alternatehistory.com

During the first phase of European expansion overseas the Portuguese settled controlled the major part of the African coast (both the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean coasts) but did not settle heavily like they did in Brazil.

Let’s say that following the expulsion of the Jewish communities in Spain, many of whom went to Portugal, the Portuguese King decides to use this influx of population to expand its colonial empire and reduce the tensions created by the Jewish presence in mainland Portugal. Portuguese Jews establish a colony on the site of the future Cape Colony and it quickly becomes a success, situated in a middle point of the Europe-India Portuguese dominated commercial routes.

Not only it thrives of the commerce and support to the passing vessels, but that also start to settle inland, using the land to create an abundant Agricola production. Soon news of this new “promised land” reaches even the most remote Jewish communities in the Polish/Lithuanian Commonwealth and over the next decades/centuries the Jewish migration to the colony in the South of Africa practically depopulates Europe of its Jewish population.

Butterflies?
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