And he knew he had to lie about the dia of the Earth to sell the Japan story.
in the ancient world the belief that the Earth was 18,000 miles in circumference was accepted
that had been stated by both Pliny secundus and Poseidonius along with their belief that the earth was egg shaped
Erastothenes who did get the circumference measurement correct was widely discarded
the only people who would have known that at the time of columbus would be someone who had access to the Library of Alexandria
so you either have to believe that Columbus
1) came up with these two ideas independantly (this is what he claimed)
2) had access to time travel (this would be believable compared to 1.)
3) had help from someone who had access to alexandrian library records (now who could that be)
the fact that he lied to his crew about the distance they covered is well known
every time he travelled a certain distancehe told them it was considerably less
there are two reason he would do this
1) he suspected the actual distance was further
2) he was a habitual liar
whos for both
either way the orthodox account of his travels reads like fiction to anyone armed with modern geographical knowledge
something which at the time of writing no one would have noticed
