page_title: Voyages of Christopher Columbus
section_title: Arrest of Governor Columbus
hierarchical_section_title: Voyages of Christopher Columbus / Voyages and events / Governorship issues / Arrest of Governor Columbus
context_page_description: In 1492, a Spanish-based transatlantic maritime expedition led by Italian explorer Christopher Columbus encountered the Americas, continents which were virtually unknown to and outside of the Old World political and economic system. The four voyages of Columbus led to the widespread knowledge that a continent existed west of Europe and east of Asia. This breakthrough in geographical knowledge inaugurated a period of exploration, conquest, colonization, biological exchange, and trans-Atlantic trade, whose effects and consequences persist to the present, and are sometimes cited as the start of the modern era.
  Columbus was an Italian-born navigator sailing for the Crown of Castile in search of a westward route to the Indies, the vaguely rumored East Asian sources of spices and other precious oriental goods obtainable only through arduous overland routes. Although he did not realize it, this search failed when he encountered the New World between Europe and Asia. Columbus made a total of four voyages to the Americas between 1492 and 1502.
context_section_description: Columbus was arrested in 1500 and supplanted from his posts. A number of returned settlers and friars lobbied against Columbus at the Spanish court, accusing him of mismanagement. Francisco de Bobadilla arrived on August 23, 1500 and detained Columbus and his brothers and had them shipped home. On October 1, 1500, Columbus and his two brothers, likewise in chains, were sent back to Spanish Aragon. Once in Cádiz, a grieving Columbus wrote to a friend at court:
  It is now seventeen years since I came to serve these princes with the Enterprise of the Indies. They made me pass eight of them in discussion, and at the end rejected it as a thing of jest. Nevertheless I persisted therein... Over there I have placed under their sovereignty more land than there is in Africa and Europe, and more than 1,700 islands... In seven years I, by the divine will, made that conquest. At a time when I was entitled to expect rewards and retirement, I was incontinently arrested and sent home loaded with chains... The accusation was brought out of malice on the basis of charges made by civilians who had revolted and wished to take possession on the land...
  I beg your graces, with the zeal of faithful Christians in whom their Highnesses have confidence, to read all my papers, and to consider how I, who came from so far to serve these princes... now at the end of my days have been despoiled of my honor and my property without cause, wherein is neither justice nor mercy.
  Columbus and his brothers were jailed for six weeks before the busy King Ferdinand ordered them released. Not long thereafter, the king and queen summoned the Columbus brothers to their presence at the Alhambra palace in Granada. There the royal couple heard the brothers' pleas; restored their freedom and their wealth; and, after much persuasion, agreed to fund Columbus's fourth voyage. But the door was firmly shut on Christopher Columbus's role as governor. From that point forward, Nicolás de Ovando y Cáceres was to be the new Governor of the Indies.
  Although he regained his freedom, he did not regain his prestige and lost all his titles including the governorship. As an added insult, the Portuguese had won the race to the East Indies: Vasco da Gama returned in September 1499 from a trip to India, having sailed east around Africa.
caption: Columbus Before the Queen[75] by Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze, 1843 (Brooklyn Museum of Art)
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "1536", "Image ImageLength": "1147", "Image BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8]", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "2", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "3", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS6 (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2016:07:05 13:36:32", "Image ExifOffset": "232", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "382", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "10043", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1536", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1147"}