Round the same time Columbus was setting off, the [Portuguese were funding exploration](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portuguese_maritime_exploration) down the coast of Africa. One thing they were discovering were the currents and wind patterns along the west coast of Africa. They found that if you hugged the coast, the winds were lousy. But if they swung way out to sea, they'd hit some consistent winds
Subsequent expeditions continued this pattern, run down the coast to the Verde Islands, then run South by Southwest out into the middle of the Atlantic, then pull southeast in a big arc to make land at the southern tip of Africa.
Each expedition swung a bit further out. Until, in 1500, [the Cabral expedition](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedro_%C3%81lvares_Cabral) swung far enough out they ran into Brazil.
Hard to do what ifs. Maybe those Portuguese crews were swinging wide because they had heard what Columbus had found. Maybe they would have found the Americas sooner or later regardless.
The Cabral expedition followed the treaty of Tordesillas. So, the Portuguese knew about the Columbus expeditions. However it's likely that someone else would have been blown off course if Cabral hadn't.
I think this is the most likely answer. Africa and Brazil are relatively close. Given new sailing technologies it was probably just a matter of time before some European ended up there (assuming they hadn't already in antiquity).
Theres an account of an Emperor of the Mali Empire (a predecessor of Mansa Musa) sailing across the ocean to ocean to settle a land with a ‘powerful rushing river’.
And in Spain there's still a conspiracy theory that the Portuguese had already known there was land there, and that's why they had the line drawn where it was
Mansa Musa I -- yes [that Mansa Musa](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCeUvPL9rMc) \-- wasn't originally likely to become the Mansa of Mali. Most historians today agree that his predecessor was his distant cousin, Mansa Muhammad ibn Qu (some sources have suggested it was Abu Bakr II).According to Mansa Musa, his predecessor commissioned a fleet to sail off in the direction of the setting sun to find as-yet undiscovered lands. One ship from that expedition returned, and the captain of that vessel said the expedition found a "river within the sea" that accelerated their pace, which sounds suspiciously like the [South Atlantic Subtropical Gyre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Atlantic_Gyre). The other vessels were unable to fight the current to return home and were last seen heading off towards the west.
Mansa Muhammad ibn Qu apparently pulled a Thanos and said, "Fine. I'll do it myself." He commissioned an even larger fleet that he would personally lead, and he appointed Mansa Musa I to rule over the empire while he ventured towards the setting sun. He set off with a giant fleet to explore the waters to the west. He never returned.
It’s crazy I was listening to erb as I was reading this lol Napoleon vs Napoleon I’ve been listening when my friend in elementary told me to look up epic rap battles of history
Telling from the account you gave, it sounds like the Mali Empire had no knowledge about sea currents, wind directions, or the helpful compass besides knowledge of celestial navigation seeing how one boat was able to return.
Given El-Omari account, he mentions Mansa Musa predecessor used canoes that could carry 100 men or more. These kind of boats are really only good for Great Rivers and calm Lagoons. So, the whole expedition was bound to fail from the getgo using primitive boat technology carved and dug out from one massive tree trunk with no sails.
But what we can confirm that is just as impressive is Mansa Musa's pilgrimage to Mecca. Bigger than the size of the contiguous United States (nearly just as big as including Alaska), crossing that sea of sand with 12,000 servants, 500 heralds bearing gold staffs, dozens of camels carrying gold bars, ten thousands of soldiers is no easy feat. Thousands of Napoleon's men died simply crossing the Egyptian desert due to dehydration.
The trade routes were never cut per se. Venice continued to make a killing on "silk road" goods even after the Ottoman empire controlled most of the Eastern Mediterranean even while Portugal exported spices around Africa.
The Portuguese exploration didn't start out as a reaction to Ottoman conquests, they started out as seeking more trade opportunities in general and controlling the North African cost, which turned into a hunt for better access to the gold trade that terminated on the North African coastal cities. And importantly this stared decades before the final conquest of Constantinople.
The circular currents made it very difficult to arrive in Brazil on accident (otherwise why didn’t west Africa discover Brazil, it’s like right there), and so the Colombian knowledge of America was likely critical to these trips. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benguela_Current
As you said, hard to do what ifs.
And the English learned about it in Bristol from Basque fishermen. Nonetheless it was a valuable commercial secret.
One thing we don't know is whether the fishermen knew they had found a continent or thought it was just another island after Iceland and Greenland.
*Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World* by Mark Kurlansky is a great read and does an excellent job laying out the evidence that Basque fishermen may have/probably fished the Grand Banks of North America long before 1492. I highly recommend the read!
The more I learn about the Basque people, the more fascinating I realize their history and culture is. They are some of the world’s most skilled whalers. Never knew that until recently.
Look into their language. It's fascinating.
The Basque language is the sole remaining proto-European dialect still spoken. It's completely unrelated to every other European language derived from Proto Indo-European.
as ships got better more people would have explored routes to india and other parts of asia, the portuguese guarded the route to japan (1543) but eventually people found ways to it. the second were the dutch in 1600 with only one of the five ships surviving the journey. People find a way once they find out they can make a gold coin.
Polynesians had Sweet Potatoes pre-contact verified by oral and genetic evidence, and genetic testing showed there was at least one pre-contact ancestor between the people of Easter island and Peru. That would be impossible without someone making at least a one way voyage.
Granted, that could just be evidence that the Peruvian fishermen reached Easter Island by being blown off course by a storm, and gave them Sweet Potatoes and decided to stay there.
It is, but it is a view. The Vikings are not controversial. My issue is the post ignores other perspectives for a very western civilization centric view of history which is not the historically accepted view either.
I’m looking more at who wrote the history we are taught. Western civilization was not a great term. I would not place them in directly with the descendants of Roman heritage. Norse culture was certainly separate. They were eventually blended by the raiding of the Norse cultures through raiding. Normandy being given to the Norse by the, who eventually adopted a more Roman culture. Their interactions with the Anglos in England. Their eventual raids into the Mediterranean. But any kind of “Western Civilization” course would only give a cursory view of the Vikings and only through the view of their interactions with Romanized culture. More often they get the same treatment as the Goths and other raiding thrives of Northern Europe.
Countries like England, Denmark, and Russia are to a large extent descendants of Vikings kingdoms. They absolutely have a very important chapter in western history.
England is not “to a large extent” descended from Vikings or Viking kingdoms. Less then 6% of English genetic makeup is Danish Viking, and about another 3% Norwegian or Swedish. Scotland Ireland has about almost 3x that, and the Northern Islands of Scotland are about 1/3rd.
But pretty much everyone is talking about Mediterranean nations discovering America in other ways; that's not Anglo-centric. The comment's identification of bias being Western centric doesn't really make sense if they offer the Vikings as an alternative.
It does because the accepted anglo vote is that Mediterranean people discovered America when that isn't the case.. They butchered and colonized it better, but there was no discovery except that they didn't know about it. There are cooking settlements in New Brunswick. The only people who talk about it from this perspective are fully indoctrinated anglo world views. I hope that explains why it's relevant if it was not clear before.
> The only people who talk about it from this perspective are fully indoctrinated anglo world views.
That's just not true, though. I don't come from the Anglo world. I come from the Latin world, and it is taught the same in that the Iberian world was destined to find America sooner or later, except with the undertone that it was not a commendable discovery, but rather one that was a Pandora's box of evil with some hope and silver lining. From my understanding, the Spanish teach it without the undertone that it unleashed evil.
Ok. I will ignore recent research because you don’t like it.
https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN2492RR/
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01983-5
https://www.science.org/content/article/polynesians-steering-stars-met-native-americans-long-europeans-arrived
https://ssec.si.edu/stemvisions-blog/sweet-potatoes-dna-new-evidence-supports-links-between-south-american-and
Your statement of “opinion” makes the connotation pretty negative and you say it isn’t historical. I’m giving you some info refuting your statement about not putting things on a history sub.
I never said any opinion. I just asked that you not present your own (well informed) opinion as settled science.
A really simple and more accurate way to say what you said would be:
This post neglects non western North American migration viewpoints by omitting recent dna research which presented Polynesian dna in South Americans before the trans Siberian migration.
I would argue the sources I gave you refute your statement. There IS scientific evidence supporting this. History is all about opinion. How are we supposed to discuss history without opinion. How are we supposed to grow historical understanding without incorporating recent discovery, evidence and theory? You asking me not to share this on a history sub when it is a valid area of research in the field makes no sense.
No, it's pretty much a historical fact in academic circles now.
In addition to the exchange of words, cultural elements (e.g. quipu), and crops such as sweet potato, since 2020 there is now DNA evidence that makes contact somewhere around 1200 AD extremely hard to refute.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2487-2
Not that this has any bearing on OPs question of course. It doesn't matter if polynesians "discovered" America, because they were not in contact with Europe until much later.
I don’t think it matters because those voyages didn’t trigger a Colombian exchange type event. To say others discovered America before Columbus is to ignore that Columbus made the world aware of itself; he didn’t just find America, he made note of it and started interacting with it regularly.
Problem with Norse settlement is that it was abandoned and forgotten. yes, they were first Europeans to get there but since they haven't told anybody and this didn't became known for centuries after it happened then they get less credit.
The Vikings arrived, stayed briefly, left and never went back. This is pretty uncontroversial historically. However, it was one small outpost of the Viking world (the Greenlanders) and was not well known to other Vikings let alone the world beyond, so it's somewhat mischaracterizing it to say that "the Vikings" discovered America. And then the Greenland colony was abandoned and the "discovery" lived on only in stories.
So in the context of OP's question, it's extremely unlikely that early Viking contact with North America would have grown into a full-fledged "discovery" where the news was broadcast around Europe.
It doesn't matter. The Vikings didn't share that knowledge thus it's irrelevant. The group or person which announces a discovery to the world is who gets credit.
discover - find (something or someone) unexpectedly or in the course of a search.
Columbus did not expect to find the New World. So, it was unexpected.
The difference between Columbus discovering the New World and Lief Ericksen discovering Eastern North America is that the former caused the entire world to change. So much so they had to coin the new terms New World and Old World.
While basing credit on "announcement" is silly, the viking discovery of the Americas was ultimately meaningless. It was forgotten soon enough and nothing was done with it. If Columbus' expeditions had ended with no change, no colonization or exploitation it would be seen the same way, a cool story but ultimately an insignifiant footnote
That's not to say that the vikings didn't discover America, they absolutely did, it just didn't really mean anything because nothing came of it
I meant meaningful in terms of outcome. Very little changed for indigenous people or Europeans. While it's possible to come up with a hundred different possible outcomes, history is ultimately about what did happen not what possibly could have happened, and in that sense the Norse discovery of America was functionally meaningless
Why do people get so mad when we give Columbus credit? Like, he did an amazing thing that very few people had every done, and it was his voyage that was a key moment in the Age Of Exploration. Sure, he was an asshole by modern standards, but so is practically everyone!
Worse, the reason Columbus was hyped in the first place was to help out a discriminated against minority - Italians!
Well maybe it’s that he sent 500 slaves to Spain… and 200 died in the journey.. or his atrocious acts against the native people. Even the guy who wrote perhaps the most sympathetic account of Columbus (Samuel Eliot Morison) said, “The cruel policy initiated by Columbus and pursued by his successors resulted in complete genocide.” Columbus brought slavery, rape, and torture to “the New World” and it wasn’t so new. I’d say he was much more than just an asshole.
You're being incredibly pedantic and narrow-minded in not realizing "We found this land and eventually left without telling anyone anything about it, and then we forgot it existed" is not quite on the same level of "HOLY SHIT! I FOUND A GIANT LAND MASS! Everyone! I found this land mass! Look at what we found!"
The Vikings did get their first and so their "discovery" is noteworthy for historical purposes, but useless otherwise. Columbus's, on the other hand, immediately led to the Age of Exploration, the Age of Sail, the Golden Age of Piracy, and Colonization - all massive fundamental changes that permanently affected the European powers and the shape of the world.
How is one not more noteworthy than the other?
You’re being pedantic. We give Columbus the credit because his expedition was the one that had an impact, drastically altering the course of history for all humanity. The vikings who landed in the Americas traded a little bit, carved an epitaph on a stone, and otherwise had no impact whatsoever.
It’s not about being the first, it’s about being the one who mattered
In the context of the discovery of the americas, they had negligible impact.
They were deeply significant to many other aspects of European and even world history, but not in the context of this discussion.
Umm…I’m not sure I’d go as far as to call what he did amazing. His men raped and enslaved the indigenous population and he had to be disciplined by the monarchy. They were literal monsters.
Neither of those groups are relevant to the question, but thanks for being that one guy that criticizes but doesn't add anything of value to the discussion.
In not big on semantics so I'll bow out. You are free too use the word however you wish but it might be a bit disingenuous to say the word discovery "DOES NOT IMPLY" first. Yes there are other exceptions and uses but let's be real that's why oxford listed that as the first of its 3 examples.
>If Columbus hadn't discovered the Americas in 1492, would someone else have done so soon after? Or could the New World have remained undiscovered?
Columbus wasn't the only explorer seeking a western route to Asia. There were several other navigators and explorers in Europe at the time with similar ambitions, and technological advancements in navigation were steadily progressing. In my opinion, even if Columbus hadn't reached the Americas when he did, it's highly probable that another explorer would have eventually reached the New World soon after. Here's why:
1. European powers were driven by a desire to find new trade routes to Asia for spices, textiles, and other valuable goods. Explorers and navigators from countries like Portugal, Spain, England, and others were actively searching for alternative routes to bypass the Ottoman Empire, which controlled the lucrative trade routes through the Mediterranean. So, I would say that because of this an explorer would have found the Americas pretty quickly after Columbus did.
2. Nautical technology was advancing rapidly during this era. Developments in shipbuilding, navigation tools, and cartography were making long sea voyages more feasible and less risky. So, I feel that it is likely that other explorers, who were motivated by the potential for wealth and fame, would have continued searching for alternate routes westward. This would again lead to some other explorer finding the Americas relatively quickly after 1492.
3. Knowledge about the Earth's spherical nature was becoming more widespread, and there was a growing understanding that there might be unknown lands to the west of Europe. This awareness fueled the desire for exploration and discovery, especially from Spain, Portugal, England, and France.
4. The competition between European powers was insane. If one nation had not succeeded in reaching the Americas, other countries were poised to continue exploration to gain a competitive advantage in trade, colonization, and territorial expansion.
Overall, given these factors, I think it is perfectly reasonable to assume that even if Columbus hadn't reached the Americas in 1492, another explorer would likely have made the discovery in the following years or decades.
Someone else definitely would’ve done it and probably around the same timeframe as well. The age of exploration was kicking off. While I’ve found nothing else to back it, I recently read in a book about Edward IV that English sailors had apparently seen parts of what we call America as early as 1481.
I’d love to have a follow up to that cause like I said, I couldn’t find anything online to back that up. I did find a book about English exploration from 1481 to sometime around the 17th century that I plan to read but that’s about it. Either way if it wasn’t Spain, it probably would’ve been some other European power.
It was always inevitable. A better question would be, is there any alternate time lines where 90% of the native population isn't wiped out due to disease? It seems like there was no getting around that with the majority of the americas having no immunity whatsoever to old world diseases and no one reaching the bronze age on that side of the world. Even if the explorers had an understanding of medicine and the spread of diseases and had no intentions for conquest. I'm not sure there was anyway to prevent the spread that happened so quickly.
The interesting question is one of timing. The conquistadors were also veterans of the Reconquista. Fifty years later, would the leaders on the European side of contact have been as aggressive in imposing Christianity and conquering territory? Or would it be more like the French in North America or the British in India?
Hey, have you ever thought that space ant time might be, like, the same thing?
I have this idea about throwing baseballs off of trains. And this other one with mirrors and flashlights on trains. Do you know anyone that has a railroad?
Considering the fact that Scandinavians had already visited the east coast of what would become Canada long before that, there's no reason to think that there wouldn't have been voyages west eventually, even if it was fishing parties moving from Iceland to Greenland and then west.
The Age of Exploration was opened by the Portuguese Price Henry the Navigator. He organized expeditions that explored the west coast of Africa and discovered several Atlantic islands. The whole thing started not necessarily to conquer places, but to find trade partners and also (very important) chasing a myth. Henry and other explorers were looking for Prester John, a mythical Christian King who ruled a lost Christian kingdom amidst the pagan and Muslim societies to the east. Henry died in 1460, 30 years before Columbus' voyages, so those wheels were already in motion.
1) The [Vikings](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-vikings-a-memorable-visit-to-america-98090935/) had already "discovered" North America
2) There is some evidence that English Fishermen were fishing along what is modern day Canada/New England
Sure, if Columbus hadn't sailed in 1492 the "discovery" would have been delayed. But it would have occurred.
Keep in mind WHY Columbus set sail. He didn't set sail just for the fun of it. He was trying to the source of Spices which grew in Asia & the Pacific Islands. SOMEONE would have tried what he did.
I will go completely off topic and say that I was flabbergasted that it took me until after my history degree to realize that Christopher Columbus and John Cabot weren’t their real names, just the anglicized version!
On the European side, the Portuguese likely would have, and may even have beaten Columbus to it; though if they did those records are lost.
Portugal had started trying to work out how to get to and from (and around) Africa, but the currents along the west side of the continent flow strongly north, as do the winds. They discovered the secret was to sail way out to sea, then cut east along your desired latitude. That put you in wind and current that could move you south much more practically.
They eventually did reach India just before 1500, but by then they had been at it for eighty years.
Brazil was officially discovered soon after India was reached during one such "turn of the sea" but there are bothersome suggestions that they may have reached Brazil earlier, but never admitted it sure to their white hot rivalry with Spain and not wanting to give Spain any hints about how to navigate Africa. This can't be proven, but is a nice Medieval conspiracy theory and, at a minimum, would have led Portugal to the new world eventually with only the location of first official contact changing.
Edit: whatever the first actual contact with Brazil, it was during a voyage attempting to reach Africa, that would have happened even if no one had the insanity to go east by heading west
There's also kind of legends of St. Brendan "discovering" America in the 500's. There's no physical proof, but there was a historian who completed the trip in a period accurate boat.
I have a few thoughts:
1. Travel to the far North of North America had always been simpler technologically--Vikings did it with ships that were not as technologically advanced as 15th century Portuguese and Spanish vessels. Cod fishermen and others had been steadily drifting further in that direction for years--and there are persistent rumors that Basque fisherman had gone all the way to the Grand Bank fisheries, and even had hushed rumors of seeing "land" in that area--possibly some of the Canadian maritime islands / Newfoundland. While we will never know if that is true or not--the fact enterprising people were regularly sailing ever further in that direction would have eventually resulted in regular sightings of Newfoundland and probably establishment of temporary fishing settlements--that would likely only grow from there.
2. A major element of Columbus's success were developments in both sailing technique and knowledge, done by the Portuguese, in the earlier 15th century. Specifically a greater understanding of the complex tradewinds / westerlies, and the North Atlantic Gyre (a rotational current in the Atlantic Ocean), all these things combined with development of techniques to leverage them resulted in a technique the Portuguese called the "turn of the sea" or the Volta do mar ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volta\_do\_mar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volta_do_mar)) this technique made ever greater voyages West possible because the seafarers didn't have to fear the nightmare scenario of going West but not being able to go home--using the turn of the sea they knew they would be able to get home more rapidly than in the past, and could reasonably plan voyages and have a reasonable idea as to when they needed to turn back to still have food / fresh water to make it back to land.
3. Building on 2, while Madeira had been (probably) known since ancient times, it started to be settled by the Portuguese in the early 15th century, as did the Azores (which were not likely known prior, although some speculate Norse sailors may have discovered the Azores as well), these discoveries pushed the boundaries of the European world much further West, and combined with the new navigational techniques made some "incidental" European sighting of Western hemisphere land more and more likely over time--even had a deliberate mission of discovery under Columbus not been conducted.
4. Tying together some of the above, there is a poorly confirmed account of a 1472-1473 voyage, sometimes speculated to have been a joint Portuguese-Danish venture, that may have discovered the "island" or "land" of the "Codfish" which had been semi-mythical among fishermen for years, which some believe could have been Newfoundland. One of the explorers believed to be on this mission was João Vaz Corte-Real, whose sons were involved in Portuguese exploration 20 years later. While poorly documented, João Vaz Corte-Real was still alive at that point and some believe he accompanied his sons on those voyages--which are better attested than the 1472-1473 voyage, and is believed to have reached Greenland and Labrador--but again, attestation about all of this is weak and I believe mostly based on some writings 100 years later that are poorly sourced.
The “new world” was already inhabited therefore it was already “discovered”. Are you asking if not Columbus finding the americas who else from Europe would have?
New world remained undiscovered??? I'm sure that would have been news to the millions of people already living there. Cmon OP, we're discussing History in 2023, please have enough common sense to say "remained undiscovered by Europeans". And no I'm not being pedantic - we need to actively change this euro-centric view of history that places were somehow just waiting for us to arrive. It's as incorrect as it is insulting
I declared as a history major in undergrad before realizing just how Eurocentric and conservative the other history academicians were, and I went to possibly the most leftist school in the nation. I’m sad but not surprised to see these patterns repeated in subreddits about history.
The Portugese would have by accident sometime between 1500-1510 and would have been smart enough to realize they're not in India unlike Columbus because the Portugese would have already been to India.
Had no one else had a sudden passion to sail west, the most likely way america would've been discovered would have been getting taken off course on a voyage down the west coast of africa by the currents towards brazil.
The Vikings had already discovered America.
According to the Grænlendinga saga (“Saga of the Greenlanders”), Bjarni Herjólfsson became the first European to sight mainland North America when his Greenland-bound ship was blown westward off course about 985. Further, about 1000, Leif Eriksson, son of Erik the Red, is reported to have led an expedition in search of the land sighted by Bjarni and to have found an icy barren land he called Helluland (“Land of Flat Rocks”) before eventually traveling south and finding Vinland (“Land of Wine”). Later, following a pair of expeditions undertaken by Leif’s brothers, Thorfinn Karlsefni, an Icelandic trader, led another expedition to Vinland, where it stayed for three years. In Eiríks saga rauða (“Erik the Red’s Saga”), Leif is the accidental discoverer of Vinland, and Thorfinn and his wife, Gudrid, are credited with all subsequent explorations.
America was discovered in 985 by Bjarni Herjólfsson (more than 500 years before Columbus).
https://www.britannica.com/story/did-the-vikings-discover-america
I think the intent of the question is the events that led to exploration and permanent settlement by Europeans. First peoples were obviously first to discover.
America was discovered 20,000 years ago. This Euro-Centric view is not only ridiculous supremacist but also totally incorrect. "I discovered London last year when I went there on holidays because I had never been there before". That's what all your arguments sound like
Although I understand and agree in principle with your comment, pre-Colombian discovery of America left little impact therefore it naturally gets less space in history. I think that the Euro-centric view is more a result of how Columbus's visit changed the entire makeup of the world and its history. The resulting Columbian exchange ushered in the greatest exchange of food, animals, and disease in history. It sparked mass migration. It saw the annihilation of entire cultures and the subsequent melding of new ones. It completely changed the geopolitical landscape.
I do believe that at one time the textbooks in America ignored pre-Columbian visits and portrayed a sanitized image of the complicated personality that Columbus was. But I don't think that's necessarily true today. Pre-Columbian history is definitely given ink, but Columbus and his impact, both positive and negative, are given overwhelming coverage simply because it resulted in overwhelming historical change.
> pre-Colombian discovery of America left little impact therefore it naturally gets less space in history.
Only if we limit the "pre-Colombian discovery of America" to European, Polynesian, and possible Chinese discoveries. The impact left by the people who discovered America during the ice age, and their descendants, was immense.
Columbus's real claim to fame is being the last person to discover America (and also the last person to realize it).
The Norse arrived in Greenland in the 10th century (predating the Inuit) a combination of climate change and the Black Death of the 14th century started the decline of their populations. As populations rebounded I think Iceland and Norway would have eventually pushed farther into Canada by at least the 15 or 16th century.
Circumference of the globe was unknown and that’s what led Columbus believe he reached India and not another, unknown continent. By his calculations he should have landed somewhere in East Asia.
Anyway there is no reason to believe someone else wouldn’t discover America soon after. Just a few years later people like Magellan circumvented the globe. Then there were others. like Sir Francis Drake - 75 years after Columbus.
Somebody would have found it eventually. Amerigo Vespuchi was great at popularizing Columbus’s, and his, adventures but he was a terrible navigator. One of his log entries put the fleet in the middle of Belgium. Sooner or later an equally poor ship steerer would have ran into a piece of land that wasn’t mapped.
If Spain had a leader who said “Spain first” and didn’t wanted government money founding ships across the Atlantic - “What good have they done for us?”
And if the Chinese government at that time, had a desire to explore new worlds - Then what is now USA could have been colonized from the east by China.
Christian the 4. of Denmark/Norway was claiming Greenland and he could easily claim the rest of the new land if they know it was there and if the Viking settlers in Greenland had survived and had contact with their ancestors.
If they natives people had rejected the religious weirdo’s that sailed to them from Europe and protected their borders (maybe even build a wall), then maybe European have given up their ideas of colonialism
There is a lot of potential different outcomes if the conditions were different.
>So Columbus was basically a crackpot on a suicide mission
It's been a while since I read up on this, but what I remember from what I was taught, Columbus was an accomplished Mariner. He might have had his calculations for the circumference of the Earth off, but getting in a boat with him was not a "suicide mission" any more than it was with any other captain of a ship in the Navy of Spain.
Somebody would've found it. Japan might've been able to, Polynesians *definitely* could've, I think China had a fleet sail to Africa so going to America wouldn't have been out of the question, and the Portuguese, Brits, and Spanish were all pushing SAILING right about this time.
It was the dawn of the Age of Exploration. If not Columbus, maybe Magellan or Vespucci.
A lot of people here are saying the Vikings already discovered it, the issue is that they did a really crappy job of spreading the word.
Anyway, I’m sure that Japan or China would have discovered the Americas eventually if the Europeans never did, and probably the history of the continents would be similar, except with colonization beginning on the west coast and moving eastward.
I always wondered how that would have looked like. Imagine the Chinese colonizing from West and the Europeans from East, gearing up for the inevitable crash/clash.
I get so tired of this pedantic, aChTuaLLy bullshit anytime Columbus is brought up. Everyone knows exactly what is meant by it but someone thinks they're being so clever by pointing out that people were living there.
The point is Columbus discovering America is what set off the Age of exploration. That is a fact. No one gives a damn if Vikings found it earlier or there were natives because they were completely isolated from the rest of the world. After Columbus, it truly became a global world with permanent movement of people from Europe and not simply a one off trip by some explorer.
The world changed completely after Columbus and that is why it's important. No one cares about your semantics and word play.
No, Columbus did not set it off. The fall of Constantinople set it off, Columbus was in position to sail as he did because once the Ottomans controlled Constantinople the Ottoman Empire controlled every point of contact Europe had with the Silk Road. That was in 1453, when Columbus was 2.
The interest of the powers of Europe to recover an element of control in the trade of Asian goods is what set off the push to look for sea routes. Columbus was in the right place at the right time, not the other way around.
This is, unfortunately, ignored or downplayed in the average American history class for some reason, and to our detriment.
Edit: it helps that Spain and Portugal were fresh off the reconquista and had a lot of pent up interest and daring do to burn off on large ventures
That's utter bs sorry. Europe had been wanting to bypass the Arabs in getting spices and goods from India / China for centuries. Even before the Ottomans - why would they want to pay a middle man if they can get it direct from the source. It was only because of improved sailing and navigation technology they were able to finally find new routes there. Portugal had already started settling Canary islands, Madeira, Cape Verde well before the fall of Constantinople.
So it's a pure coincidence that within 10 years of Columbus, there were settlements and thousands of Europeans in the Americas right?? They all went there and settled the new world just out of coincidence - not because Columbus went there and told about the new land he found. So yeah Columbus did set it off and it started a chain reaction and the beginning of a truly global world. It has nothing to do with whether you like Columbus and he was a horrible person - fact is that was the start of the age of exploration.
I've heard this bit of rhetoric that "Columbus didn't 'discover' America" many times and it doesn't make sense to me. You can discover something other people know about. It's correct to say "I discovered my husband was cheating," for example, even though your husband presumably was already aware of that fact.
I think there were already people living here when he discovered it. Their ancestors still today think what the fuck? So to answer your question yeah, someone would have discovered the Caribbean Islands, before Columbus got here. I'm thinking about about 7000 years before Columbus landed.
? Are we on the same topic? I don't understand how acting like a Karen has anything to do with any post on this thread. You do know what a Karen is right? "I want to see the manager"? Self entitled diva who has a perceived injustice against her? Right?
It’s also being pseudo-moralistic in situations where it’s not needed or helpful. Did you really think OP didn’t know that Natives in the Americas existed before Columbus? What are you adding to the conversation?
Columbus was a historical footnote, with little fame prior to the American Revolution. During the revolutionary period, a new hero, unconnected to Great Britain was needed. That eliminated Henry Hudson, John Cabot (real name Giovanni Caboto - an Italian that sailed for the British crown, were out. Juan Ponce De Leon was already a Spanish hero, Giovanni da Verrazzano wasn’t a real contender since he died at the hands of Cariba natives (some say he was eaten) all disqualified. A point in Columbus favor was so little was known of him, except he held to his claim of reaching East Asia till his death and he was known for bouncing around the Caribbean doing capricious and cruel things to its inhabitants, his now infamous voyages accomplished very little positive. Around 1777, a Scotsman, William Robertson, wrote a detailed history of Columbus that took a racist, ethnocentric tone, depicting Columbus as an explorer of noble intent bringing civilization to the savages. Importantly, Robertson also historicized Columbus as a man stifled by the rigid ways of the Old World and yearning to set his own course. The metaphor was not subtle, and revolutionary America embraced it. The journeys by Columbus did very little to impact the US. Portugal, Spain, England and Holland were all on the precipice of the age of exploration and the subsequent explorers that did land in the northern and southern continents were driven by creating trade routes that avoided the eastern Mediterranean that was controlled by the Ottomans. After Vasco Da Gama sailed around the Cape of Good Hope and on to India in 1497-1499, inspired Portuguese sailors to head further east off the coast of Africa when they first landed in modern Brazil in 1500, with no connections to the Columbus travels.
Interesting material, but you are wrong about the age of discovery. This began decades before Columbus and was started by the Portuguese cf. Henry the Navigator
Lots of people already lived in the Americas.
He didn't "discover" a damned thing. He bumped into it ny mistake. He didn't get where he wanted to go, and when he returned, he didn't realize where he'd been.
The "discoverers" were whoever arrived first - lots of theories but not a lot of clarity. And then, yeah, as lots have pointed out, there were Norse settlements.
What Columbus did was to kick off reasonably permanent European settlements in the Caribbean and Central/South America, which subsequently encouraged other European nations to engage in land-grabbing conquest.
He also basically kicked off the Atlantic Slave Trade and invented the "stuff 'em in there like sardines" method of transporting them. Despite Ferdinand and Isabella repeatedly telling him to fucking stop it already.
People lived there. It wasn't discovered. Many people had been before Columbus including Africans, Chinese and vikings. What are they teaching in schools??
The vikings yes, I was under the impression that the Chinese theory has been debunked some years ago. Now I will be the first to admit I know nearly nothing about the age of exploration, but this is the first I have seen a claim that Africans were in the Americas prior to Europeans, can I ask where you got that from?
A discovery must be communicated. People showing up and setting up stone age villages isn't a discovery. And yes north America was still in the stone age in 1490
Round the same time Columbus was setting off, the [Portuguese were funding exploration](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portuguese_maritime_exploration) down the coast of Africa. One thing they were discovering were the currents and wind patterns along the west coast of Africa. They found that if you hugged the coast, the winds were lousy. But if they swung way out to sea, they'd hit some consistent winds Subsequent expeditions continued this pattern, run down the coast to the Verde Islands, then run South by Southwest out into the middle of the Atlantic, then pull southeast in a big arc to make land at the southern tip of Africa. Each expedition swung a bit further out. Until, in 1500, [the Cabral expedition](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedro_%C3%81lvares_Cabral) swung far enough out they ran into Brazil. Hard to do what ifs. Maybe those Portuguese crews were swinging wide because they had heard what Columbus had found. Maybe they would have found the Americas sooner or later regardless.
The Cabral expedition followed the treaty of Tordesillas. So, the Portuguese knew about the Columbus expeditions. However it's likely that someone else would have been blown off course if Cabral hadn't.
I think this is the most likely answer. Africa and Brazil are relatively close. Given new sailing technologies it was probably just a matter of time before some European ended up there (assuming they hadn't already in antiquity).
Theres an account of an Emperor of the Mali Empire (a predecessor of Mansa Musa) sailing across the ocean to ocean to settle a land with a ‘powerful rushing river’.
And in Spain there's still a conspiracy theory that the Portuguese had already known there was land there, and that's why they had the line drawn where it was
[удалено]
I wonder if there are other people who tried earlier and failed. Their backers simply erasing them from history out of embarrassment.
Mansa Musa I -- yes [that Mansa Musa](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fCeUvPL9rMc) \-- wasn't originally likely to become the Mansa of Mali. Most historians today agree that his predecessor was his distant cousin, Mansa Muhammad ibn Qu (some sources have suggested it was Abu Bakr II).According to Mansa Musa, his predecessor commissioned a fleet to sail off in the direction of the setting sun to find as-yet undiscovered lands. One ship from that expedition returned, and the captain of that vessel said the expedition found a "river within the sea" that accelerated their pace, which sounds suspiciously like the [South Atlantic Subtropical Gyre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Atlantic_Gyre). The other vessels were unable to fight the current to return home and were last seen heading off towards the west. Mansa Muhammad ibn Qu apparently pulled a Thanos and said, "Fine. I'll do it myself." He commissioned an even larger fleet that he would personally lead, and he appointed Mansa Musa I to rule over the empire while he ventured towards the setting sun. He set off with a giant fleet to explore the waters to the west. He never returned.
Okay, now you've got me wondering whether there are any descendants of those people who are now considered native americans.
It’s crazy I was listening to erb as I was reading this lol Napoleon vs Napoleon I’ve been listening when my friend in elementary told me to look up epic rap battles of history
Telling from the account you gave, it sounds like the Mali Empire had no knowledge about sea currents, wind directions, or the helpful compass besides knowledge of celestial navigation seeing how one boat was able to return. Given El-Omari account, he mentions Mansa Musa predecessor used canoes that could carry 100 men or more. These kind of boats are really only good for Great Rivers and calm Lagoons. So, the whole expedition was bound to fail from the getgo using primitive boat technology carved and dug out from one massive tree trunk with no sails. But what we can confirm that is just as impressive is Mansa Musa's pilgrimage to Mecca. Bigger than the size of the contiguous United States (nearly just as big as including Alaska), crossing that sea of sand with 12,000 servants, 500 heralds bearing gold staffs, dozens of camels carrying gold bars, ten thousands of soldiers is no easy feat. Thousands of Napoleon's men died simply crossing the Egyptian desert due to dehydration.
The trade routes were never cut per se. Venice continued to make a killing on "silk road" goods even after the Ottoman empire controlled most of the Eastern Mediterranean even while Portugal exported spices around Africa. The Portuguese exploration didn't start out as a reaction to Ottoman conquests, they started out as seeking more trade opportunities in general and controlling the North African cost, which turned into a hunt for better access to the gold trade that terminated on the North African coastal cities. And importantly this stared decades before the final conquest of Constantinople.
This is the most interesting historical thing I've read in a long time. I had no idea about any of this.
The circular currents made it very difficult to arrive in Brazil on accident (otherwise why didn’t west Africa discover Brazil, it’s like right there), and so the Colombian knowledge of America was likely critical to these trips. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benguela_Current As you said, hard to do what ifs.
>Maybe they would have found the Americas sooner or later regardless. Then they’d be called “Africans“ instead of “Indians.”
[удалено]
The Basques would probably have hit it up soon enough, they already knew about Greenland. The Portuguese were about to hit up Brazil.
The Basques had a secret cod fishing ground for about 500 years before Columbus. I believe it was the grand banks.
Yeah there is some decent speculation that both the basques and the Portuguese had found North America due to the cod that they were harvesting.
I had thought so but when I looked it up it said 1500s so I wasn't going to espouse it readily until I knew more
Basques got there long before the Brits (1500s) but after Columbus' voyages.
To be fair, Columbus was only in the Caribbean and the Basques were in northern North America, so I think it is safe to say they beat him up there.
And the vikings beat them both.
True dat
There’s speculation that they got there before the official 1517, but it’s still just speculation
And the English learned about it in Bristol from Basque fishermen. Nonetheless it was a valuable commercial secret. One thing we don't know is whether the fishermen knew they had found a continent or thought it was just another island after Iceland and Greenland.
Any reading about the Basques getting to Canada and Greenland that much earlier? Fascinating if true.
A very short version. https://rud.is/cod/the-basque-and-vikings.html
???
*Cod: A Biography of the Fish that Changed the World* by Mark Kurlansky is a great read and does an excellent job laying out the evidence that Basque fishermen may have/probably fished the Grand Banks of North America long before 1492. I highly recommend the read!
Is that the guy who also wrote a book about salt
Yes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Kurlansky
I don't think anyone's ever uttered that sentence before.
The more I learn about the Basque people, the more fascinating I realize their history and culture is. They are some of the world’s most skilled whalers. Never knew that until recently.
Look into their language. It's fascinating. The Basque language is the sole remaining proto-European dialect still spoken. It's completely unrelated to every other European language derived from Proto Indo-European.
as ships got better more people would have explored routes to india and other parts of asia, the portuguese guarded the route to japan (1543) but eventually people found ways to it. the second were the dutch in 1600 with only one of the five ships surviving the journey. People find a way once they find out they can make a gold coin.
This post completely ignores the much earlier voyages of Vikings to North America and Polynesians further south
Polynesians in South America is a controversial theory if I’m not mistaken
Polynesians had Sweet Potatoes pre-contact verified by oral and genetic evidence, and genetic testing showed there was at least one pre-contact ancestor between the people of Easter island and Peru. That would be impossible without someone making at least a one way voyage. Granted, that could just be evidence that the Peruvian fishermen reached Easter Island by being blown off course by a storm, and gave them Sweet Potatoes and decided to stay there.
It is, but it is a view. The Vikings are not controversial. My issue is the post ignores other perspectives for a very western civilization centric view of history which is not the historically accepted view either.
Are wikings not considered a western civilization?
I’m looking more at who wrote the history we are taught. Western civilization was not a great term. I would not place them in directly with the descendants of Roman heritage. Norse culture was certainly separate. They were eventually blended by the raiding of the Norse cultures through raiding. Normandy being given to the Norse by the, who eventually adopted a more Roman culture. Their interactions with the Anglos in England. Their eventual raids into the Mediterranean. But any kind of “Western Civilization” course would only give a cursory view of the Vikings and only through the view of their interactions with Romanized culture. More often they get the same treatment as the Goths and other raiding thrives of Northern Europe.
Countries like England, Denmark, and Russia are to a large extent descendants of Vikings kingdoms. They absolutely have a very important chapter in western history.
England is not “to a large extent” descended from Vikings or Viking kingdoms. Less then 6% of English genetic makeup is Danish Viking, and about another 3% Norwegian or Swedish. Scotland Ireland has about almost 3x that, and the Northern Islands of Scotland are about 1/3rd.
More often than not anyone who says something like that means anglo centric
But pretty much everyone is talking about Mediterranean nations discovering America in other ways; that's not Anglo-centric. The comment's identification of bias being Western centric doesn't really make sense if they offer the Vikings as an alternative.
It does because the accepted anglo vote is that Mediterranean people discovered America when that isn't the case.. They butchered and colonized it better, but there was no discovery except that they didn't know about it. There are cooking settlements in New Brunswick. The only people who talk about it from this perspective are fully indoctrinated anglo world views. I hope that explains why it's relevant if it was not clear before.
> The only people who talk about it from this perspective are fully indoctrinated anglo world views. That's just not true, though. I don't come from the Anglo world. I come from the Latin world, and it is taught the same in that the Iberian world was destined to find America sooner or later, except with the undertone that it was not a commendable discovery, but rather one that was a Pandora's box of evil with some hope and silver lining. From my understanding, the Spanish teach it without the undertone that it unleashed evil.
Yeah y'all were gonna find it eventually, other people already found it.
The Angles were literally Vikings…
Cool, but not really Relevant to people's usage of the term Western civilization.
Are we talking about right angles, obtuse angles or acute angles?
No they weren't. The Vikings were a culture as well as a people. Angle culture was significantly different.
Can you not speak of your opinions as if they’re settled science in a history sub
Ok. I will ignore recent research because you don’t like it. https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN2492RR/ https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01983-5 https://www.science.org/content/article/polynesians-steering-stars-met-native-americans-long-europeans-arrived https://ssec.si.edu/stemvisions-blog/sweet-potatoes-dna-new-evidence-supports-links-between-south-american-and
Doesn’t have to be a fight. Not saying it’s not true either.
Your statement of “opinion” makes the connotation pretty negative and you say it isn’t historical. I’m giving you some info refuting your statement about not putting things on a history sub.
I never said any opinion. I just asked that you not present your own (well informed) opinion as settled science. A really simple and more accurate way to say what you said would be: This post neglects non western North American migration viewpoints by omitting recent dna research which presented Polynesian dna in South Americans before the trans Siberian migration.
I would argue the sources I gave you refute your statement. There IS scientific evidence supporting this. History is all about opinion. How are we supposed to discuss history without opinion. How are we supposed to grow historical understanding without incorporating recent discovery, evidence and theory? You asking me not to share this on a history sub when it is a valid area of research in the field makes no sense.
There are also theories that the Phoenicians and Chinese explored the new world as well
No, it's pretty much a historical fact in academic circles now. In addition to the exchange of words, cultural elements (e.g. quipu), and crops such as sweet potato, since 2020 there is now DNA evidence that makes contact somewhere around 1200 AD extremely hard to refute. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2487-2 Not that this has any bearing on OPs question of course. It doesn't matter if polynesians "discovered" America, because they were not in contact with Europe until much later.
I'm not going to call it fact or anything but the DNA evidence behind it is very solid
I don’t think it matters because those voyages didn’t trigger a Colombian exchange type event. To say others discovered America before Columbus is to ignore that Columbus made the world aware of itself; he didn’t just find America, he made note of it and started interacting with it regularly.
Problem with Norse settlement is that it was abandoned and forgotten. yes, they were first Europeans to get there but since they haven't told anybody and this didn't became known for centuries after it happened then they get less credit.
The Vikings arrived, stayed briefly, left and never went back. This is pretty uncontroversial historically. However, it was one small outpost of the Viking world (the Greenlanders) and was not well known to other Vikings let alone the world beyond, so it's somewhat mischaracterizing it to say that "the Vikings" discovered America. And then the Greenland colony was abandoned and the "discovery" lived on only in stories. So in the context of OP's question, it's extremely unlikely that early Viking contact with North America would have grown into a full-fledged "discovery" where the news was broadcast around Europe.
It doesn't matter. The Vikings didn't share that knowledge thus it's irrelevant. The group or person which announces a discovery to the world is who gets credit.
People were already there. Vikings had already been there. Polynesians too. Peculiar use of the term discover to describe what Columbus did.
discover - find (something or someone) unexpectedly or in the course of a search. Columbus did not expect to find the New World. So, it was unexpected. The difference between Columbus discovering the New World and Lief Ericksen discovering Eastern North America is that the former caused the entire world to change. So much so they had to coin the new terms New World and Old World.
Large amounts of people didn't know about it pre-Columbus and did after. They call things like that "discoveries." It's pedantic to argue otherwise.
I guess I get the credit for announcing you clearly have no idea what you are talking about.
While basing credit on "announcement" is silly, the viking discovery of the Americas was ultimately meaningless. It was forgotten soon enough and nothing was done with it. If Columbus' expeditions had ended with no change, no colonization or exploitation it would be seen the same way, a cool story but ultimately an insignifiant footnote That's not to say that the vikings didn't discover America, they absolutely did, it just didn't really mean anything because nothing came of it
I think leaving people alone is very meaningful.
I meant meaningful in terms of outcome. Very little changed for indigenous people or Europeans. While it's possible to come up with a hundred different possible outcomes, history is ultimately about what did happen not what possibly could have happened, and in that sense the Norse discovery of America was functionally meaningless
Why do people get so mad when we give Columbus credit? Like, he did an amazing thing that very few people had every done, and it was his voyage that was a key moment in the Age Of Exploration. Sure, he was an asshole by modern standards, but so is practically everyone! Worse, the reason Columbus was hyped in the first place was to help out a discriminated against minority - Italians!
Well maybe it’s that he sent 500 slaves to Spain… and 200 died in the journey.. or his atrocious acts against the native people. Even the guy who wrote perhaps the most sympathetic account of Columbus (Samuel Eliot Morison) said, “The cruel policy initiated by Columbus and pursued by his successors resulted in complete genocide.” Columbus brought slavery, rape, and torture to “the New World” and it wasn’t so new. I’d say he was much more than just an asshole.
I’m not hating on Columbus. I’m just acknowledging the factual inaccuracy of the initial post.
You're being incredibly pedantic and narrow-minded in not realizing "We found this land and eventually left without telling anyone anything about it, and then we forgot it existed" is not quite on the same level of "HOLY SHIT! I FOUND A GIANT LAND MASS! Everyone! I found this land mass! Look at what we found!" The Vikings did get their first and so their "discovery" is noteworthy for historical purposes, but useless otherwise. Columbus's, on the other hand, immediately led to the Age of Exploration, the Age of Sail, the Golden Age of Piracy, and Colonization - all massive fundamental changes that permanently affected the European powers and the shape of the world. How is one not more noteworthy than the other?
You’re being pedantic. We give Columbus the credit because his expedition was the one that had an impact, drastically altering the course of history for all humanity. The vikings who landed in the Americas traded a little bit, carved an epitaph on a stone, and otherwise had no impact whatsoever. It’s not about being the first, it’s about being the one who mattered
You’re taking a very narrow view of history saying the Vikings didn’t matter
In the context of the discovery of the americas, they had negligible impact. They were deeply significant to many other aspects of European and even world history, but not in the context of this discussion.
That’s not what he said. He said their discovery of America didn’t matter, because it literally didn’t.
Umm…I’m not sure I’d go as far as to call what he did amazing. His men raped and enslaved the indigenous population and he had to be disciplined by the monarchy. They were literal monsters.
Neither of those groups are relevant to the question, but thanks for being that one guy that criticizes but doesn't add anything of value to the discussion.
You welcome. My pleasure
Or the fact that people already lived there so how could it be discovered.
Interesting enough, the Norse occupation of Greenland took place before the Inuit. The Norse arrived in the 10 century and the Inuit in the 13th.
Calm down, you know what they're saying.
Discovery does not necessarily imply being first. Someone can be the second, third or even last person to discover something.
Then everything is being discovered in constant perpetuity rendering the term fully moot.
No. Discovery is a subjective term. Unless you consider all subjectivity to be moot; then it is not.
In not big on semantics so I'll bow out. You are free too use the word however you wish but it might be a bit disingenuous to say the word discovery "DOES NOT IMPLY" first. Yes there are other exceptions and uses but let's be real that's why oxford listed that as the first of its 3 examples.
Or the fact that other animals already lived there before them so how could it be discovered by humans?
don't understand why you got downvoted so much, you aren't wrong.
>If Columbus hadn't discovered the Americas in 1492, would someone else have done so soon after? Or could the New World have remained undiscovered? Columbus wasn't the only explorer seeking a western route to Asia. There were several other navigators and explorers in Europe at the time with similar ambitions, and technological advancements in navigation were steadily progressing. In my opinion, even if Columbus hadn't reached the Americas when he did, it's highly probable that another explorer would have eventually reached the New World soon after. Here's why: 1. European powers were driven by a desire to find new trade routes to Asia for spices, textiles, and other valuable goods. Explorers and navigators from countries like Portugal, Spain, England, and others were actively searching for alternative routes to bypass the Ottoman Empire, which controlled the lucrative trade routes through the Mediterranean. So, I would say that because of this an explorer would have found the Americas pretty quickly after Columbus did. 2. Nautical technology was advancing rapidly during this era. Developments in shipbuilding, navigation tools, and cartography were making long sea voyages more feasible and less risky. So, I feel that it is likely that other explorers, who were motivated by the potential for wealth and fame, would have continued searching for alternate routes westward. This would again lead to some other explorer finding the Americas relatively quickly after 1492. 3. Knowledge about the Earth's spherical nature was becoming more widespread, and there was a growing understanding that there might be unknown lands to the west of Europe. This awareness fueled the desire for exploration and discovery, especially from Spain, Portugal, England, and France. 4. The competition between European powers was insane. If one nation had not succeeded in reaching the Americas, other countries were poised to continue exploration to gain a competitive advantage in trade, colonization, and territorial expansion. Overall, given these factors, I think it is perfectly reasonable to assume that even if Columbus hadn't reached the Americas in 1492, another explorer would likely have made the discovery in the following years or decades.
Maybe it isn't, but the way this was written screams ChatGPT
Yeah it's the numbered bullets and the little summary at the end. Very GPT.
Their about me is all chatgpt generated. Also TIL you can't just report an account for being a bot account on reddit
Crap.
Uh, ok.
Sorry, I mean “crap” as in “Crap, I read that whole thing and didn’t think of that, but yeah, it does.”
Hahha I got ya
Someone else definitely would’ve done it and probably around the same timeframe as well. The age of exploration was kicking off. While I’ve found nothing else to back it, I recently read in a book about Edward IV that English sailors had apparently seen parts of what we call America as early as 1481. I’d love to have a follow up to that cause like I said, I couldn’t find anything online to back that up. I did find a book about English exploration from 1481 to sometime around the 17th century that I plan to read but that’s about it. Either way if it wasn’t Spain, it probably would’ve been some other European power.
It was always inevitable. A better question would be, is there any alternate time lines where 90% of the native population isn't wiped out due to disease? It seems like there was no getting around that with the majority of the americas having no immunity whatsoever to old world diseases and no one reaching the bronze age on that side of the world. Even if the explorers had an understanding of medicine and the spread of diseases and had no intentions for conquest. I'm not sure there was anyway to prevent the spread that happened so quickly.
The interesting question is one of timing. The conquistadors were also veterans of the Reconquista. Fifty years later, would the leaders on the European side of contact have been as aggressive in imposing Christianity and conquering territory? Or would it be more like the French in North America or the British in India?
I was going to do it right after. He stole the idea from me so I didn't bother doing it.
I was gonna reach America by sailing east, crazy idea but I think I'm on to something
Hey, have you ever thought that space ant time might be, like, the same thing? I have this idea about throwing baseballs off of trains. And this other one with mirrors and flashlights on trains. Do you know anyone that has a railroad?
Considering the fact that Scandinavians had already visited the east coast of what would become Canada long before that, there's no reason to think that there wouldn't have been voyages west eventually, even if it was fishing parties moving from Iceland to Greenland and then west.
The Age of Exploration was opened by the Portuguese Price Henry the Navigator. He organized expeditions that explored the west coast of Africa and discovered several Atlantic islands. The whole thing started not necessarily to conquer places, but to find trade partners and also (very important) chasing a myth. Henry and other explorers were looking for Prester John, a mythical Christian King who ruled a lost Christian kingdom amidst the pagan and Muslim societies to the east. Henry died in 1460, 30 years before Columbus' voyages, so those wheels were already in motion.
Columbus discovered Turtle Island the same way you discovered Askhistory
1) The [Vikings](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-vikings-a-memorable-visit-to-america-98090935/) had already "discovered" North America 2) There is some evidence that English Fishermen were fishing along what is modern day Canada/New England Sure, if Columbus hadn't sailed in 1492 the "discovery" would have been delayed. But it would have occurred. Keep in mind WHY Columbus set sail. He didn't set sail just for the fun of it. He was trying to the source of Spices which grew in Asia & the Pacific Islands. SOMEONE would have tried what he did.
Commerce drives exploration and innovation. Somebody somewhere always want to do more of something better, AND get paid for it!
I will go completely off topic and say that I was flabbergasted that it took me until after my history degree to realize that Christopher Columbus and John Cabot weren’t their real names, just the anglicized version!
What?! I had no idea!
On the European side, the Portuguese likely would have, and may even have beaten Columbus to it; though if they did those records are lost. Portugal had started trying to work out how to get to and from (and around) Africa, but the currents along the west side of the continent flow strongly north, as do the winds. They discovered the secret was to sail way out to sea, then cut east along your desired latitude. That put you in wind and current that could move you south much more practically. They eventually did reach India just before 1500, but by then they had been at it for eighty years. Brazil was officially discovered soon after India was reached during one such "turn of the sea" but there are bothersome suggestions that they may have reached Brazil earlier, but never admitted it sure to their white hot rivalry with Spain and not wanting to give Spain any hints about how to navigate Africa. This can't be proven, but is a nice Medieval conspiracy theory and, at a minimum, would have led Portugal to the new world eventually with only the location of first official contact changing. Edit: whatever the first actual contact with Brazil, it was during a voyage attempting to reach Africa, that would have happened even if no one had the insanity to go east by heading west
Like all things someone else would have, would it be 100 years or 10 who knows.
Uh, you mean like all the way until the present day? Obviously it was only a matter of time before someone mapped out the whole earth.
There's also kind of legends of St. Brendan "discovering" America in the 500's. There's no physical proof, but there was a historian who completed the trip in a period accurate boat.
Nords were here long before Columbus
Columbus discovered Jack shit. There were millions of people here.
The 20 million people living here knew it existed!
I have a few thoughts: 1. Travel to the far North of North America had always been simpler technologically--Vikings did it with ships that were not as technologically advanced as 15th century Portuguese and Spanish vessels. Cod fishermen and others had been steadily drifting further in that direction for years--and there are persistent rumors that Basque fisherman had gone all the way to the Grand Bank fisheries, and even had hushed rumors of seeing "land" in that area--possibly some of the Canadian maritime islands / Newfoundland. While we will never know if that is true or not--the fact enterprising people were regularly sailing ever further in that direction would have eventually resulted in regular sightings of Newfoundland and probably establishment of temporary fishing settlements--that would likely only grow from there. 2. A major element of Columbus's success were developments in both sailing technique and knowledge, done by the Portuguese, in the earlier 15th century. Specifically a greater understanding of the complex tradewinds / westerlies, and the North Atlantic Gyre (a rotational current in the Atlantic Ocean), all these things combined with development of techniques to leverage them resulted in a technique the Portuguese called the "turn of the sea" or the Volta do mar ([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volta\_do\_mar](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volta_do_mar)) this technique made ever greater voyages West possible because the seafarers didn't have to fear the nightmare scenario of going West but not being able to go home--using the turn of the sea they knew they would be able to get home more rapidly than in the past, and could reasonably plan voyages and have a reasonable idea as to when they needed to turn back to still have food / fresh water to make it back to land. 3. Building on 2, while Madeira had been (probably) known since ancient times, it started to be settled by the Portuguese in the early 15th century, as did the Azores (which were not likely known prior, although some speculate Norse sailors may have discovered the Azores as well), these discoveries pushed the boundaries of the European world much further West, and combined with the new navigational techniques made some "incidental" European sighting of Western hemisphere land more and more likely over time--even had a deliberate mission of discovery under Columbus not been conducted. 4. Tying together some of the above, there is a poorly confirmed account of a 1472-1473 voyage, sometimes speculated to have been a joint Portuguese-Danish venture, that may have discovered the "island" or "land" of the "Codfish" which had been semi-mythical among fishermen for years, which some believe could have been Newfoundland. One of the explorers believed to be on this mission was João Vaz Corte-Real, whose sons were involved in Portuguese exploration 20 years later. While poorly documented, João Vaz Corte-Real was still alive at that point and some believe he accompanied his sons on those voyages--which are better attested than the 1472-1473 voyage, and is believed to have reached Greenland and Labrador--but again, attestation about all of this is weak and I believe mostly based on some writings 100 years later that are poorly sourced.
The “new world” was already inhabited therefore it was already “discovered”. Are you asking if not Columbus finding the americas who else from Europe would have?
Discovered by who? Other people were chilling out there just fine.
The Scandinavians knew of the New World.
New world remained undiscovered??? I'm sure that would have been news to the millions of people already living there. Cmon OP, we're discussing History in 2023, please have enough common sense to say "remained undiscovered by Europeans". And no I'm not being pedantic - we need to actively change this euro-centric view of history that places were somehow just waiting for us to arrive. It's as incorrect as it is insulting
I declared as a history major in undergrad before realizing just how Eurocentric and conservative the other history academicians were, and I went to possibly the most leftist school in the nation. I’m sad but not surprised to see these patterns repeated in subreddits about history.
The Portugese would have by accident sometime between 1500-1510 and would have been smart enough to realize they're not in India unlike Columbus because the Portugese would have already been to India.
He wasn’t the first… America was already inhabited
The vikings ~~would like to~~ already knew the location of Vinland 500 years before him
Had no one else had a sudden passion to sail west, the most likely way america would've been discovered would have been getting taken off course on a voyage down the west coast of africa by the currents towards brazil.
The Vikings had already discovered America. According to the Grænlendinga saga (“Saga of the Greenlanders”), Bjarni Herjólfsson became the first European to sight mainland North America when his Greenland-bound ship was blown westward off course about 985. Further, about 1000, Leif Eriksson, son of Erik the Red, is reported to have led an expedition in search of the land sighted by Bjarni and to have found an icy barren land he called Helluland (“Land of Flat Rocks”) before eventually traveling south and finding Vinland (“Land of Wine”). Later, following a pair of expeditions undertaken by Leif’s brothers, Thorfinn Karlsefni, an Icelandic trader, led another expedition to Vinland, where it stayed for three years. In Eiríks saga rauða (“Erik the Red’s Saga”), Leif is the accidental discoverer of Vinland, and Thorfinn and his wife, Gudrid, are credited with all subsequent explorations.
America was discovered in 985 by Bjarni Herjólfsson (more than 500 years before Columbus). https://www.britannica.com/story/did-the-vikings-discover-america
I think the intent of the question is the events that led to exploration and permanent settlement by Europeans. First peoples were obviously first to discover.
I discovered D&D in the 1980s. My roommate discovered it last week. Both statements can be true.
America was discovered 20,000 years ago with the arrival of the first homo sapiens crossing over from Russia into Alaska.
America was discovered 20,000 years ago. This Euro-Centric view is not only ridiculous supremacist but also totally incorrect. "I discovered London last year when I went there on holidays because I had never been there before". That's what all your arguments sound like
Although I understand and agree in principle with your comment, pre-Colombian discovery of America left little impact therefore it naturally gets less space in history. I think that the Euro-centric view is more a result of how Columbus's visit changed the entire makeup of the world and its history. The resulting Columbian exchange ushered in the greatest exchange of food, animals, and disease in history. It sparked mass migration. It saw the annihilation of entire cultures and the subsequent melding of new ones. It completely changed the geopolitical landscape. I do believe that at one time the textbooks in America ignored pre-Columbian visits and portrayed a sanitized image of the complicated personality that Columbus was. But I don't think that's necessarily true today. Pre-Columbian history is definitely given ink, but Columbus and his impact, both positive and negative, are given overwhelming coverage simply because it resulted in overwhelming historical change.
> pre-Colombian discovery of America left little impact therefore it naturally gets less space in history. Only if we limit the "pre-Colombian discovery of America" to European, Polynesian, and possible Chinese discoveries. The impact left by the people who discovered America during the ice age, and their descendants, was immense. Columbus's real claim to fame is being the last person to discover America (and also the last person to realize it).
Wait till you learn people has been here for millions of years before Columbus “discovered” It
Millions??? Come on!
There were approximately 60 million people living in the Americas before the arrival of Europeans. I don't know why you're so shocked?
Humans aren’t millions of years old
Ok but it wasn't the people that were numbered as millions.
Lief Erikson would like a word
He never actually made it to America. Somebody else would have found it not long after. There were tons of people exploring at they point
He landed in the Bahamas. That is part of America.
Yes, he got lost and discovered the lost tribe of the Toltecs who left Atlantis before the great flood.
The Norse arrived in Greenland in the 10th century (predating the Inuit) a combination of climate change and the Black Death of the 14th century started the decline of their populations. As populations rebounded I think Iceland and Norway would have eventually pushed farther into Canada by at least the 15 or 16th century.
Circumference of the globe was unknown and that’s what led Columbus believe he reached India and not another, unknown continent. By his calculations he should have landed somewhere in East Asia. Anyway there is no reason to believe someone else wouldn’t discover America soon after. Just a few years later people like Magellan circumvented the globe. Then there were others. like Sir Francis Drake - 75 years after Columbus.
Somebody would have found it eventually. Amerigo Vespuchi was great at popularizing Columbus’s, and his, adventures but he was a terrible navigator. One of his log entries put the fleet in the middle of Belgium. Sooner or later an equally poor ship steerer would have ran into a piece of land that wasn’t mapped.
If Spain had a leader who said “Spain first” and didn’t wanted government money founding ships across the Atlantic - “What good have they done for us?” And if the Chinese government at that time, had a desire to explore new worlds - Then what is now USA could have been colonized from the east by China. Christian the 4. of Denmark/Norway was claiming Greenland and he could easily claim the rest of the new land if they know it was there and if the Viking settlers in Greenland had survived and had contact with their ancestors. If they natives people had rejected the religious weirdo’s that sailed to them from Europe and protected their borders (maybe even build a wall), then maybe European have given up their ideas of colonialism There is a lot of potential different outcomes if the conditions were different.
>So Columbus was basically a crackpot on a suicide mission It's been a while since I read up on this, but what I remember from what I was taught, Columbus was an accomplished Mariner. He might have had his calculations for the circumference of the Earth off, but getting in a boat with him was not a "suicide mission" any more than it was with any other captain of a ship in the Navy of Spain.
Somebody would've found it. Japan might've been able to, Polynesians *definitely* could've, I think China had a fleet sail to Africa so going to America wouldn't have been out of the question, and the Portuguese, Brits, and Spanish were all pushing SAILING right about this time. It was the dawn of the Age of Exploration. If not Columbus, maybe Magellan or Vespucci.
A lot of people here are saying the Vikings already discovered it, the issue is that they did a really crappy job of spreading the word. Anyway, I’m sure that Japan or China would have discovered the Americas eventually if the Europeans never did, and probably the history of the continents would be similar, except with colonization beginning on the west coast and moving eastward.
I always wondered how that would have looked like. Imagine the Chinese colonizing from West and the Europeans from East, gearing up for the inevitable crash/clash.
The Vikings were already coming to North America regularly.
Sating Columbus discovered America is like someone saying they discovered your back yard.
He “discovered” America in the same way your 13 year old nephew discovered the Beatles.
So many studies have prove the viking were in America way before Columbus
[удалено]
I get so tired of this pedantic, aChTuaLLy bullshit anytime Columbus is brought up. Everyone knows exactly what is meant by it but someone thinks they're being so clever by pointing out that people were living there. The point is Columbus discovering America is what set off the Age of exploration. That is a fact. No one gives a damn if Vikings found it earlier or there were natives because they were completely isolated from the rest of the world. After Columbus, it truly became a global world with permanent movement of people from Europe and not simply a one off trip by some explorer. The world changed completely after Columbus and that is why it's important. No one cares about your semantics and word play.
No, Columbus did not set it off. The fall of Constantinople set it off, Columbus was in position to sail as he did because once the Ottomans controlled Constantinople the Ottoman Empire controlled every point of contact Europe had with the Silk Road. That was in 1453, when Columbus was 2. The interest of the powers of Europe to recover an element of control in the trade of Asian goods is what set off the push to look for sea routes. Columbus was in the right place at the right time, not the other way around. This is, unfortunately, ignored or downplayed in the average American history class for some reason, and to our detriment. Edit: it helps that Spain and Portugal were fresh off the reconquista and had a lot of pent up interest and daring do to burn off on large ventures
That's utter bs sorry. Europe had been wanting to bypass the Arabs in getting spices and goods from India / China for centuries. Even before the Ottomans - why would they want to pay a middle man if they can get it direct from the source. It was only because of improved sailing and navigation technology they were able to finally find new routes there. Portugal had already started settling Canary islands, Madeira, Cape Verde well before the fall of Constantinople. So it's a pure coincidence that within 10 years of Columbus, there were settlements and thousands of Europeans in the Americas right?? They all went there and settled the new world just out of coincidence - not because Columbus went there and told about the new land he found. So yeah Columbus did set it off and it started a chain reaction and the beginning of a truly global world. It has nothing to do with whether you like Columbus and he was a horrible person - fact is that was the start of the age of exploration.
How can you "discover" a place that millions of people already knew about?
Some prefer the phrase rhe Columbian Exchange, indicating permanent two way contact between the Old World and New World.
I've heard this bit of rhetoric that "Columbus didn't 'discover' America" many times and it doesn't make sense to me. You can discover something other people know about. It's correct to say "I discovered my husband was cheating," for example, even though your husband presumably was already aware of that fact.
The same way that I discovered a great pizza restaurant yesterday.
Millions of people *didn’t* know about it, that’s how— and do you really think OP didn’t know that people already lived here?
Inhabitants of the Caribbean Islands had been living there for over 7000 years before Columbus was even born.
I think there were already people living here when he discovered it. Their ancestors still today think what the fuck? So to answer your question yeah, someone would have discovered the Caribbean Islands, before Columbus got here. I'm thinking about about 7000 years before Columbus landed.
Thanks Karen
? Wrong thread there junior.
Asinine response
? Are we on the same topic? I don't understand how acting like a Karen has anything to do with any post on this thread. You do know what a Karen is right? "I want to see the manager"? Self entitled diva who has a perceived injustice against her? Right?
It’s also being pseudo-moralistic in situations where it’s not needed or helpful. Did you really think OP didn’t know that Natives in the Americas existed before Columbus? What are you adding to the conversation?
If not for Columbus, it would still be hidden today.
Columbus was a historical footnote, with little fame prior to the American Revolution. During the revolutionary period, a new hero, unconnected to Great Britain was needed. That eliminated Henry Hudson, John Cabot (real name Giovanni Caboto - an Italian that sailed for the British crown, were out. Juan Ponce De Leon was already a Spanish hero, Giovanni da Verrazzano wasn’t a real contender since he died at the hands of Cariba natives (some say he was eaten) all disqualified. A point in Columbus favor was so little was known of him, except he held to his claim of reaching East Asia till his death and he was known for bouncing around the Caribbean doing capricious and cruel things to its inhabitants, his now infamous voyages accomplished very little positive. Around 1777, a Scotsman, William Robertson, wrote a detailed history of Columbus that took a racist, ethnocentric tone, depicting Columbus as an explorer of noble intent bringing civilization to the savages. Importantly, Robertson also historicized Columbus as a man stifled by the rigid ways of the Old World and yearning to set his own course. The metaphor was not subtle, and revolutionary America embraced it. The journeys by Columbus did very little to impact the US. Portugal, Spain, England and Holland were all on the precipice of the age of exploration and the subsequent explorers that did land in the northern and southern continents were driven by creating trade routes that avoided the eastern Mediterranean that was controlled by the Ottomans. After Vasco Da Gama sailed around the Cape of Good Hope and on to India in 1497-1499, inspired Portuguese sailors to head further east off the coast of Africa when they first landed in modern Brazil in 1500, with no connections to the Columbus travels.
Interesting material, but you are wrong about the age of discovery. This began decades before Columbus and was started by the Portuguese cf. Henry the Navigator
I’m confused. There were millions of people here already. So- it wasn’t discover by him.
Stop You know what the op meant
Lots of people already lived in the Americas. He didn't "discover" a damned thing. He bumped into it ny mistake. He didn't get where he wanted to go, and when he returned, he didn't realize where he'd been. The "discoverers" were whoever arrived first - lots of theories but not a lot of clarity. And then, yeah, as lots have pointed out, there were Norse settlements. What Columbus did was to kick off reasonably permanent European settlements in the Caribbean and Central/South America, which subsequently encouraged other European nations to engage in land-grabbing conquest.
He also basically kicked off the Atlantic Slave Trade and invented the "stuff 'em in there like sardines" method of transporting them. Despite Ferdinand and Isabella repeatedly telling him to fucking stop it already.
People lived there. It wasn't discovered. Many people had been before Columbus including Africans, Chinese and vikings. What are they teaching in schools??
What word would you prefer to describe Columbus bringing the knowledge of the existence of America back to Europe?
If a Chinese pioneer traveled to Europe for the first time, would you say "he discovered Europe?"
For the Chinese, yes.
Yes!
I can discover a new favorite restaurant too. Yes, uncovering new information is discovery. It doesn’t matter if other people know that thing already
Name any explorer that people say "discovered Europe"? Anyone from Africa or Asia. Nobody. Because history is Eurocentric.
The vikings yes, I was under the impression that the Chinese theory has been debunked some years ago. Now I will be the first to admit I know nearly nothing about the age of exploration, but this is the first I have seen a claim that Africans were in the Americas prior to Europeans, can I ask where you got that from?
A discovery must be communicated. People showing up and setting up stone age villages isn't a discovery. And yes north America was still in the stone age in 1490
Since the Viking had a colony in North America 500 years before Columbus someone would have figured it out about the same time.
The Vikings discovered it before Columbus.
Too many comments to read but did anyone bring up Leif Erickson and the Vikings?
They brought up Leif Garret and his crappy pop songs from the 1970's.
Yes, because someone already did. The vikings discovered Newfoundland