Talk:Magellan expedition

There has to be a mistake in the list of 18 men who were the first to circumnavigate the world

The Spanish wikipedia has 2 men from Bayona, their names also appear on the monument Diego Carmena Gallego y Vasco Gómez Gallego you can also check this website from a Spanish newspaper that has short biographies of most of the survivors https://www.abc.es/cultura/abci-18-supervivientes-primera-vuelta-mundo-historia-201908110112_noticia.html I don't know how to edit, just wrote this here for you to see this issue. English wikipedia and Spanish wikipedia have 1 difference with regards to the 18 survivors. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 181.84.122.55 (talk) 03:52, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

I also found some gaps, eg the "Maestre Anes", or Master Hans von Aachen - mentioned in the Spanish wiki, the article and in Kelseys work on circumnavigators. He probably is meant by the Juan Martin in the given list, who seems to have no actual job. Hans was gunner and hired on with Elcano on his next journey as Master gunner. If there are no objections within the next seven days, I will add Kelsey as a source and adjust the list according to his work, which - as far as my spanish works - goes conform with the Spanish article given above. This should also make the list compatible with that given in the Victoria-article ASchudak (talk) 12:07, 13 April 2021 (UTC)

Kelsey is a good source and seems to be in agreement with most recent sources. I would support adding Maestre Anes. I also note that Juan Martin is listed twice: arriving on the Victoria and held captive in Cape Verde. Kelsey has him on the list of Cape Verde captives and indicates he testified in Portugal before being returned to Spain. He should be removed from list of those arriving on the Victoria.I will add Kelsey to Bibliography now, in preparation for the proposed changes.Glendoremus (talk) 18:47, 13 April 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for already adding Kelsey. I have swapped out two persons, made spelling adjustments with a few names, swapped out some "origins" and changed the positions aboard to their Spanish terms, all information directly drawn from Kelsey. The list is now conforming to his work.

I also added a small list of six men that survived the circumnavigation but died before they reached home. Its a bit weired that they pop up under "Survivers", but Hans Vargas is there, too, and they did successfully survive to circumnavigate.

If any changes are requested just make it so or ask here, and I will adjust it next week (eg. return to English rolenames, remove the list, check the other lists... ) ASchudak (talk) 09:30, 20 April 2021 (UTC)

Seems that Gonzalo Gomez de Espinosa went into the wrong list in the Appendix (p 149) of Kelsyes work, as he did not die at sea but survived (dying 1540 according to his Spanish Wiki-entry). I put him in the correct list and reformated the other two lists of circumnavigators, so that all now use the same format. ASchudak (talk) 14:21, 26 October 2021 (UTC)

Magellan did not cicumnavigate the world

The title of this article should be the "Elcano Circumnavigation" because Juan Sebastian Elcano was the navigator who actually sailed around the world. Another option would be "Magellan-Elcano Circumnvaigation" because Magellan started it (with no intention of circumnavigating the world) and Elcano completed it.88.13.70.87 (talk) 16:59, 11 June 2020 (UTC)

I dont know why we keep the Magellan-Elcano Circumnavigation, Magellan didn't nor wanted to circumnavigate the world. Should be just Elcano Circumnavigation 193.86.73.182 (talk) 15:32, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

It seems that the Magellan expedition was a necessary precondition for the unplanned Elcano circumnavigation. ASchudak (talk) 11:35, 24 August 2022 (UTC)

At least for now, it really shouldn't. Cf. WP:COMMON WP:ENGLISH. Fwiw, Elcano also shows up as del Cano, el Cano, and Cano and he wasn't the nominal leader of the expedition nor the one who decided on circumnavigation... Gonzalo Gómez de Espinosa was. Not just calling it the Magellan Expedition really opens up a can of worms. — LlywelynII 08:18, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Armada de Molucca title

I see no evidence that Magellan's fleet was called the "Armada de Molucca" other than in 20th century or later writing in English. The Spanish Wikipedia page on the subject refers to it as "Armada para el descubrimiento de la especería", meaning "Fleet for the discovery of the spice trade." Also where did they land what port did they land at i see no evidence so this dosent help me that much.

[The unsigned comment above was left at the top of this talk page (with no section heading). I moved it down and added a section heading, for the sake of following standard talk page layout. Colin M (talk) 14:35, 1 August 2019 (UTC)]

I mean, yeah, that's important if it's true. Kinda hard to prove a negative but also kinda hard to remove the name if reliable English sources are using it. Presumably they have their reasons but, if there's a mistake going on, it'd be good to find out and flesh it out. — LlywelynII 08:22, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Did Magellan visit the Cape of Saint Augustine?

Maybe someone with more expertise on the subject can help me out here. I'm getting some conflicting information from sources about whether the Armada stopped at/sighted the Cape of Saint Augustine:

• Bergreen 2003 (Over the Edge of the World) says yes. the fleet raised Cape Saint Augustine on November 29. Here, Pigafetta relates, the fleet paused to take on fresh food and water
• Cameron 1974 (Magellan and the first circumnavigation of the world) says no. At least, it doesn't mention Cape of Saint Augustine, and it seems to strongly imply that their first landfall was Rio. On 6 December a brightly-coloured land-bird was sighted, and next day the earthy scent of the great Brazilian forests came drifting out of the west... They hit the coast a little south of Cape Roque: a perfect landfall after a voyage of almost five thousand miles. They were, however, in Portuguese waters; a landing would have been impolitic, and the armada therefore followed the coastline south... On 13 December they came to an anchorage...
• 1911 Britannica says no?. It seems to say that they sighted the Cape but didn't land there: Steering south-west and calling at Teneriffe (Sept. 26-Oct.3), Magellan sighted South America at Cape St Augustine, near Pernambuco on the 29th of November; thence he followed the east coast of the New World down to the La Plata estuary...
• s:The First Voyage Round the World/Narrative of the Anonymous Portuguese says ???. Not clear from text whether they landed. we sailed south-west, until we found ourselves at the Cape of Saint Augustin, which is in eight degrees of south latitude, having accomplished 1200 miles. And from Cape Saint Augustin we sailed south
• s:The First Voyage Round the World/Pigafetta's Account of Magellan's Voyage says ???. ...and we crossed as far as a country named Verzin... This country is from the cape St. Augustine... At this place we had refreshments of victuals, like fowls and meat of calves... We entered into this port the day of Saint Lucy [13th December], before Christmas From this description, it sounds like he's talking about their stop in Rio de Janeiro, and that the mention of the Cape of Saint Augustine is just a reference point when talking about the extent of 'Verzin' (Brazil). There's no mention of anything happening on November 29th.
• s:The First Voyage Round the World/Log-Book of Francisco Alvo or Alvaro says no?. Relevant quote: Tuesday, 29th day of November, I began to take the altitude of the sun whilst following the said voyage; and whilst in the vicinity of Cape St. Augustine, and in 7° altitude on the S. side, and at a distance from the said cape a matter of 27 leagues to S.W. I don't know about telescopic technology back then, but I'm guessing that if they never got closer to the cape than 27 leagues (~= 75 miles), then they wouldn't have been able to see it? I'm guessing Alv(ar)o knew he was in the vicinity of the Cape based on his latitude readings and the latitude of the Cape already being known from prior expeditions.
• For however much it's worth, Ferdinand Magellan currently says that "he set course for Cape St. Augustine", but that South America wasn't sighted until December 6. Timeline of the Magellan–Elcano circumnavigation doesn't mention Nov 29 or the cape. Armada de Molucca does currently say they stopped at the cape.

My best guess based on the sum of these sources is that they didn't land at the Cape or even spot it. The only source that definitively states that they did land is Bergreen, and I'm gradually losing my faith in that source's accuracy. A couple of factual errors I've found so far in Bergreen: 1) it gives the name of Pigafetta's employer as "Andrea Chiericati" (actual name: Francesco Chieregati) 2) Misquotes Pigafetta as saying they arrived at Tenerife on the sixteenth of September (he actually says the twenty-sixth).

I'm curious to hear any other perspectives though. Colin M (talk) 21:49, 9 April 2019 (UTC)

Hi. I would trust the primary sources rather than Bergreen. Cape St. Augustine was a very well-known geographical feature for Iberian pilots and mapmakers of the time. In 1515 there actually was a survey among the Casa de la Contratación's pilots to determine its latitude as accurately as possible. It makes sense for Magellan to have said they would sail towards that cape because everyone understood where it was but Alvo's log makes it clear that they did not land there. --Hispalois (talk) 06:26, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Better name than Armada de Molucca?

I think the current title, Armada de Molucca, fails the WP:TITLE criteria of recognizability and naturalness, and the WP:COMMONNAME policy. As a starting point for better titles, here's the list of titles that currently redirect to Ferdinand Magellan#Voyage of circumnavigation (which has historically been linked to more than this standalone article, because it had better coverage):

• First circumnavigation of the globe
• Magellan expedition
• Magellan's circumnavigation
• Magellan's circumnavigation of the world
• Magellan's voyage
• Magellan-Elcano circumnavigation
• Magellan–Elcano circumnavigation

(It would be interesting to see how many times each redirect is referred to in articles, but it looks like the rdcheck tool doesn't do that) Also, here are some of the non-English names used for this article:

• es: Expedición de Magallanes-Elcano
• fr: Circumnavigation Magellan-Elcano
• it: Spedizione di Ferdinando Magellano
• hungarian: Magellán Föld körüli útja (~= "Magellan's Way around Earth")
• catalan: Expedició de Magalhães-Elcano ("Magalhães-Elcano Expedition")

My first choice at this point would be Magellan's circumnavigation. Most of the titles above vary along two axes:

1. Whether to call it an 'expedition', 'voyage', or 'circumnavigation'
2. Whether to attribute to Magellan alone, or Magellan and Elcano

Regarding split 1, I slightly prefer 'circumnavigation' for reasons of clarity. Magellan participated in more than one voyage/expedition, but only one circumnavigation. Regarding 2, I get the sense there might be some controversy here as a matter of national pride, because Magellan was Portuguese and Elcano was Spanish/Basque? But based on a survey of reliable sources, it seems like there's a majority of authors who use Magellan's name alone when referring to the expedition. As an informal experiment, I scanned through all the books and articles listed in the bibliography of Bergreen 2003, which I consider a fairly reliable and comprehensive source. I looked for works whose titles referred directly to the expedition (i.e. not counting biographies of Magellan or Elcano). One referred to both men (Magallanes-Elcano; o, La primera vuelta al mundo by Amando MELON RUIZ DE GORDEJUELA), and 5 used Magellan's name alone (more if you count 4 different translations of Pigafetta's diary). (Zero used the term Armada de Molucca) Also, Bergreen himself casually throws around the phrase "Magellan's circumnavigation" in the text. So my first choice would be Magellan's circumnavigation. Thoughts? Colin M (talk) 20:58, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

Comments by banned user hidden --IamNotU (talk) 01:56, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I think that considering that Juan Sebastián Elcano was the one who completed the expedition, his name should be added, regardless of whether Magallanes is a better known figure or not. There are also many sources that call it Magellan-Elcano, especially modern. It should be changed to "Magellan-Elcano circumnavegation", as it is in other Wikipedia articles. Jacob34T (talk) 23:54, 6 August 2019 (UTC) There is a Wikipedia article associated below with this article that is literally called Timeline of the Magallanes-Elcano circumnavegation. It is honestly a more complete and less ambiguous name, because remember that Magellan does not complete the trip. He did not circumnavigate. Eliminating the name of Juan Sebastián Elcano as one of the key figures that it was seems quite unfair and meaningless. It is not a matter of national pride, the reality is that Magellan organized the trip and Juan Sebastián Elcano completed it successfully. Both are important and thus officially recognized. Even this year, Spain and Portugal commemorate the anniversary of the trip together. That there are authors who for convenience or to synthesize use in the title only Magellan does not really mean anything. Jacob34T (talk) 00:06, 7 August 2019 (UTC) There is a Wikipedia article associated below with this article that is literally called Timeline of the Magallanes-Elcano circumnavegation. It is honestly a more complete and less ambiguous name, because remember that Magellan does not complete the trip. He did not circumnavigate. Eliminating the name of Juan Sebastián Elcano as one of the key figures that it was seems quite unfair and meaningless. It is not a matter of national pride, the reality is that Magellan organized the trip and Juan Sebastián Elcano completed it successfully. Both are important and thus officially recognized. Even this year, Spain and Portugal commemorate the anniversary of the trip together. That there are authors who for convenience or to synthesize use in the title only Magellan does not really mean anything. Jacob34T (talk) 00:07, 7 August 2019 (UTC) Struck comments by sockpuppet of banned user --IamNotU (talk) 01:56, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Once more, I arrive late to a discussion, sorry for that. I agree that Armada de Molucca was an awkward title. However, Magellan's circumnavigation has two drawbacks:

1. The first is that this expedition was not intended to be a circumnavigation. The goal was to claim the Spice Islands, and the crew were explicitly instructed to not enter the Portuguese hemisphere. The planned return route was via the Pacific Ocean.
2. The second issue is that Magellan did not circumnavigate the world because he died in the Philippines. It was Elcano who, in a desperate situation, came up with the project of sailing back to Spain via the Indian Ocean (while the crew of the Trinidad took the Pacific route) and who completed that trip.

For these two reasons, I would support to move the article to Magellan-Elcano expedition. --Hispalois (talk) 06:58, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

I accept that both of those points are accurate, but I don't think they make the title problematic when viewed through the lens of our WP:NAMINGCRITERIA. Whether the title is 'accurate' as a description of the topic is not actually a primary consideration. A silly example of this is Egg cream, which is the title of an article about a beverage which contains neither eggs nor cream. We usually use the name that's most frequently used in English-language reliable sources, because that usually best satisfies the WP:CRITERIA, particularly recognizability and naturalness. My review of RS about the voyage led me to believe that most sources refer to it as "Magellan's circumnavigation", or "the voyage of Magellan", or "the Magellan expedition", or similar - i.e. they usually don't give Elcano top billing. The usage of circumnavigation/expedition/voyage was more mixed. I suggested "circumnavigation" on the relatively weak basis that it was arguably more precise (given that Magellan did participate in many prior expeditions/voyages), and perhaps more recognizable (since, even if it wasn't planned to be one, the key aspect of the voyage for which it is now remembered is that it circumnavigated the globe for the first time). I'm definitely open to considering other titles, but I think RS usage should be the main determining factor. Colin M (talk) 19:23, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Hi everybody. I think the title is misleading. Magellan did not "circumnavigate" the world, only the 18 survivors of the expedition did, those that returned to Spain in 1522, led by Juan Sebastian Elcano. If anything, this article should be called the Magellan-Elcano expedition, like in other languages. Regards. ElizaldeGV (talk) 21:37, 20 September 2019 (UTC)

Replying to Colin M. The drawback I see in WP:COMMONNAME is that it can perpetuate terms that are obsolete or no longer favored by current opinion, in this case by current historians. One such unfortunate example is the article Prince Henry the Navigator, which sticks to the 'Navigator' nickname even though the article itself explains that "No one used the nickname 'Navigator' to refer to prince Henry during his lifetime or in the following three centuries." The term "Magellan's circumnavigation" is similarly unfortunate because Magellan did not and never aimed to circumnavigate the world.

Furthermore, if I look at the five criteria listed in WP:NAMINGCRITERIA, I would say that the Naturalness criterion should make us prefer "Magellan's expedition" over "Magellan's circumnavigation". Expedition is a far more common word than circumnavigation, apart from more historically accurate. This would also allow to start the article in a less awkward manner and more according to the Manual of style, for instance: "Magellan's expedition, officially called Armada del Maluco, was an expedition launched by King Charles I of Spain, under the command of Ferdinand Magellan, to find a western route to the Spice Islands and claim them for Spain." --Hispalois (talk) 15:18, 23 September 2019 (UTC)

I don't think I agree with Prince Henry the Navigator being a problematic title. Wikipedia title policy is descriptive rather than prescriptive. The title should be what the topic is actually called (currently), not what we think it ought to be called. Using another name would risk WP:ASTONISHing readers.

For this article, "Magellan's Expedition" (or maybe just "Magellan Expedition") doesn't sound unreasonable to me, since I think it is approximately as popular in RS as the current title (though I'd want to double-check). It has some minor advantages and disadvantages vs the current title - I'd be more or less neutral on it. Colin M (talk) 15:53, 25 September 2019 (UTC)

Requested move 22 May 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Move. Cúchullain ^t/c 15:18, 31 May 2019 (UTC)

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Armada de Molucca → Magellan's circumnavigation – Consistent with how RS most frequently refer to the voyage (based on a survey of titles cited in a recent authoritative work on the topic - Bergreen 2003). Satisfies the WP:CRITERIA of recognizability, naturalness and precision much more than the current title. See above for more detailed reasoning, and discussion of a few other available options. Colin M (talk) 22:00, 22 May 2019 (UTC)

• Support. Srnec (talk) 20:58, 23 May 2019 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

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Comments by banned user hidden --IamNotU (talk) 01:56, 26 August 2019 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
The name of the article should be changed It should be changed to: "Magellan-Elcano Circumnavigation" or similar Because it was completed by Juan Sebastián Elcano, and organized by Magellan. Therefore, in modern historiography it is so called. Even Wikipedia in many other articles also refers to that name. Jacob34T (talk) 23:25, 6 August 2019 (UTC) Struck comments by sockpuppet of banned user --IamNotU (talk) 01:56, 26 August 2019 (UTC) I agree, the inconsistency with Timeline of the Magellan–Elcano circumnavigation is unfortunate, but that could just as well be fixed by renaming the timeline article. I proposed the current title based on WP:COMMONNAME - I looked at a bunch of scholarly works about the expedition, and found that more works referred to it using just Magellan's name rather than Magellan and Elcano (more details above, as I assume you've seen). If you have data that contradicts that, that would be interesting. For better or for worse, "fairness" is not one of the naming criteria. We generally have to follow the language used by reliable sources, even if we have good reasons to think they ought to be using different terminology. Colin M (talk) 03:45, 7 August 2019 (UTC) Whether to mention Elcano in first sentence @Jacob34T: it seems we disagree on whether Elcano should be mentioned in the first sentence. The accounts of the expedition that I've read (mostly Bergreen and Joyner, but also some older sources) don't devote much attention to Elcano's role. For example, according to the index, the first mention of Elcano in (Bergreen, 2003) is 151 pages in, and he's not mentioned again until pg. 292. The book is just a little over 400 pages. I think there are a few reasons he tends to draw less attention than Magellan in historical accounts: There's the simple fact that Magellan led the expedition for a significantly longer period than Elcano, as well as having conceived and planned the voyage. Also, Elcano never really led the expedition per se (i.e. I don't think he ever held the title of captain-general) - he was just the captain of what ended up being the only surviving ship. From a nautical/navigational point of view, the most impressive and noteworthy parts of the journey were the discovery of and passage through the Strait of Magellan, and the Pacific crossing - huge historical firsts. Elcano's portion of the voyage - from the Moluccas back to Spain - was a journey that many Europeans had taken before (though of course he faced some unique challenges). Pigafetta, whose diary is by far the best first-hand account we have of the voyage, seems to have had a pretty dim view of Elcano. I think Elcano is never actually mentioned by name at any point in the diary. Anyways, I think mentioning him in the second paragraph of the intro is sufficient. His involvement is a significant piece of information about the expedition, but there are some pieces of information that I think are more significant which should be mentioned earlier (e.g. the goal of the expedition, the rough path they followed). Colin M (talk) 10:13, 7 August 2019 (UTC) BTW, I do think there's a shortage of coverage of Elcano in the body, simply because the section on the return trip to Spain is just a very brief sketch. If you're concerned about Elcano getting due weight, I think that's absolutely the area that needs attention, rather than the intro. Colin M (talk) 10:17, 7 August 2019 (UTC) Hello good afternoon. Elcano was the one who completed the circumnavigation. Magellan never circumnavigated the earth. That is the reality, regardless of whether a particular book or study gives less credit or more to Elcano. It is necessary, indeed to the information that the person who completed the trip was Elcano, it is completely normal to name it in the header. The reasons you give me are not important when omitting the documented reality that Elcano went around the world is that expedition. And Pigafetta does name Elcano as responsible for the return to Spain, and even narrates how they were decorated by the King of Spain for going around the Earth. Sincerely. Don't worry, I will add the missing information to the body of the article. But it cannot erase something documented, as it was that Elcano completed the circumnavigation only by the fact of being "less known" or popular. And the trip back to Spain by Elcano was less, but not much less, but that's not the point. Struck comments by sockpuppet of banned user --IamNotU (talk) 01:56, 26 August 2019 (UTC) We don't disagree on the underlying facts, it's just a question of WP:DUE weight. To be honest, I don't think you've rebutted any of my reasoning for why mentioning Elcano in the first sentence is undue. And I think you're misrepresenting the situation when you say things like "omitting the documented reality" and "erase something documented". No-one wants to erase Elcano from the article. It's just a question of where in the intro to mention him. And are you sure about Pigafetta? Because Joyner pg. 239 says [Pigafetta's] narrative, filled with details of the voyage, paid eloquent tribute to Magellan, whom he described as "so noble a captain," but nowhere does it contain any mention of the Basque shipmaster who brought the Victoria home. Colin M (talk) 17:20, 7 August 2019 (UTC) If I have misunderstood his words, I apologize. I do not think there is a problem placing it in another paragraph of the heading, as long as information is not omitted. There may be authors who give more credit to Magellan, for reasons such as those you presented, despite Elcano's success in performing the circumnavigation is the main reason Magallanes is known. And Pigafetta did name Elcano, I'm pretty sure of it, even though Joyner and his source don't show it. I don't really know why so much concern with Joyner, it's not a kind of Bible or the only author about Pigafetta's diary. Anyway, this is not the point of the matter. That said, I agree that the information should be placed in another paragraph if you wish, but in an integrated and respectful way with the reality and the sources that are linked. PS: I will try to solve the problem that I cannot answer the other Box Talk. A respectful greeting. Jacob34T (talk) 19:52, 7 August 2019 (UTC) Struck comments by sockpuppet of banned user --IamNotU (talk) 01:56, 26 August 2019 (UTC) Joyner was just the first source in which I was able to find that information - I think I might have also read the same fact in other places. FWIW Joyner puts a footnote on the sentence I quoted above, citing (Nowell, p. 332), though I don't have that source at hand to check. Anyways, glad to see we're reaching some consensus! Colin M (talk) 17:37, 8 August 2019 (UTC) Well, my idea was to mention who completed the expedition. Adding in one of the paragraphs that Magellan-Elcano is an alternative name is not something that I have requested or claimed. For me the article is exactly the same. Your friendly and respectful attitude is appreciated anyway, but I don't see any change. Jacob34T (talk) 18:58, 8 August 2019 (UTC) Struck comments by sockpuppet of banned user --IamNotU (talk) 01:56, 26 August 2019 (UTC) Intro and "first circumnavigators" @Jacob34T: I want to discuss the sentence you added to the intro: Elcano and the 18 survivors of the expedition were the first men to circumnavigate the globe. References I mentioned this in an edit summary earlier, I don't know if you saw it, but basically, the identity of the "first circumnavigator"(s) is a confusing question that reliable sources don't have a clear answer to. Some say it was Elcano and the 18 survivors (I think Elcano was actually even given a globe by King Charles that said "thou encircled me first" or something), but others say the circumnavigation doesn't need to be all in one continuous journey, and therefore say Magellan was first. The last para of the intro to Ferdinand Magellan talks about this: Magellan achieved a nearly complete personal circumnavigation of the globe for the first time in history. Some speculate that Magellan had visited the Philippines earlier in life when he sailed for Portugal, in which case it would have been a truly complete circumnavigation (though I think this theory is a little WP:FRINGEy). Others say that Magellan's slave Enrique of Malacca was the first, via 'personal circumnavigation'. This is mentioned in that article's intro: According to biographer-philosopher Stefan Zweig, he is the first person to circumnavigate the world. The history.com source you cite even goes into this ambiguity. It merely calls Elcano "the most obvious candidate" for first circumnavigator, but then goes on to say "many historians give the honor to Magellan's Malay slave, Enrique". Given how complicated this issue is, I'd rather not get into it in the intro of this article at all. The article is about the expedition itself, and we certainly know that it was the first expedition to do a circumnavigation. The first person or people to go around the world is an issue that's probably more appropriate to get into in Circumnavigation, and the biographical articles on the possibly-first circumnavigators. Does that sound reasonable? Also, I'm sorry if it seems like I'm opposing or second-guessing all your edits. I'm not trying to WP:OWN this article - I just think the intro is especially valuable real estate, since many readers will only read that, and skip or skim the body, so it's especially important to optimize it. I'm glad to have someone else taking an interest in editing this article, and I hope you'll stick around! Colin M (talk) 17:32, 8 August 2019 (UTC) Oh, sorry, I hadn't seen it. Sorry for the previous edition. Well, there are several protagonists who gave the first circumnavigation: - Magellan: Magellan did not do it because he died on the way. And the possibility that during several previous trips he managed to circumnavigate the earth is not accepted, because there is no proof that he could complete it completely, but almost. In addition, in the standardized rules of circumnavigation it is estimated that it must be done on the same trip or expedition. - Enrique of Malacca: There is the possibility that after being expelled from the trip after the death of Magellan he could reach his home and thus technically circumnavigate the Earth. However, there is no evidence that he succeeded, and presumably he did not have the resources to do so, since his home was miles away from where he was abandoned. - Juan Sebastián Elcano and the other 17 survivors: This is the official option, and the most widespread. Both Elcano and the other 17 are considered the first men to circumnavigate the Earth. Maybe the sources used were not good, but it is quite documented that they were the first to circumnavigate the Earth and are even recorded in the Guinnes Record. I can offer many more sources, and better. Leaving that aside, I think it is necessary that the head of the article mention who completed the circumnavigation, I think it is something natural and logical. This circumnavigation would not even be half known if Elcano decided not to return home (Spain). It is an article about the circumnavigation initiated by Magellan, I think it is logical to mention how he concluded, who concluded it and who came home. I think it is essentially necessary, I do not care in which paragraph, but it is something that should be added, and also occupies virtually no space. I consider the title also a problem. Because Magellan's idea was never to circumnavigate the Earth, but initially to find the Spice route, and subsequently the trip was transformed into a circumnavigation trip, in which both Magellan and Elcano were key, both. The conforming title is currently designed seems somewhat misleading, because Magellan never circumnavigated the Earth. In addition, Portugal and Spain have agreed and negotiated by consensus the name of this expedition as "Magallanes-Elcano" and presented it to UNESCO to be considered a world heritage site. Jacob34T (talk) 18:04, 8 August 2019 (UTC) There are many authors who give more credit to Magellan and many others who give credit to both, but I think that Portugal and Spain's decision to name this historical fact should be respected. They are the protagonists of this event after all, and it is the official name they have agreed upon. Jacob34T (talk) 18:15, 8 August 2019 (UTC) Even the photo used and the text of the photo refer to the event as Magellan-Elcano circumnavegation and Magellan-Elcano voyage, it is also the name used in other Wikipedia articles and a name widely used by writers. That added to the fact that the consensus between Spain and Portugal has been commented upon makes it necessary to change the title so that it is more correct and less misleading or ambiguous. So, I respectfully beg you to change it. Sincerely. Jacob34T (talk) 18:32, 8 August 2019 (UTC) Struck comments by sockpuppet of banned user JamesOredan --IamNotU (talk) 01:04, 26 August 2019 (UTC) I think it is necessary that the head of the article mention who completed the circumnavigation Wouldn't you say the following text from the intro already gives that information? Only 18 men and one ship (the Victoria) completed the return trip to Spain. Magellan himself died in battle in the Philippines, and was succeeded as captain-general by a series of officers, with Juan Sebastián Elcano leading the Victoria's return trip (thus the expedition is also sometimes called the Magellan-Elcano circumnavigation). As for the title stuff, I think this discussion will be easier to navigate if we keep this section about the 'first circumnavigators' question, and discuss the title in a separate section (preferably the one you've already made with the heading "The name of the article should be changed"). If you're still having technical issues with commenting in that discussion section, I'd again recommend trying the help desk. Or I may be able to help you out if you can provide some more detail (for example, you mentioned an error message - could you paste the text of the error message?). But to briefly respond to your points: I don't think it's relevant whether Magellan intended to circumnavigate the world Regarding the UNESCO designation, could you provide some links? https://whc.unesco.org/en/tentativelists/6212/ was the first result when I googled "circumnavigation unesco world heritage". The title of that page is "Route of Magellan. First around the World", so I can't imagine that was what you were referring to... I wouldn't be able to unilaterally change the title to "Magellan–Elcano circumnavigation" even if I wanted to. It would have to go through the Requested Move process to get input from the wider community. You're free to initiate an RM about this at any point, but it might be worth at least letting our informal discussion here run its course, in case one of us manages to convince the other. :) Colin M (talk) 04:08, 9 August 2019 (UTC) I think it is a very indirect and strange way of saying that Elcano circumnavigated the Earth. I think it should be modified slightly and add that Elcano circumnavigated the Earth, obviously providing better and more sources. Actually, the information almost seems to say that he made a simple and normal trip, when in fact he literally circumnavigated the Earth. It seems as if he had left his trip from the Philippines, when in fact he left from Seville like the rest of the expedition. Regarding the title, I will try to answer in the other Box when I can detect what the problem is. I'm just going to clarify a little about UNESCO: Portugal presented the "Route of Magellan" in UNESCO in 2017 (It is currently only a draft of the tentative list), but Spain complained that Portugal was patrimonizing a historical event that also belongs (Even more, being a Spanish expedition) to Spain. Portugal decided to go back and negotiated with Spain the name they would jointly present at UNESCO on the occasion of the Fifth Centenary of the start of the expedition. After negotiations and some specific controversy they agreed to call it Magellan-Elcano, thus giving importance to Magellan and Elcano. This terminology is not new, it has been used before in numerous books of different languages. But finally, in 2019 Portugal and Spain and their governments and respective foreign ministers have reached that consensus. About the sources of all this I am trying to send it in the other Talk Box (There are many links and sources). I will try to send it during these days. And about the method of a name change I didn't know it, I thought you could do it directly, sorry for that. Thank you for your patience. A greeting. Jacob34T (talk) 14:39, 9 August 2019 (UTC) Struck comments by sockpuppet of banned user JamesOredan --IamNotU (talk) 01:04, 26 August 2019 (UTC)

Misleading title

Ok, I know there was discussion about this issue a few months ago, and seems to be closed, but I can't avoid pointing out that, no matter what, "Magellan's circumnavigation" is a unaccurate title for the historic event described in this article.

I have carefully read the talkpage and I can't agree with arguments supporting current title: "Magellan's circumnavigation". The fact is that Magellan didn't circumnavigate the globe in the 1519-1522 expedition as he died in the Philippines. This title is therefore clearly improper, misleading and should be changed under Wikipedia's article titles Policies (mainly Precision and Recognizability).

IMHO:

• "Magellan's expedition" would be a better title, on a recognizability basis.
• "Magellan–Elcano circumnavigation" is also a better title, on a precision basis.

I would appreciate to hold new discusion on this issue again before filing a new Requested Move. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.61.223.79 (talk) 23:00, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

I support both options and also a third one, "Magellan–Elcano expedition". All look better to me than the current title. --Hispalois (talk) 08:45, 30 September 2019 (UTC)

After seeing some of the discussion here and thinking about it some more, I agree that Magellan expedition would be a better title. (I think the version without ’s is a bit more common in RS, and also how most other similar titles are formatted, e.g. Ross expedition, Lewis and Clark Expedition, Crawford expedition).

Here's an ngram search that provides some support for the rename. Note that even just "Magellan–Elcano" (i.e. "Magellan–Elcano circumnavigation" + "Magellan–Elcano voyage" + "Magellan–Elcano expedition" etc.) gets relatively few hits compared to other options, so I would still oppose that option as failing WP:COMMONNAME. Colin M (talk) 16:19, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Magelan's "circumnavigation" is plain wrong. The Portuguese sailor died long before the expedition returned to Spain. Plus his expedition did not intend to sail around the world, but simply to find a westward route to the Moluccas. This is a misleading and inaccurate title. I agree with the other users that this should be called Magellan-Elcano Circumnavigation, or simply Magellan-Elcano Expedition. ElizaldeGV (talk) 19:19, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

I also think that Magellan–Elcano circumnavigation is the best option, as Magellan didn't circumnavigate the world. -Theklan (talk) 09:55, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

• I would oppose using Elcano's name in the title. The attempt to brand the expedition as the "Magellan-Elcano" voyage is a recent bit of political theater to emphasize Spain's role in the expedition. Check out this NYT article: [1]. Before a couple years ago, no one used the term "Magellan-Elcano". Glendoremus (talk) 18:35, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

Sorry, but that is not true. Via Google Books one can find three books published many years ago with "Magallanes-Elcano" (or with both names fully developed) in the title:

• Magallanes-Elcano o la primera vuelta al mundo (1920) by Amando Melón
• Viaje de Magallanes y de Sebastián de Elcano alrededor del mundo (1944)
• Las tablas náuticas de la expedición de Magallanes-Elcano (1959) by Uruguayan researcher Rolando Laguarda.

Of course, many more publications have used the term "Magallanes-Elcano" (or Magellan-Elcano in English) as you can yourself check with a simple search for books or scholarly publications. --Hispalois (talk) 23:46, 30 January 2020 (UTC)

@Hispalois: Presenting a handful of exclusively Spanish sources doesn't really make the point you think you're making. It supports Glendo's point. — LlywelynII 07:16, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Hello @LlywelynII, thanks for reminding me of this old debate.

The term Magellan-Elcano is used by scholars from all over the world, certainly not only Spanish ones; for example:

• Doina Vasilca et al., 2016 (Romanian)
• Amalia Drăgulănescu, 2019 (Romanian)
• Clayton McCarl, 2019 (U.S.)
• David Irving, 2021 (British)
• Danilo Madrid Gerona, 2021 (Filipino)

Hispalois (talk) 21:38, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

You're welcome. Again, you're making his point a bit but of course you're both right. The common name in English has always been and currently continues to be the Magellan expedition. That's where the page should stay. The rebranding seems to have started as a Spanish PR push but certainly is used in English now. It should be mentioned in the lead section, as should Magellan's death and Elcano's actual completion of the circumnavigation. There may be a point in the nearish future where Magellan–Elcano expedition fully becomes the common English name but we aren't there yet. — LlywelynII 02:00, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

I can't help but to point out that the title is misleading, wrongly used. It is true that Magellan was the person in charge of the expedition for the Spanish crown, but he never made it back, not even close. The matter of the fact is that, although unplanned, the person that really accomplished the first true circumnavigation of the world (the first documented and verified) was Juan Sebastián Elcano, an NCO of the expedition. Since we're discussing the facts here (of which the circumnavigation of earth is the most prominent one) it becomes evident that the acknowledgement in the title of the article blatantly ignores history. And just to make it clear, I'm not a Spaniard nor do I want to elevate the Spanish maritime and historical legacy (which is undeniable) but it's important to call out this arbitrary aware omission of historical facts. I can see by reading other threads of discussion related to this here that I'm not the only person who considers that the title is just wrong. I hope this can be corrected in the light of the known history. Augustusrex1210 (talk) 16:01, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

I think that the expedition was Magellans to start with - he prepared it for years - and so the title "Magellan expedition" is fine with me. While the circumnavigation is the major historical achievement, this expedition would justify an entry of its own even when the fleet would have faltered and sunk at Cape Horn (eg). The fact that Elcano led the expedition via circumnavigation home is given credit in the article, but it does not make the enterprise his expedition. Overall I think we should follow the typical naming convention of English articles and books on this matter, and here Magellan/Elcano is rather unusual. ASchudak (talk) 22:31, 28 October 2021 (UTC)

Reference check: date of loss of Santiago?

Magellan's_circumnavigation#Loss_of_Santiago currently says Serrano/the Santiago left San Julian in July and they were wrecked in a storm in August, but I'm thinking that's probably not correct. Joyner (p. 145) says they left around May 1, and was wrecked in Santa Cruz on May 22. Which is a pretty huge difference.

I think the July/August dates came from (Cameron 1974), which is more of a popular account than a high-quality historiographic source, so I have no hesitation about overriding it. However, at Timeline of the Magellan–Elcano circumnavigation there's also an entry saying that the Santiago discovered the Santa Cruz on August 5, which is cited to (Bergreen 2003, p. 156). That gives me a little more cause to wonder.

Could someone who has a copy of Bergreen at hand check that page number to see if it actually says that? I wouldn't be surprised if it were just a transcription error (possibly committed by me). Or could anyone double-check what any other high-quality sources say about the dates here? I can't find any decent online sources that go into that much detail, and the only book I have at hand ATM is Joyner. Colin M (talk) 17:14, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

 Done Nevermind, I got my hands on a copy of Bergreen. P. 156 indeed talks about the Santiago's excursion to the Santa Cruz river, but says nothing about August 5. No idea where that came from. I've corrected the timeline article and will correct the "Loss of Santiago" section of this article now. Colin M (talk) 19:29, 8 October 2019 (UTC)

Removing "Pacific size: divergent historical views" section (for now)

@JMetrope: thank you for your addition of this section. It appears thoroughly written and thoroughly-researched, but I don't think it's quite ready for primetime. The main issue I see is one of WP:DUE weight. I wouldn't exactly say I'm a Magellan expert, but I've read a few of the standard English-language works on the expedition, and they all say that Magellan underestimated the size of the pacific. The theory that he accurately estimated the size of the pacific seems to come essentially from the writing of one "Xavier de Castro", which, depending on how reliable we assess his work to be, would make it at least a minority point of view, or at worst a WP:FRINGE theory. Yet, with this section, we have 1 sentence about Magellan underestimating the size of the ocean, and 10 paragraphs about Castro's theory. That seems like wildly WP:UNDUE weight.

I think it could be appropriate to restore information about this theory in some form, but it would help if you could do some of the following:

• Condense it significantly (or provide some evidence that the theory has more widespread acceptance than just from Castro and his associates)
• Provide in-text attribution explaining who holds these beliefs
• Provide quotes with the citations that support the claims. You can do this using the "quote" parameter of templates like {{cite book}}, or the "ps" parameter of {{sfn}}. This is especially helpful when you're citing non-English works that will be very difficult for the average reader/editor to get their hands on. (In this specific case, these books seem to available in only a handful of libraries in France).

Also, if you can provide any evidence of this Xavier de Castro's reliability, that would help. After a bit of googling, it seems like this is a pseudonym for "Michel Chandeigne", who is the founder of "éditions Chandeigne", the publisher of Castro (2019), Castro (2018), and Castro et al (2010). So that seems like... a bit of a red flag.

(The same general comments apply to other ideas you've introduced with attribution to Castro, such as there being ~230 crew members rather than ~270) Colin M (talk) 23:27, 23 October 2019 (UTC)

Spanish or Castilian?

The expedition is described in the lead as a "Spanish expedition". However, I wonder if "Castilian expedition" would be more exact. I may be wrong but the affairs of Spanish America were mostly reserved to people and institutions of the Crown of Castile with the Mediterranean being the preserve of the Crown of Aragon. I don't know if Spain was formally considered one country by then or just a combination of the different kingdoms of Charles. From Crown of Castile:

It continued to exist as a separate entity after the personal union in 1469 of the crowns of Castile and Aragon with the marriage of the Catholic Monarchs up to the promulgation of the Nueva Planta decrees by Philip V in 1715.

The Indies, Islands and Mainland of the Ocean Sea were also a part of the Crown of Castile when transformed from lordships to kingdoms of the heirs of Castile in 1506, with the Treaty of Villafáfila, and upon the death of Ferdinand the Catholic.

--Error (talk) 19:30, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

'Rodas' wikilink

Two of the surviving sailors are listed as being from 'Rodas'. The wikilink for Rodas goes to a Cuban town founded in the 19th century. This cannot be correct but I do not know what Rodas refers to otherwise. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.196.181.137 (talk) 15:04, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

They need to link to Rhodes. Actually, just one of them - Francicso Albo lived on Rhodes but was born on Chios, so I swapped the "place of origin" to Chios.ASchudak (talk) 09:46, 20 April 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 16 June 2021

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved to Magellan expedition. (closed by non-admin page mover) Lennart97 (talk) 11:45, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

---

Magellan's circumnavigation → ? – As previously discussed the article title should be modified as it is misleading and not accurate. Magellan's expedition is one thing, other thing is the first circumnavigation of the Earth. This do not underestimate the great Magellan's legacy and achievements, i.e. succeeding the first expedition goal when finding the interoceanic passage through the Americas and then crossing the Pacific. The expedition was led by Magellan until his death in 1521, then others took command of it, ultimately Elcano, to continue the search for the Spice Islands, the expedition's ultimate goal achieved by Elcano. Only then the latter decided to return to Spain sailing westwards achieving the circumnavigation.

Apart from any good reasons already provided here above, consider that Portugal and Spain have recently agreed to submit to the UNESCO a joint candidacy for the Magellan-Elcano expedition be granted the status of World Intangible cultural heritage.

In any case Magellan's circumnavigation is not at all an option. I propose, considering all the above plus the insights provided in previous discussions above, to change the title to Magellan-Elcano Expedition.

This outcome should settle the main controversies and issues at stake: 1. Ends the debate around the fact that Magellan did not achieve the circumnavigation but Elcano. 2. While Magellan led the expedition until his death, Elcano assumed command thereafter to complete the mission. 3. The event is today well known or depicted under that name 4. It follows the wikipedia practice of other articles on expeditions' titles which designate, precisely, the expedition name and not the outcome (see i.e. French Geodesic Mission to the Equator, Malaspina expedition, First voyage of James Cook, Expédition Particulière, United States Exploring Expedition, Challenger expedition, British Arctic Expedition or Great White Fleet

Many thanks PLUS ULTRA CARLOS (talk) 03:45, 16 June 2021 (UTC)

• Support Magellan Expedition. Elcano was a minor player in the conception, planning and implementation of the expedition. Glendoremus (talk) 04:05, 16 June 2021 (UTC)
  • @Glendoremus: Are you sure Expedition should be capitalized? The lowercase version gets significantly more hits in ngrams, and WP:NCCAPS says we should capitalize terms only if they're consistently capped in a substantial majority of RS. Colin M (talk) 04:22, 16 June 2021 (UTC)
    • Good point. Many expedition articles in Wiki use a capital "E", but based on MOS, that's probably not correct. I'm okay with expedition. Glendoremus (talk) 05:06, 16 June 2021 (UTC)
• Support Magellan expedition. Though I opened the RM that resulted in the current name, I've since realized that "expedition" rather than "circumnavigation" is slightly more common in RS, and arguably has a bit more consistency with how we name articles about other expeditions. Re Magellan-Elcano: even if you think the current title gives Elcano short shrift, we don't choose titles to WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS - we generally go by what the topic is most commonly called in reliable sources. English scholarly writing on this topic overwhelmingly favours identifying the voyage with Magellan over "Magellan-Elcano". This is clear from thumbing through some of the works in the bibliography of this article, but see also: ngrams ("circumnavigation"), ngrams ("expedition"). As Glendoremus mentioned earlier, the "Magellan" vs. "Magellan-Elcano" thing is sort of a recent gesture to soothe political egos (Magellan was Portuguese, Elcano was Spanish, so this often comes down to a divide along national lines). But disinterested historians have largely not bought into this novel "Magellan-Elcano" rebranding. Colin M (talk) 04:19, 16 June 2021 (UTC)
• Support Magellan expedition (lowercase e) per above.  Mysterymanblue  21:51, 21 June 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Inappropriate title.

I can't help but to point out that the title is misleading, wrongly used. It is true that Magellan was the person in charge of the expedition for the Spanish crown, but he never made it back, not even close. The matter of the fact is that, although unplanned, the person that really accomplished the first true circumnavigation of the world (the first documented and verified) was Juan Sebastián Elcano, an NCO of the expedition. Since we're discussing the facts here (of which the circumnavigation of earth is the most prominent one) it becomes evident that the acknowledgement in the title of the article blatantly ignores history. And just to make it clear, I'm not a Spaniard nor do I want to elevate the Spanish maritime legacy (which is undeniable) but it's important to call out this arbitrary aware omission of historical facts. I can see by reading other threads of discussion related to this here that I'm not the only person who considers that the title is just wrong. I hope this can be corrected in the light of the known history. Magellan-Elcano expedition or Magellan-Elcano circumnavigation would be better, more accurate options for the title IMHO. Augustusrex1210 (talk) 16:12, 22 October 2021 (UTC)

The people who realy accomplished the first true circumnavigation of the world seem to have been the Greek component of the original crew, who seem to have survived in an absurd proportion vs. everyone else.

Fwiw, Elcano started as a boatswain and was never the actual leader of the expedition. Gonzalo Gómez de Espinosa was and it was GdE who decided on attempting the circumnavigation, although he mistakenly thought trying to head back east would be the easier of the two routes home.

In the meantime, there's WP:COMMON WP:ENGLISH to consider. — LlywelynII 08:27, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

did meggelan ever visit the Portuguese colonies in india?

did meggelan ever visit the Portuguese colonies in india? Jff69420lolz (talk) 16:54, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

No. He died before. Theklan (talk) 16:44, 13 June 2022 (UTC)

Ever? Yes, but years before this expedition. — LlywelynII 08:28, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

References

You need to get the references sorted. They are shot to pieces. That is a proverb, but it is accurate. scope_creep^Talk 15:23, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

@Scope creep: Could you elaborate on that? Colin M (talk) 15:29, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

Yip. Try clicking on Ref 122-152. It doesn't click into the bib section. There is full cite for "Castro et al. 2010" for example, and so on. Ref 74,14,83,86,88 is damaged. There is script that shows you what condition they are in. It is worth getting. I don't know the name it. Bergreen 2004 doesn't have a cite. Is it supposed to be 2003? Ref 7 and 14 are damaged. Ref 46. I think more missing information. Ref 91 Suarez is missing a cite. Hope that helps. scope_creep^Talk 15:39, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

The cite for Castro has been set as "CITEREFCastro,_Xavier_de_(dir.);_Carmen_Bernand;_Hamon,_Jocelyne_et_Thomaz,_Luiz_Filipe2010". If you put harv ref id of "Castro et al.|2010" it would fix refs 123-152, in one fell swope. scope_creep^Talk 15:43, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

Sorry I got the wrong ref. The Harv for Castro 2010 et all, is called "CITEREFCastro,_Xavier_de_(dir.);_Carmen_Bernand;_Hamon,_Jocelyne_et_Thomaz,_Luiz_Filipe2010." so you need a harv ref on it. Hope that helps. scope_creep^Talk 15:45, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

That fixed the bunch of "Castro et all|2010" errors, but there is a ton more do. Once you get script it pop up and make a start in fixing them all. I'll leave it there. scope_creep^Talk 15:50, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

Thanks, I see what you mean now. I believe the Castro cites were all added by JMetrope, who doesn't appear to be actively editing anymore. My long-term plan is to hopefully replace most or all of them with citations to high-quality English sources per WP:RSUE. But I agree that as long as they're in use the no-target errors should be fixed. Thanks for the fix you did to Castro 2010, and for identifying the two erroneous Bergreen cites, which I've just fixed. I'll try to come back to fix more of these when I have some more time. Colin M (talk) 16:38, 2 April 2022 (UTC)

Lead sentence

"...was the first voyage around the world in recorded history" Is this necessary? When did recorded history start? Even if we assume it applies everywhere at the same time and take a conservative view that it started in AD 1000, what is the likelihood of anyone else having done it before then? Almost nil I think. Shouldn't we therefore remove that sentence? Roger 8 Roger (talk) 06:46, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

Of course we shouldn't remove the sentence. It's the main topic of the article.

As far as removing the word 'recorded', it makes the sentence 100% accurate as opposed to just tendentious. For example, it's quite probable that numerous Inuit and similar guys in the Arctic accomplished this centuries before Magellan. It's similarly possible that some unlucky Polynesians got pulled too far south and accomplished it by accident in the southern ocean before starving or freezing to death. Then to ignore them you get pulled into the kind of hairsplitting we have to do for modern entries at List of circumnavigations: they need to meet arbitrary criteria X, Y, and Z for it to count. In other words, remove that word and it becomes "this expedition was the first to meet the criteria that ensure this expedition was the first to meet its criteria". Simply noting that it's the first that we now certainly know to have actually happened is far more valid and fair. — LlywelynII 09:33, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Crew list

Captains, pilots, Enrique, and the 18 lucky ones on the Victoria obviously deserve direct mention here. The second and third shifts of circumnavigators are certainly notable enough to deserve full inclusion, too, although that can be done on the list of circumnavigations and the separate pages on the Trinidad and Victoria. Personally, I think the full list of known crew are notable enough for inclusion on Wikipedia, although it should be divided by ships or put onto a new separate subpage like Crew of the Magellan expedition.

In any case, I do think there should be more granularity in the treatment of the crew here. Some important things that seem to be missing:

1) It's not just that there were "a smaller number of ... Greek ... sailors". There were 8 or 9. (One was registered but doesn't seem to have boarded.) Now, look at the list of the survivors: Chios... Rhodes... Nafplio... Rhodes... Rhodes... They survived in absurd proprtion to their numbers and we should probably acknowledge that and give a bit more notice to Albo, in particular since his close log established the Spice Islands definitely weren't on the Spanish side of any fair line.

2) The current list of nationalities omits "German", "HRE", or the individual breakdown of German states on the voyage. If there were only two—Maestre Anes & Hans Barge [de]—they survived at a 100% rate, up until dealing with jail in Portugal. Master Hans of Aachen certainly deserves more notice here, given that he subsequently circumnavigated again with the Loaisa Expedition and got halfway around the world again with the Villalobos Expedition (unless this was a Dread Pirate Roberts situation).

3) We shouldn't lump "Italians" together unless it's unavoidable. Italy was just a geographical concept at the time and it's notable that some were from Genoa, others from Venice, others "Sicilian" (but really inclusive of the Mezzogiorno at the time).

4) Similarly, it's great we separated the Basques but is there a good reason we're saying "Asian" and "black" when the sources are saying "Malay" and black African? Enrique was certainly and importantly a Malay slave. Were all the other Malays? Were the blacks? I'm certain some (most?) of our WP:READERS would like more details on that if it's at all available.

5) There weren't "a smaller number of ... English ... sailors". There was an English sailor named Master Andrew of Bristol "who had married a woman of Seville". Fair enough not to mention him by name until he gets his own page or everyone else does, but the list shouldn't make it sound like there was a full cricket team on the San Antonio.

6) This source specifies that it was 37 Portuguese in the crew. (I suppose it's possible the writer wasn't including Magellan or other Portuguese captain in that figure, though.) More importantly, they mention that number was deliberately kept low by the Spanish in part because they worried about Portuguese sabotage of the mission. Seems interesting and worth mentioning.

7) Good information in note 2 here that should be included about the pay records, the minimal known number actually embarked, and the max upper bound with names for the other scholars who've done detailed work on this. The current #Ships section should make note of the 29+ sailors whose location in the fleet is unknown (ie, the numbers aren't quite as accurate as we're making them sound). Similarly probably worth noting whatever rule he's talking about where Chuck 1/5 limited the complements to 235 and then got ignored and that all the gunners were foreign for some reason.

 — LlywelynII 09:33, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

I am sure that informations deserves to be archived somewhere. The question is wether it should go upon a seperate Wikipage "crews of the Magellan expedition" or on a Webpage that is just linked here. I have to admit that I am undecided on this one. If the information is available it certainly has some worth concerning the composition of this and similar other expeditions. ASchudak (talk) 17:54, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

This might be helpful: Magellan’s Fleet Enters the Pacific Ocean – November 28, 1520 (archived) mentions the names of Roldan de Argot, Bocacio Alonso, and Hernando de Bustamente, who looked from a peak into the direction of the end of the Strait of Magellan into the Pacific Ocean. Best, --ThT (talk) 18:20, 8 January 2024 (UTC)

I added the "German" to the list now in alphabetical order, as it somehow seems to have been ommitted. The "Italians" can imho stay together - Italy was far more then a geographical concept. Guiccardini wrote the "History of Italy" roughly at the same time, and while they had no political union the Italians viewed themself as culturally distinct from the foreigners.

The Basques are already in, nothing to do there anymore.

As Joyners work is not available online I cannot check his reference to "black" sailors, but I am not sure wether the color should be named in line with the nationalities - they certainly do have a nationality, too. Perhaps they could be given a seperate statement? If somebody can check the source for better information... ASchudak (talk) 14:38, 18 August 2024 (UTC)

"Tons"

are not the weight of the ships. They were their capacity. Also, the original figures were certainly in toneladas, which are calqued as the word "tons" but aren't at all the English unit ton of the period, let alone modern tonnage. Tons are a huge mess everywhere across Europe but generally the traditional English tons were reckoned around 100 cu. ft. Scholars think the Sevillian tonelada of the period was nearly exactly the Bordeaux "sea ton" of about 1.42 m³ (almost exactly half the English number).

The only reason not to just change "ton" to "tonelada" here and link to their sourced article that it's unclear whether the (eg) our sources' "110-ton Trinidad" is actually just a lazy way of writing "110-tonelada Trinidad" (i.e., the "c. 55-ton Trinidad") or if our sources already approximated the conversion to English units without saying so and the original Spanish sources were talking about the 220-tonelada Trinidad. — LlywelynII 09:33, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Ok, it seems like it gets even stupider: The historians seem to have directly calqued the local Biscayan tonel ("tun") from the records of the expedition without converting it either into English language tons or standard Spanish toneladas ("tunful"). Cf. Walls y Merino (1899), which includes the documents from the Spanish archives. — LlywelynII 23:11, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Maravedís

don't really need their accent mark in English (although it's kinda prettier) but they certainly need some kind of conversion to be meaningful to any reader. Our current overview of Spanish currency is hilariously bad (~85 characters long) and the separate maravedí article just says "it was a lot of different things at different times" and skips over the relevant part of Spanish history here entirely. At the same time, just saying "it was exactly $115,000,000 (1980)" based on an inflation converter is fairly useless since the purchasing power was so completely different and modern currencies inflate so quickly.

Probably the cleanest way to set up an explanation would be to use {{efn}} notes since those are already set up, providing the methodology. The generic way to handle this that I've seen is that the conventional money at the time was actually the Venetian ducat (3.545 g of gold at 99.47% purity) and Sevillian merchants reckoned the maravedí unit of account at 375 to the ducat. (For what it's worth, that's implicitly exactly the exchange rate being used by this discussion of Magellan's ships and their price.) This could produce a conversion similar to

...The official accounting of the expedition put the cost at 8,751,125 maravedís, including...

People who want to see it in dollars, euros, or yuan RMBs could then look up the day's spot price but understand that it was a very different system at the time. I think this would help understand the values much more clearly—82 kg of gold is much easier to grok than 8.75m maravedis and much easier to grok correctly than just writing $5m followed by a bunch of caveats—and still be easy to fix if (eg) a subsequent search shows that in 1519 the exchange rates were slightly different for whatever reason. — LlywelynII 09:56, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

...and of course it turns out the Spanish had their own knock-off ducats that were slightly smaller than the Venetian ones and those are the ones that traded at a value of 1 to 375 maravedís. So the actual entry should go something like:

...The official accounting of the expedition put the cost at 8,751,125 maravedís, including...

 — LlywelynII 23:39, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Sources for future article expansion

• Costa Canas, António (2017), "The Astronomical Navigation in Portugal in the Age of Discoveries", Cahiers François Viète: Épistémologie, Histoire, Sciences, & Techniques: History of Astronomy in Portugal, vol. 3, Nantes: Centre François Viète, pp. 15–36, doi:10.4000/cahierscfv.752.

can be used as a source for Ruy Faleiro getting pulled for mental health reasons. It also has an extensive discussion about the document he prepared for Magellan before the voyage and the way the expedition subsequently went about doing its reckoning. Particularly important points are that a date in one of the sources is obviously a typo based on the actual timing of a conjunction, plus discussion of the honesty in the calculations of Pigafetta, Albo, and the rest w/r/t the effect of their calculations on Spanish interests. — LlywelynII 04:21, 5 February 2023 (UTC)

Trying to be concise in the first sentence

Hello! I know that the first sentence is now longer, but I wanted to be concise. Magellan's expedition goal was to go the Molukas sailing westward, and not sailing through Portuguese waters. Then, they should return by the same way. So, the term Magellan's expedition should be applied to that part. Eventually, after Magellan's death and some changes in leadership, two ships remained. One of them, the one leaded by Elcano, decided to continue sailing westward and circumnavigate the world. But this wasn't the goal for the expedition. I have tried to make this evident in the first sentence, but I aknowledge that it may be longer now. Theklan (talk) 08:38, 7 May 2023 (UTC)

I think the first paragraph contains the appropriate information in concise format. (well done) However, the second sentence is 51 words. Somehow break it up? Gprobins (talk) 14:13, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Minor Questions.

As a NON-historian, I have some minor questions about the article. I think another article somewhere clarified that astronomer and astrologer were evolving terms at the time. (Was Magellan a Libra? /s) ...With the international composition of the crew, did they find it difficult to communicate? I suppose it's sufficient as is. ...Shouldn't it be Islas Infortunadas? (two capital I letters). ....Should south-west be changed to southwest? ....Should the article indicate (as mentioned in Exploration of the Pacific) that Balboa named it the "South Sea"? ...I'm not quite clear why the King of Portugal was initially trying to arrest Magellan. ...Was charcoal a typical disguise method? Gprobins (talk) 14:55, 24 August 2023 (UTC)

Issue

User:LlywelynII, since you seemed informed about this and raised first the problem in the past, do you know if this "Magellan-Elcano expedition" and "Elcano succeeded Magellan" terminology in the intro and infobox is backed up by books and sources? My doubt is that the position and role of Elcano is not presented correctly. We have the problem that very weird language on Elcano and Magellan has been introduced and pushed (over many years) by essentially one agenda-driven and blocked user (and his socks) who disregarded or twisted the sources in various wikipedia articles. To my knowledge, Elcano is the captain of the only ship that managed to return at the starting point, but was he promoted to Magellan's place after the latter died? I fear this language is OR and/or undue weight. But I may be wrong and I'd like to know what people with a better knowledge on the matter have read in books and sources. Barjimoa (talk) 09:11, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

@Barjimoa: Nice of you to ring me, but my point above was about the article name. Magellan is certainly the WP:ENGLISH WP:COMMONNAME. On the other hand, it's certainly true that some people mention Elcano and that he was the 'leader' by the end of the voyage, even if the push for emphasizing that started as POVy Spanish PR.

The current lead seems fine in the way it's expressed. The messy bit was what happened right after Magellan died, and the article appropriately glosses that it was a laundry list of changing leaders at the top and then provides their names down in the body. In other words, as of 18 May 2024, the article doesn't say what you were afraid it did: "promoted... after [Magellan] died". I can't speak to if other articles aren't as correct as this one in their current forms but they should just be brought into alignment with saying something similar if they don't.

I might be missing your point though: You might be asking if Elcano was ever formally charged by an appropriate authority as Magellan's successor of the king's charge. The article doesn't seem to claim that but the answer would be, eh, in a way, of course not since he took over once they were on the other side of the planet from the lawful Spanish authorities and, in a way, of course since he was the appointed and recognized commander of the single vessel left of the fleet. He was definitely the lawful commander of the survivors of the voyage, even if he wasn't the lawful heir of whatever admiralties or governorships Magellan might've been authorized to take up. Elcano's article notes he was called in to the king and spoke as the authority for the voyage but seems to (albeit unclearly) suggest he got in trouble for selling his ship and that his family had trouble getting the Spanish government to honor its supposed commitments to him... so, yeah, but not with the full honors someone with more pull would've gotten.

Oh... Yeah, the infobox here is just completely wrong. You should fix that if you have the time to skim the text and provide the guys between Magellan and Elcano with <br> line breaks between them instead of the current mistaken presentation there. — LlywelynII 07:37, 18 May 2024 (UTC)

Ok, thank you for the clarification. Then I would change "also known" into "sometimes known" as Magellan-Elcano expedition. The infobox you already corrected it, it would be even better to mention the most relevant people of the "others".Barjimoa (talk) 06:48, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

Spanish historical good by David Dourado Fdez

The expedition was militar, Nao victoria is first militar ship to circumnavigate earth. David Dourado Fernandez (talk) 17:26, 23 October 2024 (UTC)