Christopher Columbus set sail from Spain in August 1492 with three ships, the Ni–a, the Pinta, and the Santa Mar’a, hoping to find a western route to Asia. Instead, after weeks at sea, he reached islands in the Caribbean on October 12, 1492, likely first landing on an island in the Bahamas known to its inhabitants as Guanahani and renamed San Salvador by Columbus.
That landing was the beginning of sustained European contact with the Americas, but it was not the ÒdiscoveryÓ of an empty continent. People had lived there for thousands of years, and the islands Columbus encountered were already home to Indigenous communities, including the Ta’no and other peoples. Columbus believed he had reached lands near Asia, so he called the people he met ÒIndians,Ó a mistake that reflected his original goal and misunderstanding of where he had arrived.
After landing, Columbus explored parts of the Caribbean, including Cuba and Hispaniola. His voyage brought Europe into direct contact with the Americas and opened the way for further Spanish expansion, settlement, and colonization. That process had lasting consequences for Indigenous peoples, whose societies were transformed by violence, disease, and displacement in the centuries that followed.
The first encounter also showed the mixture of curiosity and exploitation that marked ColumbusÕs journey. He exchanged small objects with local people and noted their ornaments and customs, but he also became interested in gold and took some Indigenous people prisoner for information and guidance. His own writings and later accounts make clear that he saw the lands he found primarily through the lens of wealth, conquest, and his mistaken belief that he had reached the East Indies.
Columbus returned to Spain in 1493, and news of the voyage quickly spread across Europe. His arrival in the Americas is now remembered as a turning point in world history, but it is also one of the most disputed. It marked the start of permanent transatlantic contact between Europe and the Americas, while also beginning a long era of colonization that brought catastrophic losses to many Indigenous communities.