27 History 1st part

Wikipedia

 

Neolithic

 

The region of present-day Portugal was inhabited by Neanderthals and then by Homo sapiens, who roamed the border-less region of the northern Iberian peninsula.[5] These were subsistence societies that, although they did not establish prosperous settlements, did establish organized societies. Neolithic Portugal experimented with domestication of herding animals, the raising of some cereal crops and pluvial or marine fishing.[5]

 

Early in the first millennium BC, several waves of Celts invaded Portugal from central Europe and inter-married with the local populations, forming different ethnic groups, with many tribes. Chief among these tribes were the Calaicians or Gallaeci of northern Portugal, the Lusitanians of central Portugal, the Celtici of Alentejo, and the Cynetes or Conii of the Algarve. Among the lesser tribes or sub-divisions were the Bracari, Coelerni, Equaesi, Grovii, Interamici, Leuni, Luanqui, Limici, Narbasi, Nemetati, Paesuri, Quaquerni, Seurbi, Tamagani, Tapoli, Turduli, Turduli Veteres, Turdulorum Oppida, Turodi, and Zoelae.

 

There were in the southern part the country, some small, semi-permanent commercial coastal settlements founded by Phoenicians-Carthaginians (such as Tavira, in the Algarve).

 

The Tartessian language from the southwest of the Iberian peninsula, which John T. Koch has claimed to be able to translate, has been accepted by philologists and other linguists as the first attested Celtic language.[6][7] From later 2011, Tartessian was classified as a Celtic language[8][9][10] based on linguistic arguments from John T. Koch.[6][11][12] Prior to later 2011, the linguistic mainstream continued to treat Tartessian as an unclassified language,[13][14] and Koch's view of the evolution of Celtic was not then generally accepted.

 

Roman Lusitania and Gallaecia

 

The first Roman invasion of the Iberian Peninsula occurred in 219 BC. Within 200 years, almost the entire peninsula had been annexed to the Roman Republic. The Carthaginians, Rome's adversary in the Punic Wars, were expelled from their coastal colonies.

 

The Roman conquest of what is now part of modern day Portugal took several decades: it started from the south, where the Romans found friendly natives, the Conii. It suffered a severe setback in 150 BC, when a rebellion began in the north. The Lusitanians and other native tribes, under the leadership of Viriathus, wrested control of all of the Portuguese land. Rome sent numerous legions and its best generals to Lusitania to quell the rebellion, but to no avail — the Lusitanians kept conquering territory. The Roman leaders decided to change their strategy. They bribed Viriathus's ambassador to kill his own leader. In 139 BC, Viriathus was assassinated, and the resistance was soon over.

 

Rome installed a colonial regime. During this period, Lusitania grew in prosperity and many of modern day Portugal's cities and towns were founded. The complete Romanization of Portugal, intensified during the rule of Augustus, took three centuries and was stronger in Southern Portugal, most of which were administrative dependencies of the Roman city of Pax Julia, currently known as Beja. The city was named Pax Julia in honour of Julius Caesar and to celebrate peace in Lusitania. Augustus renamed it Pax Augusta, but the early name prevailed. In 27 BC, Lusitania gained the status of Roman province. Later, a northern province of Lusitania was formed, known as Gallaecia, with capital in Bracara Augusta, today's Braga.

 

Numerous Roman sites are scattered around present-day Portugal, some urban remains are quite large, like Conimbriga and Mirobriga. Several works of engineering, such as baths, temples, bridges, roads, circus, theatres and layman's homes are preserved throughout the country. Coins, some of which coined in Portuguese land, sarcophagus and ceramics are numerous. Contemporary historians include Paulus Orosius (c. 375-418)[15] and Hydatius (c. 400–469), bishop of Aquae Flaviae, who reported on the final years of the roman rule and arrival of the Germanic tribes.

 

Germanic kingdoms (5th–7th centuries)

 

In the early 5th century, Germanic tribes invaded the peninsula, namely the Suevi, the Vandals (Silingi and Hasdingi) and their allies, the Sarmatian Alans. Only the kingdom of the Suevi (Quadi and Marcomanni) endured after the arrival of another wave of Germanic invaders, the Visigoths, who conquered all of the Iberian Peninsula and expelled or partially integrated the Vandals and the Alans. The Visigoths eventually conquered the Suevi kingdom and its capital city Bracara in 584–585.

 

The Germanic tribe of the Buri also accompanied the Suevi in their invasion of the Iberian Peninsula and colonization of Gallaecia (modern northern Portugal and Galicia). The Buri settled in the region between the rivers Cávado and Homem, in the area known as thereafter as Terras de Boiro or Terras de Bouro (Lands of the Buri).[16]

 

Other minor influences from this period include some 5th century vestiges of Alan settlement, which were found in Alenquer, Coimbra and even Lisbon.

 

Moorish Rules and the Reconquista (711–1249)

 

Landing near Algeciras in the spring of 711, the Islamic Moors (mainly Berbers with some Arabs) from North Africa invaded the Iberian Peninsula.,[18] destroying the Visigothic Kingdom. Many of the ousted Gothic nobles took refuge in the unconquered north Asturian highlands. From there they aimed to reconquer their lands from the Moors: this war of reconquest is known in Portuguese (and Spanish) as the Reconquista.

 

In 868, Count Vímara Peres reconquered and governed the region between the rivers Minho and Douro. The county was then known as Portucale (i.e., Portugal).

 

While it had its origins as a dependency of the Kingdom of León, Portugal occasionally gained de facto independence during weak Leonese reigns.

 

Portugal gained its first de jure independence (as the Kingdom of Galicia and Portugal) in 1065 under the rule of Garcia II. Because of feudal power struggles, Portuguese and Galician nobles rebelled. In 1072, the country rejoined León under Garcia II's brother Alfonso VI of León.

 

In 1095, Portugal separated almost completely from the Kingdom of Galicia. Its territories consisting largely of mountain, moorland and forest were bounded on the north by the Minho, on the south by the Mondego River.

 

Independence

 

At the end of the 11th century, the Burgundian knight Henry became count of Portugal and defended his independence, merging the County of Portucale and the County of Coimbra. Henry declared independence for Portugal while a civil war raged between León and Castile.

 

Henry died without achieving his aims. His son, Afonso Henriques, took control of the county. The city of Braga, the unofficial Catholic centre of the Iberian Peninsula, faced new competition from other regions. Lords of the cities of Coimbra and Porto (then Portucale) with Braga's clergy demanded the independence of the renewed county.

 

Portugal traces its national origin to 24 June 1128, with the Battle of São Mamede. Afonso proclaimed himself first Prince of Portugal and in 1139 the first King of Portugal. By 1143, with the assistance of a representative of the Holy See at the conference of Zamora, Portugal was formally recognized as independent, with the prince recognized as Dux Portucalensis. In 1179 Afonso I was declared, by the Pope, as king. After the Battle of São Mamede, the first capital of Portugal was Guimarães from which the first king ruled. Later, when Portugal was already officially independent, he ruled from Coimbra.

 

Affirmation of Portugal

 

From 1249 to 1250 the Algarve, the southernmost region, was finally re-conquered by Portugal from the Moors. In 1255 the capital shifted to Lisbon.[19] Neighboring Spain would not complete their Reconquista until 1492 almost 250 years later.[20]

 

Portugal's land-based boundaries have been notably stable in history. The border with Spain has remained almost unchanged since the 13th century. The Treaty of Windsor (1386) created an alliance between Portugal and England that remains in effect to this day. Since early times, fishing and overseas commerce have been the main economic activities. Henry the Navigator's interest in exploration together with some technological developments in navigation made Portugal's expansion possible and led to great advances in geographic, mathematical, scientific knowledge and technology, more specifically naval technology.

 

Naval exploration and Portuguese Empire (15th-16th centuries)

 

During the 15th and 16th centuries, Portugal was a leading European power, ranking with England, France and Spain in terms of economic, political, and cultural influence. Though not predominant in European affairs, Portugal did have an extensive colonial trading empire throughout the world backed by a powerful thalassocracy.

 

July 25, 1415 marked the beginning of the Portuguese Empire, when the Portuguese Armada departed to the rich trade Islamic centre of Ceuta in North Africa with King John I and his wife Phillipa of Lancaster and their sons Prince Duarte (future king), Prince Pedro, Prince Henry the Navigator (born in Porto in 1394) and Prince Afonso, and legendary Portuguese hero Nuno Álvares Pereira.[21] On August 21, 1415, Ceuta, the city on the coast of North Africa directly across from Gibraltar, was conquered by Portugal, and the long-lived Portuguese Empire was founded.[22]

 

The conquest of Ceuta had been helped by the fact that a major civil war had been engaging the Muslims of the Magrib (North Africa) since 1411.[23] This same civil war between the Muslims prevented a re-capture of Ceuta from the Portuguese, when Muhammad IX, the Left-Handed King of Granada, laid siege to Ceuta and attempted to coordinate the forces in Morocco and attempted to get aid and assistance for the effort from Tunis.[24] The Muslim attempt to retake Ceuta was ultimately unsuccessful and Ceuta remained the first part of the new Portuguese Empire.[25] However, further steps were taken that would soon expand the Portuguese Empire.

 

In 1418 two of the captains of Prince Henry the Navigator, João Gonçalves Zarco and Tristão Vaz Teixeira, were driven by a storm to an island which they called Porto Santo ("Holy Port") in gratitude for their rescue from the shipwreck. In 1419, João Gonçalves Zarco disembarked on Madeira Island. Uninhabited Madeira Island was colonized by the Portuguese in 1420.[26]

 

Between 1427 and 1431, most of the Azorean islands were discovered and these uninhabited islands were colonized by the Portuguese in 1445. A Portuguese expedition may have attempted to colonize the Canary Islands as early as 1336, but Castile objected to any claim by the Portuguese to the Canary Islands. Castile began its conquest of the Canaries in 1402. Castile expelled the last Portuguese from the Canary islands 1459. The Canary Islands would eventually be part of the Spanish Empire.[27]

 

In 1434, Gil Eanes turned the Cape Bojador, south of Morocco. The trip marked the beginning of the Portuguese exploration of Africa. Before the turn, very little information was known in Europe about what lay around the cape. At the end of the 13th century and the beginning of the 14th, those who tried to venture there became lost, which gave birth to legends of sea monsters. Some setbacks occurred: in 1436 the Canaries were officially recognized as Castilian by the Pope; earlier they were recognized as Portuguese. Also, in 1438 in a military expedition to Tangier, the Portuguese were defeated.

 

However, the Portuguese did not give up their exploratory efforts. In 1448, on a small island known as Arguim off the coast of Mauritania, an important castle was built, working as a feitoria, a trading post, for commerce with inland Africa. Some years before the first African gold was brought to Portugal, circumventing the Arab caravans that crossed the Sahara. Some time later, the caravels explored the Gulf of Guinea which lead to the discovery of several uninhabited islands: Cape Verde, Fernão Póo, São Tomé, Príncipe and Annobón.[28]

 

On November 13, 1460, Prince Henry the Navigator died.[29] He had been the leading patron of all maritime exploration by Portugal up to that time. Immediately following Henry's death, there was a lapse of further exploration. Henry's patronage of explorations had shown that profits could be made in trade which followed the exploration of new lands. Accordingly when exploration was commenced again private merchants led the way in attempting to stretch trade routes further down the African coast.[30]

 

In 1470s, Portuguese trading ships reached the Gold Coast.[31] In 1471, the Portuguese captured Tangier, after years of attempts. Eleven years later in 1482, the fortress of São Jorge da Mina in the town of Elmina on the Gold Coast in the Gulf of Guinea was built. (Setting sail aboard the fleet of ships taking the materials and building crews to Elmina on this trip in December 1481 was Christopher Columbus.) In 1483, Diogo Cão reached and explored the Congo River.

 

The New World

 

In 1484, Portugal officially rejected Christopher Columbus's idea of reaching India from the west, because it was seen as unreasonable. Some historians have claimed that the Portuguese had already performed fairly accurate calculations concerning the size of the world and therefore knew that sailing west to reach the Indies would require a far longer journey than navigating to the east. However, this continues to be debated. Thus began a long-lasting dispute which eventually resulted in the signing of the Treaty of Tordesillas with Spain in 1494. The treaty divided the (largely undiscovered) world equally between the Spanish and the Portuguese, along a north-south meridian line 370 leagues (1770 km/1100 miles) west of the Cape Verde islands, with all lands to the east belonging to Portugal and all lands to the west to Spain.

 

A remarkable achievement was the turning of the Cape of Good Hope by Bartolomeu Dias in 1487.[32] The richness of India was now accessible. Indeed the name of the cape stems from this promise of rich trade with the east. In 1489, the King of Bemobi gave his realms to the Portuguese king and became Christian. Between 1491 and 1494, Pêro de Barcelos and João Fernandes Lavrador explored North America. At the same time, Pêro da Covilhã reached Ethiopia by land. Vasco da Gama sailed for India, and arrived at Calicut on 20 May 1498, returning in glory to Portugal the next year.[33] The Monastery of Jerónimos was built, dedicated to the discovery of the route to India.

 

In the spring of 1500, Pedro Álvares Cabral set sail from Cape Verde with 13 ships and crews and a list of nobles that included Nicolau Coelho, Bartolomeu Dias and his brother Diogo, Duarte Pacheco Pereira (author of the Esmeraldo) along with various other nobles, nine chaplains and some 1,200 men.[34] From Cape Verde they sailed southwest across the Atlantic. On April 22, 1500, they caught sight of land in the distance.[35] They disembarked and claimed this new land for Portugal. This was the coast of what would later become the Portuguese colony of Brazil.[36]

 

However, the real goal of the expedition was to open sea trade to the empires of the east. Trade with the east had effectively been cut off since the fall of Constantinople in 1453. Accordingly, Cabral turned from exploring the coasts of the new land of Brazil and sailed to the southeast back across the Atlantic and around the Cape of Good Hope. Cabral reached Sofala on the east coast of Africa in July 1500.[37] Later in 1505, a Portuguese fort would be established here and the land around the fort would become the Portuguese colony of Mozambique.[38]

 

Then they sailed on to the east and landed in Calicut in India in September 1500.[39] Here they traded for pepper and, more significantly opened European sea trade with the empires of the east. No longer would the Islamic occupation of Constantinople form a barrier between Europe and the east.Ten years later in 1510, Afonso de Albuquerque after attempting and failing to capture and occupy Zamorin's Calicut militarily, conquered Goa on the west coast of India.[40]

 

João da Nova discovered Ascension in 1501 and Saint Helena in 1502; Tristão da Cunha was the first to sight the archipelago still known by his name 1506. In 1505, Francisco de Almeida was engaged to improve the Portuguese trade with the far east. Accordingly, he sailed to East Africa. Several small Islamic states along the coast of Mozambique, Kilwa, Brava and Mombasa were destroyed or became subjects or allies of Portugal.[41] Almeida then sailed on to Cochin, made peace with the ruler and built a stone fort there

The two million Portuguese people ruled a vast empire with many millions of inhabitants in the Americas, Africa, the Middle East and Asia. From 1514, the Portuguese had reached China and Japan. In the Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea, one of Cabral's ships discovered Madagascar (1501), which was partly explored by Tristão da Cunha (1507); Mauritius was discovered in 1507, Socotra occupied in 1506, and in the same year Lourenço de Almeida visited Ceylon.

 

In the Red Sea, Massawa was the most northerly point frequented by the Portuguese until 1541, when a fleet under Estevão da Gama penetrated as far as Suez. Hormuz, in the Persian Gulf, was seized by Afonso de Albuquerque in 1515, who also entered into diplomatic relations with Persia. In 1521, a force under Antonio Correia conquered Bahrain ushering in a period of almost 80 years of Portuguese rule of the Persian Gulf archipelago[43] (for further information see Bahrain as a Portuguese dominion).

 

On the Asiatic mainland the first trading stations were established by Pedro Álvares Cabral at Cochin and Calicut (1501); more important were the conquests of Goa (1510) and Malacca (1511) by Afonso de Albuquerque, and the acquisition of Diu (1535) by Martim Afonso de Sousa. East of Malacca Albuquerque sent Duarte Fernandes as envoy to Siam (now Thailand) in 1511, and dispatched to the Moluccas two expeditions (1512, 1514), which founded the Portuguese dominion in Maritime Southeast Asia.[44]

 

The Portuguese established their base in the Spice Islands on the island of Ambon.[45] Fernão Pires de Andrade visited Canton in 1517 and opened up trade with China, where in 1557 the Portuguese were permitted to occupy Macau. Japan, accidentally reached by three Portuguese traders in 1542, soon attracted large numbers of merchants and missionaries. In 1522 one of the ships in the expedition that Ferdinand Magellan organized in the Spanish service completed the first voyage around the world.

 

By the end of the 15th century, Portugal expelled some local Jews, along with those refugees that came from Castile and Aragon after 1492. In addition, many Jews were forcibly converted to Catholicism and remained as Conversos. Many Jews remained secretly Jewish, in danger of persecution by the Portuguese Inquisition. In 1506, 3,000 "New Christians" were massacred in Lisbon

 

 

 

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