Upon Prince Henry's death in 1460,
the mantle of sponsoring exploration came to rest on a new
monarch, King John II. King John II was not satisfied with
the revenues he was receiving from trading voyages and he
was determined to establish a Christian Empire in West
Africa. In 1481 he charged Diogo d'Azambuja with
forming the first permanent settlement in Africa. To mark
the philosophical change in Portugal's voyages from trade
missions to settlement, a series of granite pillars were
commissioned for subsequent voyages. On each pillar could be
found the royal arms of King John II as well as a Christian
cross. When explorers reached a previously uncharted region,
they were to place the pillar ashore to claim the land in
the name of Christendom and Portugal. By 1487, Portuguese
explorers had placed granite pillars as far south as Cape
Cross.
Under Diogo's command were two different captains,
Bartolomeu Dias and Christopher Columbus, who would soon
attain notoriety in their own right. Bartolomeu Dias(1457-1500) was to continue the work of previous
Portuguese explorers and to conduct advance reconnaissance
about the African coast, but to him goes the credit of
circumnavigating the Cape of Good Hope. Sailing from Tagus
in 1487, Dias coasted south and placed a pillar at a
headland now known as Dias Point. When the voyage resumed, a
favouring wind turned into a gale. For thirteen days, the
gale blew from the north and carried the Portuguese ships
far beyond the Cape of Good Hope into the South Atlantic
where no previous European had been. As the wind finally
died down, Dias steered east and north until he found land
again at Mossel Bay. Unaware that he had passed beyond the
southern tip of Africa, Dias continued his voyage past Algo
Bay. It was at this point where the coastline changes from
east to north-east that it became clear that the
southernmost point of the continent had been passed. This
was uncharted territory for European sailors and rather than
risk certain mutiny, Dias yielded to the demands of his crew
and charted a course back to Europe. As they rounded the tip
again, Dias named the location the Cape of Good Hope. The
name "Good Hope" was designed as an optimistic reminder that
the overall objective was to find a sea-route to Asia. Dias
returned home having travelled a remarkable 11,000 kilometres
south.
Predominant Winds and Explorers' Routes
Sailing along the coast, Dias circumnavigates the southernmost point of Africa
If it can be said that Bartolomeu Dias found the gates
to the sea-route to India, it would remain for another
explorer to force them open. In the interim, successive wars
with Castile and Spain (the latter of which was fuelled by
competing claims between Portugal and Spain for a division
of spoils in the New World of North America) delayed further
exploration. Furthermore, a serious shortage of funds
jeopardised the future of exploration by the Portuguese.
Only the death of King John II in 1495 and the succession of
King Manuel I (1495-1521) would renew the Portuguese quest
to find a sea-route to India.
Early in the summer of 1497, Vasco da
Gama (1469-1524) was granted an audience with King Manuel at
Montemóro-o-Novo where the captain took an oath of
fealty to the Portuguese Crown and was presented with a
silken banner displaying the Cross of the Order of Christ.
Da Gama was not commissioned to conquer new lands, but
rather to seek out Christian kingdoms in the East and to
secure for Portugal access to the great markets of Asia.
Predominant Winds and Explorers' Routes
Vasco da Gama navigates the Atlantic and Indian Oceans to reach Asia
Da Gama set sail from Lisbon and then called at the Cape
Verde Islands. Because da Gama was familiar with the wind
patterns of the Atlantic, he worked his ships on a south by
south-east course before making a wide sweep westwards to
reach the currents and winds he would need to round the Cape
of Good Hope - or so he thought. Unfortunately, da Gama
miscalculated and after travelling over 6,000 kilometres in
ninety-three days - all of which occurred out of the sight
of land - his ships barely reached the Cape of Good Hope.
The sheer distance covered by da Gama was three times the
distance travelled by Christopher Columbus during his first
voyage to Hispaniola in 1492. There were numerous
disappointments on this voyage: da Gama's progress up the
south-eastern coast of Africa was tediously slow and
encounters with indigenous populations revealed that
conversion to Christianity would not be as easy as hoped.
Finally, however, the Portuguese captain reached the tip of
the Indian Ocean. The Portuguese were finally on the edge of
the Asian markets they had searched many years to find. Thus
began, as the historian K.M. Panikar noted, the Vasco da
Gama epoch of Asian history. That is, the era of history
when European nations alone controlled the seas - until the
emergence of Japan and the United States as major naval
powers at the end of the nineteenth century.
