Lithograph entitled: The first sight of the new world, Columbus discovering America. Christopher Columbus (1451-1506) was an Italian explorer, colonizer, and navigator. Under the support of the Catholic Monarchs of Spain (King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella), he completed four voyages across the Atlantic Ocean that led to European awareness of the American continents. During his first voyage in 1492, instead of reaching Japan as he had intended, Columbus landed in the Bahamas archipelago, which he named San Salvador. Over the course of three more voyages, Columbus visited the Greater and Lesser Antilles, the Caribbean coast of Colombia and Venezuela claiming them for the Spanish Empire. Those voyages, and his efforts to establish permanent settlements in the island of Hispaniola, started Spanish colonization, which foreshadowed the general European colonization of the "New World".