Vasco da Gama, a Portuguese explorer, arrives in Calicut, India in 1489, becoming the first European to reach India by sea.
Vasco da Gama (1460s – 24 December 1524) was a Portuguese explorer and the first European to sail to India. His first voyage to India via the Cape of Good Hope (1497–1499) was the first to connect Europe and Asia via an ocean route, connecting the Atlantic and Indian oceans, and thus the West and the Orient. Da Gama landed in Calicut on May 20, 1498, after decades of sailors attempting to reach the Indies, with thousands of lives and dozens of vessels lost in shipwrecks and attacks. Unrestricted access to the Indian spice routes boosted the Portuguese Empire's economy, which was previously based in northern and coastal West Africa.
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