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Prestige, Ideology and Social Politics: The Place of the Portuguese Overseas Expansion in the Policies of Dom Manuel (1495–1521)1
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 April 2010
Extract
The search to understand the motives behind Portuguese overseas expansion has long preoccupied historians of the early modern period. Numerous articles, surveys and studies have addressed its economic incentives, achievements and legacies to the point where the historiography has obscured a holistic understanding of the forces at play in the early sixteenth century. Moreover, in this field of study overseas policy has been set apart from the domestic political and social climate, giving the impression that events taking place in Southeast Asia were foremost the concern of the policy makers in Lisbon. D. Manuel (1495–1521) who was king of Portugal and driving force behind the expansion during its arguably most crucial period, was neither warrior king nor astute entrepreneur, but rather the proponent of ambitious political reforms. The tenuous nature of his succession and his relationship with the highest stratum of nobility demands that scholarly attention focus on domestic politics during the so-called ‘Vasco da Gama era’. This paper contends that placation of the grandes (titled elites and their families) was D. Manuel's primary motivation behind continued expansion and conquest, superseding aspirations to economic and imperial power. It asserts that in an attempt to defuse his legacy of political instability left to him by his predecessor, D. Manuel manufactured a culture of chivalry that was linked to the overseas expansion and provided venues for noble combat away from the political centre.
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References
Notes
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