42 
THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 
PoRTUGCEbB 
Expeditions in 
toe Fiftbentii 
Century. 
Henry the 
Navigator. 
Christian vessels were no longer safe. It became essential to look towards the external 
ocean for another route to India, Cathay, the islands of spices, and all the charms and 
riches of the East. 
The revelations of Marco Polo concerning the great Eastern Ocean rendered it 
necessary to make important changes in Ptolemy’s map of Asia. There is evidence that 
this subject was much discussed in European cities, where some few men took an interest 
in geographical questions. The great Florentine astronomer, Toscanelli, was apparently 
the first to give definite shape to the new views, and to discuss in a scientific wa} \the 
subject of transatlantic lands. In the year 1474 he addressed a letter and a map to the 
King of Portugal, setting forth clearly that it was possible to reach the land of spices by 
ailing westward. Years afterwards, probably irn 1480, Columbus asked Toscanelli for 
information concerning the way to the land of spices, which it was thought possible to 
reach by sea direct from Europe. Toscanelli replied by sending a copy of the letter and 
map he had previously sent to the King of Portugal, and at the same time encouraging 
Columbus to undertake the voyage across the Atlantic. Columbus is believed to have 
taken Toscauelli’s map with him on his first voyage. The map has been lost, but has 
been reconstructed, chiefly from materials furnished by the globe of Martin Behaim, 
which bears the date of 1492. 1 (For reproduction of Toscanelli’s map, see Plate YI.) 
Towards the end of the thirteenth century two Genoese galleys are said to have been 
fitted out with the view of rounding Africa from the west and opening up a route to 
India; this expedition was unfortunate. 2 In 1346 a sailor of the island of Majorca, 
Jacques Ferrer, also attempted to follow the west coast of Africa beyond the Canaries, 
but he was not more successful than the Genoese had been. The Portuguese expedi- 
tions of the fifteenth century along the African coasts were, however, the prelude to the 
grand maritime explorations which resulted in the discovery of America and the circum- 
navigation of the world. Not content wfith having expelled the Moors from their 
territories, the Portuguese followed them across the sea into the continent of Africa. 
These armed voyages originated a long series of discoveries in the Atlantic. 
When, in 1420, Prince Henry the Navigator established his maritime observatory at 
Sagres, employed the best Italian map-makers and pilots, and commenced to give an 
impulse to the navigators of Portugal, these were so incompetent that they dared not 
venture more than six miles from the coast . 3 All the expeditions sent to round Cape 
Boj idor, even up till the year 1433, returned unsuccessful, because a reef extended six 
miles seawards and barred the passage . 4 
1 - II. Wagner, Die Rekonstruktion der Toseanelli-Karte v. J. 1474 und die Pseudo-Facsiinilia des Behaim- 
Globus v. J. 1492, Nachr. d. K. Guelltch, d . Witt. z. Gottingen , Philol.-hist. Kl., 1894, No. 3, p. 208. 
; Tli evidence for thin expedition of the brothers Vivaldi (in 1291) is considered insufficient by R. H. Major. 
» See Poach ei (op. cit., p. 237) concerning the instruments and methods employed by the Portuguese to determine 
latitudes at sea. 
4 Sec K. II. Major, The Discoveries of Prince Henry the Navigator, and their Results, ed. 2, p. 68, London, 1877. 
