Part 831

"King John [the First] had married an English wife, Philippa Plantagenet—a grand-daughter of our King Edward III., thoroughly English, too, on her mother's side, and not without a dash of Scottish blood, for her great-great-grandmother was a Comyn of Broghan. King John of Portugal was married to his English wife for twenty-eight years, they had five noble sons and a daughter (who was Duchess of Burgundy and mother of Charles the Bold); and English habits and usages were adopted at the Portuguese Court. We first meet with Prince Henry and his brothers, Edward and Peter, at the bed-side of their English mother. The king had determined to attack Ceuta, the most important seaport on the Moorish coast; and the three young princes were to receive knighthood if they bore themselves manfully, and if the place was taken. Edward, the eldest, was twenty-four, Peter twenty-three, and Henry just twenty-one. He was born on March 4th, 1394. There were two other brothers, John and Ferdinand, but they were still too young to bear arms. Their mother had caused three swords to be made with which they were to be girt as knights; and the great fleet was being assembled at Lisbon. But the Queen was taken ill, and soon there was no hope. Husband and sons gathered round her death-bed. When very near her end she asked: 'How is the wind?' she was told that it was northerly. 'Then,' she said, 'You will all sail for Ceuta on the feast of St. James.' A few minutes afterwards she died, and husband and sons sailed for Ceuta on St. James's day, the 25th of July, 1415, according to her word. … Ceuta was taken after a desperate fight. It was a memorable event, for the town never again passed into the hands of the Moors unto this day. … From the time of this Ceuta expedition Prince Henry set his mind steadfastly on the discovery of Guinea and on the promotion of commercial enterprise. During his stay at Ceuta he collected much information respecting the African coast. … His first objects were to know what was beyond the farthest cape hitherto reached on the coast of Africa, to open commercial relations with the people, and to extend the Christian faith. Prince Henry had the capacity for taking trouble. He undertook the task, and he never turned aside from it until he died. To be close to his work he came to live on the promontory of Sagres, near Cape St. Vincent, and not far from the seaport of Lagos. He was twenty-four years old when he came to live at this secluded spot, in December, 1418; and he died there in his sixty-seventh year. … He established a school at Sagres for the cultivation of map-drawing and the science of navigation. At great expense he procured the services of Mestre Jacome from Majorca, a man very learned in the art of navigation, as it was then understood, and he erected an observatory. … {2572} My readers will remember that during the time of the Crusades a great order of knighthood was established, called the Templars, which became very rich and powerful, and held vast estates in most of the countries of Europe. At last the kings became jealous of their prosperity and, in the days of our Edward II. and of the French Philip IV., their wealth was confiscated, and the order of Knights Templars was abolished in all countries except Portugal. But King Dionysius of Portugal refused either to rob the knights or to abolish the order. In the year 1319 he reformed the order, and changed the name, calling it the Order of Christ, and he encircled the white cross of the Templars with a red cross as the future badge of the knights. They retained their great estates. Prince Henry was appointed, by his father, Grand Master of the Order of Christ in the year 1419. He could imagine no nobler nor more worthy employment for the large revenues of the Order than the extension of geographical discovery. Thus were the funds for his costly expeditions supplied by the Order of Chivalry of which he was Grand Master. When Prince Henry first began to send forth expeditions along the coast of Africa, the farthest point to the southward that had been sighted was Cape Bojador. The discovery of the extreme southern point of Africa, and of a way thence to India, was looked upon then exactly as the discovery of the North Pole is now. Fools asked what was the use of it. Half-hearted men said it was impossible. Officials said it was impractical. Nevertheless, Prince Henry said that it could be done, and that, moreover it should be done. … In 1434 he considered that the time had come to round Cape Bojador. He selected for the command of the expedition an esquire of his household named Gil Eannes, who was accompanied by John Diaz, an experienced seaman of a seafaring family at Lagos, many of whose members became explorers. Prince Henry told them that the current which they feared so much was strongest at a distance of about three to five miles from the land. He ordered them, therefore, to stand out boldly to sea. 'It was a place before terrible to all men,' but the Prince told them that they must win fame and honour by following his instructions. They did so, rounded the Cape, and landed on the other side. There they set up a wooden cross as a sign of their discovery. … The Prince now equipped a larger vessel than had yet been sent out, called a varinel, propelled by oars as well as sails. Many were the eager volunteers among the courtiers at Sagres. Prince Henry's cup-bearer, named Alfonso Gonsalves Baldaya, was selected to command the expedition, and Gil Eannes—he who first doubled Cape Bojador—went with it in a smaller vessel. … They sailed in the year 1436, and, having rounded Cape Bojador without any hesitation, they proceeded southward along the coast for 120 miles, until they reached an estuary called by them Rio d'Ouro. … During the five following years Prince Henry was much engaged in State affairs. The disastrous expedition to Tangiers took place, and the imprisonment of his young brother Ferdinand by the Moors, whose noble resignation under cruel insults and sufferings until he died at Fez, won for him the title of the 'Constant Prince.' But in 1441 Prince Henry was able to resume the despatch of vessels of discovery. In that year he gave the command of a small ship to his master of the wardrobe, Antam Gonsalves. … He [Gonsalves] was followed in the same year by Nuno Tristram. … Tristram discovered a headland which, from its whiteness, he named Cape Blanco. … The next discovery was that of the island of Arguin, south of Cape Blanco, which was first visited in 1443 by Nuño Tristram in command of a caravel. … The next voyage of discovery was one of great importance, because it passed the country of the Moors, and, for the first time, entered the land of the Negroes. Dinis Diaz, who was selected for this enterprise by the Prince, sailed in 1446 with the resolution of beating all his predecessors. He passed the mouth of the river Senegal, and was surprised at finding that the people on the north bank were Moors, while to the south they were all blacks; of a tribe called Jaloffs. Diaz went as far as a point which he called Cabo Verde. In the following years several expeditions, under Lanzarote and others, went to Arguin and the Senegal; until, in 1455, an important voyage under Prince Henry's patronage was undertaken by a young Venetian named Alvise (Luigi) Cadamosto. … They sailed on March 22, 1455, and went first to Porto Santo and Madeira. From the Canary Islands they made sail for Cape Blanco, boldly stretching across the intervening sea and being for some time quite out of sight of land. Cadamosto had a good deal of intercourse with the Negroes to the south of the Senegal, and eventually reached the mouth of the Gambia whence he set out on his homeward voyage. The actual extent of the discoveries made during the life of Prince Henry was from Cape Bojador to beyond the mouth of the Gambia. But this was only a small part of the great service he performed, not only for his own country, but for the whole civilised world. He organised discovery, trained up a generation of able explorers, so that from his time progress was continuous and unceasing. … Prince Henry, who was to be known to all future generations as 'the Navigator,' died at the age of sixty-six at Sagres, on Thursday, the 13th of November, 1460."

_C. R. Markham, The Sea Fathers, chapter 1._

ALSO IN: _R. H. Major, Life of Prince Henry of Portugal, the Navigator._

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1463-1498. The Pope's gift of title to African discoveries. Slow southward progress of exploration. The rounding of the Cape of Good Hope. Vasco da Gama's voyage.

"In order to secure his triumphs, Prince Henry procured a bull from Pope Eugenius IV., which guaranteed to the Portuguese all their discoveries between Cape Nun, in Morocco, and India. None of his commanders approached within six or eight degrees of the equator. … By the year 1472, St. Thomas, Annobon, and Prince's Islands were added to the Portuguese discoveries, and occupied by colonists; and at length the equator was crossed. Fernando Po having given his name to an island in the Bight of Biafra, acquired possession of 500 leagues of equatorial coast, whence the King of Portugal took the title of Lord of Guinea. The subsequent divisions of this territory into the Grain Coast, named from the cochineal thence obtained, and long thought to be the seed of a plant, Gold Coast, Ivory Coast, and Slave Coast, indicate by their names the nature of the products of those lands, and the kind of traffic. {2573} Under King John II., after an inactive period of eight or ten years, Diego Cam (1484) pushed forward fearlessly to latitude 22° south, erecting at intervals on the shore, pillars of stone, which asserted the rights of his sovereign to the newly-found land. For the first time, perhaps, in history, men had now sailed under a new firmament. They lost sight of a part of the old celestial constellations, and were awe-struck with the splendours of the Southern Cross, and hosts of new stars. Each successive commander aimed at outdoing the deeds of his predecessor. Imaginary perils, which had frightened former sailors, spurred the Portuguese to greater daring. Bartholomew Diaz, in 1486, was sent in command of an expedition of three ships, with directions to sail till he reached the southernmost headland of Africa. Creeping on from cape to cape, he passed the furthest point touched by Diego Cam, and reached about 29° south latitude. Here driven out of his course by rough weather, he was dismayed on again making land to find the coast trending northward. He had doubled the Cape without knowing it, and only found it out on returning, disheartened by the results of his voyage. Raising the banner of St. Philip on the shore of Table Bay, Diaz named the headland the Cape of Tempests, which the king, with the passage to India in mind, changed to that of the Cape of Good Hope. By a curious coincidence, in the same year Covillan [see ABYSSINIA: 15-19TH CENTURIES] … learnt the fact that the Cape of Good Hope, the Lion of the Sea, or the Head of Africa, could be reached across the Indian Ocean."

_J. Yeats, Growth and Vicissitudes of Commerce, part 2, chapter 4._

"Pedro de Covilho had sent word to King John II., from Cairo, by two Jews, Rabbi Abraham and Rabbi Joseph, that there was a south cape of Africa which could be doubled. They brought with them an Arabic map of the African coast. … Covilho had learned from the Arabian mariners, who were perfectly familiar with the east coast, that they had frequently been at the south of Africa, and that there was no difficulty in passing round the continent that way. … Vasco de Gama set sail July 9, 1497, with three ships and 160 men, having with him the Arab map. King John had employed his Jewish physicians, Roderigo and Joseph, to devise what help they could from the stars. They applied the astrolabe to marine use, and constructed tables. These were the same doctors who had told him that Columbus would certainly succeed in reaching India, and advised him to send out a secret expedition in anticipation, which was actually done, though it failed through want of resolution in its captain. Encountering the usual difficulties, tempestuous weather and a mutinous crew, who conspired to put him to death, De Gama succeeded, November 20, in doubling the Cape. On March 1 he met seven small Arab vessels, and was surprised to find that they used the compass, quadrants, sea-charts, and 'had divers maritime mysteries not short of the Portugals.' With joy he soon after recovered sight of the northern stars, for so long unseen. He now bore away to the north-east, and on May 19, 1498, reached Calicut, on the Malabar coast. The consequences of this voyage were to the last degree important. The commercial arrangements of Europe were completely dislocated; Venice was deprived of her mercantile supremacy [see VENICE: 15-17TH CENTURIES]; the hatred of Genoa was gratified; prosperity left the Italian towns; Egypt, hitherto supposed to possess a pre-eminent advantage as offering the best avenue to India, suddenly lost her position; the commercial monopolies so long in the hands of the European Jews were broken down. The discovery of America and passage of the Cape were the first steps of that prodigious maritime development soon exhibited by Western Europe. And since commercial prosperity is forthwith followed by the production of men and concentration of wealth, and, moreover, implies an energetic intellectual condition, it appeared before long that the three centres of population, of wealth, of intellect, were shifting westwardly. The front of Europe was suddenly changed; the British Islands, hitherto in a sequestered and eccentric position, were all at once put in the van of the new movement."

_J. W. Draper, History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, chapter 19._

ALSO IN: _G. Correa, The Three Voyages of Vasco da Gama (Hakluyt Society, 1869)._

_J. Fiske, The Discovery of America, chapter 4 (volume l)._

_G. M. Towle, Voyages and Adventures of Vasco da Gama._

See, also, SOUTH AFRICA: A. D. 1486-1806.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1474-1476. Interference in Castile. Defeat at Toro.

See SPAIN: A. D. 1368-1479.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1490. Alliance with Castile and Aragon in the conquest of Granada.

See SPAIN: A. D. 1476-1492.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1493. The Pope's division of discoveries in the New World.

See AMERICA: A. D. 1493.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1494. The Treaty of Tordesillas. Amended partition of the New World with Spain.

See AMERICA: A. D. 1494.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1495. Persecution and expulsion of Jews.

See JEWS: 8-15TH CENTURIES.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1498-1580. Trade and settlements in the East Indies.

See INDIA; A. D. 1498-1580.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1500-1504. Discovery, exploration and first settlement of Brazil.

See AMERICA: A. D. 1500-1514; and 1503-1504.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1501. Early enterprise in the Newfoundland fisheries.

See NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1501-1578.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1510-1549. Colonization of Brazil.

See BRAZIL: A. D. 1510-1661.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1524. Disputes with Spain in the division of the New World. The Congress at Badajos.

See AMERICA: A. D. 1519-1524.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1579-1580. Disastrous invasion of Morocco by Sebastian. His death in battle. Disputed succession to the throne. The claim of Philip II. of Spain established by force of arms.

"Under a long succession of Kings who placed their glory in promoting the commerce of their subjects and extending their discoveries through the remotest regions of the globe, Portugal had attained a degree of importance among the surrounding nations, from which the narrow limits of the kingdom, and the neighbourhood of the Spanish monarchy, seemed for ever to exclude her. … John III., the last of those great monarchs under whose auspices the boundaries of the known world had been enlarged, was succeeded in the throne of Portugal [1557] by his grandson Sebastian, a child of only three years old. {2574} As the royal infant advanced to manhood, his subjects might, without flattery, admire his sprightly wit, his manly form, his daring spirit, and his superior address, in all the accomplishments of a martial age. But the hopes which these splendid qualities inspired were clouded by an intemperate thirst of fame. … He had early cherished the frantic project of transporting a royal army to India, and of rivalling the exploits of Alexander; but from this design he was diverted, not by the difficulties that opposed it, nor by the remonstrances of his counsellors, but by the distractions of Africa, which promised to his ambition a nearer and fairer harvest of glory. On the death of Abdalla, King of Morocco, his son, Muley Mahomet, had seized upon the crown, in contempt to an established law of succession, that the kingdom should devolve to the brother of the deceased monarch. A civil war ensued, and Mahomet, defeated in several battles, was compelled to leave his uncle Muley Moluc, a prince of great abilities and virtues, in possession of the throne." Mahomet escaped to Lisbon, and Sebastian espoused his cause. He invaded Morocco [see MAROCCO: THE ARAB CONQUEST AND SINCE] with a force partly supplied by his uncle, Philip II.; of Spain, and partly by the Prince of Orange, engaged the Moors rashly in battle (the battle of Alcazar, or the Three Kings, 1579), and perished on the field, his army being mostly destroyed or made captive. "An aged and feeble priest was the immediate heir to the unfortunate Sebastian; and the Cardinal Henry, the great uncle to the late monarch, ascended the vacant throne." He enjoyed his royal dignity little more than a twelvemonth, dying in 1580, leaving the crown in dispute among a crowd of claimants.

_History of Spain, chapter 22 (volume 2)._

"The candidates were seven in number: the duchess of Braganza, the king of Spain, the duke of Savoy, Don Antonio, prior of Crato, the duke of Parma, Catherine of Medicis, and the sovereign pontiff. The four first were grand-children of Emanuel the Great, father of Henry. The duchess of Braganza was daughter of Prince Edward, Emanuel's second son; Philip was the son of the Empress Isabella, his eldest daughter; the duke of Savoy, of Beatrix, his younger daughter; and Don Antonio was a natural son of Lewis, who was a younger son of Emanuel, and brother to the present king [cardinal Henry]. The duke of Parma was great–grandson of Emanuel, by a daughter of the above-mentioned Prince Edward. The Queen-mother of France founded her claim on her supposed descent from Alphonso III., who died about 300 years before the present period; and the Pope pretended that Portugal was feudatory to the see of Rome, and belonged to him, since the male heirs in the direct line were extinct." The other candidates held small chances against the power and convenient neighborhood of Philip of Spain. "Philip's agents at the court of Lisbon allowed that if the duchess of Braganza's father had been alive, his title would have been indisputable; but they maintained that, since he had died without attaining possession of the throne, nothing but the degree of consanguinity to Emanuel ought to be regarded; and that, as the duchess and he were equal in that respect, the preference was due to a male before a female. And they farther insisted, that the law which excludes strangers from inheriting the crown was not applicable to him, since Portugal had formerly belonged to the kings of Castile." Promptly on the death of the cardinal-king Henry, the Spanish king sent an army of 35,000 men, under the famous duke of Alva, and a large fleet under the Marquis of Santa Croce, to take possession of what he claimed as his inheritance. Two battles sufficed for the subjugation of Portugal:—one fought on the Alcantara, August 25, 1580, and the other a little later on the Douro. The kingdom submitted, but with bitter feelings, which the conduct of Alva and his troops had intensified at every step of their advance. "The colonies in America, Africa, and the Indies, which belonged to the crown of Portugal, quickly followed the example of the mother country; nor did Philip find employment for his arms in any part of the Portuguese dominions but the Azores," which, supported by the French, were not subdued until the following year.

_R. Watson, History of the Reign of Philip II., book 16._

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1594-1602. Beginning of the rivalry of the Dutch in East India trade.

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1594-1620.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1624-1661. War with the Dutch. Loss and recovery of parts of Brazil.

See BRAZIL: A. D. 1510-1661.

PORTUGAL: A. D. 1637-1668. Crisis of discontent with the Spanish rule. A successful revolution. National independence recovered. The House of Braganza placed on the throne.