Eventually a Biscayan named Sebastian del Cano, sailing home by way of the Cape of Good Hope, reached San Lucar in command of the " Victoria " on the 6th of September 1522, with eighteen survivors; this one ship of the squadron which sailed on the quest succeeded in accomplishing the first circumnavigation of the globe.
So too Heraclides was sent to explore the Caspian; the survey, and possible circumnavigation, of the Arabian coasts was the last enterprise which occupied Alexander.
This voyage proved to be the most important to geography that had been undertaken since the first circumnavigation of the globe.
Thus it was that a great South Land appeared on the maps, the belief in the prodigious extension of which certainly received a severe shock by Abel Tasman's voyage of circumnavigation, but was only overthrown after Cook's great voyages had proved that any southern land which existed could not extend appreciably beyond the polar circle.
He entered the Persian Gulf, and rejoined Alexander at Susa, when he was ordered to prepare another expedition for the circumnavigation of Arabia.
