La Niña, Pinta and Santa María. These three ships possibly made the most famous sea voyage in history. The discovery of the New World inaugurated the era of European explorations. Santa Maria was one of three ships used by Christopher Columbus on his first voyage to the New World in 1492. Santa Maria was the oldest of them.
In the Diario de a Bordo de Colón, compiled by Bartolomé de las Casas, it is said that it was a caravel and it is spoken of the "three caravels", nevertheless it was the greater one of them and in several days it is defined as not. The use of the word can not mean ship or it can be treated in the sense of carrack with the terminology of the time. The other two ships of the expedition were the caravels La Niña and La Pinta. Unlike them, Santa Maria did not return to Spain.
