RonPaulCurriculum History Essay Week 20Magellan was the first to set sail around the world. Magellan was born in 1480 in Portugal, when he was 10 he was orphaned, then he became a pageant to the Queen so he grew up in the Portuguese Royal Court, and joined the royal navy. He lived in Portuguese India for about 8 years, he had several battles, and due to the battles he had many major injuries including a permanent limp and he had a promotion. Serrao, whom Magellan worked alongside in the battles, got him interested in exploring. Serrao found the Spice Islands and stayed and kept sending Magellan letters about the Spice Island. Magellan left India returned to Portugal, but since he left without permission and accused of illegal trading, which was actually false accusation, it was hard for him to get a job. Then in 1517 he asked the king for aid for an exploration. But when the king denied this request, Magellan left Portugal to go ask the king of Spain. After the Treaty of Tordesillas, Portugal had control over the east trading route that lead around Africa. So if you want to go to India, you had to go south around Africa. So Spain needed another route, so the king was funding explorations to find a new route. So Magellan and his partner drew a route and showed King Charles, who also became the Holy Roman Empire, Charles V, and he agreed to fund their journey. Magellan fleet had 5 ships and 270 men. The fleet left west across the Atlantic Ocean. He traveled through a narrow channel of water in S. America, which is now called the Straits of Magellan. It lead to an ocean which has not been sailed on before, and he named it “Mar Pacifio” or “Pacific Ocean”, he continued his journey and landed on the Philippines which he was warmly greeted. Magellan was killed in battle helping the King of the Philippines, and it was too few people to sail 3 ships, so they burned it and sailed 2 ships. The rest of the crew arrived in the Spice Islands in November 6, 1521. As they set sail back to Spain, 1 ship was damaged and the other one was too small to take the rest of the crew and all the goods. So they parted ways, one set sail to Spain, while the other was fixed and returned the way they came. But the ship was captured by the Portuguese and was wrecked in a storm under Portuguese orders. So this mean it was only this 1 ship that survived the journey. It was almost exactly 3 years after setting sail, the ship reached Spain on September 6, 1522, with only 18 survivors, and they were the first ones to travel around the world.