Lisbon, the Lady of the Seas (Continuation)
Lisbon is the market for luxury tastes of elites across Europe: Venice and Genoa up and ruin England and the Netherlands are obliged to imitate the Portuguese to halt the loss of foreign exchange. The Lisboetas control for several decades all trade from Japan to Ceuta. The city earns fame that comes myth, and in the sixteenth century is undoubtedly the richest city in the whole world. For her flock traders from across Europe, in addition to large numbers African slaves and even some Indian, Chinese and even Japanese and Brazilian Indians. In the time of King Manuel I, on the streets of Lisbon feasts are made with parades of lions, elephants, rhinos, camels and other animals not seen in Europe since the time of the Roman Circus. A rhinoceros and an elephant arriving even being offered to Pope Leo X (see Castle If). In Europe the myth of Lisbon and its discoveries is so great that when Thomas More invents its island of Utopia, try to give it credibility by saying that the Portuguese were to discover it.
To organize all private trade and collect taxes, are created in the capital of the great sixteenth century Portuguese trading houses: the House of Mina, the House of Arguin, the House of Slaves, the House of Flanders (Netherlands) and the famous house of India. The big profits are used in the construction of other buildings: are this century Jeronimos Monastery and Belem Tower in New Manueline style (which evokes trade overseas), the Forte de São Lourenço Bugoi an island in the Tagus, Palace Square, the new and imposing Royal Palace (destroyed in 1755) and Arsenal military all built by the Sea (of straw), and even the Royal Hospital de Todos-os-Santos, and numerous private palaces and manor houses. The impetus for paving the streets with geometric shapes and designs formed by cubes of white limestone and black basalt (a cobblestone) was initiated at the time a luxury that other European cities could not afford. The city expanded to reach almost 200,000 inhabitants, being built Bairro Alto, initially known as Vila Nova Andrades in honor of the rich bourgeois Galicians who settled there, and that quickly becomes the richest neighborhood in town. It opened in 1552 at the Flea Market, which still functions today in the same location.
To organize all private trade and collect taxes, are created in the capital of the great sixteenth century Portuguese trading houses: the House of Mina, the House of Arguin, the House of Slaves, the House of Flanders (Netherlands) and the famous House of India. The big profits are used in the construction of other buildings: are this century Jeronimos Monastery and Belem Tower in New Manueline style (which evokes trade overseas), the Forte de São Lourenço Bugoi an island in the Tagus, Palace Square, the new and imposing Royal Palace (destroyed in 1755) and Arsenal military all built by the Sea (the straw), and even the Royal Hospital de Todos-os-Santos, and numerous private palaces and manor houses. The impetus for paving the streets with geometric shapes and designs formed by cubes of white limestone and black basalt (a cobblestone) was initiated at the time a luxury that other European cities could not afford. The city expanded to reach almost 200,000 inhabitants, being built Bairro Alto, initially known as Vila Nova Andrades in honor of the rich bourgeois Galicians who settled there, and that quickly becomes the richest neighborhood in town. It opened in 1552 at the Flea Market, which still functions today in the same local.Culturalmente lives in Lisbon in the sixteenth century the golden generation of Portuguese Science and Letters: the humanist among scientists Damiao de Gois (friend of Erasmus and Luther) the mathematician Pedro Nunes, the physician and botanist Garcia da Orta and Duarte Pacheco Pereira; among writers Luís de Camões, Bernardim Ribeiro, Gil Vicente and others. Isaac Abravanel, one of the greatest philosophers Hebrews, is appointed Treasurer of the King
Socially benefit all classes. The nobles of the city administration and the bourgeois Real are the most benefited, but even the people living with unattainable luxuries for the English, French or German contemporaries. The heavy work required is done by African slaves and the Galicians. The first are sold in Pillory Square, separated families, and work all day without pay, subject to some brutal treatment. The latter certainly made up for the trip to face miserable conditions of rural Spain, and the virtually identical language facilitated integration.
The Jews always include some poor and others who are among the most educated and wealthy merchants, and financial literate city. The first book printed in Lisbon was the comments about the Pentateuch of Moses ben Nahman, a book in Hebrew, published by Eliezer Toledano in 1489. In 1496 the Spaniards expel the Jews from its territory, animated by the spirit of a fundamentalist Christian Monarchy exclusively. Many come to Lisbon, probably having doubled its population (after the expulsion would be one-fifth of Lisboetas or even more). In exchange for a royal wedding, the Catholic kings of Castile and Aragon ask Manuel I of Portugal to do the same, which takes place in 1497. Acknowledging the central importance of the Jews in the city's prosperity, Dom Manuel decrees that all Jews to convert to Christianity, was forced to expel those who refuse only, not before the expropriation of their property. [8] For many years these new Christians practicing Judaism in secret or openly and despite riots and violence against them (how many children are torn from their parents and given to Christian families who treat them like slaves) are tolerated until the establishment of the Inquisition in Portugal, many years later. The result is the rise of the New Christian social temporarily, without the limitation of being Jewish, progress to the highest office of the court. Again the old elites are descendants of the ancient aristocracy of Asturias and Galicia (the nobles of Portucale) that create problems for the social ascent of Jews, often better educated and more skilled than the first. Ill-telling of the Christian Old culminates in the massacre of Christian-New in 1506 prompted by the Priors of the smaller churches in which some 3,000 people have been killed. As a result of the conflict, the king is persuaded by the territorial nobles to introduce the Inquisition (which only takes place in 1531 during the reign of his son and successor King John III |) and legal limitations to all descendants of New Christians ( similar to the old against the Jews), which prevent them from threatening the senior positions of the state of the Aristocracy Old Christians. The first auto-da-fe (death of heretics at the stake) is held at the Palace Square in 1540. Besides the Inquisition other problems arise. In 1569 there is the great Plague of London, which has a third of the population died.
The inquisition on fire kills many New Christians but expropriating the property and wealth of many others. Many merchants are Christian-old also expropriated after an anonymous tip false, that the inquisitors accept as valid as the riches they revert to the condemned. On the other hand few merchants would not have New Christian ancestry, due to marriages common among children of burghers who were partners in major companies. The Inquisition thus becomes an instrument of social control in the possession of the former Old Christians against almost all merchants Lisboetas, finally restoring to them the supremacy long lost.
It is in this climate of intolerance and persecution, in which the profits of the risks and the genius of successful merchants is undone by jealousy of the big landowners (who earn much less), that the prosperity of Lisbon is destroyed. The old liberal climate conducive to trade disappears and is replaced by a fanatical Catholic conservatism and absolute. The elites of the country requires the blood pure and ancient Old Christian, ie North. Many merchants fleeing to England or the Netherlands where they settle spreading the knowledge of the Portuguese naval and cartographic. Lisbon is taken by the feudal mentality of the great nobles, merchants and Portuguese, unconditional stability, security, support and credit due to the persecutions of the Inquisition, are unable to compete with the English and Dutch merchants (many of them of Portuguese origin) they rob the markets of India, the East Indies and China. In its place elites Portucale convince the feeble King, D. Sebastian turned to the conquest of a territorial empire, with more land and revenues for Noble, North Africa, enabling them to maintain economic supremacy compared to merchants. After the disaster of military Alcazarquivir in 1578, the Aristocrats gather up arms once more to their like-minded counterparts Castilians. This time successful, in 1580 the Spanish King Philip II of Spain is declared Don King Philip I of Portugal, after defeating the candidate of the weakened merchants, the Prior of Crato, Dom António (which was new and more liberal Christian, son of Jewish mother). Philippe full well the ambition of his father Habsburg King Carlos I of Spain also Emperor Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire (Germany), and Lord of most of Italy and the Netherlands famously claimed that If I were King of Lisbon, would be in soon King of the World.
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