 |
|
|
Caution - don't trust the spelling of names on this timeline! The person who wrote this was not a good speller. |
|
|
|
|
|
Caution - don't trust the spelling of names on this timeline! The person who wrote this was not a good speller. |
|
1415- Portugal begins overseas expansion beginning with Ceuta in Morocco.
1434- Portuguese sailors reach "the southern limit of the world" when they round Africa's Cape Bojador.
1439- The Portuguese colonize The Azores.
1442- Nuno Tristão reaches Cape Blanc
1444- Tristão explores the mouth of the Gambia River in Africa.
The Portuguese discover the mouth of the Senegal River in Africa.
1456- Alvise da Cadamosto discovers the Cape Verde Islands for Portugal
1460- The Portuguese reach Sierra Leone
1477- Geography by Claudius Ptolemy is made available in a printed edition.
1482- Diogo Cão begins exploration of southern Africa coastlines.
1483- The Congo River is explored by Diogo Cão.
1488- Bartolomeu Dias rounds the Cape of Good Hope.
1492- Columbus sails the ocean blue.. and discovers Cuba and the Bahamas on his first voyage.
1493- On his second voyage, Christopher Columbus Puerto Rico and Jamaica.
1494- Portugal and Spain decide to split the undiscovered world between themselves by signing The Treaty of Tordesillas.
1497- John Cabot explores North American coastlines for England.
1498- Vasco de Gama reaches India.
Columbus discovers South America on his third voyage.
1500- Pedro Alvares Cabral lands on brazil and claims it for Portugal
1502- On his fourth voyage Columbus begins central American Exploration.
1506- Christopher Columbus dies a bitter and unhappy man.
1509- At the Battle of Diu The Portuguese defeat the Moslems in one of the first battles over sea territory.
1510- Afonso de Alburque takes Goa, India for Portugal.
1511- Afonso de Alburque claims Malaca for Portugal.
1513- Portugal begins exploration of China and the Moluccas.
1521- Hernando Cortés Tenochitlán (today's Mexico City).
Ferdinand Magellan is killed in the islands of Pigafetta.
1522- Spaniard Ferdinand Magellan becomes first to complete circumnavigation of the globe.
1524- Frenchman Giovanni da Verrazano explores the mouth of the Hudson.
Vasco da Gama Dies in Cochin.
1532- Francisco Pizzaro defeats the Incas.
1535- Jacques Cartier explores the St. Lawrence River.
1539- Hernando De Soto begins exploration of southeastern parts of North America.
1541- Francisco Coronado explores southwestern parts of North America.
Francisco Pizarro is murdered.
1547- Hernando Cortés dies of natural causes.
1549- Portuguese reach Japan.
1569- Gerhardus Mercator a world map using the "Mercator projection"
1571- Spaniards discover Manila.
1580- Sir Francis Drake circumnavigates the Globe.
1595- The Dutch begin exploration of the East Indies.
1603- Samuel de Champlain travels up the Saguenay River to St. Jean
1606- Pero Fernandes de Queiros discovers the New Hebrides Islands.
Willem Janzoon discovers Australia.
Luis Van Torres explores the coastline of New Guinea.
1607- The English settle in Jamestown.
1608- The French found colony at Quebec.
1609- Champlain begins exploration of Canada and becomes the first European to navigate what is now Lake Champlain.
1610- Henry Hudson Explores the Hudson Bay.
1611- Henry Hudson dies at sea.
1615- The Dutch settle on Manhattan Island.
Champlains last great expedition into the Canadian interior.
1620- English Pilgrims land at Plymouth.
1625- Samuel de Champlain dies on Christmas day in his homeland, France.
1678- Robert Cavelier de la Salle explores the Great Lakes.
1679- La Salle's ship, The Griffen, enters the waters of Lake Erie
1682- La Salle arrives at the mouth of the Mississippi river and claims the river and, all of the land watered by it , for France.
1683- La Salle establishes Fort St. Louis
1687- La Salle is killed on an expedition to Canada
1716- first successful voyage to Kamchatka was made by the Russians under the rule of Peter I.
1725- Vitus Bering begins quest to discover whether Asia and North America are joined.
1728- James Cook is Born in northern England.
1733 - Extensive Russian exploration of the northern Siberian coastline begins.
1741- Vitus Bering dies of scurvy on a remote island off the east coast of the Kamchatka Peninsula.
De la Croyére explores northern Siberian coast.
1767- Captain James Cook sails the Greenville from Newfoundland to England on his first command.
1769- The greatest scientific explorer of all time, Alexander von Humbolt is born.
Cook becomes the first European since Tasman to land on New Zealand.
Cook discovers Tahiti.
1770- Cook sights southeast corner of Australia.
1772- Two ships: The Resolution and The Adventure set sail from Plymouth for Australia.
1779- James Cook sets foot on Hawaiian soil for the first time at Kealakua Bay. The natives mistake him for the reincarnation of Lono, God of happiness and harvests. He would be brutally killed by them one month later.
1795- Mungo Park sets out for the African interior.
1796- Mungo park discovers the Niger River.
Mungo Parks publishes accounts of his African expedition
1798- Humbolt and Anne botanist, Aimé Bonpland begin scientific exploration of the Mediterranean Seaport of Marseille.
1799- Humbolt and Bonpland arrive at Cumaná, east of Caracas.
Mungo Parks publishes accounts of his African expedition.
1801- Alexander von Humbolt begins the second phase of his South American Oddest.
1804 - Humbolt and Bonpland return from the Americas to Paris where they receive a hero's welcome.
1806- Mungo Park's last Niger River expedition ends in tragedy as Park and several others are attacked and killed by local tribesmen.
1813- David Livingston is born in Glasgow
1821- Explorer, writer, Secret Agent, academic, and all around stud Sir Richard Francis Burton is born.
Nathaniel B Palmer may be the first person to actually set foot on Antarctica when lands there in February
1827- The French Geographic Society a reward for the first European to reach Timbuktu and return.
1828 - René Caillié reaches Timbuktu.
1829- Humbolts Expedition to Russia and Siberia.
1841- David Livingston in Africa for the first time at Cape Town.
1843- Livingston establishes his mission in Mabotsa.
1845- At 76 years of age Humbolt begins the publication of Kosmos. He would compile 5 volumes.
1848- Johann Rebmann discovers Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa's highest Peak.
1849- Livingston begins his journey across the Kalahari for Lake Ngami
1850- Heinrich Barth begins his expedition across the Sahara.
1853- Richard Burton visits Mecca disguised as a Muslim. an area forbidden to non-muslims.
Barth Becomes the first European, since Caillié to reach Timbuktu.
1855- Richard Burton and John Hanning Speke reach the holy city of Harrar. Like Mecca, Harrar was also forbidden to Europeans.
Barth returns from his expedition of the African interior. He becomes the first explorer to design reliable maps of huge regions of the African interior.
1856- David Livingston becomes the first known European to cross the entire continent of Africa when his expedition reaches Quelimane on may 20.
The Royal Geographic Society selects Richard Burton to lead an expedition to search for the source of the Nile River. Speke accepts Burton's invitation to join the expedition.
1858- Burton and Speke discover Lake Tanganyika.
1858- On August 3 John Hanning Speke discovers Lake Victoria, the source of the Nile River. He would spend the rest of his life defending his assertion that Victoria was in fact the source of the Nile. Among the disbelievers was Richard Burton.
1859- Alexander von Humbolt dies of old age in his home of Berlin.
1862- Speke returns to Lake Victoria to prove his claim that it is the source of the Nile.
1864- John Hanning Speke shoots and kills himself. The tragedy took place on the morning of a debate with Burton which was scheduled to take place in front of the Royal Geographic Society.
1865- Livingston leaves England for what proves to be the last time.
1871- Livingston reaches the Lualba River, an upper tributary of the Congo.
Henry Morton Stanley begins a search in the African Bush for David Livingston fearing the worst. Stanley finds Livingston alive and nourishes him back to health.
1873- David Livingston dies in Africa, the land he loved.
1877- Stanley's African expedition surfaces in Boma.
1880- United States Navy expedition for the North Pole begins.
1881- US navy Polar expedition is cut short by the wreck of The Jeannette.
1893- Fridtjof Nansen begins his quest for the North Pole.
1897- Nansen's Furthest North is published.
1901- Robert Scott is given command of the British Antarctic Year Expedition.
1906- The Gjoa, Amundsen's ship becomes the first to sail the entire length of the inland passage.
1907- Vilhjalmur Stefansson lives as a fully excepted member of an Eskimo tribe.
1908- Ernest Shackleton's quest for the South Magnetic Pole begins
1909- American Robert Peary leads a successful six man expedition to the North Pole.
1910- Robert Scott and Roald Amundsen begin planning their race for the South Pole
1912-Robert Scott's Expedition reaches the South Pole. The Norwegians beat the Brits by 6 days.
1913- Stefansson begins what will be the most prolonged polar expedition in history.
1928- Amundsen goes on a rescue mission to the north Pole and never returns.
1933-Richard Byrd begins scientific exploration of South Pole from his base little America.
1953- Edmund Hillary and Tensing Norgay set foot on the last of the unexplored places when, on May 29,1953, they successfully peak the summit of Mount Everest.