Rumors began spreading that Magellan was going to lead all the Spanish sailors to their deaths for the glory of Portugal, or that he was hoping to be away long enough that the Spanish court would forget about the venture. The crew was already around 860 miles farther south than the Cape of Good Hope, in Africa. When the group reached the Bay of San Julian (in present-day Patagonia) on March 31, Magellan decided to spend the winter there, reduce rations, and prepare for the final stretch around South America. Despite their fearlessness around the sharks, in steering their course, the sailors gave the sea lions wide berth as “man-eaters” and waited out storms. The ships made their way down the eastern coast of South America, sometimes catching and eating sharks, noting the abundance of “sea wolves” (sea lions). On December 13, the armada landed at Rio de Janeiro, just in time for the beginning of summer in the southern hemisphere. But the attempt was short-lived, and Magellan quickly had Cartagena arrested and removed from command.ĭespite their fearlessness around the sharks, in steering their course, the sailors gave the sea lions wide berth as “man-eaters.” Before the ships had even crossed the equator or sighted Brazil, word came to Magellan that the capitan of the San Antonio, a Spaniard named Juan de Cartagena, was collaborating with two other Spanish captains to start a mutiny. The fleet set sail for the Canary Islands, an early restocking area, on September 20, 1519. “Of this I do not know the reason, except by cause of his, the captain-general, being Portuguese, and they were Spaniards or Castilians, who for a long time have been in rivalry and ill will with one another.” “The masters and captains of the other ships of his company did not love him,” wrote Italian sailor Antony Pigafetta, the voyage chronicler. Many among them mistrusted Magellan’s intentions. The majority of the crew members were Spanish, including three of the five captains. The Spanish court awarded him a five-ship armada and around 280 crew members for the mission. Magellan’s Voyage via Picrylīut proving the Portugese-born Magellan had Spain’s best interests at heart proved a challenge from day one. If he happened to discover other islands along the way, so much the better for Spain-and for Magellan’s own coffers. He just needed to navigate a westward route to them, across the Atlantic and around the unexplored tip of South America. Magellan waded directly into these contentious waters, suggesting to the Spanish court that the Moluccas might actually fall within the Spanish side of the treaty. But even this attempt only served to “touch off a furious race between the nations to claim new lands and to control the world’s trade routes even as they attempted to shift the line of demarcation to favor one side or the other,” as the historians Scott Fitzpatrick and Richard Callaghan wrote in the Journal of Pacific History. To keep Spain and Portugal from literally warring over the lucrative territories, Pope Alexander created the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494, awarding the eastern hemisphere of the globe to Portugal and the western hemisphere to Spain. One could argue that the money made from spices contributed to the rise of the European city-state, perhaps played a role in the transition from feudalism to capitalism, fueled the impetus that opened an age of discovery, and contributed to the later emergence of the Renaissance. As the cook and author Clifford Wright stated in Gastronomica: The demand for spices was so high that whichever nation controlled access to the islands was sure to become fabulously wealthy. It was here that traders found nutmeg, cloves, and mace. To the east, beyond India, were the Spice Islands, an archipelago in Indonesia called the Moluccas. To the west lay the Americas and the Caribbean islands, rich with natural resources (nevermind that they’d been inhabited for millennia). Sailors like Christopher Columbus were opening up vast new swathes of land that Europeans viewed as ripe for exploitation. The turn of the 16th century was an unsettled time. For the Portuguese, a countryman aligning himself with public enemy number one was tantamount to treason. The Spanish court leapt at the opportunity to back Magellan’s ambitious venture-a voyage to find a westward trade route to the lucrative Spice Islands. But in 1518, after being rejected by the Portuguese authorities, Magellan turned to his country’s greatest rival: Spain. One might think Magellan was the epitome of national devotion. Born in northern Portugal around 1480, Magellan, an orphaned son of lesser nobles, spent decades serving the Portuguese crown in its wars abroad, in India and Malaysia. From the start, it was hard to know whose side Ferdinand Magellan was on.
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