Willem Adriaan Van Der Stel, and Other Historical Sketches

by George McCall Theal

The Dynasty of Avis.

During the long reign of João I the kingdom continued to prosper. The policy pursued was to maintain a firm alliance with England, to carry on commerce with that country, and to avoid connection of any kind with the other states of the peninsula. Learning was encouraged by the king, and Portuguese literature may be said to date from this period. If the martial ardour of the people was relaxing by long peace, it was revived in 1415 by the prosecution of war with the Moors on the North African coast, when the strong position of Ceuta, opposite Gibraltar, was taken. João I died in 1433, and was succeeded by his eldest legitimate son, Duarte by name. Affonso, an illegitimate son by Ines Pires, who was created count of Barcellos by his father, and duke of Bragança by his nephew Affonso V, was the ancestor of the sovereigns of Portugal from 1640 to 1910.

Duarte was an excellent king, but his short reign was marked by a great disaster. In 1437 an attack upon Tangier failed, and the fourth legitimate son of João I, Dom Fernando, became a prisoner. As he could only obtain his liberty by the restoration of Ceuta to the Moors, he remained a captive, and died at Fez in 1443.

Historical Sketches.

King Duarte died in 1438, when his son and heir, Affonso V, was only six years of age. Dom Pedro, duke of Coimbra, second son of João I and Philippa of Lancaster, then became regent, but ten years later the young king took the government into his own hands. He was a scholar and a patron of literature, but was somewhat reckless and unstable in character. He carried on war with the Moors of Northern Africa, and took several towns from them, after which he turned his arms against Castile, in hope of obtaining possession of that kingdom, but was utterly defeated in 1476 in the battle of Toro, and in 1481 died, leaving the throne of Portugal to his son João II.

The new king was twenty-six years of age when he succeeded his father. Though inclined to be a despot, he was one of the wisest and ablest princes that ever sat on the throne of Portugal. His great object was to reduce the power of the nobles, who under the feudal system of government were really masters of the country, and he therefore instituted an inquiry into the nature of their tenures, which provoked their resentment. First among them was the third duke of Bragança, who was lord of many towns, and owned more than one-fourth of the whole territory of the kingdom. He was arrested, and after a trial for treasonable correspondence with a foreign state, was executed. This was followed by the death of the duke of Viseu, who was stabbed by the king’s own hand, of the bishop of Evora, who was thrown down a well, and by the execution of about eighty of the most powerful noblemen in the country. Their estates were confiscated, though in some instances partially restored to their heirs, the vast authority they had possessed was broken for ever, and João II became an absolute monarch, though a benevolent and excellent one. He was a patron of learned men, a promoter of commerce, a just administrator, and in every way open to him he endeavoured to improve the condition of the people. He died at Alvor in the Algarves on the 25th of October 1495, to the grief of his subjects, who termed him the perfect king.

Defective Knowledge of Europeans.

It was during the reigns of the sovereigns of the dynasty of Avis that the Portuguese led the way in those geographical discoveries which have conferred such lustre upon the little kingdom. When João I ascended the throne Europeans knew far less of the western coast of Africa than was known by the Carthaginians five centuries before the Christian era, and of the southern and eastern coasts they were absolutely ignorant. The Arabs, Persians, and Indians were far more enlightened in this respect than were the people of Europe. Whether there were other writings in ancient times upon the shores of the Indian ocean than the Voyage of Nearchus and the Periplus of the Erythrean Sea is very doubtful, for if there were they would most likely have been in the great library of Alexandria,[2] to which Ptolemy had access, and of South-Eastern Africa he knew nothing at all. There is the most conclusive evidence that in very ancient times some nations frequented the eastern shore of the continent at least as far down as Cape Correntes,[3] but no accounts of their discoveries were extant in the fifteenth century, nor are there any to-day. The writings of even the Arabs and Persians after the time of Mohamed appear to have been unknown in Western Europe when the Portuguese commenced their explorations, so that to them, if the imperfect information contained in the geography of Ptolemy be excepted, all that was beyond Cape Nun from the Atlantic to the Indian ocean was a vast blank which it might be hazardous in the extreme to attempt to examine.

Historical Sketches.

The ships of the fifteenth century were ill-fitted also for long voyages. Though capable of withstanding heavy seas, they were clumsily rigged, and were without the mechanical appliances of the present day. In proportion to their tonnage they needed so many men to work them that a great deal of space was taken up with food and fresh water, and of comfort on board there was none. They could make the passage from Lisbon to London with fruit and wine without difficulty, but it was a very different thing to sail along an unknown coast, with no harbour in front where fresh provisions and water could be obtained. The compass, which is believed to have been in use in an imperfect form in China as far back as two thousand six hundred years before Christ, had recently become known in Western Europe, and about the beginning of the fourteenth century had been so greatly improved by Flavio Gioja, of Amalphi, that navigation had benefited greatly by it. But the compass, though enabling ships to steer safely between frequented ports, was not of much assistance in the exploration of seas never visited before, though it might be on the return passage. The instrument for determining latitudes at sea was exceedingly crude and imperfect, and for ascertaining longitudes no means whatever were known, so that it was only by computing the direction and the distance run that a navigator could form an opinion as to where he was. Add to this the current belief of seamen that the sun’s heat in the south was so great that it caused the water to boil and thick vapour to obscure the sky, which was always as dark as night. There was a legend that the crew of a ship that had made the venture had actually seen the region of eternal gloom, and had got away from it only by a miracle. In the minds of common mariners the ocean beyond Cape Nun was as wild and dreadful as that beyond Cape Correntes was to the Arabs of the eastern coast. Thus it was a task not only of discomfort, but of peril and dread, to proceed beyond the known part of the coast.