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A few hundred years ago, the known physical world was a lot smaller. With the discovery of the 'new world' (and its gold deposits), many Europeans were emboldened to find out more about what was out there and wasted no time launching ships and staking claims. Here are many of the more successful.
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John Cabot

aka: Giovanni Caboto
bornactivedied
1450 ca1470s-15001500 ca
an Italian navigator and explorer whose 1497 discovery of parts of North America under the commission of Henry VII of England is commonly held to have been the first European exploration of the mainland of North America since the Norse Vikings' visits to Vinland in the eleventh century.
Timeline (4)Links (19)


Sebastian Cabot

bornactivedied
1474 ca1494-15571557, Dec
an Italian explorer, likely born in the Venetian Republic. He was the son of Italian explorer John Cabot. Searched for the Northwest Passage and explored South America
Links (2)


Joao Cabral

aka: João
bornactivedied
15991620sunknown
a Portuguese Jesuit missionary, who, along with Estêvão Cacella, were the first Europeans to enter Bhutan in 1627. The following year he became the first European to visit neighboring Nepal and the Sikkim region of India.
Links (1)


Pedro Alvares Cabral

aka: Pedro Álvarez Cabral
bornactivedied
14671484-15091520
a Portuguese nobleman, military commander, navigator and explorer regarded as the discoverer of Brazil. Cabral conducted the first substantial exploration of the northeast coast of South America and claimed it for Portugal. Once, having struck a route too far east, Dias was the first European to sight the island of Madagascar. He befriended its native inhabi...
more
Timeline (5)Links (15)


Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo

aka: Juan Rodríguez
borndied
14991543, Jan 3
a Portuguese navigator and explorer, known for exploring the West Coast of North America on behalf of the Spanish Empire. Cabrillo was the first European explorer to navigate the coast of present-day California in the United States.
Timeline (3)Links (1)


Estevao Cacella

aka: Estêvão
borndied
15851630
a Portuguese Jesuit missionary. He sailed for India in 1614 and worked in Kerala. In 1626, Father Cacella and Father João Cabral, another younger Jesuit priest, travelled from Cochin to Bengal, then through Bhutan, ending Tibet where they founded a mission in the town Shigatse and explored the Himalayas
Links (1)


Cross-listed in MilitaryGovernance

Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac

aka: de la Motte, Sieur de Cadillac
borndied
1658, Mar 51730, Oct 16
a French explorer and adventurer in New France, an area of North America that stretched from present-day Eastern Canada in the north to Louisiana on the Gulf of Mexico in the south. Rising from a modest beginning in Acadia in 1683 as an explorer, trapper, and a trader of alcohol and furs, he achieved various positions of political importance in the colony. H...
more
Timeline (1)Links (1)


Rene Caillie

aka: René Caillié
borndied
1799, Nov 191838, May 17
a French explorer and the first European to return alive from the town of Timbuktu. At the age of 16 he left home and signed up as a member of the crew of a French naval vessel sailing to Saint-Louis in French West Africa. Explored North Africa
Links (1)


Cross-listed in Governance

Alvaro Caminha

aka: Álvaro
borndied
unknown1499, Apr 28
appointed by King John II of Portugal in 1492 Captain-major (governor) of the Portuguese colony of São Tomé and Príncipe which had been discovered 22 years earlier. He was told to settle and "Christianize" the then deserted island with his family and friars, and was apparently given the children of Spanish Jewish refugees who were married to Black people ...
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Links (1)


Pero Vaz de Caminha

aka: Pêro
borndied
1450 ca1500, Dec 15
a Portuguese knight that accompanied Pedro Álvares Cabral to India in 1500, as a secretary to the royal factory. Caminha wrote the detailed official report of the April 1500 discovery of Brazil by Cabral's fleet (Carta de Pêro Vaz de Caminha, dated 1 May, 1500). He died in a riot in Calicut, India, at the end of that year. Explored Brazil
Links (1)


Juan Sebastian del Cano

borndied
14761526
Del Cano set sail with Ferdinand Magellan and his fleet of ships in 1519 as a “sobrasaliente” or soldier. The fleets mission was to locate a sea-passage through the mainland and sail west to the Spice Islands, which, when found, would be claimed for the ...
more
Links (1)


Alberto del Canto

borndied
1547 ca1607, Dec 31
a Portuguese conquistador of northern New Spain. A native of the Terceira Island of the Azores, to an established and noble family. During the colonization of America, del Canto explored the northeastern part of Mexico, and founded several cities, such as Saltillo, of which he was the first mayor (1577).
Links (1)


Cross-listed in Writers

Nicolas de Cardona

aka: Nicolás
bornactivedied
unknown1610s-1620sunknown
a Spanish entrepreneur and adventurer with residence in Seville, who was involved in the exploration of the Western coast of the North American continent. He finally returned to Spain in 1623, where he published in 1624 his Hydrographic and Geographic Descriptions of Many northern and Southern Lands and Seas in the Indies, Specifically of the Discovery of th...
more
Links (1)


Tomas de Cardona

aka: Tomás de Cardona
bornactivedied
unknown1611-1630sunknown
a rich explorer, trader, and teacher of Spanish royal palace from the 17th century, who invested a fortune in a company to exploit the pearl banks in California.
Links (1)


Cross-listed in Naval

Juan Carrasco

bornactivedied
unknown1784-1803unknown
a Spanish naval officer, explorer, and navigator. He is remembered mainly for his work in the Pacific Northwest during the late 18th century. He was second in command of the 1791 voyage of José María Narváez, the first European exploration of the Strait of Georgia.
Links (1)


Jan Carstensz

aka: Carstenszoon
bornactivedied
unknown1620sunknown
a 17th-century Dutch explorer. In 1623, Carstenszoon was commissioned by the Dutch East India Company to lead an expedition to the southern coast of New Guinea and beyond. He explored New Guinea coast and the Gulf of Carpentaria.
Links (1)


Jacques Cartier

bornactivedied
1491, Dec 311534-15431557, Sep 1
a French explorer of Breton origin who claimed what is now Canada for France. Jacques Cartier was the first European to describe and map the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and the shores of the Saint Lawrence River, which he named "The Country of Canadas", after the Iroquois names for the two big settlements he saw at Stadacona (Quebec City) and at Hochelaga (Montre...
more
Timeline (6)Links (19)


Joao de Castro

aka: João
borndied
1500, Feb 71548, Jun 8
a Portuguese nobleman and fourth viceroy of Portuguese India. In 1535 he accompanied Dom Louis to the siege of Tunis, where he had the honor of refusing knighthood and reward at the hands of the emperor Charles V. Returning to Lisbon, he received from the king the ...
more
Links (1)


Rene-Robert Cavelier

aka: Sieur de La Salle, René-Robert
borndied
1643,Nov 221687, Mar 19
a French explorer. He explored the Great Lakes region of the United States and Canada, the Mississippi River, and the Gulf of Mexico. La Salle claimed the entire Mississippi River basin for France.
Timeline (3)Links (2)


Cross-listed in Pirates

Thomas Cavendish

bornactivedied
15601587-15921592
an English explorer and a privateer known as "The Navigator" because he was the first who deliberately tried to emulate Sir Francis Drake and raid the Spanish towns and ships in the Pacific and return by circumnavigating the globe. Cavendish also raided numerous ...
more
Links (3)Notes (2)


Cross-listed in Writers

Evliya Celebi

aka: Çelebi, Mehmed Zilli
borndied
1611, Mar 251682
an Ottoman Turk who travelled through the territory of the Ottoman Empire and neighboring lands over a period of forty years, recording his commentary in a travelogue called Seyâhatnâme. Explored Turkey, Egypt, Africa, Europe
Links (1)


Cross-listed in ClergyWriters

Martin del Barco Centenera

aka: Martín
borndied
15351602 ca
a Spanish cleric, explorer and author. He became a secular priest and in 1572 accompanied, as chaplain, the expedition of Juan Ortiz de Zárate to the Rio de La Plata in South America. For twenty-four years he followed the vicissitudes of Spanish exploration in the Argentine with undaunted courage. Centenera was made archdeacon of the church of Paraguay. In ...
more
Links (1)


Cross-listed in Cartographers

Samuel de Champlain

borndied
15671635
a French navigator, cartographer, draughtsman, soldier, explorer, geographer, ethnologist, diplomat, and chronicler, known as "The Father of New France". He founded New France and Quebec City on July 3, 1608. He is important to Canadian history because he made the first accurate map of the coast and he helped establish the settlements. Explored Quebec and th...
more
Timeline (1)Links (2)


Jean Baptiste Charbonneau

aka: Pompey, Pomp
borndied
1805, Feb 111866, May 16
an American explorer, guide, fur trapper trader, military scout during the Mexican-American War, alcalde (mayor) of Mission San Luis Rey de Francia and a gold prospector and hotel operator in Northern California. He spoke French and English, and learned German and Spanish during his six years in Europe from 1823 to 1829. He also spoke Shoshone and other west...
more
Timeline (1)Links (1)


Toussaint Charbonneau

borndied
1767, Mar 201843, Aug 12
a French Canadian explorer and trader, and a member of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. He is also known as the husband of Sacagawea. In November 1804, Meriwether Lewis and more
Links (1)


Cross-listed in Writers

Jean Chardin

borndied
1643, Nov 161713, Jan 5
a French jeweller and traveler whose ten-volume book The Travels of Sir John Chardin is regarded as one of the finest works of early Western scholarship on Persia and the Near East in general. Explored Persia and India.
Links (1)


Fletcher Christian

borndied
1764, Sep 251793, Sep 20
the master's mate on board HMS Bounty during William Bligh's voyage to Tahiti for breadfruit plants. In the mutiny on the Bounty, Christian seized command of the ship from William Bligh on 28 April 1789. Explored Polynesia.
Links (6)


Hugh Clapperton

bornactivedied
1788, May 181801-18271827, Apr 13
a Scottish naval officer and explorer of West and Central Africa. Born in Annan, Dumfriesshire, where his father was a surgeon, died from malaria, depression, and dysentery in Nigeria.
Links (1)


Cross-listed in MilitaryGovernance

William Clark [2]

bornactivedied
1770, Aug 11789-18291838, Sep 1
an American explorer, soldier, Indian agent, and territorial governor. Along with Meriwether Lewis, Clark helped lead the Lewis and Clark Expedition of 1803 to 1806 across the Louisiana Purchase to the Pacific Ocean, and claimed the Pacific Northwest for the U...
more
Timeline (18)Links (15)Notes (5)


Goncalo Coelho

aka: Gonçalo
bornactivedied
unknown1501-1504unknown
a Portuguese explorer who belonged to a prominent family in northern Portugal. He commanded two expeditions (1501–02 and 1503–04) which explored much of the coast of Brazil.
Links (1)


Nicolau Coelho

bornactivedied
1460 ca1490s-15021502
an expert Portuguese navigator and explorer during the age of discovery. He participated in the discovery of the route to India by Vasco da Gama where he commanded the carvel Berrio, which became the first ship to return from the journey; he was also capta...
more
Links (1)


Christopher Columbus

bornactivedied
1451, Oct1473-15051506, May 20
an Italian explorer, navigator, colonizer and citizen of the Republic of Genoa. Under the auspices of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain, he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean. Those voyages, and his efforts to establish permanent settlements on the island of Hispaniola, initiated the Spanish colonization of the New World. Explored the Caribbean.
Timeline (38)Links (22)


Cross-listed in NavalCartographers

James Cook

bornactivedied
1728, Nov 71755-17791779, Feb 14
a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the Royal Navy. Cook made detailed maps of Newfoundland prior to making three voyages to the Pacific Ocean, during which he achieved the first recorded European contact with the eastern coastline of Australia and the Hawaiian Islands, and the first recorded circumnavigation of New Zealand. Explored ...
more
Timeline (27)Links (18)


Francisco Ferdinand de Cordoba

borndied
14751526
a Spanish explorer and slave trader who explored Mexico (1517) and Nicaragua (1524). On this trip, Cordoba founded the first permanent Spanish settlements in the area, including Granada (on Lake Nicaragua) and Leon (east of Lake Managua). After trying to claim Nicaragua for himself, Cordoba was killed by Pedro Arias de Ávila.
Links (2)


Francisco Vasquez de Coronado

aka: Francisco Vásquez
borndied
15101554
a Spanish conquistador and explorer, who led a large expedition from Mexico to present-day Kansas through parts of the southwestern United States between 1540 and 1542. Coronado had hoped to reach the mythical Seven Cities of Gold. His expedition marked the first European sightings of the Grand Canyon and the Colorado River, among other landmarks. Also expl...
more
Timeline (2)Links (2)


Diogo Alvares Correia

aka: Diogo Álvares Correia, Caramuru
borndied
1475 ca1557
a Portuguese settler born in Viana do Castelo. He departed for the Portuguese colony of Brazil in 1509, and his ship wrecked in the coast of Bahia, Diogo Álvares found himself among the Tupinambá Indians. The Tupinamba called him "Caramuru" ("Creator of Fire") because of the fire of his weapon. During the following twenty years, Diogo Álvares kept contact...
more
Links (1)


Gaspar Corte-Real

aka: Côrte-Real
borndied
1450 ca1501 ca
a Portuguese explorer. In 1500, King Manuel I of Portugal sent Gaspar to discover lands and search for a Northwest Passage to Asia. Explored Newfoundland and Greenland.
Links (2)


Joao Vaz Corte-Real

aka: João Vaz Côrte-Real
borndied
1420 ca1496
a Portuguese sailor, claimed by some accounts to have been an explorer of a land called Terra Nova do Bacalhau (New Land of the Codfish), speculated to possibly have been a part of North America. For his efforts, Corte-Real was offered the Donatário-Capitancies of São Jorge and Angra, respectively.
Links (1)


Miguel Corte-Real

aka: Côrte-Real
bornactivedied
14481502unknown
a Portuguese explorer who charted about 600 miles of the coast of Labrador. In 1501, he disappeared while on an expedition and was believed to be lost at sea. Explored Newfoundland and possibly Massachusetts.
Links (2)


Hernan Cortes

aka: Hernán Cortés, Hernando Cortez
bornactivedied
14851504-15471547, Dec 2
a Spanish Conquistador who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of mainland Mexico under the rule of the King of Castile in the early 16th century. Cortés was part of the generation of Spanish colonizers who began the first phase of the Spanish colonization of the Americas.
Timeline (6)Links (23)


Cross-listed in Cartographers

Juan de la Cosa

borndied
14601510
a Spanish navigator and cartographer, known for designing the earliest European world map that incorporated the territories of the Americas that were discovered in the 15th century. De la Cosa played an important role in the first and second voyage of Christo...
more
Links (2)


Cross-listed in PhysiciansScientists

Thomas Coulter

borndied
17931843
an Irish physician, botanist, and explorer. He was a member of the Royal Irish Academy, and a fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, where he founded the college's herbarium. He served as physician with the Real del Monte Company in Mexico, during which period he collected plants in the region. He is best remembered for exploration and botanical research in Mexi...
more
Links (1)


Jean Cousin

aka: Jehan
bornactivedied
unknown1480s-1500sunknown
a 15th-century French Normand navigator who was said to have discovered the New World in 1488, four years before Christopher Columbus, when he landed in Brazil around the mouth of the Amazon. One of his captains was named Alonzo Pinzón, who left Cousin in...
more
Links (2)


Pero da Covilha

aka: Pêro da Covilhã
borndied
1460 ca1526+
a Portuguese diplomat and explorer. King John II put him in charge of diverse private missions, and finally, to use his knowledge of different languages, ordered him and Afonso de Paiva to undertake a mission of exploration in the Near East and the adjoining regions of Asia and Africa, with the special assignment to learn where cinnamon and other spices coul...
more
Links (1)


Sandor Korosi Csoma

aka: Sándor Korösi
borndied
1784/88, Mar 271842, Apr 11
a Hungarian philologist and Orientalist, author of the first Tibetan-English dictionary and grammar book. He was called Phyi-glin-gi-grwa-pa in Tibetan, meaning "the foreign pupil" and was given the title of Bosatsu or Boddhisatva (Buddhist sainthood) by the Japanese in 1933. Explored Tibet
Links (1)


Alexander Cuming

borndied
1691, Dec 181775, Aug
aristocrat, adventurer, confidence man, and the self-proclaimed, “King of the Cherokees” was born on December 18, 1691 in Aberdeenshire, Scotland to Sir Alexander Cuming, First Baronet and his first wife, Elizabeth Swinton. His family was fairly wealthy and Cuming was groomed to become a lawyer. He was well educated, and in 1720, was elected to a positio...
more
Links (1)


Tristao da Cunha

aka: Tristão
borndied
1460 ca1540 ca
a Portuguese explorer and naval commander. In 1514 he served as ambassador from king Manuel I of Portugal to Pope Leo X leading a luxurious embassy presenting in Rome the new conquests of Portugal. He later became a member of the Portuguese privy council. Explored Tristan da Cunha islands.
Links (1)

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