In 1492, previously separate worlds collided and began to merge, often painfully, into the world-system in which we live today. Columbus's four Atlantic voyages (1492-1504) helped link Africa, Europe, and the Americas in a conflicted economic and cultural symbiosis. These carefully selected documents describe the voyages and their immediate impact on Europe and the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean. Symcox and Sullivan's engaging introduction presents Columbus as neither hero nor villain, but as a significant historical actor who improvised responses to a changed world. Document headnotes provide context for understanding Columbus's voyages within the broader context of fifteenth-century Europe and the policies of the Spanish crown. Maps, illustrations, a chronology, questions for consideration, and a selected bibliography invite students to analyze and interpret the documents.

In 1492, previously separate worlds collided and new era of exploration and colonisation began. Columbus’s four Atlantic voyages (1492–1504) helped link Africa, Europe, and the Americas in a conflicted economic and cultural symbiosis. These carefully selected documents describe the voyages and their immediate impact on Europe and the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean. Geoffrey Symcox and Blair Sullivan’s engaging introduction presents a nuanced portrait of Columbus as a significant historical actor who improvised responses to a changed world. Document headnotes provide context for understanding Columbus’s voyages within the broader context of fifteenth-century Europe and the policies of the Spanish crown.

Discusses how the expeditions of Columbus increased the wealth of Spain, yet severely damaged the lives of the native Americans.

A biography of the fifteenth-century Italian seaman and navigator who unknowingly discovered a new continent while looking for a western route to India.

This is an account of three men, without whose influence and resources Columbus' enterprise of the Indies would not have occurred. Martin Alonso Pinzon was a shipowner/navigator. His young brother Vicente Yanez was also a navigator. Juan de la Cosa was owner of the merchantman Marigalante, to be chartered and renamed by Columbus the Santa Maria. The three of them had adventures, together or separately, poaching in Portuguese preserves of Atlantic Africa as far south as Guinea. These are their stories.

A biography of the fifteenth-century Italian seaman and navigator who unknowingly discovered a new continent while looking for a western route to India.