SW10: Psychovant Teaches American History #7 (Spain vs. Portugal vs. the World)

[Scott Eiler]

This is Psychovant the Duck, still teaching American history here. Last 
week, we talked about how quickly Spain took over stuff. On which note...

*  Why didn't Spain (and Portugal) conquer the whole world?  The Pope 
actually figured they would, so he came up with a treaty where they 
split it!  (https://www.britannica.com/event/Treaty-of-Tordesillas) 
Portugal would have gotten Western Australia and Spain the rest, if 
they'd made it there.  And they did split South America, and Portugal 
got the rights to Africa.  Portugal took just what it needed, though: 
some rest stops for sailors, with lots and lots of surrounding 
countryside.  Like, *size of Angola* surrounding countryside.

   -  ... Technically, size of the *coast* of Angola, for several 
hundred years.  Took them a while to race the rest of Europe to eat 
*all* of Africa. 
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angola#Portuguese_colonisation

   -  Anyway...  Aside from pirates, Spain blew its wealth on 
*conquering Portugal* for a while.  Then the Spanish Armada and the 
Thirty Years War and so on. 
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Spain#Early_Modern_Spain)  And 
they lost.  Nothing makes people hate you, so much as being top dog.

-- 
---- Psychovant the Duck, hacking http://www.eilertech.com/ ----