Brown_C Response and Annotations Week 2 1
Weekly Readings Summary and Response
Once the Atlantic Ocean was opened for exploration, European nations clamored to be
the first to send voyages further and further to discover what lay beyond, but more importantly
lay claim to this newly uncovered world. Two very basic concepts drove the Europeans, God and
Country. This is all to true for Spain and Portugal specifically. The Portuguese were leading
figures in exploring Atlantic, perfecting the technique that al other nations modeled for proper
and effective navigation. Exploration was rooted into the Spanish culture and enthusiastically
jumped into exploration right behind the Portuguese. Despite these two nations existing on the
Iberian Peninsula and sharing countless cultural similarities, there exploration and interactions
with new cultures took on very different shapes. Their philosophies for how to approach
relationships with the natives and new cultures differed greatly. The Portuguese philosophy was
weighted much more on the political spectrum, centering on creating and fostering lasting
trading relationships, versus the Spanish philosophy that was much more militaristic in nature
turning to force rather than diplomacy. The philosophical differences shaped the ensuing
interactions between these two European nations and the natives that they encountered.
Portuguese exploration of Africa began in the mid-15th century. Early Portuguese
explorers initially ventured onto the continent for trade rather than colonization1. The Portuguese
sought exclusive economic ventures among the African kingdoms and nations. Their initial
intention was not to overtake this thriving economy, but simply integrate themselves among it
through willing cooperation. In ultimately deciding for cooperation over conquest, the
Portuguese made a strategic decision based on the conditions that the observed. It became clear
to the Portuguese that conquest was the unlikely path. One reason was the shear diversity and
1 (Benjamin 2009, 109)
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size of the continent. Along the present-day Senegal and Guinea coast there was an estimate of
anywhere from fourty to fifty individual states or kingdoms alone2. The complexity of the
different nations, cultures, peoples, and even language along would make pure conquest difficult
for the Portuguese in Africa. The physical geography also played a role in the Portuguese initial
actions of for cooperation. The African interior was much of the rich and desired natural
resources lay but accessing it without the African kingdoms agreement and willingness would
make the task that much more cumbersome for the Portuguese.
Through shallow political alliances and the intense forging of economic ties, the Portuguese
made themselves a central piece of the African economy, one that many of these states and
kingdoms came to find themselves increasingly reliant on for all goods. It was not militaristic
conquest, but and economic one, made easier by the relatively compliant and willing African
states and chiefdoms. Overall, the Portuguese initially saw the conquest model not worth the
reward or effort3 and opting for peaceful relations was the logical philosophy. The unfortunate
fact was that as the Portuguese ingrained themselves into the African economy, they did the same
with the slave trade. When relations with the Kingdom of Kongo deteriorated over resistance to
the Slave trade, the Portuguese undertook the first major military conquest campaign into Africa
to restore a sympathetic king and reopen the slave trade4 in 1570. By this time the slave trade
was a major Portuguese economic venture that could not be lost. From this point forward
subsequent interactions between the Portuguese and African nations turned much more violent
and militaristic.
2 Ibid.
3 (Benjamin, 114)
4 (Benjamin, 117)
Brown_C Response and Annotations Week 2 3
Spanish interactions on the opposite side of the Atlantic, in the Americas, took a very
different route than that of the Portuguese. There were very few peaceful interactions between
the Spanish and the natives which consequently drove the Spanish to adopt the conquest model.
This many be in part because the Spanish were met with considerably different attitudes. The
natives living throughout the Caribbean and Central and South America were considerably more
resistant to what they immediately recognized as dangerous and imposing invaders. The Spanish
responded with resounding violence. They justified the violence and conquest under the guise
that they were the more civilized culture and should attempt to “educate” the natives in the
European way, specifically regarding Christianity. Any resistance to this was met with swift and
brutal militaristic backlash by the Spanish5. The Spanish considered the natives primitive,
savage, and barbaric. The cultural differences perceived by the Spanish were too extreme in their
perspective and there could be no possibility of cooperation. The Spanish justified their conquest
of the natives on religious grounds, deeming the refusal to convert enough.
The interesting conversation lays in the continued use of the word Civilized. By all
definitions, the marker of civilization simply means a culture in the advanced stages of
development and progress. These Caribbean, central and south American cultures by all
definitions were civilized in going by the sheer definition of the word. They had economic and
political structures, language, and communication abilities, a known and taught cultural history,
architecture, and religion6. Religion played the biggest role in driving a wedge between the
Spanish and these Natives. Many of the Native central and south American religions required
human sacrifice, something that was unpalatable for the Spanish Catholics they began
encountering. The Spanish conquest was in part a result of the environments they were subject
5 (Games and Rothman 2008, 57)
6 (Games and Rothman, 66)
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to. The Central and South American cultures were inherently violent and militaristic, and the
Spanish simply met the energy that was being put out.
Bibliography
Benjamin, Thomas. The Atlantic World: Europeans, Africans, Indians, and Their Shared History
1400-1900. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009.
Games, Alison, and Adam Rothman. Major Problems in Atlantic History. Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth, 2008.
Annotated Bibliography
Bohorquez, J. 2020. “Linking the Atlantic and Indian Oceans: Asian Textiles, Spanish Silver,
Global Capital, and the Financing of the Portuguese–Brazilian Slave Trade (c.1760–
1808).” Journal of Global History 15 (1): 19–38. doi:10.1017/S1740022819000317.
This article attempts to discuss the larger historical perspective of the Portuguese participation in
the African slave. It frames in a larger Atlantic perspective that allows for connections to the
broader flows of capital not just from African across the Atlantic to the Americas but also into
the Indian ocean and Asia. This article allows for the opportunity to see how interactions that
take place in the Atlantic are not isolated to this region but reverberate across the globe. In this
case, the Portuguese involvement in the slave trade ripped globally as well.
Casanova, Carlos A. 2012. “The Influence of Christianity on the Spanish Conquest of America
and the Organization of the Spanish-American Empire.” Logos: A Journal of Catholic
Thought & Culture 15 (4): 125–44.
The article is an analysis of how Christianity deeply influenced the Spanish in their conquest of
the Americas. He lists several reasons that contribute to the development of a uniquely Spanish
ethos when it comes to conquest and moral standards that at time conflict with the Enlightenment
ideas that come later. The article discusses how religion was a major contributing factor for the
Brown_C Response and Annotations Week 2 5
Spanish conquest as wells as justification for it. It also goes on to explain how Christian doctrine
and thought were used in the organization and later structuring of the Spanish empire in the
Western hemisphere and why.
Garrido, Francisco, and Soledad González. 2020. “Adaptive Strategies during Times of Conflict
and Transformation: Copiapó Valley under the Spanish Conquest in the Sixteenth
Century.” Ethnohistory 67 (1): 127–48. doi:10.1215/00141801-7888777
This article discusses how natives in Chile resisted Spanish conquest through adaptation of their
fighting and warfare styles as well as political alliances. This article offers the alternative
perspective to the predominant Spanish, Eurocentric perspective of Atlantic conquest. The article
brings to attention that the Spanish conquest was not one sided and that the indigenous and
native people were also impacted and adapted as result of interactions by the Spanish and
attempts to conquer them.
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