AMERIGO VESPUCCI (or VESPUCIO) (ves-puteh'-ee), Italian navigator, born in Florence, Italy, 9 March, 1451; died in Seville, Spain, 22 Feb., 1512. He was of a wealthy family of merchants, and received his education from his uncle, Giorgi Antonio Vespucci, a Dominican friar, a friend and colleague of Savonarola. He engaged in business, first in Florence and afterward in Seville, where he met Columbus, perhaps as early as 1493, and where in 1497 he equipped the fleet with which that navigator sailed on his third voyage. He had previously, in 1496, had charge of fitting out a fleet for the Spanish government.
Amerigo sailed from Spain in 1499 in an expedition that visited the neighborhood of Cape Paria and several hundred miles of coast, and returned in June, 1500. In May, 1501, he entered the service of Emanuel, of Portugal, and participated in an expedition that visited the coast of. Brazil. hi May, 1503, he commanded a caravel in a squadron that sailed for the discovery of Malacca,......
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