Erdogan says Muslims, not Columbus, discovered Americas
"Contacts between Latin America and Islam date back to the 12th century. Muslims discovered America in 1178, not Christopher Columbus," the Turkish president said in a televised speech during an Istanbul summit of Muslim leaders from Latin America.
"Muslim sailors arrived in America from 1178. Columbus mentioned the existence of a mosque on a hill on the Cuban coast," Erdogan said.
Erdogan said that Ankara was even prepared to build a mosque at the site mentioned by the Genoese explorer.
"I would like to talk about it to my Cuban brothers. A mosque would go perfectly on the hill today," the Turkish leader said.
History books say that Columbus set foot on the American continent in 1492 as he was seeking a new maritime route to India.
A minority of Muslim scholars have recently suggested a prior Muslim presence in the Americas, although no pre-Columbian ruin of an Islamic structure has ever been found.
In a controversial article published in 1996, historian Youssef Mroueh refers to a diary entry from Columbus that mentions a mosque in Cuba. But the passage is widely understood to be a metaphorical reference to the shape of the landscape.
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"I know ancient arabs discovered lot of stars and recorded their positions within our own galaxy milky way but there is no proof that they went beyond our galaxy in their record keeping." Arabs were muslims and your these words are proving that muslim scientists provide the basis of space technologies on which basis non-muslim scientists work hard and reached beyond the stars and galaxies.The renowned muslim scientists are Ibn-e-Sina,Ibn-e-Batoota and many others who provided the basic methods in the different fields of space technology and now just due to plagiarism we know only non-muslim scientists....
@Gp65: ...and they crossed the land bridge from Asia 30,000 years ago. We are all "natives of Africa" where our human ancestors evolved and then migrated from.
@Sneha: British India before 1492? Didn't Columbus begin all the European voyaging and colonializing business? By and by for skeptics: The Sanskrit word for River Indus is "Sindhu" and is the root underlying Sindh, Sindhis, Hind, Indus, and Hindus. Alexander the Great Hellenicized the name to "Indus". Arabs called the land "Hind".
http://lostislamichistory.com/columbus-was-not-the-first-to-cross-the-atlantic/
Food for thought
@ashrafool Meccafooq, You salute the turkish president but where is the proof that other non muslims can believe it. Also do you have proof that Muslims discovered galaxies in past millennium? . I know ancient arabs discovered lot of stars and recorded their positions within our own galaxy milky way but there is no proof that they went beyond our galaxy in their record keeping.
Muslim scientists done a lot in the world in space,seas,planets and galaxies but unfortunately we are teaching plagiarized educational materials in our schools,colleges and universities almost all over the world most especially importantly in the muslim countries this is why we believe that every advancement/development in the world belongs to the non-muslim scientists and this is our own the biggest and greatest ever committed mistakes in education sector that we teach plagiarized materials in our educational institutions instead of the achievements of muslim scientists and great muslim leaders history.First time any muslim leader said so and I salute him........
These rightwing political leaders should keep their mouths shut and not indulge in the subjects that is not their field. He should be better than Ahmedinigad of Iran but obviously he is not.
All our efforts to send Mangalyan to Mars are going to be waste..
Muslims have already discovered Mars and inhabiting it...
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is one of the most dangerous Muslim in the world stage wearing a western dark suit and colorful ties and lives in a grand Presidential palace and is an elected leader of an important Muslim Euro-Asian country. I seriously mean it. He is there to change the "world order" to suit his distorted views such as Columbus' discovery.
Native Americans have common heritage with asians.. so yea get with the program guys columbus did not discover america also lets not forget about incas and aztecs
Now we KNOW why turkeys come from TURKEY!!! I had always wondered before, but not anymore!
Neither Muslims nor Columbus 'discovered' America. Native Americans were already living them.
maybe he want some royalty for that....
They were searching marine routes to india and Indian Ocean/naming people indians landing in wrong territories since 1492 and much before. Yet only in one country history is distorted to that of world history. That there was no such thing called india before 1947. Wonder how they forget it was "British india" (British colony-india).
A brilliant politcal move by the Turkish President to challenge the hegemony of the last spaniard , fidel Castor, with the aim to construct a mosque in communist Cuba. Let the historians challenge his statement and prove that this was not the case. All is legitimate if the end is well, The wealth from the muslim world will flow and Cuba will rid itself if isolation.
Rex Minor
@Bewildered: What has Modi got to do with him? I would say more like he has a lot in common with the wild claims Pakistani's make about their heritage being purely Arab.
Can he identify the names of this people just an assumption or I said he said, or so and so heard is not a historical fact should refrain from falsifying history without solid proof
Actually ancient name of America was Islamistan.West conspired to make it into Americas.
History is written by the victors. Even if Muslims did not reach Americas before Columbus then the Vikings surely did. No ifs and buts about that. Either way Columbus being the first is factually wrong so stop sucking on the kool-aid and get with the program.
The President of a country does not make claims or shoot his mouth of in the absence of veritable claims. After all, he's not Nawaz, Bush, Modi, or some political riff raff. Salams
Modi and He seem to have something in common! Guess what? Development. Am I missing something?
Columbus must be a Muslim !!
This is great news! Applaud H.E. Erdogan for shedding light on what left-liberal historian have refused to accept.
I feel even more confident that Turkey, long the leading light in the region will shine even brighter and may be even bring back the glory days of Caliphate.
Oh wait, that has already been claimed by ISIS/ISIL/IS!
Erdogan will have to compete with Chinese now on that front. Some years ago Chinese also claimed that they had reached American long before Columbus and as a proof of their "discovery" they produced a "very old cartographic" evidence with North American map with America written in it in Chinese. Erdogan will have to compete with the newly crowned Khalifa al-Baghdadi as well as he is challenging his position by claiming the North America for Islam!
Yes Everything from a Hairpin to Aeroplane has been made by Muslims because they are very intelligent....right..I hope all would agree with me...lol....
And cars run on djins.