Portuguese discovery of the sea route to India Portuguese discovery of the sea route to India The discovery of the sea route to India is the description sometimes used in Europe and among the Portuguese for the first recorded trip made directly from Europe to India via the Atlantic Ocean. It was undertaken under the command of Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama during the reign of King Manuel I in 1497–1499. Considered by Europe to be one of the most remarkable voyages of the Age of Discovery, it consolidated the Portuguese maritime presence over the Indian Ocean and that country's dominance of global trade routes. The plan for
Portuguese India Armadas (1497–99) to the end of 1563. It is conserved at the Pierpont Morgan Library in New York City (ms. 525). Another codex of the same nature is the "Memória das Armadas que de Portugal passaram à Índia" ("Memory of the Armadas that from Portugal passed to India") or "Livro das Armadas", held by the Academia das Ciências in Lisbon. It covers the period from 1497 to 1567 (although missing the armada of 1517). The first Portuguese chronicler to attempt a systematic chronology of the India Armadas seems to have been Diogo do Couto, in his appendix to João de Barros's