Portugal Launches Age of Discovery

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Portugal Launches Age of Discovery

Overview

Over a period of about 150 years, the tiny nation of Portugal founded Brazil, discovered the sea route around Africa to India, and established colonies and trading posts in Tangiers, Angola, the Congo, the Gulf of Ormuz, India, the Spice Islands, and China. For most of that time, Portugal dominated trade between Asia and Western Europe, undercutting the economies of flourishing trading cities, including Naples and Genoa. Henry the Navigator (1394-1460) set up a prototypical research center in Sagres where maps were systematically charted and both sailing vessels and techniques that made exploration possible were invented. With these tools, Portugal was able to secure luxury goods from the East, to spread Christianity, and to increase its wealth, influence, and power. When the power shifted, it went to other European countries that followed Portugal's successful lead. Holland, England, France, and Spain joined in a scramble to discover, explore and claim new lands that lasted all the way to Captain James Cook's (1728-1779) final voyage.

Background

Portugal's geography, politics, and personality came together to encourage it to become a nautical power. The country faces outward to the Atlantic, with 1,118 miles (1,800 km) of coastline. But, looking eastward toward the most vibrant trading centers, Portugal found itself relatively far away, with difficult land routes and no coastline on the Mediterranean. While to the west, Portugal had navigable rivers and deep, natural ports, including Lisbon and Setubal, to provide safe harbor, to the east were disadvantages of cost, time, and hazard.

One such hazard was enemies, including the kingdoms that became Spain on its own peninsula and the powerful Moors to the south. The Moors, in fact, still held the territory south of Lisbon as late as 1200.

Despite foreign conflicts, the people of Portugal were relatively tolerant. Portugal's population originated from a variety of different tribes, including Celtic, African, Iberian, English, and Germanic. This encouraged a cultural broad-mindedness that gave the Portuguese critical access to tools like the compass (from Islamic countries) and maps (from Jews).

By the fifteenth century, Portugal was united internally and at peace with Spain. At the same time, it was hemmed in by the Moors to the south. The possibilities for expansion and trade were revealed when Henry the Navigator went on a crusade that seized the city of Ceuta in 1415. This trading center was filled with shops, precious metals, jewels, and spices. However, the captured city's trade stopped with the departure of the Moors, and Portugal was left with a hollow victory. If Portugal could find a route around the Moors to the East, it could participate in this rich trade directly.

Their primary trading need was pepper, which both helped preserve food and made heavily salted meat palatable. Because of Portugal's location, goods from the East went through many middlemen, and the costs to the Portuguese were high. With direct access to the East, Portugal hoped to lower prices and capture a portion of the wealth of trading. But trade was not the only reason exploration became a national goal for the Portuguese. In fact, it was 20 years before the acquisition of African slaves brought the first returns on their investments. There was another reason—conversions.

Portugal was at the forefront of the struggle between Christian and Islamic religion. Like Spain, many of its territories had been held by Islamic powers. Islamic strongholds were just across the Gulf of Cadiz, and the Popes were formally blessing crusades against the Moors. Though there was a political basis for the enmity, there was also a rising tide of religious fervor within Portugal that led to forced conversions and trials of inquisition. Within this context, the zeal for gaining religious converts rose, and the spread of Christianity became an important motivation for exploration.

To this was added the curious legend of Prester John, a wise and powerful Christian leader located in the East. The story probably originated from misinformation about the Mongol Empire, a bogus letter from Prester John to European rulers, and wishful thinking. But the Portuguese accepted the existence of Prester John as fact, and pursued a strategy to link up with this Christian ally and outflank the followers of Islam. Rather than being contained and controlled by the Moors, Portugal would contain and control its rival.

Besides trade and conversions, curiosity was also a powerful motive for exploration that should not be underestimated. Henry the Navigator had seen the economic stakes in Ceuta and had sacrificed a ransomed brother to the cause of the spread of Christianity. But he was also hungry for new knowledge, and Portugal's adventures in exploration really began with his leadership and his financial backing of a center for exploration in Sagres. It was there that better maps were drawn, navigational instruments were adopted, and a new kind of ship, the caravel, was developed. Quick, lightweight, and able to sail windward, the caravel become the key vehicle for discovery. Christopher Columbus's (1451?-1506) Nina and Pinta were both caravels. Most significantly, Henry systematically sent voyage after voyage down along the coast of Africa. This was unprecedented. He persisted even when the only benefit to Portugal was increase in the extent of known geography. Progress came to a halt when Henry's captains came to a bump on the coastline known as Cape Bojador. This was purportedly a point of no return; to pass it meant being killed or lost forever. Fifteen times over the course of 10 years captains were sent to take on this challenge for king and country, and 15 times they came back with word that it was impossible. Finally, Henry made Gil Eannes (?-1435?) swear that he would not return unless he had gone south of the Cape and, in 1435, Eannes rounded Cape Bojador, opening up territories south for further exploration. By Henry's death in 1460, the Portuguese had gone all the way to what would become Liberia, 1,864 miles (3,000 km) into unknown territory; by 1482, the Portuguese had gone as far as the Congo; by 1485, Bartholomeu Dias (1450?-1500) had rounded the Cape of Good Hope; and by 1499 Vasco da Gama (1460?-1524) had completed his trip to India. For the next hundred years, Portugal dominated the spice trade and was a world power.

Impact

With its many voyages, Portugal initiated the Age of Discovery. The Portuguese brought knowledge as well as wealth. They dispelled superstition and changed the political balance within Europe. For the Portuguese themselves, the most important geopolitical legacy is the nation of Brazil, the largest, most powerful country in South America. But the indirect results are of even greater significance. Portugal's success encouraged others, most notably the Dutch, the English, the French, and the Spanish, to engage in exploration and colonization. Portugal's competition with Spain led to a Papal decree, the Treaty of Tordesillas (1494), that secured Portugal's claims in Africa and the East and brought Spanish culture to most of Latin America. In fact, the political and cultural map of the Western Hemisphere was drawn during this era, and its shape is largely the result of forces set loose by Portugal.

Unfortunately, discovery included slavery and colonization. The slave trade that the Portuguese initiated in Africa grew quickly. One thousand slaves had already been brought to Portuguese territory by 1448, and the Portuguese continued to deal in slaves for two centuries. The Portuguese base at Elmina (Ghana) became an infamous link in the chain that brought millions of Africans to the Americas. Built in 1482, it was captured by the Dutch in 1637 and taken by the British in 1664. By the 1700s, 30,000 slaves were passing through Elmina each year.

Trading centers from Angola to India to China were established at the point of a gun. Though the Portuguese were generally not as thorough-going as the Spanish conquistadors, they did establish patterns of violence and distrust that persist today in Portuguese former colonies, such as East Timor and Angola, as well as in the former colonies of their imitators.

Portugal can be credited with more than just political and economic leadership in the Age of Discovery. The Portuguese also developed the tools and processes for exploration. Prince Henry the Navigator's center in Sagres improved ship design, transformed mapmaking into a rigorous discipline, and spurred the adoption of key navigational tools, including the compass (which others had superstitiously avoided) and the sextant. The Portuguese had a program of exploration that was systematic, objective, cumulative, patient, and determined. This approach, which was adopted by other nations, produced success over and over again. It also created a model for scientific exploration; Sagres had many of the same values and procedures that are part of the culture of today's research centers.

Though the Portuguese never linked up with Prester John, their plot to outflank the Moors succeeded. This went beyond a short-term trading advantage and political security. Thanks to communication with the East, the rise of scientific techniques, access to classical manuscripts, and the wealth of the New World, the dominance of Portugal, and more broadly Western Europe, in worldwide culture began. Islamic culture, lacking newer technology and relatively weaker in trade, went into decline and receded as a global presence and as a threat to Europe.

PETER J. ANDREWS