navigator and explorer. His grand dream was to reach Asia by sailing to the west across the Atlantic ocean to reach the far east where he would find Asia. In his four voyages to the Americas he failed to reach Asia but opened the western hemisphere to the European exploration and colonization. Although the Americas had been discovered by the Vikings hundreds of years before Columbus ,it was his voyages that revealed the New World and power to Europe. Columbus voyages gave rise to an era of European domination of the world and saw the spread of the European's religious, political and economic ideas to all the other parts of the world. The nature of Columbus achievements however was recognized by neither Columbus nor his contemporaries. Columbus was a navigator of extraordinary skill he a religious zealot and visionary. He was often daring courageous, imaginative and also tenacious. At times he could be greedy, jealous, and brutal. This year he was a colonial administrator, he eventually was stripped of his authority in the Americas and died in obscurity. Columbus's has been revered as the Admiral of the ocean sea who discovered America on October 12, 1492 and spread European civilization to the new world in the late 20th century, revisionist historians called Columbus a symbol of European exploitation and imperialism. The controversy created by these contrasting viewpoints has not obscured the central fact that he made what perhaps was the most significant voyage in recorded history and forever changed the world.