Amerigo Vespucci Amerigo Vespucci example essay topic

Amerigo Vespucci Amerigo Vespucci, an Italian explorer was born in Florence, Italy in the year of 1454. Florence was a good city to grow up in for young Amerigo, because of the growing interest in the field of exploration. Some of the adults told young Amerigo about the wonders and riches of the Indies. Like the other Italian boys in his village, undoubtedly Amerigo was fascinated with by those tales.

Amerigo lived in the Ognissanti section of Florence with a lot of the Vespucci family. The Vespucci family was pretty well off, so Amerigo thought that he was in line for a lot of money after his father's passing, but his brother Antonio was highly favored over the rest of the children. Most of theVespuccis living with Amerigo were merchants dealing in wine, olive oil, or wool. Not all of the Vespucci were merchants, a small percentage of the Vespucciswere bankers. All of the family liked art and learning, poetry and music just like the rest of the Florentines.

The ruler of these interesting Florentines was Lorenzo de' Medici or, who was also know as Lorenzo the Magnificent. When Amerigo was older, but still a young man, his father AntastagioVespucci sent him to the Monetary of San Marco to study with his uncle Giorgio. In his new school, Amerigo along with the other European boys learned Latin, math, grammar, history, Italian and Greek Literature, geography and astronomy. Amerigo learned to love astronomy, because he was fascinated about all of the shapes the stars made, that his uncle called constellations. Amerigo thought about traveling about the Earth, but he thought it to be impossible, because he was thought in school that the equator was a ring of fire that made the waters boil there. Amerigo's hopes of traveling the world were become more realistic overtime.

The first thing that sparked this was the invention of the caravel, alight, narrow, 60 to 70 foot boat. The Portugese, that started making this boat had learned to rig the caravels to sail well against the winds and currents of the rough oceans. Another reality check occurred when Amerigo was 19. What happend was the Portugese finally sailed to the equator and found no boiling seas, which proved the Roman theory that young Amerigo was taught in school wrong. But then came a period in his life that Amerigo realized he would never see the world, for Florence, unlike the nation of Portugal, which had, where Florence had just tiny merchant ships. Later on in Amerigo life, Christoper Columbus went on a great journey to the Indies.

People had thought that he and crew were swallowed up by a sea of mud. Just about 7 months later, though Columbus came back with gold, tropical animals, and copper-skinned people he named 'Indians'. When all the excitement was over, Columbus spoke to Vespucci and Gion atti Bernardi a friend of Amerigosabout a voyage back to the island Columbus found called Hispaniola.