Global Positioning System Reference
In-Depth Information
FIGURE 6.7. Detail from a sixteenth-century townscape of Seville, home port for the
Spanish expeditions of discovery, by Alonso Sánchez Coello. By royal decree, all
ships sailing between Europe and the New World had to pass through the port of
Seville. Image from Wikipedia.
travel across the Atlantic Ocean. The search for spices continued with
exploration of the Indian and Pacific Oceans by Spain (and Portugal; En-
gland, Holland, and France joined later). This search led to the Spanish
colonization of the Philippines, after Andrés de Urdaneta had found the
Spice Islands and discovered a new route back home, later known as ''Urda-
neta's route.'' This route took advantage of the volta do mar , as his Por-
tuguese competitors called the regular ocean-current circulation patterns. 9
The two main convoy routes adopted by the Spaniards to ship home
9. There are five major circulation patterns, or gyres : in the north and south Atlantic and
Pacific Oceans, and in the Indian Ocean. The northern hemisphere gyres circulate in a
clockwise direction, and the southern gyres circulate counterclockwise.
 
Search WWH ::




Custom Search