Tag Archives: Portugal

Book Review: “Richer Than Spices” by Gertrude Z. Thomas

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richer than spices book cover

 

The subtitle of this book is “How a royal bride’s dowry introduced cane, lacquer, cottons, tea, and porcelain to England and so revolutionized taste, manners, craftsmanship, and history in both England and America”.  How’s that for a long subtitle?  The book was published in 1965 by Alfred A. Knopf of New York.

Portugal was a pioneer in active exploration and trade since the fifteenth century when Henry the Navigator supervised and financed many men to find a passage around Africa to the “East Indies”.  This was a rather nebulous term that encompassed all of the area east of the continent of Africa all the way to China and Japan.  Many Portuguese had sailed to these areas and opened and manned factories.  These establishments would barter with the natives for whatever goods they had to offer and trade with them, bringing many new and exotic items to western and northern Europe.

By the seventeenth century, the newly restored Stuart king Charles II was looking for a bride.  Primarily for financial reasons, he settled on marrying Catherine of Braganza, the daughter of King John IV, the newly restored Braganza monarch of Portugal.  Catherine’s dowry was extremely lucrative for England.  It included an enormous cash payment of £300,000 pounds along with the ports of Tangiers and Bombay in India.  England was also given access to trade with other places in the world such as Brazil.

King Charles would eventually turn over Bombay to the commercial enterprise known as the East India Company.  EIC would use Bombay as a base to increase trade from India, China and the East Indies, bringing items such as cane, lacquer, cottons, tea and porcelain to Europe and England.  When Catherine arrived in England, she brought lacquered cabinets from Japan and introduced the drinking of tea for pleasure to the court.

Gertrude Thomas is an expert in antiques and furniture. She explains in this book how the dowry of Catherine of Braganza brought these different items to England and America and enhanced the quality of life for ordinary people.  For the most part, the people of England wore wool or linen from the Low Countries.  With the opening of trade with Bombay, brightly painted and affordable cottons began to arrive, giving people more options for clothing and household items.

Chairs were made of wood but with the introduction of cane, chairs became lighter and more decorative with woven cane used for the seat and backs of chairs.  Catherine’s Japanese lacquered cabinets were a sensation and these started to arrive in England for people to store their goods.  Tea, which had been used primarily for medicinal purposes, now became a drink for pleasure.  It began to be sold in coffee and tea shops and stores.  By the eighteenth century, the drinking of tea was totally ingrained in Britain as part of its culture.

The growth of the drinking of tea led to the increase in trade of porcelain from China.  The beverage needed a pot to hold the extremely hot water for steeping the tea.  The East India Company began importing porcelain and it grew in popularity.  Eventually paintings, vases, candlesticks and other items “Chinoise” became a part of decor and furniture in many households that could afford it.

Not only did this dowry result in an increase in trade of these items in England.  They also found their way to America.  As Thomas says, these items revolutionized taste, manners, craftsmanship and history.  The book is filled with illustrations and is prudently footnoted and includes a bibliography.  Thomas’ delight in her subject shines through and I found this book to be thought-provoking and educational.

Book Review: “Portugal: A Short History” by Harold V. Livermore

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Livermore states in the preface that he was invited to produce a history of Portugal for a series of short histories on various countries. He had already written a longer “History of Portugal” and a more compact “New History of Portugal” so for this version, he decided to concentrate on the evolution of Portuguese society. This volume covers the main important political events with some interpretation of social organization.

The early chapters cover the origins of Portugal from pre-Roman times to the accession of Afonso Henriques, the first Portuguese king. This section covers pre-Roman, Roman Portugal, the Suevi, the Muslims and the territory of Portucale. I found this section a bit of a slog. Livermore gives a general outline of social history here but he basically relies on the reader to know some of the events and people he is writing about. This is basic information and I’ve found other books that go into more detail about this era.

Next up is the formation of the country of Portugal, peninsular integration and the Age of Discoveries. This section holds more interest and details much of Portuguese society in medieval times and the improbable rise of Portugal and their seaborne empire. Again, there is a basic outline of the Portuguese discoveries but this book is not meant to cover this era in detail. Nevertheless, I enjoyed this section as it covered the medieval era and has some interesting characters.

Livermore has a good section on the integration of Portugal with the Spanish monarchy. Relevant to my research was an excellent explanation for the expulsion of the Spanish government and the restoration of the monarchy by naming the Duke of Braganza king and the commencement of a new dynasty. The author devotes a long chapter on the eighteenth century, the absolute monarchy and the dictatorship of Pombal. This section includes a lot of economic data and information on trade with the Portuguese colony of Brazil.

From this point on in the book, I really enjoyed Livermore’s description of the “Liberal Monarchy” and the various political factions that emerged in Portuguese government. While all of this is a genuinely tangled web, Livermore makes it comprehensible. The book ends with the dissolution of the Braganza dynasty of kings and the commencement of a republic in Portugal. This is a great little volume and I highly recommend it.

Book Review: “Portugal: A Companion History” by José Hermano Saraiva

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This book is part of a series published by Carcanet Press Limited called “Aspects of Portugal” which includes volumes on poetry, history and other books in Portuguese which have been translated into English. Eugénio Lisboa, who formerly worked as Cultural Counsellor at the Portuguese Embassy in London writes in the preface that he was constantly asked for a good short history of Portugal written in English. Lisboa and a friend approached imminent and popular Portuguese historian and television personality José Hermano Saraiva, asking for permission to translate his ‘História Concisa’ into English. Saraiva suggested he write an entirely new volume and so this book came into being.

Published in 1997, this short and concise history is a pleasant read. It really just hits the highlights of Portuguese history. The first chapter is entitled Ancient Roots and covers the origins of the Portuguese, Roman colonization, the barbarian and Islamic invasions and the Reconquest. The chapter is only twelve pages long so it is short on detail. The rest of the book entails various chronological eras in the same manner. This book is really meant to be a rudimentary introduction to the subject.

Perhaps the highlight of this book is the section of maps which were chosen, organized and added by the editors. The maps explain a wide range of history and each one has several paragraphs of description and clarification. The final map illustrates the country of Portugal and is accompanied by an historical gazetteer of place names. There is also a handy chronological timeline and a section of brief biographies of key historical figures.

The bibliography is selective and broken down by topic such as art and architecture, military, history, economics, politics, travel, etc. I especially liked the last chapter which contained a lively discussion of the history of Portugal from 1910 to the present. This book is perfect for someone who wants a basic background on the topic of Portuguese history and the added appendices will be important as reference material for future research. An enjoyable, if brief, read.