Dionisio Alcalá Galiano
| Dionisio Alcalá Galiano | |
|---|---|
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| Born |
8 October 1760 Cabra, Córdoba, Spain |
| Died | 21 October 1805 Battle of Trafalgar |
| Occupation |
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Dionisio Alcalá Galiano (8 October 1760 – 21 October 1805) was a Spanish naval officer, cartographer, and explorer. He mapped various coastlines in Europe and the Americas with unprecedented accuracy using new technology such as chronometers. He commanded an expedition that explored and mapped the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Strait of Georgia, and made the first European circumnavigation of Vancouver Island. He reached the rank of brigadier and died during the Battle of Trafalgar.
He sometimes signed his full surname, Alcalá-Galiano, but often used just Galiano. The published journal of his 1792 voyage uses just the name Galiano, and this has become the name by which he is most known.
Galiano was born in Cabra, Córdoba, Spain, in 1760. He entered the Spanish navy in 1771, at the age of 11, and enrolled in the Spanish naval school in 1775. After graduation in 1779 he entered active service.
He participated in several hydrographic surveys and became skilled in cartography. As a junior officer he spent time in the River Plate region and the Falkland Islands. He returned to Spain in 1783.
In 1784 Galiano met and worked with Alessandro Malaspina, with whom he would later journey to America. Both men were among a group of officers studying astronomy at the Royal Observatory in Cádiz under Admiral Vicente Tofiño. The association was brief, as Tofiño was called upon to create an atlas of the coast of Spain, and he chose Galiano to work on the project. Thus Galiano assisted Tofiño's great hydrographic study, which resulted in the Atlas Maritímo de España, published in 1789. This experience was the basis of Galiano's expertise as a professional cartographer.
In 1785 Galiano married María de la Consolación Villavicencio. Soon after the marriage he left on a survey of the Strait of Magellan under another influential teacher, Antonio de Córdoba.
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