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Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

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71–80 of 82 posts

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#71
post #3

World powers change and shift with changes of technology, climate and needs for resources. Countries rise to power because they are in the right place at the right time, even if monarchs and nationalists will always attribute it to God preference or other self-serving reason. > The first century of Portuguese discoveries saw a successive stripping away of layers of medieval mythology about the world and the received…

> Countries rise to power because they are in the right place at the right time, even if monarchs and nationalists will always attribute it to God preference

Isn’t it literally the God’s preference of a country for this place and time, from both secular and religious points of view?

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#72

Also unmentioned is the disastrous intervention in the Moroccan civil war of 1580, where the teen king and most of its nobles were killed, leading to 60 years of Spanish rule. This is not at the apex of the empire, but close. Also, Henry the Navigator downright stole or cajoled most of the "inovations" from Italian city states. For example, the Madeira island was named so by Italians, settled by some of Henry's minio…

Nah, he is still supposed to come back in a foggy morning according to the legend.

Fueled by the fact that his body was never found, so it might be that he survived and rather stay low than come back.

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#73
post #49

Technically, also the last global empire. Macau wasn't returned to China until 1999. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Handover_of_Macau

France and USA still have colonies around the world. So no, not the last.

Also Netherlands, also France, also Denmark, also Spain (melila and ceuta)... actually Portugal kinda is still the first global empire that managed to shift away from it

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#74
post #45
post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but every time that I spend some time in Portuguese cities, I feel just bad What do you mean? (Asking this as a Portuguese guy who really doesn't feel at home back there any more)

The Chinese selling Portuguese souvenirs made in China?

That is all over the place in Europe, unfortunely.

The world complains about China, yet gladly pays for their stuff instead of local prices.

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#75
post #3

World powers change and shift with changes of technology, climate and needs for resources. Countries rise to power because they are in the right place at the right time, even if monarchs and nationalists will always attribute it to God preference or other self-serving reason. > The first century of Portuguese discoveries saw a successive stripping away of layers of medieval mythology about the world and the received…

> Countries rise to power because they are in the right place at the right time, even if monarchs and nationalists will always attribute it to God preference Isn’t it literally the God’s preference of a country for this place and time, from both secular and religious points of view?

The traditional way of looking to by "God will" means that something is right and moral.

I agree that nowadays it is also used as just a substitute to "luck" or "random event" without the moral connotations.

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#76
post #70
post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No xenophobia is “the fear or dislike of people who are perceived as being foreign or strange”. Thats just from the dictionary. You could call the brutal repression of the Ainu and native Okinawans a kind of xenophobic/racist ultra nationalism. Also Japan’s crimes extend far beyond China, and were especially brutal in Korea were they practiced a horrific form of slavery. The Japanese are so xenophobic they try to exc…

I am very aware of the history of the Japanese with the Ainu, the native Okinawans , and in Korea and Taiwan (and in other countries, as I have said). The broader point that I am making, outside the specific instance of the Japanese which you seem to want to fixate on, is that xenophobia can be a useful social trait, to avoid a society being overwhelmed by a foreign ingress. This could work just as well for the Ainu,…

I'm clearly pointing out that you were wrong about the definition of xenophobia, and that the xenophobia of Japan was the seed for a fascist genocidal rampage. I would further argue that fearing people perceived as foreign which is what xenophobia is, is not necessary to establish and protect sovereignty or to hold close and nurture cherished cultural institutions.

I'm not fixated, I'm pointing out that xenophobia is actually bad and leads to bad things.

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#77
post #3

World powers change and shift with changes of technology, climate and needs for resources. Countries rise to power because they are in the right place at the right time, even if monarchs and nationalists will always attribute it to God preference or other self-serving reason. > The first century of Portuguese discoveries saw a successive stripping away of layers of medieval mythology about the world and the received…

>World powers change and shift with changes of technology, climate and needs for resources. Countries rise to power because they are in the right place at the right time,

I wonder when will China take the crown. Assuming US follows on their current trajectory.

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#78
post #76
post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am very aware of the history of the Japanese with the Ainu, the native Okinawans , and in Korea and Taiwan (and in other countries, as I have said). The broader point that I am making, outside the specific instance of the Japanese which you seem to want to fixate on, is that xenophobia can be a useful social trait, to avoid a society being overwhelmed by a foreign ingress. This could work just as well for the Ainu,…

I'm clearly pointing out that you were wrong about the definition of xenophobia, and that the xenophobia of Japan was the seed for a fascist genocidal rampage. I would further argue that fearing people perceived as foreign which is what xenophobia is, is not necessary to establish and protect sovereignty or to hold close and nurture cherished cultural institutions. I'm not fixated, I'm pointing out that xenophobia is…

Every organism must have an immune system which is essential to (but does not guarantee) their survival. Just the same, a society has xenophonia as its immune system. That does not make it 'bad', even though it can produce very ugly effects.

I do not agree with your expansion of xenophobia to the behaviour of a people outside their own country. I do not agree that xenophobia is objectively bad. I also do not agree that "the xenophobia of Japan was the seed for a fascist genocidal rampage" and I doubt that many, if any, historians would agree with such a simplistic assertion either.

Since you seem to have a very closed mind on this subject (i.e. xenophobia == bad, bad, bad) and further discussion seems pointless I'll leave it here.

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#79
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn’t the Dutch basically take over the Portuguese trading empire from them?

Yes! The losses were due to independence loss to Spain. In a sense the loss of sovereignty to Spain destroyed the Portuguese empire. Spain joined the Portuguese and Spanish armada and went on to fight the English (and Dutch to some extent), with catastrophic results for both Spain and Portugal fleets. When Portugal regained independence 1640 it needed to get back sovereignty of overseas territories, including from th…

>I believe Europeans have a genetic disposition for destruction, and history shows that.

I don't think that is the case, but more so they were better at war then everyone else.

Re: Portugal: The First Global Empire (2015)

#80
post #24

Spain was the first globalization, not Portugal. The article forgets to mention two key elements: 1) The Manila galeon[1], the first trading route connecting Europe, America and Asia. This was the first trully global trade route (Portugual never established a trans-Pacific route). 2) The Real de a Ocho[2], the first global currency, used virtually everywhere including the US until the modern dollar replaced it in 185…

lol, the trans-pacific route was pointless. Portugal monopolized the Indian ocean and spice trade for more than 100 years. It established the atlantic triangle trade of Africa (supplying slaves) to Brasil (supplying sugar) to Europe. All of them comercially viable for centuries. Meanwhile, Spain could barely cross the Pacific ocean and make it the viable trade route to the spice islands that it longed for to be.

Many forget that the circumnavigation of Magellan was both a mistake and a failure. The discovered pass to the Pacific, the southernmost point in the planet not counting Antarctica, was considered unnavigable most of the year (the magellan fleet had to wait 6 months at Puerto San Julian before daring to continue the search, surviving its first mutiny attempt), before treading the slow currents of the Pacific, which took down the majority of the fleet to scurvy (while most likely contributing to the madness of Magellan, which made him the delirious zealot which jumped foolishly to his death at the hands of Lapu Lapu). In fact, part of the fleet tried to make it back through the Pacific, only to give up again, come back to the spice islands and be captured by the portuguese, while the remainder barely made it back, commanded by Elcano, one of the mutineers of Puerto San Julian; a route that btw, they feared taking, as it was in direct violation of the Tordesillas treaty and would certainly condemn them to death would they be discovered. 1 ship out of 5 made it back. 18 out of 270 men. By the time they arrived, the new world colonization was still mostly considered a failure, Columbus still an outcast, not even worthy of naming the continent he discovered (this was roughly 18 years before the Aztecs, Incas, and all the gold and silver that got plundered).

Meanwhile, the portuguese routes remained largely uncontested, that is, until a certain young portuguese king died in a battle in the north of Africa leaving no children, thereby opening the door for the two crowns being ruled by the same king, and with it, making Portugal a target for the many enemies Spain had been collecting along the way. And that was the beginning of the end for the portuguese century.

The Manila galeon is certainly an historic milestone, but it connected America with Asia. Payload needed to be carried by land all the way to the Gulf of Mexico before departing to Europe. Barely global, if that's what's implied. It started quite late in the history of the spanish in Americas, some 100 years after the conquest of Mexico, because until then, extracting and transporting all the gold and silver to Europe was considered more profitable, until there was so much silver in circulation in Europe that it devalued it, thereby making Asia a more enticing market for its silver, as it was still considered valuable by then. The route also lasted a bit more than 50 years. Consider that the portuguese route to India was still being navigated way into the end of the 1800s, and only being truly disrupted by the opening of the Suez canal.

I'm not here to downplay the several achievements, or exacerbate the atrocities of the spanish empire. Every empire had them, no less the portuguese (while they did not come up with the idea of slavery, the atlantic triangle is responsible for the biggest intercontinental forced transfer of human beings in history, and the massive economic dependence it created in African kingdoms caused its brutal collapse after the abolition). But not calling it the first global empire of the discovery age, specially taking into consideration that they literally started a century before anyone else, is factually incorrect.

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