He studied at Queen Leonora's School of Pages in Lisbon and spent his days poring over texts on cartography, astronomy, and celestial navigation — subjects that would serve him well in his later pursuits. In , when Magellan was in his mids, he joined a Portuguese fleet that was sailing to East Africa.
Two years later, he explored Malacca, located in present-day Malaysia, and participated in the conquest of Malacca's port. It was there that he acquired a native servant he named Enrique. It is possible that Magellan sailed as far as the Moluccas, islands in Indonesia, then called the Spice Islands. The Moluccas were the original source of some of the world's most valuable spices, including cloves and nutmeg. The conquest of spice-rich countries was, as a result, a source of much European competition.
While serving in Morocco, in , Magellan was wounded and walked the remainder of his life with a limp. After his injury, he was falsely accused of trading illegally with the Moors, and despite all of his service to Portugal, and his many pleas to the king, any further offers of employment were withheld him. In , Magellan moved to Seville, Spain, to offer his skills to the Spanish court.
His departure from Portugal came at an opportune time. In the three years following his departure from Portugal, Magellan had religiously studied all of the most recent navigation charts. Along the way, they had encountered a new ocean, mapped new routes for European trade, and set the stage for modern globalism.
Sixty thousand miles later, and after the death of 80 percent of those involved, the expedition had proven that the globe could be circumnavigated and opened the door to European colonization of the New World in the name of commerce. Lapu-Lapu, the Mactan ruler whose forces killed Magellan, is often credited with slaying the explorer. As a result, notes Ocampo, he has become a national hero in the Philippines. Though Lapu-Lapu likely did not do the deed, he is widely commemorated as a symbol of Filipino resistance and pride.
A monument that shows the battle itself—and the group effort that brought down an epic explorer—will take its place. All rights reserved. Culture News. Magellan was first to sail around the world, right? Think again. In September , Magellan set sail from Spain with five ships. Three years later only one ship, the Victoria depicted on a map , made it back to Spain after circumnavigating the world. Share Tweet Email.
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India bets its energy future on solar—in ways both small and big. Magellan named the ocean the Pacific meaning 'peaceful' because it was calm and pleasant when he entered it. By now one of his ships had deserted, but the other four started the journey across their new-found sea.
To everyone's amazement, the crossing was to take three months and 20 days. Magellan and his men suffered terrible hunger on the voyage. They ran out of fresh food and many died of scurvy.
No: he was killed in a fight with islanders in the Philippines. In fact, the first person to sail around the world was a Malaysian, who had come back to Europe with Magellan many years before and then went as an interpreter on his later voyage.
Europeans had reached the Spice Islands by sailing east, but none had yet to sail west from Europe to reach the other side of the globe. Magellan was determined to be the first to do so. By now an experienced seaman, Magellan approached King Manuel of Portugal to seek his support for a westward voyage to the Spice Islands.
The king refused his petition repeatedly. In , a frustrated Magellan renounced his Portuguese nationality and relocated to Spain to seek royal support for his venture. When Magellan arrived in Seville in October , he had no connections and spoke little Spanish. Just 18 years old at the time, King Charles I granted his support to Magellan, who in turn promised the young king that his westward sea voyage would bring immeasurable riches to Spain.
On August 10, Magellan bade farewell to his wife and young son, neither of whom he would ever see again, and the Armada De Moluccas set sail. Magellan commanded the lead ship Trinidad and was accompanied by four other ships: the San Antonio , the Conception , the Victoria and the Santiago. The fleet reached South America a little more than one month later.
There the ships sailed southward, hugging the coast in search of the fabled strait that would allow passage through South America. Magellan quickly quelled the uprising, executing one of the captains and leaving another mutinous captain behind. Meanwhile Magellan had sent the Santiago to explore the route ahead, where it was shipwrecked during a terrible storm.
With those disastrous events behind them, the fleet left Port San Julian five months later when fierce seasonal storms abated. On October 21, Magellan finally entered the strait that he had been seeking and that came to bear his name. The voyage through the Strait of Magellan was treacherous and cold, and many sailors continued to mistrust their leader and grumble about the dangers of the journey ahead.
In the early days of the navigation of the strait, the crew of the San Antonio forced its captain to desert, and the ship turned and fled across the Atlantic Ocean back to Spain. They were the first known Europeans to see the great ocean, which Magellan named Mar Pacifico, the Pacific Ocean, for its apparent peacefulness, a stark contrast to the dangerous waters of the strait from which he had just emerged.
In fact, extremely rough waters are not uncommon in the Pacific Ocean, where tsunamis, typhoons and hurricanes have done serious damage to the Pacific Islands and Pacific Rim nations throughout history. Little was known about the geography beyond South America at that time, and Magellan optimistically estimated that the trip across the Pacific would be rapid.
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