#Vasco da gama areas explored series

After all, the Portuguese, like their Venetian contemporaries, had perfected the art of occupation of territory by way of вЂњвЂ¦division of political opponents, the employment of economic resources for political ends, and the use of superior military technology when other measures failed (Hess, 1970, 1900). These bases might simply be controlled by merely 20 men as there was no need for large garrisons. De Gama and other captains after him, would establish small strategic outposts in the territories they went around, (such as on the western coast of Africa and in India).

Vasco De Gama subsequently sailed back to Portugal with the riches he desired, (spices). Vasco De Gama followed in the footsteps of other Portuguese explorers and, in 1497, successfully went around the Cape of Good Hope, (South Africa), and onwards towards India and established a sea lane to India in 1498. The question of whether Columbus was the first to find America is not contentious but rather it is a moot point as, in the words of Abdul Hakim Quick, вЂњHow can you discover a place, if the people are living there already? (Quick, Deeper Roots Lecture ).вЂќ Certainly one can cite the plethora of information from Muslim sources of having trafficked between the Maghrib and West Africa and the Americas going back to the 10 Century CE and the stories of Mansa Musa, but that is to come later on in this book.

#Vasco da gama areas explored series

The Spaniards achieved their own crowning glory when Christopher Columbus, the so-called first European to вЂdiscoverвЂ™ America, set out from Spain to find an alternate route to India at the behest of Queen Isabella of Spain, (although Columbus himself was Portuguese), reached the shores of Cuba and began what would be a series of events that would catapult Spain from being a regional power to a superpower, (which would eventually rival the Uthmanis for a period).