Building the First European Enterprise in Early Modern Asia: The Portuguese Estado and the Carreira(s) System (Renata Cabral Bernabé)

[Frederick Noronha]

Abstract: After Vasco da Gama reached Calicut, in India, in 1498, the Portuguese became the first European nation to regularly trade with Asia via the Cape of Good Hope and the only one to do so for the subsequent hundred years. Over the course of the sixteenth century, the Portuguese built numerous trading factories along the Asian coastline and signed diverse agreements with local rulers. They also launched several intra-Asian trade voyages, developing a complex enterprise that relied both on Portuguese subjects and local Asian agents. When the northern European chartered companies entered the Asian trading arena in the early seventeenth century, they drew extensively upon the networks and structures that
the Portuguese had built. However, the literature on the European East India companies downplays the role of the Portuguese in sixteenth-century Asia and overlooks the extensive scholarship on the Portuguese enterprise both in the sixteenth and in the following centuries. In an effort to facilitate the integration of this body of knowledge, this paper reviews the scholarly debates of the last three decades on the Portuguese in Asia and considers the formation of a Portuguese enterprise in the Indian Ocean. It is structured around three patterns of activity developed by the Portuguese in the Indian Ocean – the Carreira da Índia, the intra-
Asian trade voyages and the shadow empire – and the territorial occupation  created by each of these activities.

[albe...@sapo.pt]

Excellent work on the colonization of India by the Portuguese.

I highlight page 22, because here in Portugal there are still history teachers who insist on the Portuguese presence “honest without bad intentions in the East”, avoiding making references to the uncomfortable aspect:

Page 22  - 5. Concluding remarks: In this paper, I have tried to demonstrate the diverse patterns of activities of the Portuguese in Asia and the relations between these activities, as discussed by the specialized literature of the last three decades. Piracy, privateering, trade with Europe (with the career of India), intraAsian trade (with the voyages and careers), and the various forms of taxation were all an integral part of the Portuguese enterprise in Asia, even though they sometimes converged and sometimes conflicted. These patterns of activities involved different forms of land occupation, developed various networks with local agents and relied on diverse arrangements with Asian powers.

Renata Cabral Bernabé, Brazilian, has a degree in History from the University of São Paulo (2009), a master's degree (2013) and a doctorate (2018) in Social History from the University of São Paulo. In addition to her PhD at Sophia University (Tokyo), she has a postdoctoral degree from Tohoku University (Sendai, Japan) and is currently working on a project on modern Asian history at the European University Institute (EUI) in Florence, Italy. He has experience in the area of History, with an emphasis on Modern Asian History, working mainly on the following topics: History of Japan, Christian Missions in Asia, History of Capitalism in Asia.

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Data: Sat, 7 Jun 2025 00:40:26 +0530

De: Frederick Noronha <frederic...@gmail.com>

Assunto: [GRN] Building the First European Enterprise in Early Modern Asia: The Portuguese Estado and the Carreira(s) System (Renata Cabral Bernabé)

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Abstract: After Vasco da Gama reached Calicut, in India, in 1498, the Portuguese became the first European nation to regularly trade with Asia via the Cape of Good Hope and the only one to do so for the subsequent hundred years. Over the course of the sixteenth century, the Portuguese built numerous trading factories along the Asian coastline and signed diverse agreements with local rulers. They also launched several intra-Asian trade voyages, developing a complex enterprise that relied both on Portuguese subjects and local Asian agents. When the northern European chartered companies entered the Asian trading arena in the early seventeenth century, they drew extensively upon the networks and structures that

the Portuguese had built. However, the literature on the European East India companies downplays the role of the Portuguese in sixteenth-century Asia and overlooks the extensive scholarship on the Portuguese enterprise both in the sixteenth and in the following centuries. In an effort to facilitate the integration of this body of knowledge, this paper reviews the scholarly debates of the last three decades on the Portuguese in Asia and considers the formation of a Portuguese enterprise in the Indian Ocean. It is structured around three patterns of activity developed by the Portuguese in the Indian Ocean – the Carreira da Índia, the intra-

Asian trade voyages and the shadow empire – and the territorial occupation  created by each of these activities.

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