Answer Key – European Explorers

Explorer DOB Nationality Nation # of Major Significance

represented voyages discoveries
Bartolomeu 1450 Portuguese Portugal Unknown Brazil Discovered the Cape
Dias of Good Hope
Vasco da 1469 Portuguese Portugal Unknown East Indies Discovered sea route
Gama to the East Indies
Christopher 1451 Italian Spain 4 San Salvador First European since
Columbus and West Indies the Vikings to
discover the “New
World”
Vasco de 1475 Spanish Spain 2 Pacific Ocean First European to see
Balboa the Pacific Ocean -
1513
Ferdinand 1480 Portuguese Spain Unknown Route to sail First to circumvent
Magellan around the (sail around) the
world world
Hernando 1485 Spanish Spain Unknown Mexico Conquest of Aztecs –
Cortes acquired gold
John 1450 Italian England 1 Greenland, Crossed the Atlantic
Cabot Newfoundland in record time
and Labrador
Jacques 1491 French France 2 St. Lawrence New sea route around
Cartier River North America to East
Asia
Samuel de 1567 French French The Great An explorer,
Champlain Lakes and geographer and
Quebec mapmaker
Henry 1565 English Dutch 4 Hudson Bay Searching for
Hudson Northwest Passage