Christopher Columbus, A Man with a Gift
“Of the new heaven and the new earth, of which our Lord spoke in the Revelation of John and earlier by the mouth of Isaiah, he made me the messenger and showed me where to go.”
-Christopher Columbus
It sat on a shelf in a library in the inland city of Seville, Spain, unpublished and wrapped in vellum, for nearly four hundred years. For the 400th anniversary of Columbus’s first ocean crossing, the Columbus Commission made a Spanish transcription, Libro de las profecias, and printed only 560 copies. One of those copies was obtained by Professor Delno West of Northern Arizona University from a Princeton library in 1984 for the purpose of translation into the English language. Upon receipt, it was noted that the volume’s pages were uncut. For an additional 90 years, Columbus’s most extensive written work had been on a shelf—untouched, unseen, and unread. It wasn’t until 1991 that the first English translation was made available—just short of the 500th year anniversary of “In 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” What was the Libro de las profecias? Literally translated, it was the book of prophecies. After his 3rd journey to the Americas, Columbus was intent on two projects. One of those projects was Libro de las profecias, the 84 folio sheets (168 pages), the “why” behind his ideas, motives, and inexhaustible drive. It included extensive biblical support and historical research for his ambitions and project. Could Columbus himself have been as curious about the fire within him as anyone else has been? Was he searching to understand his role in God’s grand design? Clark Hinckley, a biographer writes, “The key themes of the Libro de las profecias are clear and simple. They are that God had called Columbus and qualified him to open the gates of the Ocean Sea for the purposes of preaching the gospel to all nations and obtaining the gold and resources necessary to finance a new crusade, retake Jerusalem, and rebuild the temple in preparation for the return of the Savior.” While Columbus acknowledges “I am unlearned in literature, a layman, a mariner, a common worldly man,” citations in his work include those from Muslim, Jewish, and Christian backgrounds. “He builds his case that before the Savior returns to establish his kingdom on the earth, all nations must hear the gospel message and that his Voyage of Discovery was an essential element in fulfilling these prophecies.” Just for an idea of the breadth of Columbus’s studies, the book cites 247 chapters of the Bible (including 61 from Isaiah), the Koran, and fifty-three different authors including Aristotle. Additional notes list 83 scriptures Columbus hoped to include, but the work was never completed.
So, who was the boy who would grow to be certain of his calling to turn the key and unlock the Ocean Seas? As is God’s pattern with many of those who are asked to do great things, Columbus was born remarkably unremarkable. Sometime in the autumn of 1451, Columbus was born a weaver’s son in Genoa, Italy. His family had been in the wool weaving business for multiple generations. Genoa was a port city on the Mediterranean Sea and captains from Genoa were known all over Europe as the best mariners. Likely, a boy in Genoa would have seen and heard much about the ships and the sea. His son Fernando records that Columbus went to sea at age fourteen. Columbus himself wrote, “At a very early age I began to navigate upon the seas…”
Columbus seems to have had acquaintances with the people who could provide the opportunities he would need to be perfectly trained for the work ahead of him. At an early age he was gaining experience all over the Mediterranean and European Seas. Even a shipwreck worked to his advantage. His son Fernando reports that at age 24 the ship upon which Columbus was sailing was attacked and sunk off the coast of Portugal. Columbus lept into the sea and used an oar as a floatation device, then swam 6 miles to shore to save his life. After recovering, he made his way to Lisbon, the European heart of exploration in that age. Though he was alone and penniless, in Lisbon, Columbus found opportunities to sail to Iceland and Ireland. In Lisbon, he found his way into the map-making business and furthered his knowledge of the coasts and seas. Here, he also married Felipa, who was the daughter of a man who had participated in colonizing voyages. His mother-in-law, seeing how interested Columbus was in her husband’s experiences, gave him sea-charts and writings her husband had left which added to Columbus’s education. His marriage also put Columbus into a certain network of people that would become instrumental in his eventual success.
Even with all of his research and calculations, Columbus drastically underestimated the circumference of the Earth. The reasons are uncertain, but the fact remains. To obtain the necessary funding, his plan had to be believable. He simply knew he could do it, and in his own words, “with a hand that could be felt, the Lord opened my mind to the fact that it would be possible to sail from here to the Indies, and opened my will to desire to accomplish the project.” In possession of such a knowledge, Columbus “prayed to the most merciful Lord concerning my desire [to sail across the Atlantic], and he gave me the spirit and the intelligence for it.”
By 1484, Columbus had sailed all of the known seas. He had also extensively studied and researched and was ready to take his proposition to those who could make his plans a reality. He first gained an audience with the King of Portugal. Portugal was making the most aggressive exploration voyages of the time down the coast of Africa. Though his interactions with the King of Portugal were favorable, his proposal was rejected—twice. After all of his work and preparation, the rejection by the King of the country heading up the greatest explorations of the time was quite a blow to Columbus. About the same time, he lost his wife Felipa. At 33-years-old he was a widower with a young son, in debt, and turned down by the one country he felt was most likely to accept his plan.
One biographer, Felipe Fernando-Armesto wrote, “Divine plans mature slowly. In this case, certainly, God seems to have been in no hurry.” After his hopes were dashed in Portugal, Columbus and his son moved to the Kingdom of Castille, present day Spain. Columbus, though discouraged, was relentless. He spent the next 6 years working to convince King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella that his plan would work. Finally, in 1492, sharing a Christian missionary heart with Queen Isabella, Columbus convinced the sovereigns of the merit of his mission. After 8 years of rejection, Columbus had the permission and the funding he needed. It took 4 months from the time the decision was made to departure.
No biographer or historian disputes the fact that Columbus had an exceptional gift as a mariner. “Columbus did what no predecessor had been able to do, something that, until it was done, seemed impossible to achieve with the technology of the day. Time and time again, when his pilots and fellow captains disagreed with his navigation, the Admiral was proven to be correct.” To put things in perspective, part of the navigation process was accomplished by a ship’s boy watching and marking a stroke on a slate each time a suspended sand glass was emptied and flipped each half hour. “In 1939, Samuel Eliot Morison and a team from Harvard University attempted to trace the route of the First voyage using only the primitive technology and methods available to Columbus. Morison opined, “No man alive [today], limited to the instruments and means at Columbus’s disposal, could obtain anything near the accuracy of his results.” Columbus primarily used the “dead reckoning” method. “Dead reckoning consists of simply laying down the course traveled each day on a chart by estimating the distance traveled and using the compass to determine the direction of travel. Sailing in uncharted seas, Columbus had little more than a blank sheet of paper as his initial chart. He had this compass to determine the direction of travel, the sand glass to estimate the time, and his best guess to determine his speed. Estimating time and speed, he simply multiplied the two estimates to obtain distance traveled and marked it on his chart.” “In 1991, a careful reconstruction of the First Voyage based on the information in Diario (Columbus’s travel log) concluded that Columbus’s dead reckoning on both the outward and return passages was 99.7 percent accurate.”
The well-known trio of ships, The Nina, The Pinta, and The Santa Maria, were shockingly small for overseas travel by today’s standards. The Nina was 50-60 feet long, The Pinta slightly larger, and The Santa Maria was perhaps 75 feet long. The other captains were the Pinzon brothers of Palos. The combined crews totaled 90 men, 87 of whose names are known. Contrary to rumor, only 4 were former convicts. One having killed a man in a brawl, and the other three convicted for trying to help him escape.
The ships left Palos on the tide before dawn on August 3, 1492. It wasn’t customary for captains to maintain daily travel logs, yet Columbus recorded much more than just his travel. His record is known as the Diario. One biographer wrote, it is “unique in the annals of the sea; no master ever compiled so detailed a log; no commander of the day ever wrote such copious reports; no navigator of that era…displayed such talent for observation, such sensitivity to the elements, such appreciation of nature.” Because they were sailing for Spain, they sailed via the Canary Islands which are much more southern than the Azores of Portugal where they most likely would have sailed from had they been sailing for Portugal. This more southerly route may have made all the difference as it put the course in congruence with the easterly trade winds, heretofore unknown, which carried Columbus’s fleet across the ocean.
Generally, that first journey was made with remarkable speed, Columbus seems to have kept his ships moving as fast as possible around the clock. It was not uncommon to travel 140 miles per day and one day the record states 182 miles. During that era, sailors rarely went more than a few days without seeing land. Even the Portuguese explorers rarely lost sight of land as the made their way down the coast of Africa. Weeks into the journey, understandably the crew became anxious. Two false land sightings were experienced and as one day at sea turned into the next, fears mounted. On October 9th, wondering if their food would hold out and if they would be able to find their way back, the Pinzon brothers came aboard the Santa Maria and emphatically protested. Columbus prevailed with a bargain of “three more days.” The next day the crew began an uproar. They were way beyond where they had been told they would find land. Columbus promised what he had promised the other captains. On the evening of October 11th, as was usual, the crew had prayer and sang. At sunset, Columbus changed the course to due west. At 2am on October 12th Rodrigo de Triana was the man who first spotted land. The three days Columbus had bargained for was exactly what he needed. That first landing place is now known as San Salvador or Watlings Island in the Caribbean.
On the first voyage, with the exception of being attacked by a group of Indians on January 12th just before departure, all the interactions with the natives were cordial. Columbus wrote, “In order that they would be friendly to us—because I recognized that they were people who would be better freed [from error] and converted to our holy faith by love than by force—to some of them I gave red caps, and glass beads which they put on their chests, and many other things of small value in which they took so much pleasure and became so much our friends that it was a marvel.” Some natives, coming aboard during the island explorations, cautioned Columbus about areas not to land due to cannibalistic tribes. When it was time to leave, six natives joined Columbus and were introduced to the King and Queen back in Spain. Columbus summed up his interactions with the new people, “May your Highnesses believe that in the whole world there cannot be a better or more gentle people.”
One of the Pinzon brothers was upset about the failure to locate significant gold and on November 20, without permission, he commanded the desertion of The Pinta.
On Christmas Eve, when Columbus was getting some much-needed sleep, a negligent helmsman “turned the tiller over to the ship’s boy” and The Santa Maria slid onto a coral reef. The result was a ship that could no longer sail and crew that could not all fit aboard The Nina. In consequence, the lumber from the ship became the first European settlement in the New World, Navidad, and 39 men were left to attend it.
Without The Santa Maria or The Pinta, Columbus decided the exploration was over and it was time to head for home. On January 4th, they made their way out of the reefs and into the sea. Amazingly, two days later The Pinta came into view. Pinzon offered excuses for his desertion, but Columbus was suspicious.
On the 12th they anchored temporarily and on January 16th The Pinta and The Nina left the New World. Columbus found the trade winds within a week and the ships moved swiftly, even recording their fastest day of 198 miles. On the 12th of February a storm began that would crescendo until Columbus was so concerned for his life and success of the voyage that he wrote as much as he could about everything they had experienced and sealed it in a barrel that would hopefully float if the vessel sunk in order to preserve a record of his mission. His greatest fear was that if he didn’t return, the King and Queen would never know he succeeded in finding the New World.
With only one sail left and having been blown more than 150 miles off course, Columbus had no other option than to put into the closest river, the port of Lisbon, Portugal. He did not know what had happened to The Pinta. The citizens of the town at the mouth of the river were shocked to see such a small ship coming out from the storm. After spending the morning in prayer for them, the citizens came to see the survivors. Twenty-five ships had been lost that winter in that area and some had been trapped in the river for 4 months. Columbus and his crew had been spared from the fate that so many other men met that winter.
Though physically safe, Columbus was worried that the King of Portugal would not be pleased with his success for Spain. Though the King argued that Columbus’s successes belonged to Portugal, he graciously took care of Columbus, his men, and repaired his ships. Columbus spent 8 days in Portugal before heading for Spain. He was concerned that if The Pinta had survived and reached Europe before he did that Pinzon would try to claim success for the voyage. His suspicions were correct. When The Pinta landed, Pinzon sent word to Barcelona requesting an audience. Fortunately, the sovereigns replied that they would wait to hear “word from their Admiral.”
The Nina landed in Palos, Spain, on March 15, 1493. The Pinta actually came in on the same tide that afternoon. This return was a great celebration for all of Palos. As Columbus took his journey to Barcelona to meet with the King and Queen, his company was as if it were a parade through all of Spain. There were Indians, parrots, colorful pieces of clothing and accessories, and gold jewelry—all of which were a sight to behold in 15th century Spain. The sovereigns happily received Columbus and he earned his official title as “Admiral of the Ocean Sea.” Though there are no images of Columbus from the time period, several corroborating physical descriptions by those who knew him exist. “He was, by these accounts tall and well built, with a long nose and high cheekbones. His hair had been light red as a youth, but by the time of the First Voyage it had turned silver. He had light blue eyes and fair, reddish complexion. As he entered the [Royal] square,…, he looked…like a Roman senator.” His audacious claim had been confirmed. He really did find the East by sailing west. In the words of Columbus, “For God is wont to listen to His servants who love His precepts, even in impossibilities, as has happened to us on the present occasion, who have attained that which hitherto mortal men have never reached.”
Likely sometime during his first journey, Columbus redesigned his signature. The prominent feature in the bottom line, “Xpo Ferens” which is a Greco-Roman form of Christopher, means “Christ-bearer.” He saw himself as the one who had opened the way for the spread of Christianity. It was the height of Columbus’s life. Word spread quickly and another voyage was planned immediately.
Unfortunately, none of the other three voyages Columbus made were as glorious as the one he had just completed. Much of tragedy occurred, beginning with the discovery of the annihilation of the settlement which he left in the New World. This tragedy came as a result of the crew’s abhorrent treatment of the natives in Columbus’s absence and the retaliation of the natives. Hurricanes, mutinies, shipwrecks, battles, starvation, sickness, and even spending one return trip in shackles, are all part of the rest of Columbus’s story. While all agree Columbus was unparalleled on the sea, all also agree he was a weak administrator when it came to colonization. The beginning of slavery in the Americas has been spread as the fault of Columbus. It may be more accurately traced to customary war protocol at the time. In that era, enemies to the Spanish crown and Christianity were captured as slaves, somewhat like prisoners of war. When a group of natives warred against Columbus and his men, Columbus followed protocol, just as his sovereigns had done in recent years in recent wars. These events were a source of great anguish for Columbus. During one particularly difficult time Columbus records hearing a divine voice of comfort “since thou wast born, ever had He [God] had thee in His watchful care” and “of the barriers of the Ocean Sea, which were closed with such mighty chains, He gave thee the key.”
An illegitimate child is also part of Columbus’s story. After the death of his wife Felipa, Columbus fathered Fernando with Beatriz. After his third voyage, the other work upon which Columbus was intent was the gathering of legal documents securing his financial situation in order that Beatriz and his sons, Diego and Fernando, would be taken care of. He did not try to hide his relationship, nor shirk his responsibilities as provider to Beatriz and his sons. Whether or not Columbus intended to marry Beatriz is unknown. However, once he became nobility after his first voyage, he was prohibited from marrying outside of nobility and could not marry Beatriz. As a teenager, Fernando accompanied him on his 4th voyage and became one of Columbus’s praising biographers.
With much of heartache and tribulation as part of any good man’s story, may the work, divine calling, dogged determination, gift, and zeal of Columbus not be lost. As we all hope our own lives will be remembered, that is, by our greatest successes, might we also remember the life of Columbus. One biographer boldly wrote of Columbus’s voyage that it was, “the greatest event since the creation of the world, save the incarnation and death of Him who created it.” The world is today connected because Columbus connected it.
In Columbus’s words, everything ‘turned out just as our redeemer Jesus Christ had said, and as he had spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets.” His last words, on May 20, 1506, were “Into thy hands Lord, I commend my spirit.”
Primary Resource: Hinckley, Clark B., "Christopher Columbus, A Man among the Gentiles," Deseret Book Company, 2014.
All quotations come from this source unless otherwise noted. Some quotations are biographers Clark quoted. See his work for detailed citations.
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