Thread: In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue...

I guess they believed it because sometimes people went off on these voyages and were never seen again.

There are also weird things that happen at sea, storms, giant creatures they'd never have seen before, St Elmos fire...

So the sailors that made it back would have been telling these stories about what they'd seen, and probably embellishing some , and these rumours of the edge of the earth and creatures from the pits of Hell would have started.

And then people would start believing that those who didnt come back had been taken by these creatures, or fallen off the edge of the earth.