“It is not discovery, but awareness that changes the world.”
“The first modern man was Amerigo Vespucci.” - Yuval Harari, author of Sapiens

Columbus reached the American continent, but until the day he died he believed it was India.
Scientists at the time already knew the size of the Earth and the location of Asia, so they knew that the land he had discovered could not be Asia.
However, Columbus ignored such scientific observations and insisted that “the Earth is pear-shaped.”
In these turbulent times, one man saw the true meaning of the land.
Amerigo Vespucci, a Florentine navigator and observer.
After several explorations, he recorded his historical realization that “this is not Asia, but a completely new world.”


Stefan Zweig, a European intellectual and Germany's greatest biographer, uncovers the truth of history like a detective with his characteristically meticulous observation.
History sometimes leaves behind great ironies created by a single minor mistake.
How did the name of Amerigo Vespucci, a Florentine explorer who arrived later than Christopher Columbus, become entrenched in the names of two continents in the late 15th century? Zweig traces the history of misunderstandings and controversies surrounding Amerigo Vespucci, captivatingly revealing how a coincidence hidden in a simple letter and a single map became the secret to the naming of the New World, a secret that has endured for centuries.

After whom did the American continent come to be called 'America'?
--- From the first sentence

These events are the result of countless coincidences, errors, and misunderstandings.
This is the story of a man who achieved the incredible honor of having the fourth continent named after him, based on a voyage he never set out on, a voyage he never claimed to have set out on.

--- p.11

Columbus claimed to have discovered thousands of islands on his own, and even saw a river flowing from paradise.
But it was a strange thing! How could all these islands and these peculiar lands, nestled off the coast of India, have remained unknown to the ancients and Arabs? It was all so confusing, so contradictory, so full of mystery, that people were at a loss as to what to believe about these islands in the west.

--- p.42

But the original fame and world-historical significance of this little pamphlet lies neither in its content itself nor in the spiritual tension it aroused in the minds of its contemporaries.
What made this letter a major incident was, surprisingly, not the text itself, but the word "new world."

--- p.59

Waldseemüller printed the word "America" ​​in the margins of paragraphs and also included it on the world map attached to the book.
From that moment on, Amerigo Vespucci, who had been a finite being, unknowingly received an immortal halo over his head.
From this time on, the land called America was called America, and it was destined to remain so forever.

--- p.89

Never before have coincidences and errors achieved such daring comedy.
But history, which knows how to create both grand tragedies and delightful comedies, has provided a peculiar and subtle moment of dramatic change in this comedy of errors.

--- p.99

Perhaps the name best suited to a democratic nation is not that of a king or a conqueror, but that of an ordinary person who was brave without a name.
This would certainly be a fairer designation than names like West Indies, New England, New Spain, or the Land of the Holy Cross.

--- p.186