Pedro Álvares Cabral

Pedro Álvares Cabral (1460?-1526?), Portuguese navigator, who claimed the Bahia State of Brazil for Portugal. He was born probably in Belmonte. In 1500 Manuel, king of Portugal, appointed him commander of a trading expedition to India. With 13 vessels and more than 1000 men, Cabral left Lisbon under orders to proceed along the Cape of Good Hope route discovered in 1497-98 by the Portuguese navigator Vasco da Gama. To avoid storms and calms, Cabral set a more westerly course than that followed by da Gama, but winds and currents drove his vessels still farther westward.

On April 22, 1500, about three months after the arrival of the Spanish explorer Vincente Yáñez Pinzón, Cabral reached the present-day Bahia State of Brazil. After claiming possession of the region for Manuel, he sent a vessel to Portugal with news of his discovery. He then resumed his voyage, sailing eastward, but four of his vessels were lost in a storm off the Cape of Good Hope. The remainder of his expedition succeeded in reaching Calicut (now Kozhikode), India. There he negotiated a commercial treaty with the native ruler and established a trading post. Little is known of Cabral after his return to Portugal in 1501.