by Brian Commette

Created on: May 15, 2009   Last Updated: July 23, 2011

The Real Christopher Columbus

Every year on the second Monday in October, millions of people gather together to celebrate Columbus Day. Columbus was a great sailer and explorer who discovered the new world or so we thought. But who was Columbus? Was he really the brave man students have learned about in classrooms across America for decades? Was he really the peaceful man he painted himself to be in his diary when he traveled to what he thought was Asia? The answer is no, Christopher Columbus was a power hungry Conquistador and slave trader in search of gold. Columbus murdered thousands of Arawak Indians who he saw only as a useful tool for his grand scheme of finding fields of gold in the new world.

In Christopher Columbus's diary of his first voyage, Columbus paints a beautiful scene of the New World which he has landed. He later ventures on to land to explore and finds himself in awe of the landscape. Here Columbus states: Throughout the island all is green, and the herbage like April in Andalusia. The songs of the birds were so pleasant that it seemed as if a man could never wish to leave the place. The flocks of parrots concealed the sun; and the birds were so numerous, and of so many different kinds, that it was wonderful (Columbus, 54). Here one would think reading this statement that Columbus was in awe by taking in the beautiful sights of the island. Unfortunately, we later learn of his underlying motive of searching for gold.

When Columbus is traveling around the island, it is obvious the the natives know there is a stranger around. Columbus and his men come across houses that are abandoned and everything is left for the taking. In his diary he also states that he tells his men to touch nothing because he does not want to upset the natives and jeopardize a meeting with the King of the tribe to speak about the gold he has heard of. This statement makes Columbus's motive very apparent, I intended to search the island until I had had speech with the king, and seen whether he had the gold of which I had heard. I shall then shape a course for another much larger island (Columbus,55).

Columbus believed there were great amounts of gold on the islands because he saw gold in the noses of the islanders he and his men came across, and also thought he had landed in Asia, where there was plentiful amounts of gold to be had. When Columbus arrived back to Spain after his first voyage he addressed the court Madrid who funded his voyage of his findings in the new

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