No one at the time seems to have questioned the fact that Christopher Columbus had indeed done what he had set out to do. The lands discovered was undoubtedly the easternmost end of the Asiatic continent, and the coast of Hispaniola therefore must be the northern end of Japan. A direct route to the lands of Marco Polo had thus been opened; if Columbus had not as yet seen any evidence of Oriental splendor, they would certainly find the cities of Cathay and Cipango on their next voyage out.
But already disputes had begun as to whose property these unexplored regions beyond the horizon should be – native populations, of course, never being considered as the logical owners. As head of all Christendom, it was by tradition up to the Pope to partition all lands not in the hands of any Christian king, and to see to it that they were brought into the Christian community. Several such Papal decrees, known as bulls, had already awarded to the King of Portugal: the African coast “as far as the country where the Indians serve Christ” – meaning the legendary kingdom of Prester John – as well as “any and every island that might be found and possessed beyond the Canary Islands and on the hither side of Guinea or in its neighborhood.” John II of Portugal, therefore, with some justification for his claim that Columbus had invaded his domains, had already begun to fit out a fleet to explore the newly discovered lands.
But now Ferdinand and Isabella appealed to Pope Alexander VI asking that Columbus’ discovery be officially recognized as Spanish property, and with Alexander any request from the Spanish Sovereigns was sure to receive special attention. Not only was he a native of Spain, but Ferdinand and Isabella had been instrumental in getting him elected Pope; they also had presented large estates to Alexander’s illegitimate children, the most infamous of whom were Cesare and Lucrezia Borgia. The Pope, at any rate, was not one to forget favors. In his famous Bull of Demarcation in 1493, a line was drawn 370 leagues west of the Cape Verde Islands, running north to south; all discoveries east of this line, even if made by Spanish ships, would belong to Portugal; those to the west of the line, even if made by Portuguese ships, would all belong to Spain. Always a matter of controversy and frequently violated by all concerned, this Demarcation Line eventually made all of Brazil a Portuguese possession, and the Portuguese language is still spoken in that country today. For the time being, however, the entire non-Christian world had thus been divided between the kingdoms of Spain and Portugal.