AMERICA, the grand land division of the western hemisphere of the world, comprising North, Central, and South America, the West Indies and other adja cent islands. Although the indigenous inhabitants of the greater part of America display no family connection with the other races of the earth, the Eskimos of the Arctic regions are un questionably of Mongolian origin. By many it is believed that the earliest dis covery of America was by the Chinese. According to a circumstantial Chinese narrative, the voyager Hwui-Shan, at the end of the 5th century A. D., sailed 32,000 li E. to the Fu-Sang country. Moreover, students of the ancient Mex ican and Peruvian civilizations find in them evidences of the imitation of Chinese institurons and practices.
The first European voyages to Ameri can shores were made by the Northmen, who, in the middle of the 10th century, discovered and colonized Greenland, and (about 1001) visited the coasts of New England, where they established settle ments. In 1492 Columbus discovered the West Indies, and in 1498 the mainland of South America; the first navigator to reach the North American mainland was Cabot (1497). The circumstances of the origin of the name America are highly interesting. Amerigo Vespucci, a navi gator of Florence, undertook four voy ages across the Atlantic—in 1497, 1499, 1501, and 1503. He described his ex
periences in a series of letters, addressed to his friend Soderini, gonfalonier of Florence, and to other gentlemen. These letters were translated by Martin Wald seemiiller, a German schoolmaster and cosmographer at St. Die in Lorraine, and incorporated by him in a treatise, "Cos mographi Introductio," published in 1507. In his preface Waldseemiiller pro posed that "this fourth part of the world" should be called, after its discov erer, a man of sagacious mind, by the name of Amerige—that is to say, the land of Americus or America, since both Europe and Asia have obtained the name of women." The mature judgment of historical specialists acquits Vespucci of any collusion or participation in the nam ing of America, and places the respon sibility wholly upon the obscure Vosgian pedagogue. The two American conti nents, with their N. and S. islands, have a length of about 8,280 geographical miles, covering 138 degrees of latitude. Their extreme E. and W. points are sep arated by 1311/2 degrees of longitude. The combined area is estimated at , t 16 000,000 square miles; the population at 200,000,000.