Replies

In saying there was no reference to Asia or its trade in Columbus' contract with the Monarchs, which is the best evidence of what he intended to find, and why...

I by no means meant anything so trivial as that the WORD "Asia" did not appear in it, which of course did often mean Anatolia in those days. I meant, of course, that there was no reference under any name to any part of what we call Asia, nor any evidence that any such hope was any significant part of the reason for his trip.

Indeed, since this contract was intended to make Columbus and all of his descendants rich, and titled nobility, forever... had any such possibility as the trade with rich Asia [modern sense] been seriously entertained, it surely would have been mentioned. Nearly all serious Europeans, including Columbus, understood where China was and how far west of Seville it did in fact lie.

Again, it alluded only to "certain islands and mainlands in the Ocean Sea," i.e. the western Atlantic.

It was only upon finding the inhabitants to be Asian, and the lands to resemble the Spice Islands, that the small-world hypothesis for a time, came to be entertained by him and any serious others.