today we are sailing back to the 1500s and the age of explorers hopefully you've already checked out some of our other videos on explorers like christopher columbus and amerigo vespucci don't forget to like and subscribe to see all of our videos on famous explorers and while columbus and vespucci are pretty famous today we'll be talking about the explorer's version of a world champion the one guy who holds the title for launching the first voyage to sail around the world ferdinand magellan is remembered for launching the first expedition to successfully circumnavigate the globe ferdinand magellan was
a portuguese and later spanish sailor he was born in 1480 to a noble family in sabrosa portugal not far from porto a region famous around the world for its wines when magellan was 12 he and his brother moved to the country's capital lisbon where they served as pages for the queen it was here that magellan was inspired by the tales of exploration and learned about sailing navigating and reading maps by 1505 magellan and his brother were sailing as part of the portuguese fleet for seven years magellan sailed around africa and india fighting in many battles
and eventually being seriously wounded in 1513 while fighting in morocco the battle left him with a limp for the rest of his life but magellan hoped to do more than just fight battles back in magellan's day sailors merchants and entire countries were getting rich by finding exotic spices like cinnamon clove and even black pepper from asia and bringing them back to europe yes the same black pepper you might have sprinkled on your lunch used to be a lot more expensive magellan wanted to command a fleet that would sail around the world and find a new
route to make it easier to trade for these spices he petitioned the king manual of portugal to provide him with ships but the king repeatedly turned him down so magellan left portugal and moved to spain to try and get the attention of the spanish king during magellan's life sailors like vasco de gama had already proven that you could sell east to reach asia by sailing around africa in the cape of good hope however no one had ever sailed west to reach asia plus portugal controlled the eastward route to the spice islands so the spanish were
looking for another route king charles of spain the grandson of the same king ferdinand and queen isabella the monarchs who funded christopher columbus's voyage eventually supplied magellan with five ships and nearly 270 sailors in the hopes that magellan could provide spain with a new route to the spice islands on august 10th 1519 magellan left his wife and his young son and set off on a voyage to circumnavigate the globe magellan and his five ships reached what is now south america after a month of sailing the armada struggled during the first few months of the voyage
magellan had to stop a mutiny staged by some of his crew and ended up losing two ships one was lost in a storm and the crew of the other abandoned the mission and sailed back to spain but eventually magellan got a breakthrough as he found a shortcut through the bottom of south america which we now know as the strait of magellan magellan hoped it would only take a few days to sail across what he called the pacific ocean due to its gentle nature however it actually took a few months until magellan's fleet eventually landed on
what is now guam a number of men died of scurvy during this leg of the voyage the exhausted crew eventually left guam after killing a number of natives while battling over goods taken from some of the ships magellan then visited a number of eastern philippine islands where he befriended and traded with a number of native tribes thanks to his slave enrique malacca who was originally from modern day indonesia and served as a translator he even met a local ruler named raja kalambu who welcomed him the fleet pushed on exploring more islands eventually pushing deeper into
the philippines with the help of kalambu where magellan attempted to convert many of the locals to christianity however one island mactan resisted so magellan and his crew attempted to convert them by force however in a fierce battle the maktan natives defeated magellan and his crew ultimately killing ferdinand magellan with magellan gone and the fleet losing yet another ship a new captain by the name juan sebastian ocano took over and eventually elcano was able to locate the spice island the crews of the remaining two ships decided to split up for fear of being captured by one
of the many portuguese ships roaming the nearby seas okano's ship continued journeying west while the other went east only one sebastian elcano ship the victoria eventually completed the voyage of the estimated 270 men who joined the voyage only 18 returned to spain and while the distance of the journey was far too great to use for trading at the time magellan helped vastly expand europe's knowledge of the world which was much larger than many had expected and so magellan will always be remembered for spearheading the first successful voyage to circumnavigate the globe
