African Coast.

Portuguese navigators spearheaded Europe's ventures into uncharted waters at the dawn of the age of exploration and expansion. From their homeland at Europe's southwestern tip, early-fifteenthcentury Portuguese mariners set out on voyages along the unfamiliar coast of Africa. Eventually these efforts would culminate in the late fifteenth century with two landmark voyages: Bartholomeu Dias's 1487-1488 journey to the Cape of Good Hope at Africa's southern tip and the 1497-1499 expedition of Vasco da Gama, the first European to reach the ports of India by sailing around Africa. It is doubtful, however, that Prince Henry the Navigator and his contemporaries had in mind any such grand scheme to reach India. The earliest fifteenth-century Portuguese voyages appear to have been inspired by more-immediately tangible goals such as religious crusades against Muslim North Africa and securing direct access...