Ferdinand Magellan was a Portuguese explorer who organized and led the first expedition to sail around the world, though he died before it was completed. Born Fernão de Magalhães in 1480 in Sabrosa, northern Portugal, he came from a family of minor nobility. His voyage, launched in 1519 under the Spanish flag, proved that the Earth’s oceans were connected and reshaped European understanding of the planet’s size.
A Soldier Before an Explorer
Magellan spent nearly two decades in Portuguese military service before he ever planned his famous voyage. At 25, he enlisted in the Portuguese army and served along the coasts of Africa and across the Indian Ocean, first as a soldier, then as an officer. Between 1505 and 1513, he took part in expeditions to establish Portuguese control in India and to conquer Malacca (modern-day Melaka, Malaysia). He later served in Morocco, where he was seriously wounded in hand-to-hand combat. The injury left him with a permanent limp.
Despite years of loyal service, and having spent most of his personal fortune in the process, Magellan fell out of favor with King Manuel I of Portugal. He had clashed with Portuguese officials in Morocco, and when he approached the king on three separate occasions to fund an expedition seeking a new westward route to the Spice Islands, Manuel refused each time. The king did, however, allow Magellan to offer his services elsewhere. Magellan took him up on it and never returned to Portugal. Manuel I considered him a traitor.
Switching Allegiance to Spain
Magellan turned to Spain, Portugal’s rival in the race to control the lucrative spice trade. He proposed sailing west to reach the Moluccas (the Spice Islands in present-day Indonesia), arguing that a westward route would place the islands within Spain’s sphere of influence under the Treaty of Tordesillas, which had divided the non-European world between the two kingdoms. The young King Charles I of Spain, later Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, agreed to fund the expedition.
On September 20, 1519, Magellan departed from Sanlúcar de Barrameda, Spain, with a fleet of five ships and roughly 270 crew members. The fleet sailed southwest across the Atlantic to the coast of South America, then worked its way south along the coastline searching for a passage to the ocean beyond.
Through the Strait and Into the Pacific
In late October 1520, after more than a year of sailing, the fleet found the narrow waterway at the southern tip of South America that now bears Magellan’s name. The Strait of Magellan was treacherous, a winding 350-mile channel flanked by mountains and battered by storms. During the passage, one ship, the San Antonio, broke away from the fleet and turned back to Spain. Magellan pressed on with the remaining vessels.
When the fleet emerged on the other side, they encountered an ocean so calm compared to the Atlantic that Magellan named it the “Pacific,” from the Latin word for peaceful. That calm was deceptive. The Pacific crossing became the most brutal stretch of the entire voyage. The fleet sailed for months without resupply. Antonio Pigafetta, the expedition’s official chronicler, recorded that of the 166 men who crossed the Pacific, 19 died and another 25 to 30 fell seriously ill. Scurvy, caused by a complete lack of fresh fruits and vegetables, ravaged the crew. They resorted to eating sawdust, leather strips from the ships’ rigging, and rats.
Death in the Philippines
The fleet finally reached the Philippine archipelago in March 1521. Magellan began forging alliances with local rulers, using a combination of diplomacy and force to persuade them to convert to Catholicism and accept Spanish authority. He found a willing partner in Rajah Humabon, a powerful chief on the island of Cebu. But not all local leaders were receptive.
Datu Lapu-Lapu, a chieftain on the nearby island of Mactan, refused to submit. Humabon and another local ally, Datu Zula, urged Magellan to use force. On the early morning of April 27, 1521, about 60 European soldiers joined with Humabon’s forces and attacked Mactan at dawn. Lapu-Lapu and his warriors were waiting for them on the beach. Weighed down by heavy armor, the Europeans stumbled in the shallow water under a hail of arrows. Magellan was struck by a poisoned arrow in his unarmored leg, then wounded in the arm with a spear and slashed in the leg with a large native sword, likely a kampilan. His men were overwhelmed. Lapu-Lapu’s warriors killed Magellan and several of his companions.
The Voyage Continues Without Him
Magellan’s death did not end the expedition. The surviving crew, now drastically reduced, continued westward under new leadership. They reached the Spice Islands and loaded cargo. Of the original five ships, only one remained seaworthy for the return trip: the Victoria. The Trinidad, taking on water and beyond repair, had to be abandoned along with its crew.
The Victoria, commanded by Basque navigator Juan Sebastián Elcano, sailed across the Indian Ocean, rounded the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa, and arrived back in Sanlúcar de Barrameda on September 6, 1522. The voyage had taken nearly three years. Of the original 270 crew members, only 18 survived to complete the full circumnavigation.
Legacy and Modern Reassessment
For centuries, Magellan was celebrated in the Western world as the mastermind of the first circumnavigation, a feat that proved the Earth was round (already known to educated Europeans) and demonstrated just how vast the Pacific Ocean truly was. His name remains on the strait he navigated and on the Magellanic Clouds, two galaxies visible from the Southern Hemisphere that Pigafetta documented during the voyage.
In the Philippines, however, the story is told very differently. Magellan is not a hero but an invader, and Lapu-Lapu is the central figure. In 2021, during the 500th anniversary of the Battle of Mactan, the Filipino government organized national commemorations that explicitly honored Indigenous resistance. Events included a military parade, a drone show, and the unveiling of a new shrine to Lapu-Lapu. A national art competition centered on themes of sovereignty and unity. The grand prize in the sovereignty category went to a painting titled “Hindi Pasisiil” (Never to be Conquered), depicting Lapu-Lapu leaping forward with his kampilan raised while Magellan and his armored soldiers tumble into the sea. The Filipino approach flips the traditional colonial narrative, telling the story of Mactan from the perspective of the people who lived there rather than the strangers who arrived on their shores.