from the ion historian, Marvin May Magellan: Why We Still Recognize His Name

his is the third in the series of three Magellan’s death from the Although the men Tarticles on Ferdinand Magellan. The first arrows and spears of the tatooed were able to savor article discussed the historical background "Pintados" warriors of Cebu, for several weeks the that precipitated Magellan’s expedition. The Philippines, in April, 1521, left the beauty and bounty second recounted actual events during his Molucca’s expedition without its they found there, the circumnavigating voyage. This final install- most skilled mariner and cartog- explorers surmised ment examines the legacy of Magellan and the rapher, as well as its spiritual and that Tidore was beyond enduring recognition of his accomplishments. administrative leader. the extended line of Of the 260–270 men on the papal demarcation and five ships that departed Seville, lay within Portuguese Spain, nearly two years earlier, territory. It turned out only 107 were left, with the most to be 10 degrees west experienced of their captains and A 1521 map drawn by Antonio of the extended line navigator among those that either Pigafetta , "Figure of the Five declared by the 1494 Islands Where Grow the were killed, died of starvation Cloves, and of Their Tree.” They Treaty of Tordesillas or sickness, deserted, or were picture Ternate, Tidore, Moti, and a dangerous place Makian, and Bacan - the “Spice victims of an inglorious mutiny. Islands.” Beinecke Rare Book & for them to remain for Barely able to maintain two Manuscript Library, Yale long. ships, the Trinidad and the Eventually, the of- Victoria, the depleted expedition spent ficers of the Trinidad and Victoria decided to the next six months aimlessly searching take separate routes and try to find their way for the long desired Spice Islands, which to Spain. The Trinidad attempted to sail back we know as the Moluccas. Finally, in No- northeast, hoping eventually to cross the This image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite vember 1521, with the aid of a captured Isthmus of Panama. Severe storms, scurvy, galaxy to our own Milky Way galaxy. The Magellanic pilot from the islands who knew the entire and their lack of navigation skills forced Clouds of the southern hemisphere and the fuchsia magellanica on the facing page are just some of the archipelago, they landed on Tidore, an them to retreat to Ternate island in the Indo- natural phenomena, tools, and landmarks named after island that was the center of one of two nesian archipelago, part of the other Moluc- Ferdinand Magellan. Image courtesy European Space Agency/Hubble spice-funded sultanates in the Moluccas. can sultanate. The ship and most of the crew were “confiscated” by the Portuguese, who had sometime earlier made an alliance with the sultan. Only the Victoria, with an emaciated crew of eighteen of the original Europeans and three Moluccans aboard, proceeded westward around the Cape of Good Hope, back to Cape Verde and finally completed the circumnavigation.

Losing a Day One of the many “firsts” experienced by the expedition was the phenomenon of the date line. It was observed by the meticulous Antonio Pigafetta, a Venetian explorer and Spanish-language map of the first world circumnavigation of Ferdinand de Magellan and Juan Sebastián Elcano, from 1519 to 1522, echoing the same illustration in Portuguese, French, Chinese, and a number of other chronicler of the expedition who survived to languages on Wikipedia. tell the tale.

ION Newsletter 14 Fall 2013 35 of the 260 crew members who left Cadiz bears his name is graced by the Universidad three years earlier eventually returned home. de Magallanes. As a student and patron of Most of them, Magellan included, had died of celestial navigation, he has also been hon- hunger or violence along the way. ored by having the prominent feature of the The expedition lost four ships, they didn't night sky in the southern hemisphere named bring back enough spices to pay the costs the Magellanic Clouds. of the trip, and the route was too long and More recent additions to his legacy have dangerous to serve as a practical route to the been a spacecraft named Magellan, which Moluccas. crossed the interplanetary void to map the Politically, the expedition did nothing to surface of Venus, and the name of a pioneer resolve the territorial issues between Spain GPS receiver manufacturer, now a subsid- and Portugal associated with the Treaty of iary of MiTAC International Corporation. In Tordesilla — far from it. future centuries, the stupendous expedi- Even the common perception of Magellan tion led by Magellan almost five centuries being the first person to circumnavigate the ago, will undoubtedly continue to inspire globe was technically untrue. He first sailed humankind to expand its horizons into the from Portugal to the Spice Islands eastward A statue honoring Enrique of Malacca in the Maritime vast unknowns of space. Museum of Malacca, Malaysia. The captured slave, around Africa in 1518. From 1519 to 1521, As Stephan Zweig, in his prologue to Ma- interpreter and companion of Magellan was possibly he went westward from Spain around South the first person to circumnavigate the globe. Wikimedia gellan, Pioneer of the Pacific, wrote: “For by Commons photo America through the Straights of Magellan learning, after many years’ fruitless search, into the Pacific Ocean and finally was killed the true dimensions of our planet, man for Before the last leg of the voyage, crew near the Philippines. Thus Ferdinand Magel- the first time discovered his own true dimen- members who had sneaked ashore in search lan’s personal circumnavigation was not sions, became aware of his own greatness of critical replenishments at the Portuguese done on the same expedition or in the same with renewed pleasure and fortified courage. colony of Cape Verde returned with astound- direction. This deed of Magellan has ing news. It was Thursday on shore, although shown for all time that an onboard ship it was unquestionably Wednes- Leaving a Legacy idea, winged by genius and day. A Malay slave , captured in 1511 sturdily energized by pas- Pigafetta had kept a precise diary during at the siege of Molacca and sion, proves stronger than the three year voyage and he was astonished called Enrique by his captors, the elements of nature, and by the news. Each diary entry was headed by had accompanied Magellan on that a thing which a hundred the day and date, and it didn't seem pos- many of his expeditions. He generations had regarded as sible that he could have made such a serious spoke the language of diplo- no more than a wish-dream mistake. He checked with Francisco Albo, a macy of the southeast Asian can by one man in his short Greek pilot’s assistant who also kept a record islands and acted as interpreter lifetime be translated into the of the days in the ship’s log, and Albo was and negotiator during the Fuchsia magellanica, the realm of reality and become equally confident that it was Wednesday. circumnavigation voyage. Many hardy fuchsia native to the an imperishable truth.” Somehow, by traveling westward, the area around the Straits chroniclers think Enrique of Magellan. J. J. Harrison, circumnavigators had lost an entire day out actually may have been the first Wikimedia Commons Portions of this article of the calendar, and Pigafetta’s report of this person to actually sail around photo were excerpted from Magel- strange phenomenon mystified the European the world in one direction. lan, Pioneer of the Pacific, world. It was a revelation to the humanists Still, we all remember Ferdinand Magellan Stephen Zweig, Cassell and Co. LTD, 1938, of the 16th century comparable to the excite- and his marvelous voyage, even though we and Magellan, Tim Joyner, International ment generated by the theory of relativity have forgotten the names of kings and power Marine, 1992. u during the 20th century. brokers who sponsored it or the slave who Today we recognize Magellan’s and his completed it. For its sheer magnitude and Marvin B. May ([email protected]) fellow sailors’ accomplishments as a triumph intellectually liberating consequences, the is the Chief Scientist of the Pennsylva- of the human spirit and as a quantum leap expedition must be ranked as the cardinal nia State University’s Applied Research in the knowledge of geography. However, it achievement of the Age of Discovery and one Laboratory’s Navigation R&D Center in wasn't considered much of a success at the of the outstanding events of the European Warminster, Pennsylvania. time. Renaissance. Eighteen sailors and one ship arrived The resource-rich region surrounding the in Seville, Spain, in September 1522. Only strait that Magellan discovered and that now

ION Newsletter 15 Fall 2013