|
Product Description
As remarkable as Columbus and the conquistador expeditions, the history of Portuguese exploration is now almost forgotten. But Portugal's navigators cracked the code of the Atlantic winds, launched the expedition of Vasco da Gama to India and beat the Spanish to the spice kingdoms of the East - then set about creating the first long-range maritime empire. In an astonishing blitz of thirty years, a handful of visionary and utterly ruthless empire builders, with few resources but breathtaking ambition, attempted to seize the Indian Ocean, destroy Islam and take control of world trade.Told with Roger Crowley's customary skill and verve, this is narrative history at its most vivid - an epic tale of navigation, trade and technology, money and religious zealotry, political diplomacy and espionage, sea battles and shipwrecks, endurance, courage and terrifying brutality. Drawing on extensive first-hand accounts, it brings to life the exploits of an extraordinary band of conquerors - men such as Afonso de Albuquerque, the first European since Alexander the Great to found an Asian empire - who set in motion five hundred years of European colonisation and unleashed the forces of globalisation.
Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought
- The Last Crusade: The Epic Voyages of Vasco da Gama
- A Concise History of Portugal (Cambridge Concise Histories)
- City of Fortune: How Venice Ruled the Seas
- Empires of the Sea: The Siege of Malta, the Battle of Lepanto, and the Contest for the Center of the World
- 1453: The Holy War for Constantinople and the Clash of Islam and the West
- The Portuguese: A Modern History
- Journey to Portugal: In Pursuit of Portugal's History and Culture
- The Accursed Tower: The Fall of Acre and the End of the Crusades
- Night Train to Lisbon: A Novel
- The Enemy at the Gate: Habsburgs, Ottomans, and the Battle for Europe
*If this is not the "Conquerors: How Portugal Forged The First Global Empire" product you were looking for, you can check the other results by clicking this link. Details were last updated on Dec 25, 2024 14:49 +08.