Juan Díaz de Solís

Juan Díaz de Solís (* 1470 in Lebrija, Seville, Spain, † February 2nd, 1516 on the Río de la Plata) was a Spanish navigator and explorer.

Life

Until 1505 he worked in the service of the Portuguese King Manuel I as a cartographer at the Casa da Índia. After his expeditions in Central America in 1506 and in Brazil in 1508, he was after the death of Amerigo Vespucci 1512 " piloto mayor " (Supreme helmsman of the Royal trade association for America) Casa de Contratación appointed.

Two years after his appointment to this office was preparing Solís an expedition to explore the southern part of the continent and to find the Northwest Passage to India. With three caravels he stabbed on October 8, 1515 from the Spanish town of Sanlúcar de Barrameda in the lake. He sailed the coast of South America to the Río de la Plata along and sailed up this river, which he called Mar Dulce ( Sweet Sea) to take these lands on behalf of the Crown in possession. He landed on the eastern shore of the Río de la Plata, near the confluence of the Uruguay River and the Paraná River with two officers and seven sailors. This area was inhabited by many indigenous tribes. These fell upon the land Gone, and Solís and most of his men were killed.

One of the survivors of the expedition of Juan Díaz de Solís was the 14 -year-old cabin boy, Francisco del Puerto, who lived for 10 years among the Indians until he was found by the expedition of Sebastian Cabot. The Argentine writer Juan José Saer has this story impressive in his historical novel El entenado ( Eng.: " The ancestor "; lit.: ' The stepson ') was added. The starting point was him doing the few lines that the Argentine historian José Luis Busaniche (1892-1959) lost in his Historia argentina about the case.

• Seafarer
• Cartographer (16th century)
• Spaniard
• Born in the 15th century
• Died in 1516
• Man