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CHAPTER II. Of Christopher Columbus; his plan for reaching India by a route to the West; the fate of his applications to the Court of Portugal from 1470 to 1484, and afterwards to the Court of Spain till 1492; a squadron then fitted out. Mr. Irving supposes Christopher Columbus to have been born about 1435 or 1436;* being some ten years earlier than is generally represented. The City of Genoa has the honour of being his birthplace.f He had two brothers, Bartholomew and Diego, and a sister. Columbus attained manhood at a period worthy of remark. John Guttenberg, the inventor of printing, was yet alive. In consequence of Guttenberg’s not attaching any date to his works, we do not know the precise time of his first attempts. But there is little doubt that the works disseminated by means of his invention had the effect of stimulating Columbus to his enterprise. Las Casas thinks that none had more effect in this way than those of Pedro de Aliaco, one of the most learned and scientific men of the day. He was born in 1350, and died in 1416 according to some, in 1425 according to others. When Mr. Irving was in Seville, making researches in the Bibliothica Colombina, the library given to the cathedral of that * Irving’s Columbus, vol. 1, p. 3; vol. 2, p. 229, 30, Appendix No. 4; also p. 231, Ap pendix No. 5. t Id. p. 233, Appendix No. 6.
