Verrazzano (1524)
Verrazzano, Giovanni da (1485?-1527). Scheeps-togt Van Johan de Verrazano,Florentyner, na Florida [...]. Leyden: P. vander Aa, [1710?].
Giovanni da Verrazzano, an explorer, navigator and merchant, was born in Florence or the vicinity around 1485.
As in the cases of John Cabot and Jacques Cartier, we know almost nothing about Verrazzano before his first voyage of discovery to America, which he undertook in 1524 under the sponsorship of France. He too set out in search of a route to Asia and returned disappointed: "I did not think that the new land I discovered would be such an obstacle to me." Though disappointed, he did not return empty-handed, for he was the first European to sail along the entire coast of North America from Florida to Newfoundland, which enabled him to claim that "the New World I described above is a whole in itself; it is not linked either to Asia or to Africa (of this I am certain)." Since Columbus's discovery, nobody had yet been able to claim, on the basis of evidence, that America was really a distinct continent.
In 1528 Verrazzano undertook a second voyage in search of the undiscoverable passage to Asia, this time to the south of the region he had explored previously. After landing on one of the Caribbean islands, he was killed by the Caribs.
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