Ferdinand Magellan

Ferdinand Magellan ( or ; , ; , ; 1480 – 27 April 1521) was a Portuguese explorer best known for having planned and led the 1519 Spanish expedition to the East Indies across the Pacific Ocean to open a maritime trade route, during which he discovered the interoceanic passage thereafter bearing his name and achieved the first European navigation to Asia via the Pacific. During this voyage, Magellan was killed in the Battle of Mactan, Mactan Island, now Province of Cebu, Cebu group of islands in 1521 in the present-day Philippines, after running into resistance from the indigenous population led by Lapulapu, who consequently became a Philippine national symbol of resistance to colonialism. After Magellan's death, Juan Sebastián Elcano took the lead of the expedition, and with its few other surviving members in one of the two remaining ships, completed the first circumnavigation of Earth when they returned to Spain in 1522. Born 1480 into a family of minor Portuguese nobility, Magellan became a skilled sailor and naval officer in service of the Portuguese Crown in Asia. King Manuel refused to support Magellan's plan to reach the Maluku Islands (the "Spice Islands") by sailing westwards around the American continent. Magellan left Portugal and proposed the same expedition to King Charles I of Spain, who accepted it. In Seville he married, fathered two children, and organised the expedition. For his allegiance to the Hispanic Monarchy, in 1518, Magellan was appointed an admiral of the Spanish fleet and given command of the expedition – the five-ship Armada of Molucca. He was also made Commander of the Order of Santiago, one of the highest military ranks of the Spanish Empire. Granted special powers and privileges by the King, he led the Armada from Sanlucar de Barrameda southwest across the Atlantic Ocean, to the eastern coast of South America, and down to Patagonia. Despite a series of storms and mutinies, the expedition successfully passed through the Strait of Magellan (as it is now named) into the Mar del Sur, which Magellan renamed the Mar Pacifico (the modern Pacific Ocean). The expedition reached Guam and, shortly after, the Philippine islands. There Magellan was killed in the Battle of Mactan in April 1521. Under the command of captain Juan Sebastian Elcano, the expedition later reached the Spice Islands.