Famous Navigators
A tribute to the great Portuguese navigators
Portuguese Navigators
Portugal was the country that lead the greatest expansion of the known world. In only one hundred years, they managed to be the first Europeans in nearly one half the globe, as well as be the first to push south. The accomplishments of the rest of Europe paled by comparison. From the early 15th century, the nautical school of Henry the Navigator had been extending Portuguese knowledge of the African coastline. The Portuguese dreamed of finding an all-water route to India around Africa. The goal of Portuguese exploration was to gain control over the system of maritime trade that linked the countries of southern Asia from China to the Red Sea. Portugal provided a long and distinguished line of explorers and navigators, with its ships the first to discover Brazil and the lucrative trade routes to Asia, Africa and India. Names such as Vasco da Gama, Henry the Navigator, Ferdinand Magellan and Bartholomeu Dias are now legendary for having made great discoveries in the New World in the name of Portugal. The Portuguese were the first to introduce the art of using latitude in navigation which gave them mastery over the oceans. They were also the first to introduce longitude into navigation, in the early sixteenth century. Zero longitude which was located in the Portuguese Madeira Islands remained the world's standard for the next three hundred years, until 1884 when the English established the Greenwich Observatory.
