Christopher Columbus
Why Columbus Day Isn't Worth Celebrating
“Christopher Columbus.” Encyclopedia Britannica.
History.com Editors. “Christopher Columbus.” History.com.
It’s the second Monday of October, and if you’re in the United States, that means it's Columbus Day. Despite efforts to reclaim today as “Indigenous Peoples Day,” the government continues to celebrate this violent and incompetent man. So to *honor* Columbus, let’s break down three myths you might have learned about him.
Columbus wasn’t a genius for thinking the earth was round. By 1492, humans had known the earth was round for over a millennia. In fact, Columbus was criticized for thinking that the earth was smaller than it actually was and not bringing enough supplies for the trip to the Indies. If he hadn’t run into the Bahamas, Columbus and his men would have likely died from a lack of supplies.
Columbus never “discovered” [the United States of] America. In addition to the fact that indigenous peoples already lived throughout the Americas, Columbus never stepped foot on the modern territory of the US.
Columbus wasn’t a good person, even for the time. Columbus was such a brutal and incompetent leader that he was removed from his post as governor of Hispaniola and arrested. He was only set free because of his value to the Castilian crown.
Columbus Didn't Discover the United States
“Christopher Columbus.” Encyclopedia Britannica.
History.com Editors. “Christopher Columbus.” History.com.
Fen Montaigne. “The Fertile Shore.” Smithsonian Magazine.
“Vikings Settled in North America in 1021AD, Study Says.” British Broadcasting Corporation.
Even though we’ve had over 500 years to get our facts straight, people are still being taught that Columbus discovered America. So what did he really accomplish?
First of all, we need to establish that Columbus didn’t “discover” anything. The Americas were discovered 15 to 20,000 years ago by Paleo-Siberians, not Europeans. Second, Columbus wasn’t even the first European to land in the Americas; it’s believed that Norse explorers established a colony in modern-day Canada several hundred years before Columbus was born. Finally, Columbus never even set foot on modern day “America.” Instead, he spent his four voyages visiting South America, Mesoamerica, and the Caribbean.
But that doesn’t mean Columbus didn’t do anything! He did successfully create a foundation for generations of Europeans to engage in colonization and mass human trafficking, but we’ll cover more of that later.
Columbus' Brutality and Incompetence
Varela, Consuelo. “Cristóbal Colón, 1506–2006: Historia y Leyenda.”
“Why Columbus Day Courts Controversy.” History.com.
“Christopher Columbus.” Encyclopedia Britannica.
Despite frequent assertions that Columbus only wanted to save the indigenous people he encountered, his actions and writings show the truth: that Columbus was a brutal leader focused almost exclusively on personal glory. Columbus’ detailed journals share his real impressions of the indigenous people. He said, “They would make fine servants … With fifty men we could subjugate them all and make them do whatever we want.” And that’s what Columbus did. When he couldn’t find the treasures he had promised the Spanish monarchs, he instead sent Queen Isabella 500 enslaved people. Appalled by the slavery of what she considered her subjects, the queen returned the “gift” back to the New World. But Columbus’ cruelty didn’t end with slavery. Columbus was repeatedly accused of mistreating, overworking, and starving native peoples and allegations concerning his treatment of peninsulares were similarly terrifying. It was these accusations that saw Columbus dragged back to Spain in chains. Even though he was eventually released on the orders of the king, Columbus had lost his titles and status, and his imprisonment remains a permanent historical reminder of the severity of his alleged crimes.
The Mythology of Columbus
Lakshmi Gandhi. “ How Columbus Sailed Into U.S. History, Thanks To Italians.” NPR.
Dave Roos. “Christopher Columbus: How The Explorer's Legend Grew - and Then Drew Fire.” History.com.
Carol Delaney. “Columbus’s Ultimate Goal: Jerusalem.” Society for Comparative Study of Society and History.
If Columbus really was such a bad - or at least messy - person, why does the United States celebrate him every year?
To understand the celebration of Columbus, we have to begin with how Columbus saw himself. He believed that God had sent him to “the Indies” to raise money for a Christian invasion of Jerusalem. Due largely to the fact that Columbus never actually made it to the Indies, Columbus’ plan for another crusade didn’t pan out. However, Europeans continued to assert a divine motivation for exploration, and as a result, spreading Christianity remained colonization’s moral excuse for centuries. That’s why, as far back as 1792, the US was celebrating Columbus as the God-sent “discoverer” of the country. You see, the US has long been reliant on the idea that it was a nation founded and ordained by God, so Columbus, this devout Christian who paved the way for the United States’ existence, needed to be celebrated. Over time, the belief that the United States was ordained by God gave rise to the idea of “Manifest Destiny,” which followed Columbus’ example of obliterating indigenous communities and identity.
Due to his importance in the narrative of the United States, the mythology of Columbus only grew over time. One example of such myth-building was Washington Irving’s “A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus,” a fictional account of Columbus’ voyages based loosely on historical fact. It’s from this alleged biography that we get many of our popular ideas about Columbus, including that he was a kind and adventurous leader pushing against the medieval idea of a flat earth. Of course, none of that was true, but it didn’t matter - The myth had been made.
Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, we celebrate Columbus because of the terrible racism that many Italians faced as they immigrated to the US beginning in the 1880s. Italian immigrants were frequently stereotyped as simple-minded criminals, and these bigoted beliefs would sometimes lead to terrible violence against their communities. But as the 400th anniversary of Columbus’ arrival approached, some Italian Americans saw an opportunity: push Columbus, already considered an Italian-American hero, even more into the mainstream. To accomplish this, many Italian American groups began putting up statues of Columbus and holding their own Columbus Day celebrations. By the 1920s, Italian-Americans had become a large part of the United States’ immigrant community, and as a result, held significant political power. Suddenly, state legislatures, the US Congress, and the President of the United States were scrambling to make Columbus Day an official holiday in pursuit of the Italian-American vote. And that’s how Columbus, a brutal and incompetent leader who never touched North American soil, became an integral part of the United States’ identity.