The Portuguese Empire 1415 1808

Winner of the Dom João de Castro Prize for Portuguese History This is the story of the first and one of the greatest colonial empires: its birth, apotheosis, and decline. By approaching the history of the Portuguese empire thematically, A. J. R. Russell-Wood is able to pursue ideas and make connections that previously have been constrained by strict chronological approaches. Using the study of movement as a focus, Russell-Wood gains unique insight into the diversity, breadth, and balance between the competing interests and priorities that characterized the Portuguese culture and its expansion spanning four centuries' events on four different continents.

A study of Europe's first great maritime empire, which embraced three continents and lasted through four centuries.

This is not specialist political, imperial, economic or religious history. 'These aspects, ' Russell-Wood says, 'have been ably covered by others.' What fascinates him is movement. 'Taking movement as my underlying and unifying theme has freed me to cross oceans, to move form one continent to another, and escape within reason the tyranny of chronology.

No other people in history made such extensive geographical explorations as Portuguese. During the course of the fifteenth century they were the first to reveal to Europe the unknown coast of West Africa, reaching and passing the Cape of Good Hope. They made the first all-water voyage from the West to the East in 1497-99. Cabral touched on Brazil en route to India in 1500. Many of the East Indies islands had been visited by Portuguese ships before Magellan began the first voyage around the world in 1519. Christopher Columbus largely learned his trade as navigator in Portugal. By the end of the sixteenth century the Portuguese flag was flying around the world. The question arises of why the small country of Portugal led the way in exploration in the fifteenth century. This volume provides not only a narrative of the spread of the Portuguese empire but new interpretations and analyses of the history, such as a discussion of how Portuguese power differed in Africa, India, and the Far East, and an analysis of the empire's failure as a business enterprise.

In 1807, the Portuguese prince regent Dom João made an extraordinary decision. Although horrified by the idea of sea travel, Napoleon's troops were closing in on Lisbon so he opted to transplant his entire court and government to Portugal's largest colony, Brazil. 10,000 aristocrats, ministers, priests and servants clambered aboard the rickety fleet. After a rough passage they spilled off their ships bedraggled and lice-ridden to the astonishment of their new-world subjects. Thus began a thirteen-year period of imperial rule from a 'tropical Versailles' set against the city's jungle-clad mountains. But this only partially obscured the brutal workings of what was then the largest slaving port in the Americas. While the court grappled with the dark side of its own empire, Brazil was coming of age. Patrick Wilcken brings this remarkable period to the life, blending vivid contemporary testament with a rich evocation of a time in history when European royalty went native.

Three lectures given at the University of Virginia in November, 1962.