Vasco da Gama Reaches India
Vasco da Gama arrived in Calicut, India, establishing a sea route from Europe to Asia
May 20, 1498
Sailing to the Spice Islands of the East
In July 1497, Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama set sail from Lisbon with four ships and about 170 men on a mission to find a sea route to India. European powers had long sought a way to reach the rich spice markets of Asia without going through the Ottoman-controlled overland routes that made spices enormously expensive. Da Gama sailed south along the African coast, rounded the Cape of Good Hope at Africa's southern tip, and continued northeast along the East African coast. He reached Calicut on the southwestern coast of India on May 20, 1498 — the first European to arrive there by sea. The voyage took about 10 months each way.
A Brutal and Determined Sailor
Da Gama was not a gentle explorer. He was known for his iron will and extreme cruelty to those who crossed him. Along the East African coast, he sometimes seized local pilots by force to guide his ships. On later voyages, he burned ships filled with Muslim pilgrims and bombarded coastal cities. He was determined to break into the Indian Ocean spice trade, which was dominated by Arab and Indian Muslim merchants, and used violence freely to do so. His negotiations with the Zamorin of Calicut went poorly — the Portuguese goods he brought to trade were not impressive by Indian standards — but he did return to Portugal with a small cargo of spices worth 60 times the cost of the voyage.
Opening a New Era of Trade and Colonialism
Da Gama's voyage opened the sea route between Europe and Asia that Portugal would dominate for the next century. It broke the Arab monopoly on the spice trade and shifted the center of global commerce from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic. Portugal established a series of trading posts and forts along the African and Indian coasts, creating the first European maritime empire in Asia. Da Gama made three voyages to India in total and died in Goa in 1524, while serving as Portuguese Viceroy of India. His first voyage is considered one of the most consequential journeys in the history of exploration, one that permanently reshaped global trade and power.