This timeline is an incomplete list of significant events of human migration and exploration by sea.
This timeline does not include migration and exploration over land, including migration across land that has subsequently submerged beneath the sea, such as the initial settlement of Great Britain and Ireland.
On 27 June 1542, Cabrillo sails northwest with three ships to explore the Pacific Coast of Mexico and the Californias.
On 1 November 1542, López de Villalobos sails west with six galleons and 400 men across the Pacific Ocean to the East Indies.
López de Villalobos dies on 4 April 1544, in a Portuguese prison cell on the Island of Amboyna.