What if Portugal discovered America?

Christopher Columbus had once lived in Portugal and had attempted multiple times to get a westward voyage financed by the Portuguese, all unsuccessfully, until he went to Spain and well... the rest is history. But what if he did get the finances from Portugal, and discovered America under the service of the Portuguese rather than the Spanish?

What all changes in such a timeline where Portugal gets to America first?
 
Tordesilles is pushed a little west and Portugal gets some islands. Theres some reason to believe they already knew about labrador and Brazil at this point and didn't care since they were trying for asia. However, if he manages to get repeated sponsorships and discovers anything involving gold or the Aztecs and their massive empires of riches...
 
You're forgetting one of my favourite conspiracy theory: they did.
There was a big pause between 1488 (Bartolomé Dias crosses the Cape of Good Hope) and 1498 (Vasco de Gama reaches India).
Then, on the VERY NEXT voyage after Vasco de Gama reaches India and comes back, Cabral discovers Brazil. Which is a pretty good coincidence, given Tordesillas is renegotiated in 1494 to include more of what seems empty ocean, but actually conveniently includes a big chunk of modern Brazil.
So the story goes: to cross the Cape of Good Hope you need to do a major Westward loop through the Atlantic and then Eastward through St Helena.
The Portuguese realise this sometimes after Dias comes back, but keep it a secret. There might have been failed expeditions, people that reached India but never came back... At some point they arrive in Brazil but don't publicise it, because Brazil is not the goal, the Indies are the goal.
So to be sure, they force a renegotiation of Tordesillas.
When they get a safe result, an expedition going to India and back, they can publicise their finding with less chances of being screwed by other countries.
 
You're forgetting one of my favourite conspiracy theory: they did.
There was a big pause between 1488 (Bartolomé Dias crosses the Cape of Good Hope) and 1498 (Vasco de Gama reaches India).
Then, on the VERY NEXT voyage after Vasco de Gama reaches India and comes back, Cabral discovers Brazil. Which is a pretty good coincidence, given Tordesillas is renegotiated in 1494 to include more of what seems empty ocean, but actually conveniently includes a big chunk of modern Brazil.
So the story goes: to cross the Cape of Good Hope you need to do a major Westward loop through the Atlantic and then Eastward through St Helena.
The Portuguese realise this sometimes after Dias comes back, but keep it a secret. There might have been failed expeditions, people that reached India but never came back... At some point they arrive in Brazil but don't publicise it, because Brazil is not the goal, the Indies are the goal.
So to be sure, they force a renegotiation of Tordesillas.
When they get a safe result, an expedition going to India and back, they can publicise their finding with less chances of being screwed by other countries.

Nice theory, but is it possible, that all sailors, who saw Brazil kept their mouths closed for years before Cabral discovered it officially?
 
Nice theory, but is it possible, that all sailors, who saw Brazil kept their mouths closed for years before Cabral discovered it officially?
Portugal was fairly centralised, and then was pretty brutal with breaking the secret about the exact route to the Indies, so I don't think it absolutely incredible that a few small crews of elite sailors would be incentivised to keep their mouth shut.
And that's for the crews that make it back!
 
Nice theory, but is it possible, that all sailors, who saw Brazil kept their mouths closed for years before Cabral discovered it officially?
Pretty much. IIRC there were expeditions in that general direction by Jorge/João somebody and Diogo somebody under Affonso V already. And potentially Fernão d'Ulmo (Ferdinand van Olmen) same year as Dias. Portugal probably had a far better pic of the Western Atlantic than Castile did when they turned a Genovesi down.
 
Nice theory, but is it possible, that all sailors, who saw Brazil kept their mouths closed for years before Cabral discovered it officially?

Even if thet talked would be about islands in the Atlantic, which wouldn't be anything of grand note, the important parts, the navigation charters, would be kept under lock and key and under threat of death to any who tried to smuggle them out.

On if Portugal discovered the path to the Americas there wouldn't be much change on policy and all, the focus was very much to the east not west, as it can be seen that Portugal never bothered doing the joint naval expedition with Castile, which also didn't had much interest in it, to find the dividing meridian as agreed in the treaty of Tordesilhas.
 
Portugal might ignore it. No one at the time knew about the silver mines of Americas. The real wealth was in Asia, which Portugal was trying to reach. Even if Portugal gets interested in the new world they would just trade with them. Portugal didn't have the manpower to conquer and hold such a large area.
 
It's kind of funny to me how Spain and Portugal were antithetical in how they viewed the Americas, highlighted perfectly with the Treaty of Tordesillas.

Spain dedicated itself to conquering the New World and uses the resources from it for their gain, while spreading Christianity to as many Indians as possible, while crushing all resistance. They were happy to get all the gold (as well as platinum, silver, copper, tobacco, sugar, coffee etc.) as they could from the New World and bring it back home, and heavily depending on that to prop them up as a superpower.

Meanwhile, Portugal seemed to be kind of "meh" about its American holdings and viewed it as a side project compared to trading with India and dominating the spice trade. Brazil didn't become important to them until centuries later when they lost the monopoly on spices, but sugar was in more and more demand, and they discovered gold, at which point Portugal actually cared about their American holdings.

It's why to this day we have dozens of Spanish speaking nations in the Americas, but only one (albeit, BIG) Portuguese speaking one. Since Portugal remained a relevant power longer than Spain, I guess their way was better?

I can't lie though, I'm a bit disappointed by how little Portugal discovering America first changes things based on answers here.
 
Meanwhile, Portugal seemed to be kind of "meh" about its American holdings and viewed it as a side project compared to trading with India and dominating the spice trade. Brazil didn't become important to them until centuries later when they lost the monopoly on spices, but sugar was in more and more demand, and they discovered gold, at which point Portugal actually cared about their American holdings.

Wasn't a matter of meh, was that the Portuguese Empire was too spread out and involved in too many enterprises at the time, colossal amount of resources were used in the enterprises in Morocco, the attempts to dominate the trade across all of the indian ocean and the wars with the ottomans across said ocean stretched the naval resources to the limit, given all the involvements Brazil became an important production center relatively quickly, specially in the aforementioned sugar production in that by the second decade of the 1500s was already getting established and causing the decline of the sugar production in Madeira and São Tomé e Príncipe, and the Portuguese monarchy passed several edicts and awarded privileges from early on to establish bases in Brazil.

Just like in Spain the New World started to raise in importance strategically to Portugal by the late 1510s early 1520s.
 
Christopher Columbus had once lived in Portugal and had attempted multiple times to get a westward voyage financed by the Portuguese, all unsuccessfully, until he went to Spain and well... the rest is history. But what if he did get the finances from Portugal, and discovered America under the service of the Portuguese rather than the Spanish?

What all changes in such a timeline where Portugal gets to America first?
That is impossible to happen (C Columbus voyage west) unless you can butterfly the knowledge Portugal had of the world size. I think a best premise would be no C Columbus voyage and Brazil is discovered like OTL by Cabral, due to the winds and currents involved in navigation to India, that is the main Portuguese objective, seems to be more a logical POD.

But lets assume that some New Christian(s) gets the Crown authorization to finance the voyage and it goes like you said, in late 15th century, so I assume that those lands will be explored by private individuals rather than by the Crown initiative.

Diplomaticly the lands will probably be divided according to the Treaty of Alcáçovas, so the line to divide the New World will be based on a North-South compromise around the cape Bojador, probably pushed south considering the winds and currents to America.
 
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the attempts to dominate the trade across all of the indian ocean and the wars with the ottomans across said ocean stretched the naval resources to the limit
Yes, let's not forget the Portuguese, one of the smallest kingdoms of Europe, was at one point engaged in what can legitimately be described a World War (3 continents involved) with the Ottomans & their allies.
They were massively stretched through the century
 
That is impossible to happen (C Columbus voyage west) unless you can butterfly the knowledge Portugal had of the world size. I think a best premise would be no C Columbus voyage and Brazil is discovered like OTL by Cabral, due to the winds and currents involved in navigation to India, that is the main Portuguese objective, seems to be more a logical POD.

But lets assume that some New Christian(s) gets the Crown authorization to finance the voyage and it goes like you said, in late 15th century, so I assume that those lands will be explored by private individuals rather than by the Crown initiative.

Diplomaticly the lands will probably be divided according to the Treaty of Alcáçovas, so the line to divide the New World will be based on a North-South compromise around the cape Bojador, probably pushed south considering the winds and currents to America.
I wasn't focusing on how realistic it was to convince them, just that somehow, someway he managed to do it and discovered America under the service of Portugal and seeing where it goes from there.
 
Yes, let's not forget the Portuguese, one of the smallest kingdoms of Europe, was at one point engaged in what can legitimately be described a World War (3 continents involved) with the Ottomans & their allies.
They were massively stretched through the century

It's a shame the Ottoman-Portuguese War is little known given how much it marked the Indian ocean regions in the 16th century.
 

Coivara

Banned
"What if"
We're already living in the timeline in which Portugal discovered America.
In the Portuguese speaking world, Cristovão Colombo is not considered that important. It's the Spanish speaking world and, for some reason, the US, which gives him more importance.
It's assumed by many scholars that the Portuguese already knew about America before Colombo's journey.

Yes, let's not forget the Portuguese, one of the smallest kingdoms of Europe, was at one point engaged in what can legitimately be described a World War (3 continents involved) with the Ottomans & their allies.
They were massively stretched through the century
Must have been kind of infuriating to go forth to find new lands and new peoples and keep running into the Ottomans and their lackeys all the damn time. They must have been like Portugal's Klingons.
"Captain, Ottoman ships on sight! Again..."
Sighs "Again with the Ottomans..."

World War indeed, people think multi-continental wars are new, but this one was probably the first legitimate World War.

Yeah the Portuguese were massively stretched at the time, a small kingdom was trying to take over a big chunk of the world's trade and fight some massive opponents at the same time. 16th-17th century, you can practically choose any part of the world map at random and you will probably find the Portuguese there. They don't call them "Heroes of the Sea" for nothing, the Portuguese were doing some insane feats at the time, the kind of thing that would be considered bullshit if you read it in a fictional book - because the difference between reality and fiction, is that fiction has to make sense.

They were at the forefront of naval technology, too. Not just in peace but war - I was reading about portuguese cannons one of those days, their ship cannon design at the time was the best in the planet.

It's a shame the Ottoman-Portuguese War is little known given how much it marked the Indian ocean regions in the 16th century.
Indeed, it's pivotal to world history

Not just India, the Portuguese were fighting the Ottomans and their allies everywhere:
1. In North Africa, where they feared the possibility of North Africa being used as base for an Ottoman Conquista of Iberia, bringing back Muslim domination of the Peninsula. Which might sounds nuts to us today, but that time was the peak of Ottoman Power and the possibility of an Ottoman conquest of Christendom was taken very seriously by the kings of Europe.
2. In Europe. The Portuguese numbered among the allied christian forces in Lepanto, and they also fought another, less know naval battle against the Ottomans, but I can't recall.
3. In Sub-Saharan Africa, where the Portuguese teamed up with the Ethiopians to fight the Ottoman-supported Adal Sultanate. Portugal is practically the reason Muslims never conquered Ethiopia.
4. In India, where the Portuguese also fought for dominance of the Indian Trade against the Ottomans and their allied muslim rulers.
 
Must have been kind of infuriating to go forth to find new lands and new peoples and keep running into the Ottomans and their lackeys all the damn time. They must have been like Portugal's Klingons.
"Captain, Ottoman ships on sight! Again..."
Sighs "Again with the Ottomans..."

Really funny you wrote this because the first person Gama meet in India was a Moroccan merchant surprised to see them there.
 
Actually, I'd be very interested in knowing what was happening in Brazil around 1600. Did we see a push of Portuguese settler colonialism?
 
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