By the time Magellan made his case for a voyage, King Manuel, then fifty-one years old, had entered the throes of a personal crisis. He believed that his long reign was coming to an end; his adored wife had recently died in childbirth, and he decided to abdicate in favor of his son. But when the young man proved ungrateful, Manuel abruptly changed his mind, decided to remain on the throne, and arranged to marry his son’s fiancée, Leonor, the twenty-year-old sister of King Charles of Spain.
