Question

state the chief characteristics of the Portuguese seaborne trade​

Answer 1

Answer:

Following Christopher Columbus’ first voyage, the rulers of Portugal and Spain, by the Treaty of Tordesillas (1494), partitioned the non-Christian world between them by an imaginary line in the Atlantic, 370 leagues (about 1,300 miles) west of the Cape Verde Islands. Portugal could claim and occupy everything to the east of the line and Spain everything to the west (though no one then knew where the demarcation would bisect the other side of the globe). Portuguese rule in India, the East Indies, and Brazil rested on this treaty, as well as on Portuguese discoveries and on papal sanction (Pope Leo X, by a bull of 1514, forbade others to interfere with Portugal’s possessions). Except for such minor incursions as those of Ferdinand Magellan’s surviving ship in 1522 and the Englishman Sir Francis Drake’s voyage around the world in 1577–80, the Portuguese operated in the East for nearly a century without European competition. They faced occasional Oriental enemies but weathered these dangers with their superior ships, gunnery, and seamanship.

Explanation: