Christopher Columbus passed away on this day in 1506. His fourth major voyage to the New World had ended a few years earlier when his four ships were beached on Jamaica, leaving him stuck on the island for a year; he was lucky that he was clever enough to convince some local indigenous folk to provide him with food. The trip was considered a failure, and three weeks after returning to Spain, his main patron, Queen Isabella, died. Columbus was in a pickle.
Isabella’s widower and co-regent King Ferdinand lacked the same respect for Columbus due to his cruelty toward the residents of Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic) and the diminishing returns from each voyage. Columbus had lived in luxury based on the rewards granted to him by the monarchs, and that was now cut off. While the gold he’d hauled from the Americas continued to fund his lavish lifestyle, he’d spend the last couple of years of his life seeking to reclaim his line of credit (and honor) from the king.
Adding to all of that was the fact that Columbus was dying. He’d known he was ill since his fourth voyage, but by 1505, he started amending his will in anticipation of his passing. His body would be moved several times, from its initial resting place in Valladolid, Spain, to Seville, and then to what’s now the Dominican Republic. Later it was moved to Havana, Cuba, then back to Seville nearly 400 years after his death. There’s a chance (however slim) that the corpse that moved between the Old and New Worlds wasn’t Columbus at all, as another set of bones supposedly belonging to the man were found in the Dominican Republic in 1877, where they remain.
You can read more about Columbus’ death on the website of the Encyclopedia Britannica.
