I found the following sentence very difficult to understand. There are actually two parts I didn't understand.
- Since Christopher Columbus began his journey to America with the intent of finding an alternate route to Southeast Asia, he is said to have assumed that the people he came into contact with upon reaching land were Indians.*
The link of this sentence is, http://www.wisegeek.org/why-are-native-americans-called-indians.htm. See first paragraph of the essay.
Does **he is said to have assumed* mean that people say that Christopher Columbus assumed that. I asked this question because the usage of this term is very difficult to understand since this usage behavior does not exist in my native language.
Does upon reaching land mean India (a nation) or South East Asia?
Best Answer
As Man_From_India says, you have understood is said to have assumed correctly. More generally SUBJ BE said to VERBinfinitive may be paraphrased as people say that SUBJ VERBfinite.
The preposition phrase upon VERBpres.ppl may be paraphrased at the time SUBJ VERBfinite, where SUBJ is the subject of the clause which the preposition phrase modifies: