The Trinidad was seized by the Portuguese on its return journey, but on September 6, , the Victoria and only 18 surviving crew members returned to Spain, completing the first circumnavigation of the Earth. Though Magellan died before the voyage was completed, he is often credited with the first circumnavigation of the Earth as he initially led the voyage.
Magellanic Clouds in space were also named for him, as his crew was the first to view them while sailing in the Southern Hemisphere. Actively scan device characteristics for identification. Use precise geolocation data. Select personalised content. Create a personalised content profile.
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Measure content performance. Develop and improve products. List of Partners vendors. Share Flipboard Email. Amanda Briney. Geography Expert. Amanda Briney, M. Featured Video. Cite this Article Format. Briney, Amanda. With those disastrous events behind them, the fleet left Port San Julian five months later when fierce seasonal storms abated.
On October 21, Magellan finally entered the strait that he had been seeking and that came to bear his name. The voyage through the Strait of Magellan was treacherous and cold, and many sailors continued to mistrust their leader and grumble about the dangers of the journey ahead.
In the early days of the navigation of the strait, the crew of the San Antonio forced its captain to desert, and the ship turned and fled across the Atlantic Ocean back to Spain. They were the first known Europeans to see the great ocean, which Magellan named Mar Pacifico, the Pacific Ocean, for its apparent peacefulness, a stark contrast to the dangerous waters of the strait from which he had just emerged.
In fact, extremely rough waters are not uncommon in the Pacific Ocean, where tsunamis, typhoons and hurricanes have done serious damage to the Pacific Islands and Pacific Rim nations throughout history. Little was known about the geography beyond South America at that time, and Magellan optimistically estimated that the trip across the Pacific would be rapid.
In fact, it took three months for the fleet to make its way slowly across the vast Mar Pacifico. Magellan was now closer than ever to reaching the Spice Islands, but when the Cebu asked for his help in fighting their neighbors on the island of Mactan, Magellan agreed. He assumed he would command a swift victory with his superior European weapons, and against the advice of his men, Magellan himself led the attack.
The Mactanese fought fiercely, and Magellan fell when he was shot with a poison arrow. Ferdinand Magellan died on April 27, In the end, only the Victoria completed the voyage around the world and arrived back in Seville, Spain, in September with a heavy cargo of spices but with only 18 men from the original crew, including Italian scholar and explorer Antonio Pigafetta.
The journal Pigafaetta kept on the voyage is a key record of what the crew encountered on their journey home. Although the trip westward from Europe to the east via the Strait of Magellan had been discovered and mapped, the journey was too long and dangerous to become a practical route to the Spice Islands. He found not only a massive ocean, hitherto unknown to Europeans, but he also discovered that the earth was much larger than previously thought.
Though Magellan is often credited with the first circumnavigation on the globe, he did so on a technicality: He first made a trip from Europe to the Spice Islands, eastward via the Indian Ocean, and then later made his famous westward voyage that brought him to the Philippines.
So he did cover the entire terrain, but it was not a strict point A to point A, round-the-world trip, and it was made in two different directions. His slave, Enrique, however, was born in either Cebu or Mallaca and came to Europe with Magellan by ship.
So Enrique was the first person to circumnavigate the world in one direction, from point A to point A. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us!
Subscribe for fascinating stories connecting the past to the present. Spaniards and Portuguese made up the vast majority of the sailors, but the voyage also included mariners from Greece, Sicily, England, Sir Francis Drake participated in some of the earliest English slaving voyages to Africa and earned a reputation for his privateering, or piracy, against Spanish ships and possessions.
The Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan is often credited as being the first person to have circumnavigated the globe, but the reality of his journey is a bit more complicated. Magellan first set sail in September as part of an epic attempt to find a western route to the Amerigo Vespucci was an Italian-born merchant and explorer who took part in early voyages to the New World on behalf of Spain around the late 15th century. In , Magellan returned to Lisbon, and the following year, he was wounded during an expedition to Morocco, which left him with a permanent limp.
After a disagreement with the Portuguese king, in Magellan went to Spain to try and enlist the Spanish king's support for an expedition to reach the Moluccas by sailing westwards. The Spanish wanted a share in the valuable spice trade from the Moluccas, but the Portuguese controlled the eastwards route round southern Africa. Magellan was successful and in September set out with a fleet of five vessels. In spite of a mutinous crew, rough weather, scurvy, a desperate lack of provisions and unknown waters, Magellan managed to cross the Atlantic and navigate through the straits at the southern point of South America which were later named after him.
Now with only three ships, Magellan sailed on into the Pacific with rapidly diminishing supplies, which led to many of the crew dying of starvation and scurvy. After around 14 weeks they reached an island, probably Guam, in the western Pacific.
They then sailed on to the Philippines.
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