Bartolomeu Dias

Bartolomeu Dias
Dias was a famous Portuguese explorer in the late 13th century and in the early 14th century. Not much is known about him prior to 1487 other than he was a superintendent for the royal warehouses and he likely had more sailing experience than the one recorded trip on a freight ship. King John II of Portugal was fascinated with the legend of Prester John, an apocryphal leader of Christians somewhere in Africa. The king sent out a pair of explorers, Afonso de Paiva and Pero da Covilha to search overland for the Christian kingdom in Ethiopia. He also wanted to find a way around the southern African coastline, so only a few months after hiring the first two explorers, he sponsored Dias’ African expedition.
In August of 1487, Dias led 3 ships out of the port of Lisbon, Portugal. They followed the route of Diogo Cao, a 15th century explorer who had traveled as far up the coast as where Cape Cross, Namibia is today. Dias took padroes with him to help mark his way. Padroes are limestone markers that the Portuguese used to claim land on the continent. Often the padroes would be planted on shorelines and have served as guidestones for older Portuguese explorations.
Dias had taken 6 African men with him who had been along the coast before on older voyages. At different towns, Dias left a man and a supply of gold and silver for trading along with warm words from Portugal to tell the townspeople. At Angro de Salto, Dias left the last two Africans along with the supply ship from the voyage. The ship was left with 9 men to guard it. In early January, 1488, Dias and his remaining two ships got blown off of the coastline by strong winds. It is reported that Dias called for a 28 southward turn. This did re-guide the ship, and while it was an extremely risky move that could have compromised the whole voyage, it proved successful. On February 3rd, 1488, the ships saw land and found Sao Bras, or present-day Mossel Bay and the much warmer waters of the Indian Ocean.
It helped that Dias had had previous experience navigating ships, but in was later found that King John and his predecessors had acquired maps from the 1360’s showing links from the Pacific and Indian oceans across Africa. After going closer to the shore, Dias’ ships were ambushed by the Khoikhoi. They threw stones and rocks at the ships until one of Dias’ men shot down one of the tribe members. Dias went further down the shoreline, but his crew was extremely nervous about the depleting food supplies.
The crew members begged Dias to turn back and were slowly turning towards the option of mutiny. Finally after threats from his crew Dias left the decision on turning back or not to his crew. The crew decided to keep sailing for another three days and then turn back. At Kwaaihoek, the crew planted a padroe on March 12th 1488. On the journey back, Dias named the two rockiest capes the Cape of Needles and the Cape of Storms for the heavy storms that rocked the Atlantic.
Upon return to Angra do Salto, Dias was greeted with a sad sight as only 3 men of the 9 he had left to guard the ship had survived the ever-impeding attacks from the locals. A 7th man died on the journey home. Finally, Dias and his considerably-smaller crew returned to Lisbon after more than 15 months at sea traveling over 16000 miles. They were greeted with open arms as heroes, but in a private meeting with the king Dias was forced to explain his failure to meet with the two explorers. Despite his immense achievements nonetheless, he was never put in charge of expeditions again.
Almost as if to add insult to injury, after taking a job in West Africa, King John’s successor put Dias into the place of shipbuilding consultant for Vasco da Gamma’s trip. Dias stuck with da Gamma’s fleet until the halfway point and then turned back for Guinea. After that, Dias was put in charge of 4 boats on a large fleet going to India. Mid-voyage, a horrific storm struck the boats and in the year 1500, 4 of the 13 ships were wrecked, including Dias’. He was lost at sea, but is today remembered for his discovery of the Cape of Good Hope (even if he wasn’t acknowledged for it in his time).