"Science, Religion, and Columbus's Enterprise of the Indies"
 
by Pauline Moffitt Watts
 
in OAH Magazine of History (Vol. 5, No. 4, Spring 1991, pp. 14-17)
 
     In the decade of the 1490s, Christopher Columbus developed his
"Enterprise of the Indies"--his theory that the Far East could be
reached by sailing westward across the Atlantic Ocean.  This
enterprise would inaugurate important new phases of hemispheric and
global history, marked by a proliferation of contacts between
European, American, African, and Asian peoples.  Precisely because
of its extraordinary historical significance, the genesis of
Columbus's "Enterprise of the Indies" has been the subject of
ongoing study and debate.
     Since the nineteenth century, well-known, popular, and
scholarly accounts of Columbus's project have usually suggested
that it was scientifically innovative.  Columbus, the "Admiral of
the Ocean Sea," is depicted as champion of the supposedly
unorthodox notion that the earth is round and that it is
circumnavigable.  Only after a perseverant struggle with ignorant,
superstitious but influential ecclesiastics at the court of
Ferdinand and Isabel, such accounts suggest, did Columbus win
acceptance of his theories and royal financing for his initial
voyage of discovery.
     It is true that Columbus had difficulty securing backing for
his enterprise; he spent seven years pleading his cause at the
court of regents.  But his lack of success can be traced to a
number of causes not directly related to the novelty of his
geography and cosmography.  First, the attention of Ferdinand and
Isabel was focused primarily on the political consolidation of
their kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, and their ongoing military
campaigns for control of the Iberian peninsula.  Columbus's project
was likely quite marginal to the central designs and goals of their
joint monarchy.  Second, when Columbus did attract royal interest
in his project, it was in the wake of the Portuguese voyages down
the western coast of Africa, which indicated that they might soon
discover a maritime route to Asia gaining considerable economic
advantages.  Finally, Columbus attached to his "Enterprise of the
Indies" a persistent demand for what seemed to be an excess of
titles and privileges should he discover new lands.  That this
tactic almost cost him the opportunity to sail is indicated in
important contemporary sources such as his son Ferdinand's
biography of his father and Bartolome de las Casas's History of the
Indies.
     In describing the enterprise itself, both Ferdinand Columbus
and Las Casas point out that it was in large part derived from a
variety of well-known ancient and medieval sources, including the
works of Aristotle, Pliny the Elder, Solinus, and Marco Polo.  In
addition to these sources, Columbus apparently also made particular
use of two other works as well.  The first of these was a treatise
entitled Imago mundi, written in the early fifteenth century by an
influential philosopher and theologian named Pierre d'Ailly (1350-
1420).  The other consisted of a pair of letters written by the
famous Renaissance cosmographer and physician, Paolo Toscanelli
(1397-1482).
     D'Ailly's Imago mundi was based upon a collection of seminal
ancient and medieval texts on cosmography and geography.  It was
completed around 1410 and apparently enjoyed a fairly wide
circulation in both manuscript and printed forms throughout Western
Europe during the fifteenth century.  Columbus possessed and
annotated an early printed edition (called an incunabulum) of Imago
mundi, published sometime between 1480 and 1483 by John of
Westphalia.  This volume survives and is located in the Biblioteca
Columbina in Seville, Spain.
     Long ago, scholars noticed that chapter eight of Imago mundi,
entitled "De quantitate terrae habitabilis" ("On the extent of the
inhabitable earth"), contained many annotations in Columbus's own
hand.  Because of these notes, it is widely presumed that this
chapter was of particular importance to Columbus in the formulation
of his Enterprise of the Indies.  In this chapter, d'Ailly,
following a number of earlier authorities, asserts that the greater
part of the globe consists of land, not water as some had supposed. 
Accordingly, the Atlantic is likely to be relatively short in
breadth and so should be navigable.
     Columbus appears to have found corroboration for d'Ailly's
theories in the two letters written by Toscanelli.  While it is
evident that the letters were composed by Toscanelli and that
Columbus read them, it is not clear that Toscanelli actually sent
the letters to Columbus.  The first was a copy of another letter,
dated 24 June 1474, which Toscanelli originally sent to Alfonso V,
King of Portugal.  The second letter purportedly was written by
Toscanelli in direct reply to a lost communication by Columbus. 
The dating of this second letter is controversial; some scholars
place it in the 1470s, others assign it to the early 1480s.  Both
Toscanelli letters are traditional in nature, presenting the theory
that the riches of the Orient described by Marco Polo and others
might well be reached by sailing west rather than by traveling
overland to the east.
     In sum, one looks in vain for novel, even esoteric elements in
the cosmographical and geographical sources used by Columbus in
formulating the Enterprise of the Indies.  Instead, it is the
conventional, if not venerable grounding of his ideas that emerges. 
It seems that he believed that his voyage westward would finally
verify the theories set forth by ancient and medieval authorities,
not significantly alter them.
     If this conclusion is correct, then it raises the interesting
question of whether the usual historical accounts adequately
explain the actions and motivations of Columbus and the genesis of
his project.  Further examination of Columbus's writings and
related sources such as Ferdinand's biography reveal that there was
another important dimension to Columbus's understanding of the
"Enterprise" and its larger historical significance.  This is what
might be called the religious or spiritual dimension.
     While Columbus fought to be awarded the title of "Admiral of
the Ocean Sea," he also nurtured a second self-image.  It was that
of Christoferens (the "Christ-bearer").  To his mind, his given
name of Christopher signified his divinely ordained mission to
carry Christianity across the westward ocean to what he presumed
were the pagans of the Orient.  Ferdinand discusses this point in
chapter four of his biography of his father, suggesting that
Columbus's role as global evangelist was but an imitation of Saint
Christopher, who was believed to have carried the Christ child
across a dangerous river on his shoulders.  Columbus's portage of
Christianity to the New World assured that, "the Indian nations
might become dwellers in the triumphant Church of Heaven."  To
Ferdinand, the family surname, Columbus, was also a sign of his
father's special destiny.  It means "dove" in Latin and, like the
dove of Noah's ark, his father had carried the oil of baptism over
the waters of the Atlantic to those previously confined in the
darkness of their paganism.
     Columbus himself apparently encoded the mystical etymology of
his name in the signature which he almost invariably employed from
the time of his first voyage until his death in 1506.  The
signature consists of a singular pattern of letters, suffixed by an
abbreviated form of the name, "Christoferens," and appears as
follows:
                               .S.
                           .S. .A. .S.
                              X M Y
                            XpoFERENS
 
The words presumably designated by the letters have not yet been
identified, though different possibilities have been devised.
     It seems likely that Columbus's self-image as the "Christ-
bearer" evolved over a period of several decades.  Its origins
probably lie in the 1480s, the period during which he formulated
the Enterprise of the Indies and began to seek funding for it.  The
evolution of "Christoferens" can be traced through Columbus's
annotations to a number of philosophical and theological works by
Pierre d'Ailly.  It emerges also through excerpts he gathered for
a book he never completed, titled The Book of Prophecies, as well
as through a number of letters he addressed to Ferdinand and
Isabel.
     The incunabulum of d'Ailly's writings which came into
Columbus's hands contained not only Imago mundi but also a number
of other short pieces.  In these, d'Ailly set forth his conception
of providential history and how it could be understood through
astrology and the interpretation of prophecy.  Put somewhat
differently, d'Ailly, like many other medieval thinkers, believed
that significant historical events unfolded according to God's
plan.  These events were frequently marked by unusual planetary
conjunctions or by extraordinary celestial phenomena such as the
appearance of comets.  They could also be identified and explained
by the proper interpretation of scriptural and other related
prophecies.  Columbus's annotations to these works show that he
followed d'Ailly's discussions with considerable interest.
     A number of these short pieces indicated that d'Ailly was
convinced that the end of the world was quickly approaching.  His
studies of earlier texts, linking various planetary conjunctions
with a succession of periods in world history, told him that the
present age was the penultimate one.  In fact, he calculated that
there were but 155 years left.  The present age, the age of
Christianity, marked by the conjunction of Jupiter and Mercury,
would soon give way to the final age of the Antichrist, marked by
the conjunction of Jupiter and the Moon.  This transition to the
final stages of history would be indicated by the fulfillment of a
number of famous late antique and medieval prophecies.
     Columbus excerpted several key passages wherein D'Ailly set
forth these ideas for inclusion in The Book of Prophecies.  As
mentioned earlier, this work was never completed.  The manuscript,
which survives in the Biblioteca Columbina, consists of a
collection of passages from Scripture and from a variety of ancient
and medieval texts, particularly those of d'Ailly.  The dating of
this manuscript is uncertain; but, it seems likely that Columbus
and his collaborator, a monk named Gaspar Gorricio, gathered the
materials contained therein over a period of years subsequent to
Columbus's first voyage.  The collection is prefaced by an
incomplete letter from Columbus to Ferdinand and Isabel, written in
late 1501 or early 1502 (between his third and fourth voyages to
the New World).
     The pattern of excerpts contained in The Book of Prophecies
indicated that Columbus was seeking to demonstrate the special role
he believed he was destined to play as the "Christ-bearer" in the
unfolding of the historical events that would mark the imminent
ending of the world.  His discovery of a heretofore unknown land of
pagans and his introduction of Christianity to that land seemed
finally to fulfill the biblical prophecy of John 10:16.  This verse
was widely held to foretell a global conversion of peoples to whom
Christianity had previously been unknown ("other sheep I have who
are not of this fold").  This final triumph of Christianity ("there
shall be one fold and one shepherd") would be accompanied by the
defeat of the Antichrist; these events would augur the end of time
and the advent of the Last Judgment.  Columbus evidently believed
then, that his discovery of a new world marked the proximity of the
end of the world.  In fact, he followed d'Ailly's assertion that
but a century and a half of post-lapsarian time and space remained.
     The force of that conviction led him explicitly to disavow the
importance of "scientific" knowledge in the formulation of the
Enterprise of the Indies.  In the prefatory letter to The Book of
Prophecies, he asserted that, "... reason, mathematics, and
'mappaemundi' were of no use to me in the execution of the
enterprise of the Indies."  Instead, he seems to claim, it is his
preordained role as "Christoferens" which underlies his
achievements.  The letter states:
 
     I abandon all my voyaging from a tender age and all the
     talks I have held with so many people in so many lands
     and of so many sects, and I abandon all the great arts
     and writings of which I spoke above.  I hold myself only
     to holy and sacred scripture and to certain prophetic
     authorities, who through divine revelation have said
     something on this subject.
 
     Columbus also saw his discoveries as relating to the
fulfillment of another crucial, penultimate prophecy, the final
recovery of the Holy Land, specifically Jerusalem, from the Muslim
infidel.  It was a victory which he thought that Ferdinand and
Isabel were destined to achieve with his assistance.  A number of
prophecies culled for The Book of Prophecies suggest that the one
who would recover Jerusalem for Christianity would come from
Iberia.  That Columbus took this to mean Ferdinand and Isabel is
also evident from his prefatory letter.  It proclaims:
 
     Who would doubt that this light, which urged me on with
     great haste continuously, without a moment's pause, came
     to you in a most deep manner, as it did to me?  In this
     voyage to the Indies, Our Lord wished to perform [a] very
     evident miracle in order to console me and others in the
     matter of this other voyage to the Holy Sepulchre
     [Jerusalem].
 
     Seen in the light of The Book of Prophecies, the Enterprise of
the Indies begins to take on a connotation quite different than the
traditional one.  It is the beginning of the end, the step which
will herald the era of apocalyptic conversion and the Last Crusade
in which the infidel will finally be vanquished.
     In the letter to Ferdinand prefacing his account of the fourth
voyage of discovery, Columbus pledged himself as a guide for this
Last Crusade.  He wrote:
 
     Jerusalem and Mount Zion are to be rebuilt by the hands
     of Christians as God has declared by the mouth of His
     prophet in the fourteenth Psalm [vv. 7-8].  The Abbe
     Joaquim said that he who should do this was to come from
     Spain; Saint Jerome showed the holy woman the way to
     accomplish it; and the Emperor of China has, some time
     since, sent for wise men to instruct him in the faith of
     Christ.  Who will offer himself for this work?  Should
     anyone do so, I pledge myself, in the name of God, to
     convey him safely thither, provided the Lord permits me
     to return to Spain.
 
     The preoccupation with his messianic role, which marks
Columbus's later years, continues to be regarded as eccentric, as
Tzvetan Todorov's recent The Conquest of America exemplifies.  But
to relegate "Christoferens" to the edges of Columbus's (and his
culture's) sanity is anachronistic.  Such margination robs him of
his understanding of historical processes and his part in them. 
Moreover, the texts and contexts which Columbus employed enjoyed
considerable currency in his own day.  Indeed, it might be argued
that he employed them precisely because they would serve his own
interests by situating his accomplishments within the spectrum of
prevailing images and designs at the court of Ferdinand and Isabel. 
In sum, it is important not to allow the contemporary divisions
between what we understand to be religion and what we term science
to obscure the significant role that "Christoferens" played in
contextualizing the Enterprise of the Indies, both for Columbus and
for the royal court that he served.
 
Bibliographical Note
     This essay is based upon Pauline Moffitt Watts' "Prophecy and
Discovery: On the Spiritual Origins of Christopher Columbus's
'Enterprise of the Indies'," American Historical Review, vol. 90,
no. 1 (February 1985), pp. 73-102.  See that piece for
documentation of the texts and ideas presented in the preceding
essay.
     Other important sources for the study of Columbus's
spirituality, his scientific knowledge, and their larger historical
contexts include: Ferdinand Columbus, The Life of Christopher
Columbus by His Son Ferdinand (Benjamin Keen, trans.), New
Brunswick, 1959; Bartolome de las Casas, History of the Indies, New
York, 1971; W.G.L. Randles, "The Evolution of Columbus's 'India'
Project by Portuguese and Spanish Cosmographers in the Light of the
Geographical Science of the Period," Imago Mundi 42, 1990,
pp. 50-64; Marjorie Reeves, The Influence of Prophecy in the Later
Middle Ages: A Study of Joachimism, Oxford, 1969; Alain Milhou,
Colon y su mentalidad mesianica en el ambiente franciscanista
espanol, "Cuadernos Colombinos," vol. 11, Valladolid, 1983; Edmond
Buron, Imago mundi de Pierre d'Ailly, 3 vols., Paris, 1930 [This
work publishes the marginal annotations of Columbus as well as the
Latin text and a French translation of Imago mundi].