Exploration and Expansion
Section 3: Voyages of Portugal and Spain
In this section you will learn about the accomplishments of early Portuguese explorers.
You will find out how the voyages of Christopher Columbus influenced Europe and the
Americas. You will learn about other Spanish and Portuguese expeditions and their effects.
You will study the Atlantic slave trade and discover why it prospered and how it affected
Africa. Finally, you will learn how the relative size of Portugal and Spain helped determine
their success in expansion and colonization.
Section 3 Summary
Portuguese and Spanish explorers made the first European voyages of discovery. A
Portuguese royal family member, Prince Henry, gathered Europe’s best navigators and
sent them to find gold and a route to the Indies. In 1488 Portuguese explorer Bartolomeu
Dias sailed around the Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa. After Dias,
Vasco de Gama sailed from Portugal, rounded the Cape, and reached India, opening a
direct trade route from Europe to the Indies. Portuguese merchants no longer had to pay
middlemen or powers that controlled overland routes. Ships carried goods more cheaply
than did caravans. Trade promised great wealth.
Meanwhile Genoan navigator Christopher Columbus studied the writings of
Marco Polo and Ptolemy. He persuaded King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain to
finance a voyage west across the Atlantic to Asia. On October 12, 1492, his three ships
reached an island that Columbus named San Salvador and claimed for Spain. Instead of
India, he had reached lands unknown to Europeans of his day.
Following Columbus’s voyage, a massive exchange took place, known as the
Columbian Exchange. Goods, plants, animals, and diseases traveled between the
Americas and Europe. Gold and silver from South America enriched Spain. American
potatoes, tomatoes, beans, and corn entered the European diet. Spanish horses changed
the lives of Native Americans on the plains. Europeans also brought small pox and other
diseases, from which millions of Native Americans died.
Spain and Portugal often claimed the same lands. To settle conflicts, Pope
Alexander VI issued an edict drawing a line down the center of the Atlantic Ocean. Spain
received all lands to the east of the line, and Portugal all the lands to the west. In 1494 the
Treaty of Tordesillas between Spain and Portugal moved the line farther west. Spain
soon took control of most of Central and South America and the Philippines. Portugal
claimed Brazil and lands in Africa, Asia, and the East Indies.
Other explorers followed Columbus. Americo Vespucci, an Italian navigator who
sailed for both Spain and Portugal, first realized that Columbus’s discoveries were a New
World. In 1513 Vasco Núñez de Balboa of Spain crossed the Isthmus of Panama and
discovered an ocean, supporting Vespucci’s idea. Ferdinand Magellan, a Portuguese
navigator sailing for Spain, proved Balboa was correct by sailing around the tip of South
America to the ocean he named the Pacific, and on to Asia.
Meanwhile, Portugal conquered lands and established trading bases in key areas
to control trade. These included the southwest coast of India, the Malay Peninsula, islands
called the Moluccas (muh·LUKH·uhs), and Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). Portugal also gained
footholds in China, Japan, and East Africa. From these posts the Portuguese blocked
other countries’ routes to the East, giving them unchallenged access to Asian markets.
In Africa the Portuguese began to trade slaves as well as gold. Later, the Dutch,
English, and French joined the slave trade, which was part of a system called the
triangular trade. First, merchants shipped cloth, weapons, and liquor from Europe to
Africa in exchange for slaves or gold. In the second stage—called the Middle
Passage—slaves were shipped across the Atlantic to the Americas and sold for goods
raised on plantations. Finally, these raw goods were shipped to Europe. The Middle
Passage was brutal. Chained in the hold without food, water, or sanitary facilities, many
Africans died. Some 10 million survived the horrible journey. The slave trade vastly
reduced native populations in Africa, with disastrous effects on Africa’s development and
progress.
The Portuguese empire soon declined. Portugal did not have the wealth or
population to support so large an empire. Shipwrecks and battles with enemies cost both
money and lives. Portugal’s small population could not replace so many losses. Finally, in
1580 Spain conquered Portugal and restricted its trade. Only Brazil and Angola survived
as major Portuguese colonies.