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'Jean de Béthencourt' (c. 1360 - 1425), was a French explorer who, in 1402, led an expedition to the Canary Islands, landing first on the north side of Lanzarote. From there, he conquered Fuerteventura and Hierro. Béthencourt received the title King of the Canary Islands but recognized King Henry III of Castile, who had provided aid during the conquest, as his overlord.

Béthencourt set sail from La Rochelle on May 1, 1402, with 280 men, mostly Gascon and Norman capers, including two Franciscan priests who narrated the expedition in ''Le Canarien'' and two Canarians, captured in an earlier Castilian expedition and already baptised.
After he reached Cádiz in Spain, and staying there for several weeks, most of his men deserted, ending with 53.
To this day, Betancourt and other forms of his surname are quite frequent among Canary Islanders and people of Canary Islander descent, in spite of his death without issue, thanks to the practice of baptising the natives with his surname and to the offspring of his nephew Maciot de Béthencourt who succeeded him as lord of the islands.
Examples include former Colombian president Belisario Betancur, former Venezuelan president Rómulo Betancourt, and Hermano Pedro de San José de Betancurt, a saint of the Roman Catholic Church. Other modern notables in recent news are Venezuelan baseball player Rafael Betancourt, Portuguese-born American musician Nuno Bettencourt, and Colombian-French activist/politician Ingrid Betancourt.
The city of Betancuria, on Fuerteventura, which he helped found, is named after Béthencourt.

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★ History of the Canaries