Who discovered America? | Live Science
To say that Christopher Columbus was a delay in the Western hemisphere would be an understatement.
As he arrived in 1492, the Amerindians had been there for tens of thousands of years. THE Vikings There had also been around 500 years earlier, and it is possible that Polynesians also ventured into the Western hemisphere before Columbus trips.
The first people of the Americas
The first people to arrive in the western hemisphere were indigenous Americans, who descended from a Ancestral group of the former Northern Siberians and the East Asians. They probably traveled along the Bring Land Bridge by land or sea.
When the first Americans arrived are a source of debate in progress. Several studies Suggest that a series of fossilized human fingerprints found in White Sands National Park in New Mexico date from 21,000 and 23,000 years. Which dates from the coldest part of the last ice ageThe last glacial maximum (which lasted approximately 26,500 to 19,000 years), when the northern part of the continent was covered with glaciers and ice caps.
Other controversial studies still suggest previous dates. For example, a study Stone artefacts dated from the Chiquihuit cave in Mexico over 30,000 years ago. However, it is Shortly if humans have really created these rocks Or if they have formed naturally in this way, which makes discovery uncertain.
Other studies go back much further. In 2017, a controversial study in the journal Nature reported Mastodon Bones in California This may have been changed by humans about 130,000 years ago. However, other archaeologists have expressed concerns about the excavation of this observation and noted that other natural or animal events could have changed the bones. To put the date of 130,000 years in context, the first proof of Homo sapiens date of About 300,000 years ago in MoroccoWhile the first proof of a successful migration of man in Asia was more than 100,000 years ago And the first proof of successful human migration to Europe was around 55,000 years ago.
Vikings in the western hemisphere
Vikings went to the Western hemisphere in the 11th century – About 500 years before Columbus- and even built an outpost at the handle at the meadows at the northern tip of Newfoundland. We do not know which Viking individual was the first to reach North America.
However, there are clues in the Icelandic sagaswho were written by people who were probably the descendants of the Viking in the 13th and 14th centuries.
According to “the saga of Erik the Red”, a merchant named Bjarni Herjólfon and his crew may have been the first Vikings to reach North America at the end of the 10th century, said Kevin McCaleseCurator at the Provincial Museum of the Chambers of St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, who studied the Vikings a lot. The saga says that the crew was destroyed while trying to reach Greenland And ended up navigating the coast of what was probably North America. Herjólfsson decided not to land and rather traveled the coast before heading to Greenland.
On the other hand, the Greenlandic saga suggests that Leif Erikson may have been the first Viking to reach North America at the end of the 10th century and made several trips there, McCaleee in Live Science told.
Whatever the Viking The attempted colonization has been thwarted Because the Vikings had a hostile relationship with the Amerindian groups and were massively in inferiority.
Polynesian trips?
Polynesians may have traveled to the western hemisphere centuries before the arrival of Columbus. In 2020, a DNA study have shown that Polynesians and Amerindians – probably from what is now Colombia – has teamed around 800 years ago. However, if this meeting came from Polynesians navigating to the Western hemisphere or people from the Western hemisphere who sail towards the Polynesian islands is not clear.
Cultures of the Western hemisphere, such as sweet potatoes, have been found on many Polynesian sites, giving birth to a debate on the fact that they were brought to the islands by people or by ocean currents. A 2024 Study who analyzed the plants of Rapa Nui (also known as Easter Island) found that the people of the island ate plants from South America about 1,000 years ago.
Christopher Columbus
While Columbus is famous for his travels to the Western hemisphere, he continued to declare that the land he had visited were in Asia.
“He had marked his reputation on the hope that he would reach Asia”, ” Ida AltmanA professor emeritus of history at the University of Florida, told Live Science in an email. “This is why people have invested in their travels and it made things difficult [for him] to move back. “”
Columbus’s position may also have been financial. Spain had promised him Great titles and part of wealth This came out of the trade in Asia, but only if it had, in fact, found a new road to Asia.
Late in his life, Columbus’s position may have changed somewhat. His “position was not entirely coherent, and in some of his subsequent writings, he described the Americas as” paradise “he had found, which implies that it was a new region for Europeans”. Anna SuranyiA history teacher at the Massachusetts College Endicott College, told Live Science in an email.
Regardless of Columbus’ own beliefs, the impact that his journey has had to the world was immense, with indigenous groups in the Western hemisphere being decimated by the disease And people from Europe colonizing North and South America, ultimately leading to the creation of new countries.
