Juan Fernández (explorer)
Juan Fernández ( * 1536, † 1604) was a Spanish navigator and explorer.
In 1563 he sailed in just 30 days from Callao in Peru to Valparaiso in Chile. Quick made him his seamanship skills in Spain famous.
On November 22, 1574, he discovered later named after him, Juan Fernandez Islands, an archipelago 700 km west of the Chilean coast. Fernández was on these islands back some goats, which should serve as a food reserve. When Alexander Selkirk, who was the model for the novel Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe stranded there in 1704, he found on his island before these goats. They had been established in the meantime, a separate breed, which was smaller than the exposed goats, and assumed a brown color. It was the so-called Juan Fernandez goats. The island, stranded on the Selkirk, was called Isla Más a Tierra until 1966, when it was renamed Isla Robinson Crusoe.
To 1574 Fernández also discovered today, which also belongs to Chile islands of San Ambrosio and San Felix.
- Man
- Spaniard
- Discoverer (16th century)
- Seafarer
- Born in 1536
- Died in 1604