What were the motives behind the Portuguese and Spanish Overseasexpansion and colonization in the period 1400-1550?

Ans: The story of the rise of Portugal and Spain as two of the most powerful and significant colonial powers in the world is one of the most intriguing stories in world History. It is a story of lust for gold and glory. It is a story of religious zeal. It is a story of adventures. It is a story of curiosity and finally it is the story of a section of mankind exploited to their bare bones. However what led to this chain of events is what we will explore in this essay.

The fuel behind the Portuguese and Spanish expansions cannot be credited to just a single reason or motive. It was a number of motives which together ultimately led to the voyages of discovery. Overpopulation, economic stability, new innovations in the field of ship building and astronomy, determination and ambitions of a few individuals and the hope of finding a promised land outside their own were some of the motives given to us by Geoffrey Scammell and J.H. Parry for the voyages of the two nations. In this essay, we shall look at the different reasons given by these historians and some of their flaws and also at other explanations.

J.H.Parry proposes land acquisition as one of the stimulus leading to the explorations. According to him the quickest way of becoming rich was by seizing the land from a docile peasantry and holding it as a fief and collecting dues from them. But the method that was widely adopted by the Portuguese and the Spaniards was the seizure and exploitation of new land which was largely uninhabited or occupied by helpless people who could be easily driven away. In this way the islands of Madeira and Canaries were occupied by the Portuguese and Spaniards respectively. Parry also talks about Portugal and Spain trying to find an alternative to the Mediterranean trade which was monopolised by the Venetians who had an unrivalled knowledge of the East and a formidable naval force.

Apart from these economic considerations the other powerful determinant that Parry talks about is religious zeal. This religious zeal manifested itself in two forms. One was the desire to convert unbelievers into believers through reasoning, preaching and persuasion. The other was the desire to ensure the safety and by extension the pre-dominance of one’s own community over others.

Charles Ralph Boxer very simply states that there were four main causes that spurred the Portuguese and Spaniards into engaging themselves in these voyages of discovery. These causes included crusading zeal against the Muslims, who at the time were rampaging through Eastern Europe and spreading their religion.

The next cause is exclusively stated by Boxer and that is the search for Prester John who was believed to be a mighty Christian ruler living in a land in the east and whose support, if mustered, would be enough to destroy the Moorish threat. The legends of Prester John told of a Christian patriarch and king said to rule over a nations lost amidst the Muslims and pagans in the orient. There were then the traditions of Christian attacks for dealing the infidels a godly blow or to acquire plunder. Conversion was important as the converts made useful allies, although the aims of the missions were very often entangled with less elevated motives.

The third cause given by Boxer was obviously the search for riches particularly gold from the famous West-African gold mines of Guinea. Fourth being the search for a route to tap the famed oriental spice and break the Venetian monopoly over its trade in Europe.

Geoffrey Scammell further elaborates by providing the explanation that there existed among the people a ‘spirit of curiosity’. The curiousness arose from a myriad of myths and fables about the East and the world beyond the Atlantic. There was an emphasis on finding the marvels of the unknown world. Some people believed that there existed utopian set ups where there was an abundance of opportunities and pleasures denied to mankind. Some others hoped to engage themselves in the voyages and escape poverty and misery. Scammell also talks about the myths where in the early years of the voyages, there were extensive searches conducted for the unknown marvels in the new world. For example, Cortez searched for the seven cities of Cibola. As one myth faded another rose to take its place. Parry on a similar line talks both about scientific and geographical curiosity where they wanted to know what lay beyond the horizon.

One of the main factors given as a cause for the voyages was the improvements in ships and navigational technology. But as both Geoffrey Scammell and Ralph Davies pointed out, these improvements took place as a result of the increasing discoveries rather than the other way round. Scammell also points out that by this time, the Portuguese venturers had already crossed and crossed difficult waters several times in whatever vessels that were available.

In opposing the technical reasons Davis says that, the chronology of maritime innovation will not support the view that exploration began because the means to carry it out had ripened. On the contrary, technical innovation was called forth by the urgent needs of oceanic exploration after it had taken the decisive strides southwards. He says that explorations began with quite primitive means with no navigational instruments beyond compass and log and ships which were not rigged in a way to face the wind systems of the Atlantic coast. There were decisive improvements in the ships and navigational methods in the middle of the 15th century when the Portuguese had already ventured south beyond Sahara coast. These improvements enabled explorations to penetrate farther but had no part in its commencement.

Ralph Davis refutes all reasons which are of political and technical nature. He says that there was a definite tension in Europe due to the Turkish expansions and threat to various east European nations but these hardly influenced the Portuguese. So Davis says that neither ideological crusading nor technical changes can account for the sudden 15th century achievement in exploration by a hitherto insignificant nation. Portugal was a poor and small country with a mountainous terrain. The soil was poor in quality and not worthy of agriculture. On the pretext of the poor commercial economy of Portugal during the period Scammell in his book The First Imperial Age argues that gold was not the initial motive because the commercial economy was not developed to such an extent to require gold in large quantities. This interest according to him developed much later.

However this idea of the economic backwardness of the Iberian Peninsula is questionable. Portuguese urban and trading interests were so strong that in 1385 they even achieved some measure of political influence as well. Portuguese fisheries were well developed and extended far beyond native waters to the North African and Irish coasts. By the 15th century the Portuguese had acquired a name in the fisheries business and most of the Portuguese enterprises were directed towards sea and not the land. They had seafarers who caught fish out at the Atlantic waters and sold it to the rest of Europe. This was a major source of revenue for them. Spain on the other hand was involved in a trade of wool, wine and cheese with the Italians. Braudel in his book The Perspective of the World mentions that Portuguese economy was not in its infancy. It had developed contacts with Muslim states like Granada and had monetary economy which existed to some extent on wage labour.

Many also suggest that Europe was overpopulated during the period and the stresses of the population led to the search for new lands overseas. However this is a highly refutable claim as Europe had just emerged from the Black Death and showed no visible signs of overpopulation until the end of the century.

This however had a paradoxical effect too. After the Black Death there was an acute shortage of labour in Europe. The market for slave labour in Europe was huge and colonizing the places where the slaves came from was a lucrative business option.

The Portuguese were powerful enough to capture Ceuta in 1415. It has been suggested that the fertile corn-growing region of the hinterland formed an attraction for the Portuguese, whose own country was even then normally deficient in cereals as suggested earlier, but a Muslim description of Ceuta states that the city had to import corn from elsewhere. In 1420 and 1425 the Atlantic islands of Madeira and Azores were discovered respectively, and settled upon by the Portuguese. The settlers cleared large areas and the initial trade of timber and dyewood from these islands was substituted by trade in corn.

Charged with the success of its initial expansions, Portugal continued with its overseas expansion. The capture of Ceuta enabled the Portuguese to obtain some information about lands of the Upper Niger and Senegal rivers where the source of Moorish wealth in the form of gold came from.

It was only in 1434 that Cape Bojador was overcome and with this explorations achieved momentum. The overcoming of this barrier also brought about decisive changes to the Portuguese vessels and the lateen-rigged Caravel evolved. The explorations paid off at last, trade in slaves started to flourish in the newly discovered lands beyond Cape Bojador. There was a rush to join in this slave trade. Numerous vessels from Portugal started to facilitate this trade in slaves.

The motivations behind the Portuguese discoveries are also clearly apparent from the wording of the Papal Bulls which were issued during the lifetime of Prince Henry and his immediate successors. The three most important Bulls were the Dum diversas of 18 June 1452, the Romanus Pontifex of 8 January 1455, and the Inter Caetera of 13 March 1456.These Bulls dealt specifically with the Portuguese explorations and exhorted them to undertake more of those. Boxer has analysed the bulls and they clearly mirror the spirit of the ‘age of discovery’. The cumulative effect of these Papal bulls was to give the Portuguese and in due course the other Europeans who followed them a religious sanction. The Bulls also reflect the initiative taken by the crown of Portugal and by Prince Henry in directing and organizing the work of exploration, conquest, colonization and exploitation.

Prince Henry better known as Henry the Navigator was the prince of Portugal. For over 40 years he steadily gave his support to the voyages. He greatly encouraged the voyages and placed men of his own household in charge of ships. His reasons for undertaking the voyages were his interests to know what lay beyond the canaries and Cape Bojador and also to open up new profitable trades. He wanted to investigate the extent of Moorish powers and also to convert the pagans to Christianity. There was also the motive to seek out Christian rulers and ally with them. One of his main motives though was to fulfil the predictions of his horoscope, where it was said that he would attempt discoveries which was hidden to other men.

The emergence of strong centralised states and powerful rulers contributed to sea voyages and creation of colonial empires. The Contribution of Isabella and Ferdinand of Spain clearly demonstrates this. The Aviz dynasty established with the help of the bourgeoisie in Portugal showed interest in sea voyages and the quest for economic gains. All this were however only contributing factors.

In the Treaty of 1479, following Portuguese wars with Castile, Castile acknowledged that West Africa was an entirely Portuguese sphere. The Gold trade was reserved to the crown and traders were allowed only under royal licenses. Portugal thus came under the eye of Europe with its flourishing trade in gold, ivory and pepper. With the resources derived from the flourishing gold and slave trades with Guinea the Portuguese beefed up the search for Prester John. The Portuguese believed that it was somewhere beyond the river Nile.

In 1487 when Bartholomew Diaz rounded of the Cape of Good Hope it was so named in good hope of finding the sea route to the infinite riches of the east and also of finding Christian Kingdoms beyond the lands which were known during the period. The travel accounts of Marco Polo and Niccolo Conti described the eastern riches and would have definitely got them excited about exploiting these riches. Few decades later with the beginning of the 16th century, travel books and references to distant lands in plays and allegories became a striking feature of the literary life of the period and certainly contributed a lot to the steady growth of interest in exploration and discovery.

This thirst for exploitation is proven by the actions of the Portuguese in India after Vasco da Gama landed in Calicut in 1498. Through their superior naval force, military garrisoning of important trading ports such as Goa and Calicut and the Cartaz system which was a form of trading license system, the Portuguese firmly cemented their control over the trade passing through the west coast of India. The economic motive in all these actions cannot be hidden.

On the other hand Spain made its greatest discovery in the form of the immense continents of Americas. Christopher Columbus, a Genoese, who was denied the support by the Portuguese ruler, discovered in 1492, the Bahamas near Florida and at the time he was working under the Spanish crown. Subsequent Spanish explorations discovered the rest of the New World which was inhabited by three powerful civilizations-The Aztecs in northern Mexico, The Mayas in central Mexico and The Incas towards the western coast of South America or the Peruvian coast. The period between 1520 CE to 1550 CE is seen as the Age of conquistadors. These conquistadors were adventurous men from Spain looking for private fortune and leading their own militia in the Americas. Conquistadors such as Hernan Cortes, Pedro de Alvarado and Francisco de Pizzaro captured and subjugated the American civilizations of Aztecs, Mayas and Incas respectively.

The Spanish followed the subjugation of the people with the capturing of their lands and establishing themselves there. They introduced institutions such as the Encomeinda system, the system of Corregitors, the vice royalties and the Audiencia. The Encomeindors ensured the safety of the natives in return for tributes and they emerged as parallels to the Spanish nobles. The Spanish exploited the good lands of Central America for cultivating large scale sugar plantations worked upon by Cheap African slave labour and made and titanic profits out of it. The Portuguese initially captured slaves from Africa. The Spanish put in place the Asiento system. Under this system permission was granted by the Spanish crown to other nations to sell slaves in the Spanish colonies. The Portuguese acquired the contract and supplied the Spanish colonies with slaves from Africa. The savings were immense and costs minimal. Sugar which was earlier meant for only the elite was now made accessible to all sections of society. Now there was conversion from production of luxury goods to producing commodities of mass consumption. The Spanish were also involved in mining activities in the Americas. Silver mines of the new world yielded large amounts of the metal and all this silver was taken to Spain to make silver bullions. The labour here too came from the cheap African slaves.

The Portuguese as we have already seen also had set up plantations in the Atlantic islands of Azores and Madeira which were worked upon by the slaves from Africa. They also had large sugar plantations in the South American nation of Brazil.

The Portuguese and the Spanish had hugely benefitted from these explorations economically. The proof was that by the 16th century the balance of economy had shifted from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic. The Portuguese acquired gold from the West African coast and the Spanish from the Americas. The plantations of the Spanish in Central America and of that of Portugal in Brazil and the Atlantic Islands by cheap African slave labour added to the profit. The trade in spices and luxury goods from the orient also brought in unprecedented wealth into Portugal. All these could have been achieved only with a planned and deliberate economic motive.

The motives were often very personal too. A great majority of the people left in search of new lands in order to make profits and earn their fortunes. Gold was almost at the top of the search list of most voyages. Many others, specially the oppressed minorities, left as it provided them a chance to practice their faiths freely and without restriction. The voyages were also an attraction to the abundant class of gentry as it gave them an opportunity to live like the nobility back at home, in the new world. For many others the voyages were an escape, an escape from poverty, escape from creditors, and an escape from hopeless misery. Most societies cherished the hope that there were lands abounding in things and opportunities which were currently being denied to them and this was important in the growth of the empires.

Scammell also notes that the Spanish conquistadors were undertaking such risks to acquire great riches for themselves and dazzle the world with their adventurous and courageous exploits. Other than personal economic benefits it also meant Glory and fame in their native lands. As Parry points out with the Renaissance Literary conventions Spaniards absorbed Renaissance attitudes of mind: The cult of the individual and the passion for personal reputation. Bernal Diaz mentions of his desire that his deed may be recorded with those of Cortez, ‘in the manner of the writings and reports of…illustrious men who served in wars in time past; in order that my children, grandchildren and descendants can say “my father came to discover and conquer these lands…and was one of the foremost in the conquest”.’

Rivalries between European states and the matter of national prestige also contributed to the voyages. Colonial powers attempted to secure what they considered to be vital interests by occupying territories which would otherwise fall into hostile hands. Voyages were also to a great extent inspired by the determination of individuals and the revelations of Spain in America and Portugal in Asia of riches on an unprecedented scale.

In short Gold, God and Glory seem to echo as the main motivation behind the overseas expansion of both Portugal and Spain. However it would be more apt to say that God was more of a legitimizing factor in the quest for Gold and Glory. The Politics and Economy of the period provided the spark to start the engine of colonization and religion and culture provided the dynamics to keep it running. Personal motives became the catalyst for all of these actions. Profit was the motive, which could not be achieved without bringing new cultivable land and resources under control and cheap labour to work upon it. Americas, the Atlantic Islands, The African west coast and Asia provided the former and African slave labour provided the latter. The economic leap that the Iberian Peninsula was able to achieve further boosted them and other rival European nations to follow pursuits of colonization overseas. The conclusion would be a story of ruthless lust for Gold and glory!

“We Spanish suffer from a sickness of the heart for which gold is the only cure”

-Hernan Cortez

Bibliography:

  • Scammell, Geoffrey, The First Imperial Age: European Overseas Expansion c.1400-1715, Routledge, 1989
  • Davis, Ralph, The Rise of Atlantic Economies, Cornell University Press, 1973
  • Charles Gibson, Spain in America, HarperCollins, 1966
  • Parry, J.H, The Age of Reconnaissance, University of California Press, 1982
  • Sinha, Aravind, Europe in Transition, From Feudalism to Industrialization, Manohar, 2010