Pedro Álvares Cabral Reaches Brazil
On 22 April 1500 Pedro Álvares Cabral's fleet of thirteen vessels, en route to India, made landfall on the coast of present-day Brazil—either by an accidental westward course correction or by deliberate exploration of a rumoured landmass. Cabral named the territory Vera Cruz and dispatched a supply ship to inform King Manuel I. The fleet's scribe Pero Vaz de Caminha wrote a long letter describing the landscape and inhabitants in warm terms, and it is this letter that has been called 'Brazil's birth certificate'. Cabral then continued to India, making Brazil a secondary discovery on a commercial voyage.
- Year: 1500 CE
- Category: Political
