Why Is Christopher Columbus Considered A Villain

By today’s standards, Christopher Columbus would be considered a villain due to the atrocities that he has committed against the indigenous people of the new land

When Columbus first travelled across the atlantic ocean, he was in search of India. What Columbus did find was not India, but was the land millions of people now call the United States of America. The first man of the shop to spot land was to receive a yearly pension of 10,000 maravedis for the rest of their life. Christopher Columbus claimed he spotted land first when, in fact, a man by the name of Rodrigo spotted the moon shining on the sand. Rodrigo never received the pension because Columbus took it from Rodrigo. When the crew reached land, the Arawak Indians would swim out to greet the foreigners and offered hospitality to them.

Columbus and his people would begin to take advantage of the Arawak Indians' hospitality. The Arawaks lived in villages, grew their own food, and wore earrings made of
Columbus would receive as much gold as he could possibly desire in return for gaining the Arawak Indians as slaves. The Indians would die as captives under Columbus, he burned down villages, took men, women and children as slaves. Columbus took them to Spain, where they were chained and auctioned off as slaves to the people. Arawak Indians were tortured, hung, and burned alive by the Spaniard masters. The Arawaks even began to kill themselves and their children to save themselves of the torture of the Spaniards. In two years, half of the Arawaks were dead. Even more were being tortured, working for the people that enslaved them. Eliot Morison, in his famous book Christopher Columbus, Mariner, wrote “The cruel policy initiated by Columbus and pursued by his successors resulted in complete genocide.” this proves that, even if indirectly, Columbus wrought havoc to the Arawak Indians, and was the reason for the death and cruelty of so