Being the first European mariner to round the southern tip of Africa
Bartolomeu Dias was a Portuguese mariner and explorer. In 1488, he became the first European navigator to round the southern tip of Africa and to demonstrate that the most effective southward route for ships lies in the open ocean, well to the west of the African coast. His discoveries effectively established the sea route between Europe and Asia.
Bartolomeu Dias was born around 1450 in the Faro District of Portugal. His family had a maritime background, and one of his ancestors, Dinis Dias, explored the African coast in the 1440s and discovered the Cap-Vert peninsula in today's Senegal in 1445.[1] Tracing his biography is complicated by the existence of several contemporary Portuguese seafarers with the same name.[2]
In 1486 he seems to have been a cavalier of the king's household, and superintendent of the royal warehouses; on the 10th of October in this year he received an annuity of 6000 reis from King John II of Portugal for "services to come"; and some time after this (probably about July or August 1487, rather than July 1486, the traditional date) he left Lisbon with three ships to carry on the work of African exploration so greatly advanced by Diogo Cão. Dias was also charged with searching for Prester John, a legendary figure believed to be the powerful Christian ruler of a realm somewhere beyond Europe, possibly in the African interior. Dias was provided with two caravels of about 50 tons each (São Cristóvão and São Pantaleão) and a square-rigged supply ship captained by his brother Diogo. He recruited some of the leading pilots of the day, including Pêro de Alenquer and João de Santiago, who had previously sailed with Cão.[5][6]
No contemporary documents detailing this historic voyage have been found as almost all maritime records were destroyed in the 1755 Lisbon earthquake and ensuing tsunami. Much of the available information comes from the sixteenth-century historian João de Barros, who wrote about the voyage some sixty years later.[7]
An illustration of the two caravels used by Dias (São Cristóvão and São Pantaleão) to cross the Cape of Good Hope in 1488.
The small fleet left Lisbon in or around July 1487. Like his predecessor, Cão, Dias carried a set of padrões, carved stone pillars to be used to mark his progress at important landfalls. Also on board were six Africans who had been kidnapped by Cão and taught Portuguese. Dias's plan was to drop them off at various points along the African coast so that they could testify to the grandeur of the Portuguese kingdom and make inquiries into the possible whereabouts of Prester John.[8]
The expedition sailed directly to the Congo, and from there proceeded more carefully down the African coast, often naming notable geographic features after saints that were honored on the Catholic Church's calendar. When they weighed anchor at what today is Porto Alexandre, Angola, Dias left the supply ship behind so that it could re-provision them later, on their return voyage. By December, Dias had passed the farthest point reached by Cão, and on 8 December 1487 he arrived at the Golfo da Conceição (modern-day Walvis Bay, Namibia). After making slow progress along the Namibian coast, the two ships turned southwest, away from land. Historians have debated whether this happened because they were driven offshore by a storm or because they were deliberately trying to find more favorable winds. Whatever its cause, the change of course brought them success: the ships traced a broad arc around the tip of Africa and, on 4 February 1488, after 30 days on the open ocean, they reached the continent's southern cape and entered what would later become known as Mossel Bay.[9]
The ships continued east for a time and confirmed that the coast gradually trended to the northeast. Dias realized that they had accomplished Portugal's long-sought goal: they had rounded the southern cape of Africa. Dias's expedition reached its furthest point on 12 March 1488, when it anchored at Kwaaihoek, near the mouth of the Boesmans River—where they erected the Padrão de São Gregório. By then, the crew had become restless and were urging Dias to turn around. Supplies were low and the ships were battered. Although Dias wanted to continue, the rest of the officers unanimously favored returning to Portugal, so he agreed to turn back. On their return voyage, they sailed close enough to Africa's southwestern coast to encounter the Cape of Good Hope for the first time in May 1488. Tradition has it that Dias originally named it the Cape of Storms (Cabo das Tormentas) and that King John II later renamed it the Cape of Good Hope (Cabo da Boa Esperança) because it symbolized the opening of a sea route from west to east.[10][11]
At the cape, Dias erected the last of their padrões and then headed northward. They reached their supply ship in July, after nine months of absence, and found that six of that ship's nine crewmen had died in skirmishes with the natives. The vessel had become rotten with worms, so they unloaded the supplies they needed from it, and burnt it on the beach. Few details are known about the remainder of the voyage. The ships made stops at Príncipe, the Rio do Resgate (in present-day Liberia), and the Portuguese trading post of São Jorge da Mina. Dias returned to Lisbon in December 1488, after an absence of 16 months.[12][13]
The Dias expedition had explored a thousand more miles of the African coastline than previous expeditions had reached; it had rounded the southern tip of the continent, and it had demonstrated that the most effective southward ship route lay in the open ocean well to the west of the African coast-a route that would be followed by generations of Portuguese sailors. Despite these successes, Dias' reception at court was muted. There were no official proclamations, and, at the time, Dias received little in recognition of his accomplishments.[14]
No record has yet been found of any adequate reward for Diaz: on the contrary, when the great Indian expedition was being prepared (for Vasco da Gama's future leadership) Bartolomeu only superintended the building and outfit of the ships; when the fleet sailed in 1497, he only accompanied da Gama to the Cape Verde Islands, and after this was ordered to São Jorge da Mina.
Later years and death
Dias perished in May 1500 when his ship was lost in a storm near the Cape of Good Hope (circa 1568 illustration).
Dias was later ennobled for his accomplishments, and by 1494 he was serving as a squire in the court of King John II. He also served as superintendent of the royal warehouses from 1494 to 1497.[15]
Following Dias's return from his successful first voyage around Africa's southern cape, Portugal took a decade-long break from Indian Ocean exploration. King John was beset by numerous problems, including the death of his only son, a war in Morocco, and his own failing health. It was not until 1497 that another voyage was commissioned and Dias was asked to provide assistance.[16] Drawing on his experience with maritime exploration, Dias contributed to the design and construction of the São Gabriel and its sister ship the São Rafael. These were two of the ships that Vasco da Gama used to sail around the Cape of Good Hope and continue to India. Dias participated in the first half of da Gama's voyage but stayed behind after reaching the Cape Verde Islands.[17]
Two years later he was one of the captains of the second Indian expedition, headed by Pedro Álvares Cabral. This flotilla was the first to reach Brazil, landing there on 22 April 1500 before continuing east to India. Dias perished in May 1500 when captaining a ship near the Cape of Good Hope: four ships, including Dias's, encountered a huge storm off the cape and were lost on 29 May.[18]
The Portuguese government erected two navigational beacons, Dias Cross and da Gama Cross, to commemorate Dias and Vasco da Gama, who were the first modern European explorers to reach the Cape of Good Hope. When lined up, these crosses point to Whittle Rock, a large, permanently submerged shipping hazard in False Bay.[21]
The Bartolomeu Dias Museum Complex (also spelled "Bartholomeu"), located at Mossel Bay,[22] features an exhibition displaying the history of early European sea voyagers who discovered sea routes. The local history 19th-century artefacts and 20th-century photographs are also displayed in this building. The building houses a life-size replica of the ship that was used by Bartolomeu Dias and his crew when they landed in Mossel Bay 1488.
Diogo Cão, also known as Diogo Cam, was a Portuguese mariner and one of the most notable explorers of the fifteenth century. He made two voyages along the west coast of Africa in the 1480s, exploring the Congo River and the coasts of present-day Angola and Namibia.
The history of the Kingdom of Portugal from the Illustrious Generation of the early 15th century to the fall of the House of Aviz in the late 16th century has been named the "Portuguese golden age" and the "Portuguese Renaissance". During this period, Portugal was the first European power to begin building a colonial empire as during the Age of Exploration Portuguese sailors and explorers discovered an eastern route to India as well as several Atlantic archipelagos and colonized the African coast and Brazil. They also explored the Indian Ocean and established trading routes throughout most of southern Asia, sending the first direct European maritime trade and diplomatic missions to Ming China and to Japan, at the same time installing trading posts and the most important colony: Portuguese Macau. The Portuguese Renaissance produced a plethora of poets, historians, critics, theologians, and moralists. The Cancioneiro Geral by Garcia de Resende is taken to mark the transition from Old Portuguese to the modern Portuguese language.
Vasco da Gama, was a Portuguese explorer and nobleman who was the first European to reach India by sea.
Mossel Bay is a harbour town of about 170,000 people on the Garden Route of South Africa. It is an important tourism and farming region of the Western Cape Province. Mossel Bay lies 400 kilometres east of the country's seat of parliament, Cape Town, and 400 km west of Gqeberha, the largest city in the Eastern Cape. The older parts of the town occupy the north-facing side of the Cape St Blaize Peninsula, whilst the newer suburbs straddle the Peninsula and have spread eastwards along the sandy shore of the Bay.
Diogo Dias, also known as Diogo Gomes, was a 15th-century Portuguese explorer. He was the brother of Bartolomeu Dias and discovered some of the Cape Verde islands together with António Noli.
Pero de Alenquer was a 15th-century Portuguese explorer of the African coast. He was born in Alenquer and accompanied Bartolomeu Dias on his journey around the Cape of Good Hope in 1487 and 1488. Alenquer was the pilot of Vasco da Gama's flagship on the latter's first voyage to India.
Pero Dias was a Portuguese explorer of the African coast. He accompanied his brothers Bartolomeu Dias and Diogo Dias on their journey around the Cape of Good Hope in 1487/1488, having commanded the supply with his brother Diogo. His voyage's original goal, however was only to reach the Cape of Good Hope as opposed to round it; however, when his ship was caught in a storm, they were blown around the Cape to the east side of Africa. Feeling they had already gone far enough, they returned to Europe.
Paulo Dias de Novais, a fidalgo of the Royal Household, was a Portuguese colonizer of Africa in the 16th century and the first Captain-Governor of Portuguese Angola. He was the grandson of the explorer Bartolomeu Dias.
The geography of North Africa has been reasonably well known among Europeans since classical antiquity in Greco-Roman geography. Northwest Africa was known as either Libya or Africa, while Egypt was considered part of Asia.
This is a historical timeline of Portugal's Second Dynasty.
A padrão is a stone pillar left by Portuguese maritime explorers in the 15th and 16th centuries to record significant landfalls and thereby establish primacy and possession. They were often placed on promontories and capes or at the mouths of major rivers. Early markers were simple wooden pillars or crosses but they deteriorated quickly in the tropical climate where they were often erected. Later, padrões were carved from stone in the form of a pillar surmounted by a cross and the royal coat of arms.
Portuguese maritime exploration resulted in the numerous territories and maritime routes recorded by the Portuguese as a result of their intensive maritime journeys during the 15th and 16th centuries. Portuguese sailors were at the vanguard of European exploration, chronicling and mapping the coasts of Africa and Asia, then known as the East Indies, and Canada and Brazil, in what came to be known as the Age of Discovery.
The Second Portuguese India Armada was assembled in 1500 on the order of King Manuel I of Portugal and placed under the command of Pedro Álvares Cabral. Cabral's armada famously discovered Brazil for the Portuguese crown along the way. By and large, the Second Armada's diplomatic mission to India failed, and provoked the opening of hostilities between the Kingdom of Portugal and the feudal city-state of Calicut. Nonetheless, it managed to establish a factory in the nearby Kingdom of Cochin, the first Portuguese factory in Asia.
The Third Portuguese India Armada was assembled in 1501 upon the order of King Manuel I of Portugal and placed under the command of João da Nova. It was small compared to other armadas of the same type and was formed for commercial purposes. Nonetheless, it engaged in the first significant Portuguese naval battle in the Indian Ocean. The Third Armada discovered the uninhabited islands of Ascension and Saint Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean. Some speculate that it was the first Portuguese armada to reach Ceylon.
The Fifth India Armada was assembled in 1503 on the order of King Manuel I of Portugal and placed under the command of Afonso de Albuquerque. It was Albuquerque's first trip to India. It was not a particularly successful armada - navigational mistakes scattered the fleet on the outward journey. Ships spent much time looking for each other and several ended up travelling alone.
João de Sá, knight was a Portuguese explorer, who accompanied Vasco da Gama on the voyage of the first ships to sail directly from Europe to India.
The Bartolomeu Dias Museum Complex is the second biggest provincial museum affiliated to the Western Cape Department of Cultural Affairs and Sport in South Africa. It is located at Mossel Bay.
The Portuguese discovery of the sea route to India was the first recorded trip directly from Europe to the Indian subcontinent, via the Cape of Good Hope. Under the command of the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama, it was undertaken during the reign of King Manuel I in 1497–1499. It is one of the most important events of the Age of Discovery and the Portuguese Empire, and it initiated the Portuguese maritime trade on the Malabar Coast and other parts of the Indian Ocean, the military presence and settlements of the Portuguese in Goa and Bombay.
The European-Asian sea route, commonly known as the sea route to India or the Cape Route, is a shipping route from the European coast of the Atlantic Ocean to Asia's coast of the Indian Ocean passing by the Cape of Good Hope and Cape Agulhas at the southern edge of Africa. The first recorded completion of the route was made in 1498 by Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama, the admiral of the first Portuguese Armadas bound eastwards to make the discovery. The route was important during the Age of Sail, but became partly obsolete as the Suez Canal opened in 1869.
Campbell, Gordon (2003). The Oxford Dictionary of the Renaissance. Oxford University Press.
Crowley, Roger (2015). Conquerors: How Portugal Forged the First Global Empire (1ed.). New York: Random House. ISBN978-0-8129-9400-1. OCLC904967943.
Dutra, Francis A. (2007). "Dias, Bartholomew". The Oxford Companion to World Exploration. Oxford University Press.
Howgego, Raymond John, ed. (2003). "Dias, Bartolomeu". Encyclopedia of Exploration to 1800. Hordern House. ISBN1-875567-36-4.
Livermore, Harold V. (2021). "Bartolomeu Dias". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 4 May 2021.
Oakley, Robert (2003). "Dias, Bartolomeu". In Gerli, E. Michael (ed.). Medieval Iberia: an encyclopedia. New York: Routledge. ISBN0-415-93918-6. OCLC50404104.
Ravenstein, Ernst Georg (2010). Bartolomeu Dias. William Brooks Greenlee, Pero Vaz de Caminha. England: Viartis. ISBN978-1-906421-03-8. OCLC501399584.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
