Famous Navigators
A tribute to the great Portuguese navigators
Bartholomeu Dias
In the fifteenth century, the armies of the Turkish Empire conquered most of the middle East and amalgamated it into an empire known as the Ottoman Empire. All trade with the East had to go through the Turks, who charged heavy tariffs. The Portuguese dreamed of finding an all-water route around Africa. The groundwork had been already laid by Prince Henry the Navigator, who had sent ships on voyages down the African coast. In 1487, King Joao II of Portugal, appointed Bartholomeu Dias to lead an expedition to discover the southern tip of Africa, if it existed, and to sail on from there to the East.
After ten months of preparation Bartholomeu Dias left Lisbon, Portugal, in August 1487 with two caravels and a storeship. They sailed towards the mouth of the Congo river and then following the African coast, entered Walfisch Bay. Here Dias erected the first of his stone columns ("padroes"), to serve as navigational beacons to other sailors. About New Year's Day, 1488, a gale hit his ships and blew them southward, past the southernmost tip of the land. After thirteen days, he managed to turn East, but found no sheltering shore. Turning North he sighted Mossel Bay, beyond the Cape of Good Hope. Unknowingly and out of sight of land, he had rounded the cape. Almost at the entrance to the Indian Ocean, the crew weary and afraid forced Dias to turn back. On the return voyage he charted the southern waters, and in May 1488 he saw the Cape of Good Hope for the first time. Dias called it Cabo Tormentoso - "stormy cape".
Dias returned home to Portugal after travelling a remarkable 11,000 kilometers south. He had sailed for over sixteen months. His discovery that Africa actually ended in a cape was of tremendous importance and used by Vasco da Gama ten years later, who sailed around the Cape of Good Hope and on to India.
