The Treaty of Tordesillas

The originals of the Treaty of Tordesillas are

 in the Archivo General de Indias in Spain and

at the Arquivo Nacional da Torre do Tombo in Portugal.

I recently watched a museum video which showed the chronology of European colonization from the 15^th century to the 20^th century.  For the first half of this presentation, there was a vertical line through the Atlantic Ocean that read ‘The Treaty of Tordesillas.’  Apparently, this treaty roughly divided colonial expansion into Spanish and Portuguese hemispheres for almost two centuries.  That such a treaty ever came to pass is quite astounding.  I always thought that European colonialism was a free-for-all where the country with the biggest navy won.   What’s the story behind this epoch-defining treaty?

Pope Alexander VI

In the late 15^th century, there were only two countries sending ships out on the high seas to claim new lands:  Portugal and Spain.  In 1481, Pope Sixtus IV had issued a papal bull giving Portugal all new lands found south of the Canary Islands as well as routes to the Indies.    Portuguese explorers had rounded Cape Horn and were exploring Eastern Africa with an eye on India.  Spain bankrolled Christopher Columbus’ voyage to find a western route to the Indies – which he thought he did.  A little over a month after Columbus’ return in 1493, Pope Alexander VI, a Spaniard, got in the act and issued another papal bull on May 3rd.  It drew a line of demarcation running from the North Pole to the South Pole “one hundred leagues towards the west and south from any of the islands commonly known as the Azores and Cape Verdes.”  Any lands discovered west of this line would belong to Spain, the Pope proclaimed.  Pope Alexander IV is probably one of the most corrupt and politically ruthless of all popes.  Perhaps you have heard of his family, the Borgias?  They recently got a Showtime miniseries starring Jeremy Irons as Pope Alexander VI.  But I digress.  Later that year, Pope Alexander VI issued yet another bull which gave the eastern routes to the Indies and all lands discovered on the way to - you guessed it - Spain.

King John II of Portugal had had enough.  He wasn’t going to stand by and watch this Spaniard Pope give away his empire.  He approached Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain with a proposal to move the line to a meridian 370 leagues west of Cape Verde Islands.  Spain would be free to explore and claim all lands west of the line; Portugal would claim everything east of the line.  Ferdinand and Isabella were incentivized to accept this proposal by two facts: 1) Portugal had the stronger navy and could whip Portugal’s navy if need be, and 2) if the Pope’s line was extended to the other side of the world it would likely exclude Spain from any claim in the Far East.  Moving the line west gave Spain a shot at the riches of Marco Polo’s fabled land (remember, their globe did not include the Americas or the Pacific Ocean.)  

On June 7^th, 1494, the monarchs of both countries signed the Treaty of Tordesillas.   After Pope Alexander VI died, Pope Julius II sanctioned the treaty in 1506.  In the following decades of exploration, both countries obeyed the terms of the treaty.  Spain explored and claimed most of North and South America while Portugal claimed the bump of South America east of the line.  As a result, Brazil speaks Portuguese while the rest of South American, Central America, and a good chunk of North America speak Spanish.  The issue of the line on the other side of the world did arise when both countries claimed the Moluccas.  This issue was resolved by the Treaty of Zaragoza in 1523 in which Spain had to drop its claim to The Moluccas for a substantial payment in gold from Portugal.  

The Treaty of Tordesillas would hold up for over two hundred years although it was moot from 1580 to 1640 when both countries were ruled by the Spanish King.  After the Reformation, Northern European countries were less inclined to respect treaties sanctioned by Papal decree.  By the 17^th century, the old agreements were ignored as the English, Dutch, and French joined the land grab.  

Boorstin, Daniel J., The Discoverers: A History of Man's Search to Know His World and Himself.  Random House. 1983. pp248-9.