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Da Gama responded by capturing 30 unarmed local fishermen, dismembering their bodies and letting the remains wash in on the tide as a message of Portuguese power.

In Calicut, there were more skirmishes between da Gama and Arab traders. The pilgrim ship incident cemented the reputation of the Portuguese as very dangerous and violent people in the Indian Ocean.' 'Maybe he was trying to create an image for the Portuguese - you don't mess with us,' says Subrahmanyam.

Sadly, scurvy had claimed all but 54 of his 170-man crew including da Gama's brother Paolo.

The local traders and merchants made it clear that gold was the only currency that mattered.Īfter a tortuous journey home against the monsoon winds, Da Gama returned to Lisbon nearly empty-handed, but he was still greeted as a hero for reaching his destination and making it home after two years and 24,000 miles (38,600 kilometers) at sea. Again, nobody in Calicut was impressed with the paltry goods the Portuguese had brought to trade for high-end spices. Instead, da Gama found outposts of an extensive African-Indian trade network operated largely by Arab Muslims. 'They were under the impression that there were a lot of Christians in India and that these people would be their natural allies,' says Subrahmanyam. Subrahmanyam says that the Portuguese were 'shocked' to find that Muslims were running the spice trade in India. The Portuguese were better received in the African kingdom of Malindi, where da Gama was able to recruit a local pilot who could guide them across the tricky Indian Ocean to their final destination.Īfter a 27-day journey, da Gama and his men arrived in Calicut, a coastal city in Southern India known today as Kozhikode. Da Gama fled back to his ship and lobbed a few canon balls at the city as parting shots. In Mozambique, the Sultan and his people were actually offended and started to riot, says Nucup. 'These weren't impressive to local traders.' 'But when da Gama stopped at ports in Eastern Africa and offered these items for trade, people would laugh at him,' says Nucup. Nucup says that da Gama was following the example of Columbus, who had won over native leaders with simple European goods like bells, flannel and metalwork. Da Gama's first major encounter with an African kingdom was in Mozambique, where he was poorly received, an experience that would be repeated throughout the first voyage.

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