Amerigo Vespucci

A few months ago, my interests took a turn toward the Spanish Conquistadors and the early explorers of the New World. I've just finished reading Frederick Ober's biography of Amerigo Vespucci, downloaded from Project Gutenberg.

In spite of having two continents named for him, Vespucci isn't well known today and most of what people today think they know about the Italian explorer, financier, navigator and cartographer isn't entirely favorable.

Although many believe Columbus is more entitled to have North and South America named for him rather than Vespucci, the fact that Columbus went to his grave believing he had discovered islands located near Asia and the fact that Vespucci knew he had landed in a New World leads me to think that the current names may be appropriate after all.