Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus (1451–1506) was a Genoese navigator who crossed the Atlantic four times for the Catholic Monarchs and opened the Americas to Europe. The son of a Genoese weaver, he went to sea and settled in Lisbon after a 1476 shipwreck. His westward plan to reach the East Indies was rejected in Portugal, but after lobbying in Castile, Isabella and Ferdinand sponsored him.

In 1492 he sailed with three ships and landed on a Bahamian island called Guanahani, then reached Cuba and Hispaniola. Three more voyages reached the Lesser Antilles, the South American coast and Central America. He died believing he had reached the Far East; Amerigo Vespucci recognized the new continent that mapmakers named America after him.

As governor he was accused of brutality and arrested on Hispaniola in 1500. He died in 1506; no important place carried his name until Colombia was named for him in 1819.