Portuguese Enclave

8/6/2019 Portuguese Enclave

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Enclave, definition.

y When a foreign culture penetrates and establishes inside theterritory of another and is therefore surrounded by the latter, yet

both coe-exist peacefully, were talking about an ENCLAVE.


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yVasco da Gama arrived to Calicut, coast of Malabar, in 1498.

y Years later, after having had contact to the kingdoms of Berar,

Ahmadnagar, Bijapur and Bidar, it was Vijayanagar the one that

helped captain Albuquerque to establish a base over firm land:

Goa.


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How did it happened?

y When the Portuguese arrived and tried to establish trading

relations they had gotten the support of the Raja Cochin in

return for the promise of helping him against the ruler

(Zamorin) of Calicut.

y Both of this kings had been able to remain independent from

Vijayanagar due to the series of mountain regions that separated

them from it.

y At the same time, Cochin saw in the Portugueses a way to

penetrate the international trading market.


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y Parallel, when the Portuguese learnt that the Muslims were

ruling over the major part of the territory, they focused their

efforts to built a counter-force.

y Albuquerque decided the best way to do it was to get the control

of an island strategically located: Goa.

y But Goa was under the control of Vijayanagar I ntimes of Krshna

deva Raya.


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y Surprisingly, Krshna got to an easy agreement with the

Portuguese:

y The disputes between Vijayanagar and Bijapur (Muslim control)

depended directly, for each others succeed, on military control.

y Both cultures were traditionally horse riding armies.

y Krshna arranged things with Albuquerque so that Vijayanagar

would enjoy monopoly of horse trading with the Portuguese.

That included the whole of India.


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y This arrangement was publicized by the King of Portugal (in

competition with Spain) as an expansion of his territories and

claimed himself Lord of eastern India.

y In reality his influence reached nothing beyond a couple of

islands.

y However this was enough for other epithet to be true: Lord of

conquering, navigation and trade of Ethiopia, Arabia, Persia and

India.


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y At the end of XVI Century Portugal controlled the major part of

the trading in eastern seas, although not all of it.

y A major amount of the riches that arrived to Portugal didnt

come from trading but from piracy against Arab ships trying to

reach or coming from India.

y The superiority in naval and war engineering permitted the

Portuguese to practically expell the Muslims from the seas that

they had controlled for over centuries.


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y

Meanwhile, the Indians didnt find that situation troublingbecause their interest in the coast and maritime routes to trade

was only marginal.

y This functioned as a condition for the possibility of good Indian-

Portuguese interaction, because the Portuguese didnt find areason to invade India, since they were getting profit as they

wanted.

y The Portuguese realized that their stability on the region

depended on the stability of the Indian kingdoms. Therefore theypreferred to use political and diplomatic strategies to maintain

their bases on Indian land.


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y The good political relations between the Portuguese and the

Indian rulers was shown by the fact that they even traded soldiers

for armament.

y The Portuguese actively participated in the eternal and

traditional Indian political intrigues and had with it influence on

the successions and establishment of new kings.

y To expand Christianity, the Portuguese fomented the mixture of

Portuguese men and Indian women. Goa had a population of

about 7,500 Lusistan-indians.


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y Yet, in the 19th C. British and Portuguese historians, influenced

by Social Darwinism and the white men burden ideology would

signal this close relation of co-existence as the main reason for

Portugal's later failure to remain and control India.


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Documents

Portuguese Enclave