Latest / The History of Portugal: The Small Nation That Built a Global Empire — Fexingo History
The Portuguese Empire's Spice Monopoly: How Pepper Paid for Power
In the early 1500s, Portugal held a monopoly on the most valuable commodity in Europe: black pepper. This episode traces how a handful of fortified trading posts—from Cochin to Malacca—controlled the flow of spices from the Indian Ocean to Lisbon, and how the Crown managed this global trade through the Casa da Índia. We look at the logistics: the annual fleets, the weight of cargoes, the prices fixed in Antwerp, and the corruption that ate into profits. We also examine the human cost—the sailors who died of scurvy, the Asian traders squeezed out, and the predatory cartaz system that forced…
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