Portugal Lisbon

Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic,
In recognized minority languages of Portugal:
:* mwl, República Pertuesa is a country located on the Iberian Peninsula, in Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Macaronesian archipelagos of the Azores and Madeira. It features the westernmost point in continental Europe, its mainland west and south border with the North Atlantic Ocean and in the north and east, the Portugal-Spain border, constitutes the longest uninterrupted border-line in the European Union. Its archipelagos form two autonomous regions with their own regional governments. On the mainland, Alentejo region occupies the biggest area but is one of the least densely populated regions of Europe. Lisbon is the capital and largest city by population, being also the main spot for tourists alongside Porto, the Algarve and Madeira.

One of the oldest countries in Europe, its territory has been continuously settled and fought over since prehistoric times. The territory was inhabited by the Celtic and Iberian peoples, such as the Lusitanians, the Gallaecians, the Celtici, Turduli, and the Conii. These peoples had some commercial and cultural contact with Phoenicians, ancient Greeks and Carthaginians. It was later ruled by the Romans, followed by the invasions of Germanic peoples together with the Alans, and later the Moors, who were eventually expelled during the Reconquista. First founded as a county within the Kingdom of León in 868, Portugal formally became an independent kingdom with the Treaty of Zamora in 1143.

During the 15th and 16th centuries Portugal led the Age of Discovery and established one of the longest-lived maritime and commercial empires, becoming one of the main economic and political powers of the time. By the early 19th century, events such as the 1755 Lisbon earthquake, the country's occupation during the Napoleonic Wars, and the resulting independence of Brazil in 1822 led to a marked decay of Portugal's prior opulence. This was followed by the civil war between liberal constitutionalists and conservative absolutists over royal succession from 1828 to 1834. The 1910 revolution deposed Portugal's monarchy, and established the democratic but unstable Portuguese First Republic, later superseded by the authoritarian regimes of '' Ditadura Nacional'' (National Dictatorship) and '' Estado Novo'' (New State). Democracy was restored after the Carnation Revolution (1974), ending the Portuguese Colonial War and eventually losing its remaining colonial possessions.

Portugal has had a profound cultural, architectural and linguistic influence, with a legacy of around 250 million Portuguese speakers around the world. Today, it is a developed country with an advanced economy, and important tourism and infrastructure industries. A member of the United Nations, the European Union, the Schengen Area and the Council of Europe, Portugal was one of the founding members of NATO, the eurozone, the OECD, and the Community of Portuguese Language Countries.

Etymology

The word ''Portugal'' derives from the combined Roman-Celtic place name Portus Cale (present-day's conurbation of Porto and Vila Nova de Gaia). Porto stems from the Latin for port, ; ''Cale''s meaning and origin is unclear. The mainstream explanation is an ethnonym derived from the Callaeci, also known as the Gallaeci peoples, who occupied the north-west of the Iberian Peninsula. One theory proposes ''Cale'' is a derivation of the Celtic word for 'port'. Another is that ''Cala'' was a Celtic goddess. Some French scholars believe it may have come from , the port of the Gauls.

Around 200 BC, the Romans took Iberia from the Carthaginians during the Second Punic War. In the process they conquered Cale, renaming it ('Port of Cale') and incorporating it into the province of Gallaecia. During the Middle Ages, the region around Portus Cale became known by the Suebi and Visigoths as ''Portucale''. The name ''Portucale'' changed into ''Portugale'' during the 7th and 8th centuries, and by the 9th century, it was used to refer to the region between the rivers Douro and Minho. By the 11th and 12th centuries, ''Portugale'', ''Portugallia'', ''Portvgallo'' or ''Portvgalliae'' was already referred to as ''Portugal''.

History

Prehistory

The region has been inhabited by humans since circa 400,000 years ago, when Homo heidelbergensis entered the area. The oldest human fossil found in Portugal is the 400,000-year-old ''Aroeira 3'' ''H. Heidelbergensis'' skull discovered in the Cave of Aroeira in 2014. Later Neanderthals roamed the northern Iberian peninsula and a tooth has been found at Nova da Columbeira cave in Estremadura.David Birmingham (2003), p.11 Homo sapiens sapiens arrived in Portugal around 35,000 years ago and spread rapidly. Pre-Celtic tribes inhabited Portugal. The Cynetes developed a written language, leaving stelae, which are mainly found in the south.

Early in the first millennium BC, several waves of Celts invaded Portugal from Central Europe and intermarried with the local populations to form several different ethnic groups. The Celtic presence is patent in archaeological and linguistic evidence. They dominated most of northern and central Portugal, while the south maintained its older character (believed non-Indo-European, likely related to Basque) until the Roman conquest. In southern Portugal, some small, semi-permanent commercial coastal settlements were also founded by Phoenician-Carthaginians.

Roman Portugal

Romans first invaded the Iberian Peninsula in 219 BC. The Carthaginians, Rome's adversary in the Punic Wars, were expelled from their coastal colonies. During Julius Caesar's rule, almost the entire peninsula was annexed to Rome. The conquest took two hundred years and many died, including those sentenced to work in slave mines or sold as slaves to other parts of the empire. Roman occupation suffered a setback in 155 BC, when a rebellion began in the north. The Lusitanians and other native tribes, under the leadership of Viriathus, wrested control of all of western Iberia. Rome sent legions to quell the rebellion but were unsuccessful. Roman leaders bribed Viriathus's allies to kill him in 139 BC; he was replaced by Tautalus.

In 27 BC, Lusitania gained the status of Roman province. Later, a northern province was separated from the province of Tarraconensis, under Emperor Diocletian's reforms, known as Gallaecia. There are still ruins of castros ( hill forts) and remains of the Castro culture, like Conímbriga, Mirobriga and Briteiros.

Germanic kingdoms

In 409, with the decline of the Roman Empire, the Iberian Peninsula was occupied by Germanic tribes. In 411, with a federation contract with Emperor Honorius, many of these people settled in Hispania. An important group was made up of the Suebi and Vandals in Gallaecia, who founded a Suebi Kingdom with its capital in Braga. They came to dominate Aeminium ( Coimbra) as well, and there were Visigoths to the south.
The Suebi and the Visigoths were the Germanic tribes who had the most lasting presence in the territories corresponding to modern Portugal. As elsewhere in Western Europe, there was a sharp decline in urban life during the Dark Ages.

Roman institutions disappeared in the wake of the Germanic invasions with the exception of ecclesiastical

HOME


Content is Copyleft
Website design, code, and AI is Copyrighted (c) 2014-2017 by Stephen Payne


Consider donating to Wikimedia



As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases