THE AGE OF DISCOVERY

In this new stage Portugal and Spain were the leaders of the exploration and expedition of
new worlds, sending explorers between the centuries of 1500 and 1600, they created
empires in part of Africa, China, they crossed the Atlantic to discover the Americas.
The first missionaries were the Vivaldi brothers, their names were not famous, they tried
their exploration navigations and failed. The motivations of explorers such as Christopher
Columbus, Magellan, Vasco de Gama was trade since Spain and Portugal wanted to have
the same level of trade and wealth as Italy. In South Asia they had many products that the
Europeans saw as motivation for trade, such as cotton, nutmeg cinnamon, black pepper, etc.
what the Europeans wanted by taking them by means of a large ship and exposing them in
their kingdoms.
China was in the Ming dynasty, and they had the largest population at that time, the
competitions of the Europeans for who would be the first to go to South Asia in ships were
quite strong, many explorers believed that with the expeditions they could get to touch and
see new land and reconquer it, even many Christian missionaries participated in these
expeditions to expand their religion.

Geography was the main misunderstanding of Europeans since no one had the idea that
America existed, they only believed that Europe, Africa, China, Asia, Africa, and Japan
were in the world.

The kingdoms of Spain and Portugal fought against Islam in the Iberian Peninsula since it
was occupied by Muslims for a long time. In 1492 the empire of Portugal was established
while the kingdom of Spain was not yet formed and in 1496 the kingdoms of Castile and
Leon were united to form a single kingdom and constitute a new sovereignty, while the
Muslims were still in power in the kingdom of Granada.
The kingdom of Portugal began to launch reconquest campaigns in North Africa and its
fight against Islam, Henry de Alice, a relative of the Portuguese king, offered schools and
equipment for explorers and pilots, in the middle of the century Portugal had a large empire
They had conquered the entire African continent and part of Asia. Spain was still fighting
for its territory with the Muslims, so the kings decided in 1492 to give money and ships to
Christopher Columbus for new expeditions to South Asia.

Columbus's expedition lasted from 1492 to 1502. He had reached the Caribbean and South
America, claiming that he was in South Asia, and found half-dressed people with little
food. When Columbus died Amerigo Vespucci was the one who continued with his
expeditions and he was the one who discovered the new continent, the new land, America
is a reference to his name Amerigo and in Europe this new discovery changed the thinking
of the kingdoms.