The name “America” was invented 500 years ago, in 1507. The German mapmaker who did it mistakenly thought Italian adventurer Amerigo Vespucci had discovered the mainland of the New World. The man who ...

AMERIGO VESPUCCI, PILOT MAJOR—Frederick J. Pohl—Columbia University Press ($3). Amerigo Vespucci first sighted the coast of Brazil late in June 1499. Vegetation grew so thickly at the water’s edge ...

“Amerigo Vespucci, who gave his name to America, was a pimp in his youth and a magus in his maturity,” writes Felipe Fernández-Armesto in his new biography (Random House, 231 pages, $24.95). His ...

Despite bequeathing his name to two continents, the explorer Amerigo Vespucci has languished in the shadow of his precursor, friend and fellow Italian, Christopher Columbus. In recent times, that has ...

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