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Y205: Exploration, Encounters and Empire 1445–1570

Exploration: explorers, their routes and the difficulties they faced

  • 2 things to know
  • Unit group 2

Overview

Recall questions on Columbus, Dias, da Gama, Cabral, Vespucci, Balboa, Magellan, Cortés and Pizarro, the routes of Portuguese and Spanish voyages, and the difficulties crews faced.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

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Key term

Contrast the routes taken by Portuguese and Spanish expeditions.

Key term

What drew a man such as Hernán Cortés to the Indies?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

  1. 1

    State the terms Columbus obtained from Isabella and Ferdinand in 1492.

    Model answer

    He was promised the hereditary title Admiral of the Ocean Sea, the offices of viceroy and governor of any lands he found, and a tenth of the profits of the enterprise.

  2. 2

    State what Bartolomeu Dias achieved in 1488.

    Model answer

    He rounded the southern tip of Africa, naming what became the Cape of Good Hope, and proved that the Atlantic and Indian Oceans were connected, though his crew forced him to turn back before reaching India.

  3. 3

    Why is the voyage of Vasco da Gama in 1497 to 1499 considered the decisive Portuguese success?

    Model answer

    He rounded the Cape, crossed to Calicut in 1498 with the help of a pilot from the East African coast, and returned with a cargo of spices, opening the first all-sea route between Europe and India.

  4. 4

    How did Pedro Álvares Cabral come to claim Brazil for Portugal in 1500?

    Model answer

    Leading a large fleet bound for India, he swung far west into the Atlantic to pick up favourable winds, sighted the Brazilian coast and claimed it for the Portuguese crown before continuing to Calicut.

  5. 5

    What did Columbus believe he had reached, and why was he mistaken?

    Model answer

    He believed he had reached the islands off Asia, because he had badly underestimated the circumference of the earth and overestimated the eastward extent of Asia, and he clung to that belief through all four voyages.

  6. 6

    What was Amerigo Vespucci's chief contribution to European understanding of the new discoveries?

    Model answer

    His coasting voyages along South America convinced him that the land was not Asia but a previously unknown continent, and the widely printed accounts under his name led mapmakers to label it America.

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