Vasco da Gama Tower Vasco da Gama Tower The Vasco da Gama Tower (, ) is a lattice tower with skyscraper in the civil parish of Parque das Nações, the municipality of Lisbon, in Portugal. Built on the north bank of the Tagus river, it is named after the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama (the first European to arrive in India by sail, in 1498). The tower was built in 1998 for the Expo '98 World's Fair. At the base of the tower was a three-story building that served as the European Union Pavilion during the Expo. While they were open, the tower was
Vasco da Gama da Gama was conspicuously overlooked, and the post given to Francisco de Almeida. On his second voyage, Vasco da Gama inflicted acts of cruelty upon competing traders and local inhabitants, which sealed his notoriety in India. During his second voyage to Calicut, da Gama intercepted a ship of Muslim pilgrims at Madayi travelling from Calicut to Mecca. Described in detail by eyewitness Thomé Lopes and chronicler Gaspar Correia, da Gama looted the ship with over 400 pilgrims on board including 50 women, locked in the passengers, the owner and an ambassador from Egypt and burned them to death. They offered