1.
1 Great discoveries
The first people to explored the earth were the Phoenicians.They needed the information for the trade
they were doing in the area of the mediterranean,atalantic and Indian ocean .So they knew very much
about the coast of these seas.
Feom the ancient Greeks,Herodotus is the most important as he traveled in many countries and
gathered plenty of information.
The expeditions of Alexander the Great are also important because beside the amry he took with him
many scientists to explore new lands.
In the middle ages big contribution have the Arabs,the normans and the Italian cities of Venice amd
Genoa.The Arabs were very good cartographers.The Vikings were great sailiors that discovered many
new lands.Under their leader Eric the Red they found Greenland and under his son Leif they reached
North America.Venice and Genoa traded with the mediterranean and had precise maps of this
region.They also used to send missionaries to far away lands as it was Marco Polo who was the first
European travelling to china.
The next big discovery was America .The ottomans blocked the sea ways to india ,so many people tried
to find and alternate way.Christopher columbus a sailor from Genoa had an idea to try the theory that
the Earths has a round shape .He got support from Spain. In 1492 he started the trip. After two months
of sailing he reached a land. He thought it was India and the people he met there he called Indians. He
came back to Spain claiming he found the alternative way to India and everybody believed. He repeated
this trip 3 more times and died in 1506 not knowing he discovered a new continent. Amerigo Vespucci
was the first one that realized it, and it was named by him, America.
The first trip around the globe was made by the Portuguese sailor Magellan (originally Magalhaes). It
was the first real proof for the theory of the round shape of the Earth. His expedition was made between
1519 and 1522. He travelled all west going around South America, reaching the Pacific Ocean. He named
this ocean so, because it was very calm. When he arrived to the Philippines he was killed in a fight with
the local people. But his crew continued the trip and managed to come back to Portugal, reaching it from
the opposite side.
The one that found the real alternative way to India was the Portuguese Vasco da Gama in 1497. He did
it by traveling all around Africa, reaching India in Calicut.
Other great sailor was James Cook who discovered that Australia is a separate continent. He found the
most of the islands in the Pacific Ocean as well.
When it was realized that the new discovered lands have big resources, the powerful countries started
colonizing them, making them their colonies.
England had colonies in North America, Africa, Australia, India, Middle East and some of the Caribbean
and the Pacific islands. Spain had colonies in Central and South America Portugal in Brasil, Angola,
Mozambique and some islands in Indian and Atlantic Ocean, France had the most of Africa, Quebec in
North America, Middle East, Indochina and some of the Caribbean and Pacific islands. Denmark had
Greenland and Ghana| Netherlands had Indonesia, South Africa and some of the Caribbean islands.
Belgium had Congo| Germany had colonies in east Africa, USA had the Philippines and some Pacific and
Caribbean islands.| Most of the colonies got independence during the XX century thanks to the many
liberation wars.
The last points of the Earth that were reached were the poles and the highest peak, Mount Everest.
North Pole was reached by Robert Peary in 1909, South Pole was reached by Roald Amundsen in 1911
and Mount Everest was first reached by the expedition of John Hunt.
1.2 Population
The area of the Earth that is populated by the people all ecumena. The ecumene of the
