Christopher Columbus first reached the Americas in 1492, during his first westward voyage sponsored by Castile's rulers Ferdinand II and Isabella I. He was seeking a sea route to Asia but instead reached islands in the Caribbean.
Columbus departed from Palos de la Frontera in August with three ships: the Santa María, the Pinta, and the Niña. After stopping in the Canary Islands, the expedition crossed the Atlantic and sighted land on October 12, 1492. The island was known to its Lucayan inhabitants as Guanahani; Columbus renamed it San Salvador.
The voyage did not represent the first human arrival in the Americas. Indigenous peoples had lived throughout the continents for thousands of years, and Norse explorers had reached North America centuries earlier. Columbus's journey was historically significant because it created a lasting link between Europe and the Caribbean, accelerating European colonization, the Columbian Exchange, and devastating consequences for Indigenous societies. Columbus himself believed he had reached islands near Asia, not an entirely separate continent.