Ohio History Journal

First Circumnavigation of the Earth

First Circumnavigation of the Earth. 165

The ancients did three things for geography: (1.) They

made known the central parts of the Eastern continent; (2.)

They invented the spherical theory; and (3.) They con-

structed a geographical system in harmony with this theory.

Two lines, one drawn from the southern end of the Scanda

navian peninsula to the mouth of the Ganges, and the other

from Cape Blanco to a point on the Eastern African coast, a

little south of Cape Guardafui, with the intercepted shore

lines, will enclose all the parts of the earth that were really

known to the Greeks and Romans. The three men who did

most to work out the ancient system of geography were

Eratosthenes, Hipparchus, and Ptolemy.

In the middle ages, geographical theory went backward

from the ground taken by the Greeks. Men now deduced

their general view from appearance directly, and then sup-

ported them with literal interpretations of tropical passages

in the Bible; or, perhaps, it would be better to say, they

deduced the view from the passages, and then supported it by

appealing to appearances. As a matter of course, the paral-

lelogram theory was restored. The familiar extracts from

Lactantius, Augustine, and other of the church fathers show

what absurdities even able men may be led into by a false

method. In the famous "Christian Topography" of Cosmas

we have an example of a patristic geographical system.

Nevertheless, geographical knowledge made great headway

in the middle ages. The Saracens cultivated the science of

geography as well as added to the facts known. The Cru-

sades greatly enlarged the geographical vision of the Western

Christians. Marco Polo's visit to Eastern Asia, falling

toward the close of the thirteenth century, worthily closed

one era and opened another. His discoveries were remark-

able in themselves, but they were followed in time by others

even more remarkable.

Prince Henry, of Portugal, called "The Navigator," born

in 1391, ushered in the great age of maritime discovery that

historians and men of science never weary of celebrating.

The passion of this age was to bring Europe and Asia into

closer relations; to open up to the West a better road to the

166 Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly

166 Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly.

East. The old commercial routes from the Mediterranean

basin to the Indus were now falling into the hands of the

Turks, who closed them to the West. In Prince Henry's

youth, men knew nothing of the Western coast of Africa

south of Cape Non; they had no knowledge of the form and

size of that continent, and they believed the tropics to be a

sea of fire, impassable to man. But the Prince formed the

opinion that Africa is a peninsula, around the southern part

of which the western and eastern waters flow together; and

from this opinion deduced the conclusion that an ocean road

to the East could be found by keeping down the African

coast. To the solution of this problem he devoted his

talents, his fortune, and his influence. This was the first

practical plan of the Maritime Age for reaching the East.

The Prince died long before this idea was realized; but at his

death, in 1464, the Kings of Portugal took it up and prose-

cuted it to the end. The equator was crossed in 1471, the

mouth of the Congo reached in 1484, the Cape of Good

Hope reached in 1486 and doubled in 1497. In 1498 Gama

cast his anchors in Calcutta and fulfilled the great dream of

the Navigator. Changes of the greatest magnitude followed

the discovery of this road to the East. Mention may be

made of the diversion to it of the India commerce, the decay

of the commercial cities of the Mediterranean, and the rise

into new prominence of the cities and nations of the Atlantic

shore-Portugal, Spain, France, England, and, in time,

Holland.

Columbus made the second suggestion looking to realizing

the passion of the Maritime Age. The old Greek idea of

the sphericity of the earth was now generally received by the

ablest navigators, and by Columbus among others. He de-

duced from that idea the conclusion that Asia could be

reached by sailing westward across the Atlantic. This

was Strabo's idea revived. By this time, too, men's knowl-

edge of the earth had become greatly enlarged, as compared

with antiquity. In 1474 Toscanelli constructed his map on

the theory of sphericity, and in 1492 Behaim made his

"World Apple." Columbus, indeed, sailed on his first

First Circumnavigation of the Earth

First Circumnavigation of the Earth. 167

voyage six years before Gama reached Calcutta; but Diaz

had already reached the Cape, and the time was fully ripe

for some great navigator to try the secrets of the Western

Ocean. The Genoese was in all ways well fitted for his un-

dertaking; he was well read in geography and in travels; he

was an extensive traveler himself; he was a practical navi-

gator, and was abreast of the nautical science of his time.

He is a good illustration of the remark of Sir Arthur Helps;

"The greatest geographical discoveries have been made by

men conversant with the book knowledge of their own time."

Columbus attempted a new passage to the eastern part of

the old world. And this he supposed he had found. Asia

was the vision that he saw in the west to the day of his death.

Thus he wrote when near his end: " If any one does not

give me credit for having discovered the remaining parts of

India, it simply arises from personal hostility." But he had

discovered a new world,-not found a new road to India.

He had discovered greater than he knew or would believe.

When he was in the West Indies he was not among the out-

lying islands of Asia, but was separated from Asia by the

width of a continent and of the greatest of oceans. Orig-

inally he had been misled in his estimate of the size of the

earth by the false longitudes of the old geographers; but

now his belief that he had found Asia confirmed him in this

estimate. He had not touched hands with Marco Polo, and

the demonstration of the doctrine of sphericity was left for

another to make.

In 1493 Pope Alexander XI issued a bull, that, in con-

nection with previous bulls issued by his predecessors, had

the effect to give all non-Christian lands already discovered,

or yet to be discovered, lying east of a meridian line one

hundred leagues west of the Azores to Portugal, and all sim-

ilar lands west of this line to Spain. This arrangement not

proving satisfactory to Portugal, the two powers entered into

the Capitulation of Tordesillas, in 1494, by which the line of

demarkation was drawn three hundred and seventy leagues

west of the Azores. From this agreement, which was

approved by the Pope as the supreme head of the Church,

168 Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly

168 Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly.

most important results followed, only one of which need be

here mentioned. The Portuguese, keeping on to the East

through the India seas, discovered the Spice Islands about

the year 1500. Among the Portuguese who served in that

quarter of the world was Magellan, a skilled navigator, a

fearless soldier, a man fully abreast of the geographical

knowledge and nautical science of the times, and of the

most indomitable resolution. After returning from the

Indies, Magellan served some time in Africa, where he was

wounded. He now renounced the service of the Portuguese,

renounced his country, even, and resorted to Spain, where

he told the King that the western road to the Spice Islands

was shorter than the eastern road; that those islands, there-

fore, lay on the King's side of the world; and that he would

prove this to be true if the King would put him in command

of a proper expedition. The causes that led Magellan to

take this course are not altogether clear. It is said that he

had become offended at the King of Portugal on account of

some real or fancied wrong; also that he had an ambition to

fulfill the dream of Columbus which, since the capitulation

of 1494, could be done only under the Spanish flag. But

Charles V listened to the bold navigator, and complied with

his request. Magellan sailed from Seville with five ships and

237 men, August 10, 1519. The principal events of the

voyage are Magellan's discovery of the strait that bears his

name, his issuance from its western portal into the Pacific

Ocean (that he named) November 28, 1520, the voyage of

twelve thousand miles to the northwest across that track-

less ocean, the discovery of the Ladrones and the Phil-

lipines, the death of Magellan, the reaching of the Spice

Islands, and the return of Sebastian del Cano, one of Magel-

lan's lieutenants, to Seville in the flag-ship "San Vittoria,"

September 7, 1522, having accomplished the circumnaviga-

tion of the earth.

Thus was the conception of Aristotle, of Strabo, and of

Seneca justified. Hitherto that conception had rested on

theoretical arguments merely; now it was practically demon-

strated. In peril and hardship, Magellan's voyage far tran-

THE FIRST CIRCUMNAVIGATION OF THE

EARTH.

THE three stages of geographical knowledge are these:

(1.) The observation of facts; (2.) The deduction of a

theory of the earth from these facts; (3.) The adjustment

of facts discovered later to this theory. The early difficulties

in the way of establishing a true theory of the earth were:

(1.) Men's limited knowledge of the earth; (2.) Their

lack of scientific discipline and habit; (3.) The misleading

character of geographical appearances. It is true of geog-

raphy, as it is of astronomy, as Sir John Herschel has said,

that "Almost all the conclusions of astronomy stand in open

and startling contradiction to those of superficial and vulgar

observation, and with what appears to every one, until he has

understood and weighed the proofs to the contrary, the most

positive evidence of his senses."

Men first supposed that the earth is a flat disk, bounded

by the visible horizon. The second theory was that it is a

flat parallelogram, longer east and west than north and south.

When we consider the limitations of the men who formed

these theories, we see that each one of them was wholly

natural in its time. The terms "latitude" and "longitude "

were given to geography by men who accepted the second

theory. By and by the spherical theory appeared, originated,

it is supposed, by Pythagoras, and received by the best in-

formed of the Greeks. This view of the earth is stated in

passages in old writers that are well known to scholars, of

whom Aristotle, Strabo, and Seneca are the best known.

Strabo, for example, wrote: "If the extent of the Atlantic

Ocean did not prevent, it would be possible for us to sail

from Spain to India along the same parallel."

1Abstract of an address before the Ohio State Archaeological and Histori-

cal Society, December 20, 1886.

164