On Christopher Columbus Being Given an Arabic Translator On His First Voyage to What He, Isabella, and Ferdinand Were All Hoping Would Be the Orient

Yeah, I guess that the rationale for it was that the Arabic language, while unlikely to be the language used in the far east, would probably be much closer than Spanish, Portuguese, or Italian would be and so why not give it a chance. Needless to say, not a single person involved was expecting Taino and so hopefully that translator had some alternative skills. Fishing, maybe?