The Great Navigations

The maritime expeditions carried out by Europeans between the 15th and 16th centuries are called Great Navigations.

The pioneers in European maritime expansion were the Portuguese and the Spanish, followed by the English, French and Dutch.

Several factors enabled Grandes Navegações such as the improvement of navigation techniques, the need for precious metals and the discovery of a new maritime route to the Indies.

Finally, we cannot forget the religious reasons, something very important at that time. In this way, Europeans also wanted to expand the Christian faith to new lands.

Summary of the history of the great navigations

With the capture of Constantinople by the Turks in 1453, trade between Asia and Europe was shaken. The products that arrived there increased in price due to the taxes that the Turks began to charge from the Europeans.

Therefore, merchants from Venice and Genoa, who monopolized maritime trade, sought alternatives to reach the Indies. This was in line with the maritime expansion project of Portugal and the Kingdom of Castile. In this way, the interests of different groups turned to sponsoring navigations through the Atlantic Ocean.

The alliance between the king and the bourgeoisie also contributed decisively to commercial and maritime expansion. At this time, monarchs wanted to centralize power, in a historical movement known as absolutism.

The king had prestige but little power and money. The bourgeoisie had money, but no power, no prestige. In this way, king and bourgeoisie supported and financed expeditions to Africa, Asia and America, and thus achieve their goals.

Portugal was the pioneer in carrying out large sea voyages. Facing the Atlantic and without the possibility of expanding into the Iberian Peninsula, the Portuguese preferred to venture into the Ocean Sea.

At the beginning of the 15th century, Portugal became the center of navigation studies, through the encouragement of the Infante D. Henrique, the Navigator.

This prince gathered at his residence in Sagres, Algarve, navigators, cosmographers, cartographers, merchants and adventurers in order to teach and learn the secrets of the seas.

In addition, D. Henrique sponsored numerous trips that made it possible to explore the coast of Africa.

The great Portuguese navigations

The Portuguese pioneering begins in 1415 with the conquest of Ceuta, a city that was an important trading post.

Let's see the chronology of Portuguese navigations:

1415 – Arrival in Ceuta, North Africa.
1419 – occupation of Madeira Island.
1431 – Gonçalo Velho arrives in the Azores
1434 – Cape Bojador is overcome by navigators
1444 – Cape Verde archipelago discovered.
1471 – occupied the islands of São Tomé and Príncipe
1482 – the navigator Diogo Cão enters the Congo River and establishes contacts in the territory of Angola
1488 – Bartolomeu Dias rounds the Cape of Good Hope.
1498 – Vasco da Gama reaches Calicut, on the west coast of India.
1500 – Pedro Álvares Cabral officializes the existence of lands in southern America and heads towards Asia, the fleet's final objective.
1500 – on August 10, Diogo Dias finds the island of Madagascar.
1505 – The Portuguese sign a treaty with the rulers of Ceylon (Sri Lanka).
1507 – The island of Hormuz (now Iran) is attacked by Alfonso de Albuquerque
1510 – capture of Goa by Alfonso de Albuquerque.
1511 – Francisco Serrão arrives in Malacca (Malaysia).
1512 – arrival of the Portuguese in Timor.
1543 – commercial relations between Portuguese and Japanese were established.
1557 – Chinese authorities allow Portuguese to stay in Macau.

The great Spanish navigations

The second European country to venture into the Great Navigations was Spain, almost eighty years after Portugal. The expeditions were supported mainly by Isabel de Castilla.

The navigator Christopher Columbus thought it possible to reach the Indies by another way to the west. For that, the caravels had to leave the safe route that bordered the African coast and follow the open ocean.

Columbus asked the Portuguese kings for help, but was rejected. He left for the kingdom of Castile, where his idea was considered crazy by some and fantastic by others. He especially managed to convince the queen of Castile, Isabel I, interested in expanding their territories as far away as they were.

On his first voyage, Christopher Columbus landed in the Bahamas, believing he had reached the Indies. It was only in 1504 that the mistake was undone, when the navigator Amerigo Vespucci confirmed that it was a new continent. Even so, until his death, Columbus maintained that he had reached the Indian subcontinent.

Below are the main dates of the Spanish navigations:

1492 – Christopher Columbus discovers America.
1499 – Alonso Ojeda arrives in Venezuela. On this expedition is the cartographer Américo Vespucci who explains that those lands are a new continent.
1500 – Vicente Pinzón sails the Amazon.
1511 – Diogo Velasquez reaches Cuba.
1512 – Ponce de León arrives in Florida.
1513 – Vasco Nunez reaches the Pacific Ocean.
1516 - Juan Díaz de Solís explores the Rio de la Plata.
1519 – Fernão de Magalhães and Sebastián Elcano set out on the first circumnavigation voyage. Magellan would die during the crossing and only Elcano would complete the feat.
1519 – Fernão Cortez arrives in Mexico.
1521 – Ferdinand Magellan takes possession of the Philippines.
1531 – Francisco Pizarro conquers Peru.
1537 – João Ayolas arrives in Paraguay.
1540 – Pedro de Valdivia discovers Chile.
1541 – Francisco Orellana explores the Amazon River.

Great European navigations

Due to the success of Portuguese and Castilian expeditions, other countries tried to conquer new territories such as England, France and Holland.

English navigations

After some geographical reconnaissance expeditions along the North American coast, the British only began to colonize North America at the end of the 16th century.

Likewise, during the reign of Queen Isabel I, English navigators were encouraged to assault Spanish galleons returning to Spain full of metals.

French navigations

For their part, the French never accepted the division of America, by the Treaty of Tordesillas, between Spain and Portugal. Therefore, they disputed territories dominated by the Spaniards. The onslaughts across the Caribbean and along the US coasts resulted in the possession of Haiti, French Guiana, Canada and Louisiana.

In the 16th century, a group of French people tried to settle in Rio de Janeiro, in the episode known as França Antártica. They even brought some groups of Protestants who were persecuted in France.

Dutch Navigations

The Dutch arrived in America in the 17th century, and founded New Amsterdam (now New York), but they would be expelled by the English. In the same century, they invaded and occupied Pernambuco and Bahia, conquering present-day Suriname and Curaçao.

In Brazil, they would be repelled by Spanish-Portuguese troops, but they would manage to establish themselves in the Caribbean, constituting the Netherlands Antilles.

In Asia, the Dutch went to war with the Portuguese to occupy several territories that they owned, such as Malacca and Timor.

Consequences of the Great Navigations

European maritime expansion has left its mark on all continents.

Europe realized that there were more peoples, languages and customs than had been known until then. For the most part, the meeting of cultures was fraught with violence.

In the Americas, indigenous life would never be the same again. The colonizers brought with them a new form of economic, political and social organization. From this mixture, always unequal, the hybrid societies of Latin America were born.

Africa was the scene of the deportation of thousands of people who were reduced to slavery. In the Americas, enslaved blacks learned to reinvent themselves and mixed their beliefs and customs with native foods and those offered by the colonizer.

The Asian kingdoms allowed Europeans to settle in their territory in a restricted way. The movement of Europeans was only allowed in ports and even then, they were constantly watched. This did not prevent Asian products from reaching Europe and changing the fashions and art of that time.

In this way, the consequences of the great navigations are still felt today, as it was this movement that allowed the spread of European society on the four continents.

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