Columbus, Santangel, and Isabella had all been right, but for all the wrong reasons. Contrariwise, the scholarly advisers to the crowns of Portugal, England, France, and Spain were far better informed than Columbus about geography, and must have been astounded when Columbus returned after his momentous first voyage from “the Indies.”23 None could imagine that a vast new world, whose outlines had been dimly and fleetingly perceived by Norse explorers, and perhaps by others from Europe and Asia centuries before, now lay within their grasp.
