Why Europe has to
come to Asia?
Factors to explain the
reasons why:
Crusades (1095 – 1291 AD)
The Crusades were a series of
religiously-sanctioned military cam
paigns
waged by much of Latin Christian
Europe, particularly the Franks of
France and the
Holy Roman Empire. The specific
crusades to restore Christian
control of the Holy Land were
fought over a period of nearly 200
years, between 1095 and 1291.
Other campaigns in Spain and
Eastern Europe continued into the
15th century. The Crusades were
fought mainly against Muslims,
although campaigns were also
waged against pagan Slavs, Jews,
Russian and Greek Orthodox Chri
stians
, Mongols, Cathars, Hussites,
Waldensians, Old Prussians, and
political enemies of the popes.
Marco Polo
Marco Polo ( 1254 – January 8,
1324) was a merchant from the
Venetian Republic who wrote
Il Milione, which introduced
Europeans to Central Asia and
China. He learned about trading
whilst his father and uncle,
Niccolò and Maffeo, voyaged
through Asia and met Kublai Khan
. In 1269, they returned to Venice
and were reunited with Marco. The
three of them embarked on an
epic journey to Asia, returning
after 24 years to find Venice at
war with Genoa; Marco was
imprisoned, and dictated his
stories to a cellmate. He was
released in 1299, became a
wealthy merchant, married and
had 3 children. He died in 1324,
and was buried in San Lorenzo
Trade Routes
A trade route is a logistical network
identified as a series of pathways and
stoppages used for the commercial
transport of cargo. Allowing goods to
reach distant markets, a single trade route
contains long distance arteries which may
further be connected to several smaller
networks of commercial and non
commercial transportation.
Fall of Constantinople (1453)
The Fall of Constantinople
refers to the capture of the
capital of the Byzantine Empire
which occurred after a siege
laid by the Ottoman Empire,
under the command of Sultan
Mehmed II. The siege lasted
from Thursday, 5 April 1453
until Tuesday, 29 May 1453
(according to the
Julian Calendar), when the city
fell to the Ottomans.
Constantinople was defended
by the army of Emperor
Constantine XI. The event
marked the end of the political
independence of the
millennium-old Byzantine
Empire.
Hagia Sophia
Prince Henry the Navigator
The Infante Henrique, Duke of Viseu,
March 4, 1394 – November 13, 1460 was
an infante (prince) of the Portuguese
House of Aviz and an important figure in
the early days of the Portuguese Empire,
being responsible for the beginning of the
European worldwide explorations. He is
known in English as Prince Henry the
Navigator.
Prince Henry the Navigator was the third
child of King John I of Portugal, the
founder of the Aviz dynasty, and of
Philippa of Lancaster, Henry encouraged
his father to conquer Ceuta (1415), the
Muslim port on the North African coast
across the Straits of Gibraltar from the
Iberian peninsula, with profound
consequences on Henry's worldview:
Henry became aware of the profit
possibilities in the Saharan trade routes
that terminated there and became
fascinated with Africa in general; he was
most intrigued by the Christian legend of
Prester John and the expansion of
Portuguese trade.
Vasco de Gama’s Expedition
Age of Exploration ( 14 – 17 ) th th
The Age of Discovery, also known as the Age of
Exploration, was a period in history which Europeans and
European descendants explored the world by ocean
searching for trading partners and particular trade goods. The
most desired trading goods were gold, silver and spices.
Western Europeans used the compass, new sailing ship
technologies, new maps, and advances in astronomy to seek
a viable trade route to Asia for valuable spices which would
be uncontested by Mediterranean powers. In terms of
shipping advances, the most important developments were
the creation of the carrack and caravel designs in Portugal.
These vessels evolved from medieval European designs from
the North Sea and both the Christian and Islamic
Mediterranean. They were the first ships that could leave the
relatively placid and calm Mediterranean, Baltic or North Sea
and sail safely on the open Atlantic.
It was not until the carrack and then the caravel were
developed in Iberia that Western Europeans seriously
considered Asiatic trade and oceanic exploration. One
factor was the lack of Christian European access to the
spice and silk trade, for the eastern trade routes had
become controlled by the Ottoman Empire after the
Turks took control of Constantinople in 1453, and they
barred Europeans from those trade routes, as they did
through North Africa and the historically important
combined-land-sea routes via the Red Sea. Both spice
and silk were big businesses of the day, and arguably,
spices which were both used as preservatives and used
to disguise the taste of poorly preserved foods were
something of a necessity—at least to those Europeans
of better than modest means.
The first great wave of expeditions was launched by
Portugal under Prince Henry the Navigator (Infante
D.Henrique). European sailing practices before Sir Henry
had been primarily coastal. Voyages out of sight of land
relied on proven routes detailed in a portolan chart.
Portolan charts showed details of geographic land
features, allowing navigators to identify their departure
point, follow a compass heading, and on landfall identify
their position and drift from the newly presented land
features. Due to the risks involved in this process,
European sailors avoided sailing beyond sight of land for
extended periods. A number of nautical myths explained
these risks in terms of oceanic monsters or an edge of
the world. Prince Henry's navigation challenged this
belief. The Madeira Islands were discovered in the
Atlantic ocean in 1419, and in 1427 the Azores. The
Portuguese settled these islands as colonies.
In 1434 the Portuguese explorer Gil Eanes surmounted
the obstacle of Cape Bojador. In the bull
Romanus Pontifex the trade monopoly for newly
discovered countries beyond Cape Bojador was granted
to the Portuguese. In 1482 an expedition under
Diogo Cão made contact with the Kingdom of Kongo.
The crucial breakthrough was in 1487 when
Bartolomeu Dias rounded (and later named) the
Cape of Good Hope and proved that access to the
Indian Ocean was possible from the Atlantic. Exploring
land Pero da Covilha colect important information about
Red Sea and Quenia coast. In 1498 Vasco da Gama
made good on this promise by reaching India.
Portugal's rival Castile (predecessor of Spain) had been
somewhat slower than its neighbour to begin exploring
the Atlantic. It was not until the late fifteenth century,
following the unification of Castile and Aragon that Spain
emerged and became fully committed to looking for new
trade routes and colonies overseas. In 1492 the joint
rulers of the nation conquered the
Moorish kingdom of Granada, which had been providing
Castile with African goods through tribute, and they
decided to fund Christopher Columbus' expedition that
they hoped would bypass Portugal's lock on Africa and
the Indian Ocean reaching Asia by travelling west.
Columbus did not reach Asia, but rather found what was
to the Europeans a New World: America. In 1500, the
Portuguese navigator, Pedro Álvares Cabral explored
the land that is today called Brazil. For the two European
monarchies a division of influence became necessary to
avoid conflict. This was resolved by Papal intervention in
1494 when the Treaty of Tordesillas divided the world
between the two powers. The Portuguese "received"
everything outside of Europe east of a line that ran 270
leagues west of the Cape Verde islands; this gave them
control over Africa, Asia and eastern South America
(Brazil). The Spanish received everything west of this
line, territory that was still almost completely unknown,
and proved to be mostly the western part of the
American continent plus the Pacific Ocean islands.
In the Americas the Spanish found a number of
empires that were as large and populous as
those in Europe. However, small bodies of
Spanish conquistadors, with large armies of
indigenous Americans groups, managed to
conquer these states. The most notable
amongst the conquered states were the
Aztec empire in Mexico (conquered in 1521) and
the Inca empire in modern Peru (conquered in
1532). Once Spanish sovereignty was
established, the Spanish focused on the
extraction and export of gold and silver.
In 1519 the Spanish crown funded the expedition of the Portuguese
navigator Fernão de Magalhães. The goal of the mission was to find
the Spice Islands by travelling west, which would place the islands
in Spain's economic and political sphere. The expedition managed
to cross the Pacific Ocean and reach the Spice Islands, and was the
first to circumnavigate the world upon its return three years later.
Magalhães died in the battle of Mactan in the Philippines, leaving
the Spaniard Juan Sebastián Elcano the task of completing the
voyage. The expedition was a failure in the sense that its route was
impractical. The Strait of Magellan (Strait of Magalhães) was too far
south and the Pacific Ocean too vast. It was not a realistic
alternative to the Portuguese route around Africa. The Spanish were
able to establish a presence in the Pacific, but not based on
Magalhães's voyage. Rather, a cross-Pacific route was established,
by other explorers, between Mexico and the Philippines. The
eastbound route to the Philippines was first sailed by Alvaro de
Saavedra in 1527. The westbound return route was harder to find,
but was eventually discovered by Andrés de Urdaneta in 1565. For
a long time these routes were used by the Manila galleons, thereby
creating a trade link joining China, the Americas, and Europe via the
trans-Pacific and trans-Atlantic routes.
Ortelius Map 1570
Map of the Pacific 1579
Treaty of Zaragoza
The treaty was signed April 5, 1529, in the Spanish town
of Zaragoza. It specified that the Portuguese line of
influence would be marked 297.5 leagues east of the
Moluccas, a line that at the time was believed to pass
near the Mariana Islands.
The treaty granted sovereignty over the Moluccas to
Portugal, including rights of navigation and trade.
Portugal agreed to pay 350,000 ducats as purchase for
the Spanish rights. In theory, the treaty implied that
Spain relinquished its rights to occupy the Philippines,
which according to the treaty would fall under the
Portuguese area of influence.
While the Portuguese in Brazil did occupy territories
beyond the Tordesillas line, Spain would attempt to
establish settlement in the Philippines in 1542 and finally
in 1565, with the expedition of Miguel Lopez de Legazpi
that founded the colonies of Cebu and Manila. Spain
later established a colony in the Marianas in 1668 under
Father Diego Luís de San Vitores.
Spain included a clause of retro-vendendo, (an escape
clause) which granted the nullification of the treaty if
future proof was found that the Moluccas lay east of the
true antimeridian of the Tordesillas line. In return, João
III would immediately pay over 350,000 ducats: an
advance on his starting offer of 200,000, but
substantially less than the original Castilian demand of
1,000,000.
