America was named after Amerigo
Columbus credited as the first European to discover the Americas.
Leif Ericson visited North America about 500 years before Columbus and the first Europen to land.
Christopher Columbus is given credit for discovering the New World, but was he really the first person to step foot in this new land. What about the Native Americas? What about Leif Ericson? Or what about Amerigo Vespucci?
2007-08-17 18:21:04 · 10 answers · asked by Anonymous in Arts & Humanities ➔ History
Obviously the Native Americans were the ones who first stepped foot on America. Columbus is credited as the first European to discover the Americas.
According to the still debated New World migration model, a migration of humans from Eurasia to the Americas took place via Beringia, a land bridge which formerly connected the two continents across what is now the Bering Strait. The minimum time depth by which this migration had taken place is confirmed at c. 12,000 years ago, with the upper bound (or earliest period) remaining a matter of some unresolved contention.
2007-08-17 18:34:14 · answer #1 · answered by Damian S 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
My attitude is that we spend too much time agonizing about this stuff.
Mind you, I'm not saying we shouldn't pay attention to who did what, and how history really happened, but I think we should just leave well enough alone when it comes to names.
Of course, Native Americans were here long before Europeans. Still, I'm not sure it is totally fair to say Europeans who hade the courage and curiosity to travel across the Atlantic Ocean deserve no historical credit at all. Discovering a previously unknown inhabited continent is still a significant discovery.
(Please, all of you who want to lecture me about the bad things done thereafter -- don't! I am talking only about explorers, not about colonialism, slavery, genocide of Native Americans, or any of the other things that followed.)
It has now been proven that Vikings (probably Eric and friends) did briefly visit the Canadian shore before Columbus ever made it to the West Indies. Unfortunately, they didn't have a good P.R. agency, not did they stay: they were successfully intimidated by the natives. We should know and remember that they got there. We should not insist that either Canada or the United States be named after Eric.
Amerigo Vespucci, as I understand it, never visited North America, but made two visits to South America. His friends named the Americas after him. In these days of pan-Americanism, attaching his name to the Americas seems quite fine.
None of which means that we should demonize Columbus. When he sailed for "India", many people thought he would fall of the edge of the (flat) world. Let's give him some credit for guts and perseverance!
2007-08-17 18:54:00 · answer #2 · answered by Lisa B 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
If we are to believe the account about the Vikings, then Ericson did. There is a book out there that says that it may have been possible that the Chinese made it to America before Columbus. The Native Americans had long been here before anybody else. It is believed that the first humans crossed the land bridge at the Bering Strait almost 12,000 years ago or so. During the voyage of Vespucci, he realized that there was an entire continent in the Western Hemisphere. That is why America is named after him.
2007-08-17 18:33:29 · answer #3 · answered by kepjr100 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Lisa has said it all very well. I have little to add. Generally speaking credit for geographic discoveries goes the the person wrote down the description of the place and kept a record. Columbus did that. The Irish Priest, St. Brendan did not record or we do not have such, the Chinese do not have a record that we know of (knowing the history of the Chinese it is unbelievable that they would not have recorded it), neither did the Phoenicians. Perhaps they all recorded it but we do not have the records. So Columbus gets the credit since he had a ships log, which still exists in Spain.
2007-08-17 19:48:03 · answer #4 · answered by bigjohn B 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Leif Ericson Discovered America
2016-11-14 20:59:24 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
St. Brendan (484-578) of Ireland landed in mainland North America before any of them. He called it Tir na nOg (The Isle of the Blessed
And to answerer sparks Leif Eriksson was Eric the Reds son (hence Eriksson!)- Eric the Red only got as far as Greenland!
2007-08-19 13:34:00 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
Have read in several places, and found several web sites that seem to suggest that the Phoenicians may have reached America some time before 350 B.C.
2007-08-17 19:29:54 · answer #7 · answered by Mike W 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Indians
2007-08-17 18:41:05 · answer #8 · answered by Parasitiko 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
most poular theory was leif ericson-(eric the red)
2007-08-17 21:01:22 · answer #9 · answered by sparks9653 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
probably the Mongols
2007-08-17 18:25:21 · answer #10 · answered by MIGHTY MINNIE 6 · 0⤊ 1⤋