Biography de gamas vasco

The diary record of the expedition ends abruptly here. Da Gama and his sickly brother eventually hitched a ride with a Guinea caravel returning to Portugal, but Paulo da Gama died en route. He eventually took passage on an Azorean caravel and finally arrived in Lisbon on 29 August according to Barros , [ 32 ] or early September [ 19 ] 8th or 18th, according to other sources.

Despite his melancholic mood, da Gama was given a hero's welcome and showered with honors, including a triumphal procession and public festivities. King Manuel wrote two letters in which he described da Gama's first voyage, in July and August , soon after the return of the ships. Girolamo Sernigi also wrote three letters describing da Gama's first voyage soon after the return of the expedition.

The expedition had exacted a large cost — two ships and over half the men had been lost. It had also failed in its principal mission of securing a commercial treaty with Kozhikode. Nonetheless, the small quantities of spices and other trade goods brought back on the remaining two ships demonstrated the potential of great profit for future trade.

His path would be followed up thereafter by yearly Portuguese India Armadas.

Biography de gamas vasco

The spice trade would prove to be a major asset to the Portuguese royal treasury, and other consequences soon followed. For example, da Gama's voyage had made it clear that the east coast of Africa, the Contra Costa , was essential to Portuguese interests; its ports provided fresh water, provisions, timber, and harbors for repairs, and served as a refuge where ships could wait out unfavorable weather.

One significant result was the colonization of Mozambique by the Portuguese Crown. This turned out to be a complicated affair, for Sines still belonged to the Order of Santiago. The master of the Order, Jorge de Lencastre , might have endorsed the reward — after all, da Gama was a Santiago knight, one of their own, and a close associate of Lencastre himself.

But the fact that Sines was awarded by the king provoked Lencastre to refuse out of principle, lest it encourage the king to make other donations of the Order's properties. In the meantime, da Gama made do with a substantial hereditary royal pension of , reis. He was awarded the noble title of Dom lord in perpetuity for himself, his siblings and their descendants.

However, Pedro Cabral entered into a conflict with the local Arab merchant guilds, with the result that the Portuguese factory was overrun in a riot and up to 70 Portuguese were killed. Cabral blamed the Zamorin for the incident and bombarded the city. Thus war broke out between Portugal and Kozhikode. Vasco da Gama invoked his royal letter to take command of the Fourth India Armada , scheduled to set out in , with the explicit aim of taking revenge upon the Zamorin and force him to submit to Portuguese terms.

The heavily armed fleet of fifteen ships and eight hundred men left Lisbon on 12 February The Fourth Armada was a veritable da Gama family affair. On the outgoing voyage, da Gama's fleet opened contact with the East African gold trading port of Sofala and reduced the sultanate of Kilwa to tribute, extracting a substantial sum of gold.

They offered their wealth, which "could ransom all the Christian slaves in the Kingdom of Fez and much more" but were not spared. Da Gama looked on through the porthole and saw the women bringing up their gold and jewels and holding up their babies to beg for mercy. After stopping at Cannanore, Gama drove his fleet before Kozhikode, demanding redress for the treatment of Cabral.

Having known of the fate of the pilgrims' ship, the Zamorin adopted a conciliatory attitude towards the Portuguese and expressed willingness to sign a new treaty, but da Gama made a call to the Hindu king to expel all Muslims from Kozhikode before beginning negotiations, which was turned down. Da Gama called him a spy, ordered the priest's lips and ears to be cut off and after sewing a pair of dog's ears to his head, sent him away.

He also captured several rice vessels and cut off the crew's hands, ears and noses, dispatching them with a note to the Zamorin, in which Gama declared that he would be open to friendly relations once the Zamorin had paid for the items plundered from the feitoria as well as the gunpowder and cannonballs. The violent treatment meted out by da Gama quickly brought trade along the Malabar Coast of India, upon which Calicut Kozhikode depended, to a standstill.

The Zamorin ventured to dispatch a fleet of strong warships to challenge da Gama's armada, but which Gama managed to defeat in a naval battle before Kozhikode harbor. Da Gama loaded up with spices at Cochin and Cannanore , small nearby kingdoms at war with the Zamorin, whose alliances had been secured by prior Portuguese fleets. The 4th armada left India in early Vasco da Gama arrived back in Portugal in September , effectively having failed in his mission to bring the Zamorin to submission.

When the Portuguese king Manuel I decided to appoint the first governor and viceroy of Portuguese India in , da Gama was conspicuously overlooked, and the post given to Francisco de Almeida. For the next two decades, Vasco da Gama lived out a quiet life, unwelcome in the royal court and sidelined from Indian affairs. His attempts to return to the favor of Manuel I, including switching over to the Order of Christ in , yielded little.

Almeida, the larger-than-life Afonso de Albuquerque and, later on, Albergaria and Sequeira , were the king's preferred point men for India. After Ferdinand Magellan defected to the Crown of Castile in , Vasco da Gama threatened to do the same, prompting the king to undertake steps to retain him in Portugal and avoid the embarrassment of losing his own "Admiral of the Indies" to Spain.

The decree granted Vasco da Gama and his heirs all the revenues and privileges related, [ 45 ] thus promoting da Gama from a petty noble to one of the relatively few titled nobles in Portugal. Vasco da Gama re-emerged from his political wilderness as an important adviser to the new king's appointments and strategy. Seeing the new Spanish threat to the Maluku Islands as the priority, Vasco da Gama advised against the obsession with Arabia that had pervaded much of the Manueline period, and continued to be the dominant concern of Duarte de Menezes , then- governor of Portuguese India.

Menezes also turned out to be incompetent and corrupt, subject to numerous complaints. As a result, John III decided to appoint Vasco da Gama himself to replace Menezes, confident that the magic of his name and memory of his deeds might better impress his authority on Portuguese India, and manage the transition to a new government and new strategy.

By his appointment letter of February , John III granted Vasco da Gama the privileged title of " Viceroy ", being only the second Portuguese governor to enjoy that title the first was Francisco de Almeida in After a troubled journey [ clarification needed ] in which four or five of the ships were lost en route, he arrived in India in September.

Early on the morning of September 8, as the ships laid becalmed near Dabul the sea began to boil and the vessels pitched and rocked violently for about an hour as the result of a submarine earthquake. Friends, rejoice and be happy, for even sea trembles before us! Vasco da Gama immediately invoked his high viceregal powers to impose a new order in Portuguese India, replacing all the old officials with his own appointments.

But da Gama contracted malaria not long after arriving and died in the city of Cochin on Christmas Eve in , three months after his arrival. As per royal instructions, da Gama was succeeded as governor of India by one of the captains who had come with him, Henrique de Menezes no relation to Duarte. Vasco da Gama's body was first buried at St.

Francis Church , at Fort Kochi in the city of Kochi , but his remains were returned to Portugal in The body of Vasco da Gama was re-interred in Vidigueira in a casket decorated with gold and jewels. Apparently, da Gama's gravestone had been exchanged with that of his great-grandson Francisco da Gama, whose tomb lay opposite his, likely during restoration works in Additionally, it was found that the casket moved in contained the bones of more than one person, whereas the other tomb contained only one skeleton.

It was not until May , during the celebrations of the fourth centenary of da Gama's arrival in Kozhikode, that the remains from the other tomb in the chapel of Vidigueira were moved to the Hieronymite monastery. In , a member of the family that now owns the estate where da Gama's remains were until the s claimed that the real bones of Vasco da Gama were located in an unmarked spot on the estate, purportedly having been hidden there by the estate's owner in the 19th century, the Visconde de Ribeira Brava.

The title thus continued through this female-line. Vasco da Gama is one of the most famous and celebrated explorers from the Age of Discovery. As much as anyone after Henry the Navigator , he was responsible for Portugal's success as an early colonizing power. Beside the fact of the first voyage itself, it was his astute mix of politics and war on the other side of the world that placed Portugal in a prominent position in Indian Ocean trade.

This journey would become one of the most significant maritime achievements of the age, securing Portugal's route to the East and transforming global trade dynamics. Da Gama's first voyage to India was marked by both triumph and hardship, as he successfully reached the shores of Calicut in after navigating through treacherous waters.

However, his initial encounters with the local population were complicated by misunderstandings and violent confrontations with Muslim traders. Despite these challenges, he returned home as a hero, later leading a second more devastating expedition in aimed at establishing Portuguese dominance in Indian trade. Vasco da Gama was born around in Sines, Portugal, into a noble family.

Although little is documented about his early years, it is known that he developed a strong affinity for the sea from a young age, which propelled him to join the navy. There, he honed his navigation skills, learning under seasoned sailors, and cultivated a reputation as a resilient and daring navigator. Da Gama's training in navigation occurred during a time when Portugal was emerging as a dominant maritime power under the influence of Prince Henry the Navigator.

This environment inspired many young seafarers, including da Gama, who were driven by the quest for exploration and discovery. His experiences at sea included various assignments that equipped him with valuable skills and strategic insight. A notable moment in his early career was when, in , he was tasked with seizing French ships as an act of vengeance, which showcased his commitment to Portuguese interests and set the stage for his later pivotal voyages.

In , Vasco da Gama was appointed by King Manuel of Portugal to find a maritime route to India, a mission that would redefine navigation and trade. Commanding a fleet of four vessels, including his flagship St. Gabriel, da Gama set sail on July 8, He navigated southward along the coast of Africa, capitalizing on favorable winds and currents.

In , he was appointed to command an expedition equipped by the Portuguese government, whose intention was to find a maritime route to the East. Setting off in July , da Gama's expedition took advantage of the prevailing winds by sailing south down the coast of Africa, then veering far out into the Atlantic and swinging back in an arc to arrive off the southern African coast.

This established a route still followed by sailing vessels. The expedition then rounded the Cape of Good and, after sailing up the coast of east Africa, took on an Arab navigator who helped them reach the Indian coast, at Calicut now Kozhikode in May This voyage launched the all-water route from Europe to Asia. Da Gama returned to Portugal.

The Portuguese nobleman Vasco da Gama sailed from Lisbon in on a mission to reach India and open a sea route from Europe to the East. After sailing down the western coast of Africa and rounding the Cape of Good Hope, his expedition made numerous stops in Africa before reaching the trading post of Calicut, India, in May Two decades later, da Gama again returned to India, this time as Portuguese viceroy; he died there of an illness in late Born circa , Vasco da Gama was the son of a minor nobleman who commanded the fortress at Sines, located on the coast of the Alentejo province in southwestern Portugal.

Little else is known about his early life, but in King John II sent da Gama to the port city of Setubal south of Lisbon and to the Algarve region to seize French ships in retaliation for French attacks on Portuguese shipping interests. Did you know? By the time Vasco da Gama returned from his first voyage to India in , he had spent more than two years away from home, including days at sea, and had traveled some 24, miles.

Only 54 of his original crew of men returned with him; the majority including da Gama's brother Paolo had died of illnesses such as scurvy.