18. It is thought that the Cape Town area was settled between 12000-15000 years ago, but little is known about this time. The European first reached the area in 1486. What nationality was this explorer?
From Quiz Cape Town - South Africa's Mother City
Answer:
Portuguese
In 1488 Bartolomeu Dias, a Portuguese explorer named the area the Cape of Storms, but later King John II of Portugal changed the name to the Cape of Good Hope because of the optimism associated with the opening of a sea route to India and the East Indies. It was wrongly thought as ships "rounded the Cape", that this was where the Atlantic and Indian Oceans met. This is not true. That occurs 150km to the east south east off Cape Agulhas, southern Africa's southern tip. However for ships sailing down the west African coast, rounding the Cape is where ships start travelling east rather than south. In the 16th Century Portuguese, French, Danish, Dutch and English ships stopped over in Table Bay en-route to the East Indies. They traded tobacco, copper and iron with the local inhabitants, the Khoikhoi, who in return gave them fresh meat.