| 1st century AD |
Chinese invent the first compass. |
| 120 AD |
Ptolemy creates the first flat map of the world. |
| 982 |
Eric the Red discovers Greenland. |
| 1002 |
Leif Ericson discovers North America. |
| 1271- 1295 |
Marco Polo goes to China. |
| 1450 |
Prince Henry
the Navigator builds school for sailors. |
| 1453 |
Turkish Empire cuts off the land route for spices from Asia
to Europe. Search for sea route begins. |
| 1487 |
Bartholomeu Dias discovers the southern tip of Africa. |
| 1492 |
Columbus sails to the New World. |
| 1497 |
John Cabot discovers
Newfoundland while he searches for the Northwest Passage. |
| 1502 |
Amerigo Vespucci returns from his
explorations of the New World. American continents named after him
by German mapmaker. |
| 1513 |
Vasco Nunez de Balboa discovers the
eastern shore of the Pacific Ocean. Juan Ponce de Leon searches for
the Fountain of Youth in Florida. |
| 1519 - 1522 |
Ferdinand Magellan and his crew
sail around the world. |
| 1521 |
Hernando Cortez defeats the Aztec
Empire. |
| 1533 |
Francisco Pizarro defeats the Inca
Empire. |
| 1534 |
Jacques Cartier discovers
the St. Lawrence River and the Great Lakes. |
| 1539 - 1542 |
Hernando De Soto explores the
southeastern United States. |
| 1540 |
Francisco Vasquez de Coronado
explores the southwestern United States and discovers the Grand Canyon. |
| 1577 |
Sir Francis Drake
becomes the first Englishman to sail around the world. |
| 1673 |
Father Jacques Marquette
and Louis Jolliet explore the Mississippi River. |
| 1682 |
Rene-Robert de La Salle explores
the Mississippi River from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. |
