CA' DA MOSTO, ALVISE

born 1432, Venice died July 18, 1488, Venice Ca' da Mosto also spelled Cadamosto Venetian explorer and trader who wrote one of the earliest known accounts of western Africa. Retained by Prince Henry the Navigator, he set sail on March 22, 1455, visited Madeira and the Canary Islands, and coasted along Africa past the mouth of the Senegal River. He ascended some distance up the Gambia River, but, finding the people hostile, he returned to Portugal. Ca' da Mosto appears to have been the first European to reach the Cape Verde Islands, two of which he explored (1456) and found uninhabited. Returning to the African shore, he sailed south from the region of the Gambia to the coast of modern Guinea-Bissau.