Why did the spanish and portuguese launch voyages of exploration? a. they hoped to establish sea routes to the indies to make profits from trade. b. they were looking for territory where people could settle. c. they wanted to study the governments of other countries around the world. d. they wanted to learn more about the cultures of peoples in other parts of the world.

The correct answer is A. They hoped to establish sea routes to the Indies to make profits from trade.

Trade between Europe and India was blocked by the Ottoman Empire as it passed through the Red Sea.

Portugal had a revolution in the use of new navigation techniques thanks to discoveries developed during the fifteenth century at the School of Sagres.

These advances allowed them to establish a new route that allowed them to sail to India bordering the African coast.

This impelled the art of navigation in many parts of Europe and motivated the navigator Christopher Columbus, from the mediterranean city of Genoa, to make trips of exploration of new routes, proposing to the King of Portugal to sponsor him in such an adventure. Upon receiving the refusal from Portugal, he presented the project to the Catholic Monarchs of Spain.

The plan was to reach India sailing east, since he knew that the earth was not flat but round but did not know the existence of the American continent.

The project was approved, financed and sponsored by the Spanish crown and without being in the plans Columbus reached the American continent, where Spain and Portugal were the first European powers to conquer lands and seize them.

The term "to colonize" comes from the action carried out by Christopher Columbus.