Pedro Mascarenhas

D. Pedro Mascarenhas was a Portuguese explorer and colonial administrator. He was the first European to discover the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean in 1512. He also encountered the Indian Ocean island of Mauritius in 1512, although he may not have been the first Portuguese explorer to do so; earlier expeditions by Diogo Dias and Afonso de Albuquerque along with Diogo Fernandes Pereira may have encountered the islands. In 1528 explorer Diogo Rodrigues named the islands of Réunion, Mauritius, and Rodrigues the Mascarene Islands, after the name of Mascarenhas.