Vandino and Ugolino Vivaldi

Vandino And Ugolino Vivaldi

Vandino (sometimes Vadino or Guido) and Ugolino Vivaldi (sometimes Ugolino de Vivaldo) (fl. 1291) were two brothers and Genoese explorers and merchants.

In the spring of 1291 they sailed from Genoa with the intention of reaching India by sea in ten years. The expedition was financed by Teodisio Doria and piloted by Majorcan sailors. In two galleys, they sailed along the coast of present-day Morocco after passing through the Straits of Gibraltar. Their subsequent fate is unknown. They may have followed the African coast as far as Cape Non. Whether they attempted to sail west across the Atlantic or circumnavigate the African continent is also unknown.

The expedition of the Vivaldi brothers was one of the first recorded voyages that sailed out from the Mediterranean into the Atlantic since the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD.