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Prince Henry 'the Navigator': A Life
Henry the Navigator, fifteenth-century Portuguese prince and explorer, is a legendary, almost mythical figure in late medieval history. Considered along with Columbus to be one of the progenitors of modernity, Prince Henry challenged the scientific assumptions of his age and was responsible for liberating Europeans from geographical restraints that had bound them since the Roman Empire’s collapse. In this enthralling account of Henry’s life―the first biography of “The Navigator” in more than a century―Peter Russell reaps the harvest of a lifelong study of Prince Henry. Making full use of documentary evidence only recently available, Russell reevaluates Henry and his role in Portuguese and European history.
Examining the full range of Prince Henry’s activities, Russell discusses the explorer’s image as an imperialist and as a maritime, mathematical, and navigational pioneer. He considers Henry’s voyages of discovery in the African Atlantic, their economic and cultural consequences, and the difficult questions they generated regarding international law and papal jurisdiction. Russell demonstrates the degree to which Henry was motivated by the predictions of his astrologer―an aspect of his career little known until now―and explains how this innovator, though firmly rooted in medieval ways of thinking and behaving, set in motion a current of change that altered European history.
Examining the full range of Prince Henry’s activities, Russell discusses the explorer’s image as an imperialist and as a maritime, mathematical, and navigational pioneer. He considers Henry’s voyages of discovery in the African Atlantic, their economic and cultural consequences, and the difficult questions they generated regarding international law and papal jurisdiction. Russell demonstrates the degree to which Henry was motivated by the predictions of his astrologer―an aspect of his career little known until now―and explains how this innovator, though firmly rooted in medieval ways of thinking and behaving, set in motion a current of change that altered European history.
502 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2000
About the author
Peter E. Russell
13 books1 follower"Sir Peter Russell, who has died aged 92, was the most influential 20th century English-speaking scholar of Iberian letters. As King Alfonso XIII professor of Spanish and director of Portuguese studies at Oxford for nearly three decades, in his published work he time and again challenged received wisdom, while using an intimate knowledge of his university and a worldwide network of friendships to promote the study of Spanish and Portuguese literature and history.
Russell was born in Christchurch, New Zealand, coming to England as a boy with his mother and younger brother, Hugh, the epidemiologist who died earlier this year. The voyage took them via the Panama Canal and involved running the gauntlet of the German navy, kindling in the brothers a taste for travel and adventure.
Educated at Cheltenham College and Queen's College, Oxford, Russell graduated in 1935 and began research on the intervention of the Black Prince in Spain and Portugal. The result, a magisterial survey of Western Europe in the late 14th century, was not published until 1955, but two shorter studies that sprang from it established what was to become a pattern: primary historical research informed literary criticism, while the historical perspective took account of literary recourses and how original documents were produced.
Russell's travels in Europe in the 1930s had alerted him to the dangers of fascism. Recruited into the secret services in mid-decade, he monitored developments in Spain before the civil war of 1936-39, and in 1940 was commissioned into the Intelligence Corps. His first assignment was to shepherd the Duke and Duchess of Windsor from Madrid to Estoril in Portugal en route to the Bahamas, and ensure they were not waylaid by German agents. He later saw distinguished service in the Caribbean, West Africa and the Far East.
Russell had been made college lecturer at St John's, Oxford, in 1937 and at Queen's the following year. After demobilisation in 1946, he was appointed university lecturer and fellow of Queen's. The story goes that, when his Spanish teacher William Entwistle died in 1952, the then vice-chancellor, Sir Maurice Bowra, dismayed by the field, pleaded with Russell to put his name forward at the eleventh hour. He did so, and was elected. To some it seemed a puzzling choice: Russell was still in his thirties and, thanks to his war service, had published little. It proved an inspired appointment.
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In 1951 Russell astounded an audience by demonstrating that the Cantar de Mio Cid was not, as believed, the work of an early 12th century minstrel, but of a learned poet writing a century later. It was decades before his conclusions were generally accepted, especially in Spain, but the evidence he had amassed was incontrovertible and the significance of his arguments would be marked a half-century later by a volume published to celebrate the author's 90th year.
Russell's 1960 lecture on the personality cult of the Portuguese soldier-prince Henry (1396-1460) met with similar hostility, yet few would now question its conclusions, expanded in his last full-length study, Prince Henry "the Navigator": A life (2000). Work on other Spanish masterpieces, among them Don Quixote and the late 15th-century work Celestina, of which he produced an edition (1991), also changed minds and laid down lines for research.
His literary essays were collected in 1978 as Temas de la Celestina y otros estudios (del Cid al Quijote) and his historical studies in 1995 under the title Portugal, Spain, and the African Atlantic. Russell was also responsible for the best single-volume primer on Spanish letters, Spain: A Companion to Spanish Studies (1973), and much else besides.
For several years after retirement in 1981, he lectured at US universities. Russell's working assumption that intelligent young scholars, properly supported and motivated, might be relied upon to get on with their research for themselves, was vindicated time an
Russell was born in Christchurch, New Zealand, coming to England as a boy with his mother and younger brother, Hugh, the epidemiologist who died earlier this year. The voyage took them via the Panama Canal and involved running the gauntlet of the German navy, kindling in the brothers a taste for travel and adventure.
Educated at Cheltenham College and Queen's College, Oxford, Russell graduated in 1935 and began research on the intervention of the Black Prince in Spain and Portugal. The result, a magisterial survey of Western Europe in the late 14th century, was not published until 1955, but two shorter studies that sprang from it established what was to become a pattern: primary historical research informed literary criticism, while the historical perspective took account of literary recourses and how original documents were produced.
Russell's travels in Europe in the 1930s had alerted him to the dangers of fascism. Recruited into the secret services in mid-decade, he monitored developments in Spain before the civil war of 1936-39, and in 1940 was commissioned into the Intelligence Corps. His first assignment was to shepherd the Duke and Duchess of Windsor from Madrid to Estoril in Portugal en route to the Bahamas, and ensure they were not waylaid by German agents. He later saw distinguished service in the Caribbean, West Africa and the Far East.
Russell had been made college lecturer at St John's, Oxford, in 1937 and at Queen's the following year. After demobilisation in 1946, he was appointed university lecturer and fellow of Queen's. The story goes that, when his Spanish teacher William Entwistle died in 1952, the then vice-chancellor, Sir Maurice Bowra, dismayed by the field, pleaded with Russell to put his name forward at the eleventh hour. He did so, and was elected. To some it seemed a puzzling choice: Russell was still in his thirties and, thanks to his war service, had published little. It proved an inspired appointment.
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In 1951 Russell astounded an audience by demonstrating that the Cantar de Mio Cid was not, as believed, the work of an early 12th century minstrel, but of a learned poet writing a century later. It was decades before his conclusions were generally accepted, especially in Spain, but the evidence he had amassed was incontrovertible and the significance of his arguments would be marked a half-century later by a volume published to celebrate the author's 90th year.
Russell's 1960 lecture on the personality cult of the Portuguese soldier-prince Henry (1396-1460) met with similar hostility, yet few would now question its conclusions, expanded in his last full-length study, Prince Henry "the Navigator": A life (2000). Work on other Spanish masterpieces, among them Don Quixote and the late 15th-century work Celestina, of which he produced an edition (1991), also changed minds and laid down lines for research.
His literary essays were collected in 1978 as Temas de la Celestina y otros estudios (del Cid al Quijote) and his historical studies in 1995 under the title Portugal, Spain, and the African Atlantic. Russell was also responsible for the best single-volume primer on Spanish letters, Spain: A Companion to Spanish Studies (1973), and much else besides.
For several years after retirement in 1981, he lectured at US universities. Russell's working assumption that intelligent young scholars, properly supported and motivated, might be relied upon to get on with their research for themselves, was vindicated time an
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
December 4, 2009
For modern students, Prince Henry’s patronage of Portugal’s oversees exploration during the 15th century was an essential starting point for Europe’s mercantalistic empires during the Early Modern Period. Nonetheless, Prince Henry, in the minds of his charitable chroniclers, was also considered a pious crusader who strove zealously to spread Christianity to pagan lands. This duel identity has been the subject for serious debate among historians. Questions remain whether Prince Henry was motivated purely by his zealous religious beliefs, or was merely guided by his lust for individual material wealth and political power. While some truth can be extrapolated from the panegyric biographies written in his name, recent studies have begun to chip away at the Prince’s gilded historical image and have provided an ever improving balanced understanding of the true identity of the man. Of these recent critical studies, Peter Russell’s book, Prince Henry ‘the Navigator’: A Life, has been the most successful. Russell provides his audience with compelling revisionist analysis of Prince Henry, which deftly lays to waste to Henrican myths, and Illuminates the complex belief systems and personal motives that influenced Portuguese historical events during 15th century.
With analytical skill, Russell deals with Prince Henry’s illusive past by highlighting some key events that would influence his future endeavors. In his attempt to thoughtfully understand the true influences on Prince Henry’s future decision making, Russell leaves no stone unturned. Prince Henry’s destiny, according to Russell, was already in place when he was born. Russell throughout his book criticizes Prince Henry’s chronicler Gomes Eanes de Zahura for his panegyrical depiction of the Prince. Interesting enough, however, Russell agrees with Zahura’s assumption that astrology played a significant role in his subject and employer’s life. As Zahura states, Prince Henry was destined from birth for, “great noble conquests and to the uncovering of secrets previously hidden to man.” (Russell, 15). Russell argues that, while many of Prince Henry’s contemporary historical accounts do not mention this astrological destiny, it is still important to understand that the Prince was the product of his own times. During the 15th century astrological predictions were an important and accepted source of scientific information. Russell argues that it is necessary to understand that Prince Henry was well aware of this supposedly predictive information, and undoubtedly influenced the manner in which he approached his future political tasks (Russell, 15).
As Russell correctly illustrates throughout his book, Prince Henry’s seemingly contradictory actions also have to be understood within the political structure of 15th century Europe which was still influenced by chivalric and crusading ideologies. Russell broadly argues that both the pursuit of Prince Henry’s own individual political power and the collective power of the Portuguese state made crusading against North African Islamic civilizations an attractive geopolitical policy (Russell, 16). This can be understood when examining the political and economic conditions that contributed to Prince Henry’s decision to participate in crusading endeavors. Portugal’s domestic economic conditions influenced Prince Henry’s decisions. As Russell explains, John I, Portugal’s king and Prince Henry’s father, wanted to ensure that his five sons had appropriate lands for their royal status. Unfortunately it was an unlikely, given Portugal’s geographic and economic conditions that this was going to happen. While Prince Henry was lucky at young age to gain access to a new lordship in Viseu by 1411, the perceived economic and political weakness of Portugal, in comparison to larger lordships in Europe, would motivate Portuguese Princes like Henry to further pursue wealth and political legitimacy in various ways (Russell 27). Thus, Prince Henry’s motivation to participate or least support oversees exploration, crusades against Islam, and the Portuguese involvement in the African slave trade during has to be understood within the complex political and economic structure of Europe during the 15th century; something that Russell expertly examines throughout his historical narrative.
Following this stream of thought, Russell believes that modern historians have improperly believed in the notion that Prince Henry placed more personal importance on his support of oversees trade than his standard crusading pursuits. Russell counters this false- assumption by claiming that chivalric and courageous battles like the Ceuta invasion in 1415 carried far more influence in the hearts and minds of not only Prince Henry but that of the Portuguese court as well (Russell, 51). This fact can be easily understood if, as Russell argues, modern historians view Prince Henry as product of his own times; a man dictated by the motivation to secure personal and national political power through chivalric battles against infidels. This has been difficult for modern historians to admit completely. One of historical myths that Russell works to destroy is the rather recent attempt by modern historians to eliminate Portugal’s crusading ideology as an explanation for the attack on Ceuta; instead attributing Portugal’s military Endeavour as an attempt to garner “respectable economic and strategic” advantage (Russell, 35). As Russell amazingly explains, only a few commanders, among the largest fleet ever assembled by the Portuguese monarchy, knew of the destination of this military force: Ceuta (Russell, 29) Most within the Portuguese court were aware that a military maneuver was being prepared, but it was assumed that the large fleet was going to be used in an attack against Sicily (Russell, 34). Russell makes a compelling argument that the mere fact that the Portuguese officials, up until the initiation of the attack, could not predict that the Ceuta was the target, proves that Ceuta lacked the obvious strategic and economic advantages. In actuality Prince Henry’s support for the Ceuta invasion was, as Russell argues, to put Portugal, “firmly on the map of European powers to be reckoned with,” by successfully capturing a Muslim city (Russell, 41). Rather than focusing on tangible strategic and economic advantage, Prince Henry believed that the Ceuta invasion could provide Portugal with much needed geopolitical prestige amongst other European kingdoms. While certainly the success of Ceuta had a great influence on Portugal, it had an extraordinary effect on Prince Henry’s future decision making, and also proved to predict his weakness in military leadership.
Russell argues that the invasion of Ceuta cemented Prince Henry as crusader against Islam, and that from then on; his future endeavors had to be shaped within the conflict between Islam and Christianity (Russell, 58). While this is certainly true, Russell argues that something else can be gleaned from Prince Henry’s participation in the Ceuta invasion. Additionally, as Russell claims, Prince Henry’s imprudently zealous behavior during the invasion of Ceuta predicted his failure in leadership during the Tangier invasion in 1437. Russell correctly assumes that Prince Henry believed that “religious zealotry counted for more than careful strategic and tactical planning and attention to military discipline” (Russell, 50). Prince Henry’s contemporaries were also weary of Prince Henry’s impudent zealotry. Russell researches polemics created by oppositional forces within the Portuguese court that stood against the invasion of Tangiers. While it would seem that Prince Henry’s zealous behavior completely dominated the Portuguese approach towards the invasion, these documents show that some within the court questioned the prudence of such a crusading endeavor. Russell provides the audience with the development of an alternative, realist attitude towards Portugal’s policies that would later define its soft-imperial ambitions. Nonetheless, the opposition, even with its realist arguments, could not dull Prince Henry’s urge to pursue a valiant and chivalric military action that, if successful, gain himself and Portugal recognition throughout Europe. The Prince and his brother, D. Fernando were put in charge of the doomed expedition. Russell provides the most damning criticism of why the invasion failed.
“All the Portuguese assaults on the wall of Tangier failed for reasons that
probably had nothing to do with the courage of the attackers but all to do with the lack of proper equipment for the task in hand, a deficiency caused by an obvious failure to secure full information about Tangiers fortifications.” (179)
Prince Henry in this devastatingly ironic military blunder was forced to hand over his prized political possession: Ceuta. To ensure the victors his promise to hand the city over, he offered up his brother D. Fernando for ransom. Later, when it came into question the status of his brother possession by the enemy, Prince Henry spread egregious rumors that Fernando was ready for martyrdom (192) Fernando was later killed by his captors. The failed Tangier’s invasion represents the lowest point in Prince Henry’s career. However, the zealous Prince was more than able to recover, partly because of his brother’s fabricated martyrdom.
For some historians it is difficult to admit that Prince Henry’s patronage of oversees voyages off the west coast of Africa, was most importantly the consequence of crusading policies against Islam. Prince Henry’s seemingly contradictory balance between obtaining material wealth through trade, while all the while promoting non- materialist Christian belief systems might seem like an illogical contradiction. Russell deals effectively with this issue throughout the book. Russell explains, “The historical Prince, in so far as we can get near him, was plainly a far more interesting if also far more perplexing figure than the uncomplicated culture hero of the mythmakers” (Russell, 3). Prince Henry’s crusading motive can be easily seen in his desire to make a military alliance with the mythological Prestor John. According to Russell, Prestor John, largely because of the Ottoman Empires threats on Christian Europe, was portrayed as being a powerful Christian Lord with a large army ready to strike at Islamic enemies. Prince Henry, who now had ships raiding throughout the Atlantic Ocean, could quite conceivably make contact with such a civilization and push the Muslim threat out of Europe. The idea of Portugal being involved in such a glorious crusade was too much for Prince Henry to ignore. Prince Henry’s awkward balance between Christian morality and personal political motives can additionally be seen in his involvement in the Portuguese slave trade. . Russell’s description of Prince Henry’s involvement in the Portuguese slave-trade is a fascinating analysis of how a man, guided by complicated desires for both piety and material wealth can justify the enslavement of human-beings. Prince Henry , with very little thought otherwise, claims that the Africans captured by the Prince’s “explorers” were only brought back to Christianized. As Russell explains, Prince Henry believed that, “any ‘inconveniences’ the converted slave might have to endure in this life [were:] nothing when compared with the certainty of eternal salvation that conversion brings with it.” (Russell, 244). Christian zealotry only seems to bolster Prince Henry’s attempts at garnering material wealth, not in the form of gold, but in the form of slaves Russell explains that in many cases throughout his life, Prince Henry was a political realist, who departed or embraced his complex ideologies when it was necessary.
In this, Russell’s analysis of Prince Henry properly characterizes him as being a product of the political structure of 15th century Europe. Nonetheless, Prince Henry’s own zealous behavior, and his ability to garner support within the Portuguese court for crusading policies beyond the Iberian peninsula, would have a significant effect not only on Portugal but on the world as a whole. Peter Russell’s revisionist masterpiece, Prince Henry ‘the Navigator’: A Life, is an important contribution to not only the historical literature of Portugal, but to the newly developing fields of Atlantic and world historyRussell’s ability to frame Prince Henry’s life within the broad context of Portugal’s developing trade-empire without veering too far from his purported subject, provides his modern audience with both a broad understanding of Prince Henry and the historical circumstances that he was a product of. As Russell clearly Prince Henry was also involved in diverting European history.
With analytical skill, Russell deals with Prince Henry’s illusive past by highlighting some key events that would influence his future endeavors. In his attempt to thoughtfully understand the true influences on Prince Henry’s future decision making, Russell leaves no stone unturned. Prince Henry’s destiny, according to Russell, was already in place when he was born. Russell throughout his book criticizes Prince Henry’s chronicler Gomes Eanes de Zahura for his panegyrical depiction of the Prince. Interesting enough, however, Russell agrees with Zahura’s assumption that astrology played a significant role in his subject and employer’s life. As Zahura states, Prince Henry was destined from birth for, “great noble conquests and to the uncovering of secrets previously hidden to man.” (Russell, 15). Russell argues that, while many of Prince Henry’s contemporary historical accounts do not mention this astrological destiny, it is still important to understand that the Prince was the product of his own times. During the 15th century astrological predictions were an important and accepted source of scientific information. Russell argues that it is necessary to understand that Prince Henry was well aware of this supposedly predictive information, and undoubtedly influenced the manner in which he approached his future political tasks (Russell, 15).
As Russell correctly illustrates throughout his book, Prince Henry’s seemingly contradictory actions also have to be understood within the political structure of 15th century Europe which was still influenced by chivalric and crusading ideologies. Russell broadly argues that both the pursuit of Prince Henry’s own individual political power and the collective power of the Portuguese state made crusading against North African Islamic civilizations an attractive geopolitical policy (Russell, 16). This can be understood when examining the political and economic conditions that contributed to Prince Henry’s decision to participate in crusading endeavors. Portugal’s domestic economic conditions influenced Prince Henry’s decisions. As Russell explains, John I, Portugal’s king and Prince Henry’s father, wanted to ensure that his five sons had appropriate lands for their royal status. Unfortunately it was an unlikely, given Portugal’s geographic and economic conditions that this was going to happen. While Prince Henry was lucky at young age to gain access to a new lordship in Viseu by 1411, the perceived economic and political weakness of Portugal, in comparison to larger lordships in Europe, would motivate Portuguese Princes like Henry to further pursue wealth and political legitimacy in various ways (Russell 27). Thus, Prince Henry’s motivation to participate or least support oversees exploration, crusades against Islam, and the Portuguese involvement in the African slave trade during has to be understood within the complex political and economic structure of Europe during the 15th century; something that Russell expertly examines throughout his historical narrative.
Following this stream of thought, Russell believes that modern historians have improperly believed in the notion that Prince Henry placed more personal importance on his support of oversees trade than his standard crusading pursuits. Russell counters this false- assumption by claiming that chivalric and courageous battles like the Ceuta invasion in 1415 carried far more influence in the hearts and minds of not only Prince Henry but that of the Portuguese court as well (Russell, 51). This fact can be easily understood if, as Russell argues, modern historians view Prince Henry as product of his own times; a man dictated by the motivation to secure personal and national political power through chivalric battles against infidels. This has been difficult for modern historians to admit completely. One of historical myths that Russell works to destroy is the rather recent attempt by modern historians to eliminate Portugal’s crusading ideology as an explanation for the attack on Ceuta; instead attributing Portugal’s military Endeavour as an attempt to garner “respectable economic and strategic” advantage (Russell, 35). As Russell amazingly explains, only a few commanders, among the largest fleet ever assembled by the Portuguese monarchy, knew of the destination of this military force: Ceuta (Russell, 29) Most within the Portuguese court were aware that a military maneuver was being prepared, but it was assumed that the large fleet was going to be used in an attack against Sicily (Russell, 34). Russell makes a compelling argument that the mere fact that the Portuguese officials, up until the initiation of the attack, could not predict that the Ceuta was the target, proves that Ceuta lacked the obvious strategic and economic advantages. In actuality Prince Henry’s support for the Ceuta invasion was, as Russell argues, to put Portugal, “firmly on the map of European powers to be reckoned with,” by successfully capturing a Muslim city (Russell, 41). Rather than focusing on tangible strategic and economic advantage, Prince Henry believed that the Ceuta invasion could provide Portugal with much needed geopolitical prestige amongst other European kingdoms. While certainly the success of Ceuta had a great influence on Portugal, it had an extraordinary effect on Prince Henry’s future decision making, and also proved to predict his weakness in military leadership.
Russell argues that the invasion of Ceuta cemented Prince Henry as crusader against Islam, and that from then on; his future endeavors had to be shaped within the conflict between Islam and Christianity (Russell, 58). While this is certainly true, Russell argues that something else can be gleaned from Prince Henry’s participation in the Ceuta invasion. Additionally, as Russell claims, Prince Henry’s imprudently zealous behavior during the invasion of Ceuta predicted his failure in leadership during the Tangier invasion in 1437. Russell correctly assumes that Prince Henry believed that “religious zealotry counted for more than careful strategic and tactical planning and attention to military discipline” (Russell, 50). Prince Henry’s contemporaries were also weary of Prince Henry’s impudent zealotry. Russell researches polemics created by oppositional forces within the Portuguese court that stood against the invasion of Tangiers. While it would seem that Prince Henry’s zealous behavior completely dominated the Portuguese approach towards the invasion, these documents show that some within the court questioned the prudence of such a crusading endeavor. Russell provides the audience with the development of an alternative, realist attitude towards Portugal’s policies that would later define its soft-imperial ambitions. Nonetheless, the opposition, even with its realist arguments, could not dull Prince Henry’s urge to pursue a valiant and chivalric military action that, if successful, gain himself and Portugal recognition throughout Europe. The Prince and his brother, D. Fernando were put in charge of the doomed expedition. Russell provides the most damning criticism of why the invasion failed.
“All the Portuguese assaults on the wall of Tangier failed for reasons that
probably had nothing to do with the courage of the attackers but all to do with the lack of proper equipment for the task in hand, a deficiency caused by an obvious failure to secure full information about Tangiers fortifications.” (179)
Prince Henry in this devastatingly ironic military blunder was forced to hand over his prized political possession: Ceuta. To ensure the victors his promise to hand the city over, he offered up his brother D. Fernando for ransom. Later, when it came into question the status of his brother possession by the enemy, Prince Henry spread egregious rumors that Fernando was ready for martyrdom (192) Fernando was later killed by his captors. The failed Tangier’s invasion represents the lowest point in Prince Henry’s career. However, the zealous Prince was more than able to recover, partly because of his brother’s fabricated martyrdom.
For some historians it is difficult to admit that Prince Henry’s patronage of oversees voyages off the west coast of Africa, was most importantly the consequence of crusading policies against Islam. Prince Henry’s seemingly contradictory balance between obtaining material wealth through trade, while all the while promoting non- materialist Christian belief systems might seem like an illogical contradiction. Russell deals effectively with this issue throughout the book. Russell explains, “The historical Prince, in so far as we can get near him, was plainly a far more interesting if also far more perplexing figure than the uncomplicated culture hero of the mythmakers” (Russell, 3). Prince Henry’s crusading motive can be easily seen in his desire to make a military alliance with the mythological Prestor John. According to Russell, Prestor John, largely because of the Ottoman Empires threats on Christian Europe, was portrayed as being a powerful Christian Lord with a large army ready to strike at Islamic enemies. Prince Henry, who now had ships raiding throughout the Atlantic Ocean, could quite conceivably make contact with such a civilization and push the Muslim threat out of Europe. The idea of Portugal being involved in such a glorious crusade was too much for Prince Henry to ignore. Prince Henry’s awkward balance between Christian morality and personal political motives can additionally be seen in his involvement in the Portuguese slave trade. . Russell’s description of Prince Henry’s involvement in the Portuguese slave-trade is a fascinating analysis of how a man, guided by complicated desires for both piety and material wealth can justify the enslavement of human-beings. Prince Henry , with very little thought otherwise, claims that the Africans captured by the Prince’s “explorers” were only brought back to Christianized. As Russell explains, Prince Henry believed that, “any ‘inconveniences’ the converted slave might have to endure in this life [were:] nothing when compared with the certainty of eternal salvation that conversion brings with it.” (Russell, 244). Christian zealotry only seems to bolster Prince Henry’s attempts at garnering material wealth, not in the form of gold, but in the form of slaves Russell explains that in many cases throughout his life, Prince Henry was a political realist, who departed or embraced his complex ideologies when it was necessary.
In this, Russell’s analysis of Prince Henry properly characterizes him as being a product of the political structure of 15th century Europe. Nonetheless, Prince Henry’s own zealous behavior, and his ability to garner support within the Portuguese court for crusading policies beyond the Iberian peninsula, would have a significant effect not only on Portugal but on the world as a whole. Peter Russell’s revisionist masterpiece, Prince Henry ‘the Navigator’: A Life, is an important contribution to not only the historical literature of Portugal, but to the newly developing fields of Atlantic and world historyRussell’s ability to frame Prince Henry’s life within the broad context of Portugal’s developing trade-empire without veering too far from his purported subject, provides his modern audience with both a broad understanding of Prince Henry and the historical circumstances that he was a product of. As Russell clearly Prince Henry was also involved in diverting European history.
November 6, 2014
This a superb biography of the intiator Europe's Age of Discovery. Anyone wishing to learn the story of why Prince Henry decided to promote Portuguese exploration will be amply satisfied by this account which gives a full description of the trips of exploration that he commissioned as well as his vigorous promotion of Portuguese colonization of Madeira and the Azores.
Peter Russell portrays Henry as a person standing third in line to the throne behind two older brothers and thus forced to make a place for himself in the world as none will be given to him. Military adventure was what he tried first. He persuaded his father to allow him to lead a successful conquest of the North African city of Ceuta when he was only 20. He would later lead a disastrous attack on Tangier in which his younger brother would be taken prisoner.
Henry would wind up devoting most of his life to promoting exploration, training in navigation and building a fleet of caravels for international commerce. As his older brother inherited the throne, Prince Henry chose not to marry because he would have no kingdom to bequeath to his heir. He did however leave a tremendous legacy to Europe through his work to promote to the expansion of European trade and political hegemony.
Peter Russell portrays Henry as a person standing third in line to the throne behind two older brothers and thus forced to make a place for himself in the world as none will be given to him. Military adventure was what he tried first. He persuaded his father to allow him to lead a successful conquest of the North African city of Ceuta when he was only 20. He would later lead a disastrous attack on Tangier in which his younger brother would be taken prisoner.
Henry would wind up devoting most of his life to promoting exploration, training in navigation and building a fleet of caravels for international commerce. As his older brother inherited the throne, Prince Henry chose not to marry because he would have no kingdom to bequeath to his heir. He did however leave a tremendous legacy to Europe through his work to promote to the expansion of European trade and political hegemony.
April 23, 2024
Henry the Navigator, prince of Portugal, never king although he often acted as if he were, made the modern world. He lived from 1394 to 1460, and it was through him that Europe began its unprecedented domination of the globe. By sheer strength of will he initiated the Age of Exploration, so for half a millennium he was therefore seen, quite correctly, as a hero all should emulate. In our own decayed age, to be sure, he is forgotten, and if mentioned castigated. No matter; this excellent biography broadly shows how America can relaunch itself. Most of all, it demonstrates how the attitudes of elites can be guided by the right leader, who can thereby determine the course of history.
Detailed hard information about the Prince is fairly sparse. The author, the late Peter Russell (this book was published twenty-five years ago), dials back past hagiography somewhat, mostly by closely examining semi-official biographies about the Prince written contemporaneously or near-contemporaneously with his life, but this is not a revisionist biography in the sense of one trying to tear down old verities. Russell also uses other sources, such as a famous autobiography by the Venetian explorer Cadamosto about his voyages to Guinea in 1455 and 1456, which were sponsored and directed by Henry, as well as the only private letter surviving written by Henry, to his father in 1428, written from the wedding of his older brother, which shows a lighthearted side of Henry otherwise missing from the historical record.
Beyond these sources which revolve around Henry, Russell spent much of his long life examining many different types of medieval Portuguese documents, so he was the ideal man for the task of finding new information about Henry, and about Henry’s times. Even so, most documents surviving today are official government documents, from the royal chancery, and Henry, not being king, did much of what he did, including nearly all the exploration he initiated and directed, as personal business, the records of which were not retained as official records. As a result, much of the light shed on Henry is oblique. Moreover, many records of all types were destroyed in the great Lisbon earthquake of 1755. Still, Russell seems to have compiled what will probably always be the most detailed view of the Prince.
Before our twentieth-century loss of confidence and falling back in confusion, Henry was correctly seen by Western elites as the ideal leader: a man who combined zeal for scientific inquiry, directed at improving the flourishing of mankind, with zeal for spreading the Gospel. He certainly exemplified muscular Christianity, in a time when the Muslim invaders who had occupied much of Iberia for hundreds of years were losing ground to Christian counter-attack, gold and glory often took precedence in his mind and actions, he certainly had a curious, spacious mind, and encouraged, directed, and guided many other men who drove the West forward.
Henry was half English, which in part explains his prominence in the self-told stories of the Anglosphere during its era of confidence. His mother was Philippa of Lancaster, daughter of John of Gaunt, sister of the English king Henry IV, and wife to the Portuguese king John I. While Philippa’s was a political marriage (aimed at benefitting joint Portuguese and English interests against the Castilians, at a time when Spain was still fragmented), it was also an extremely successful one. Philippa, considered old to be married for the first time at twenty-seven, bore nine children. Henry was the third son, so never likely to ascend to the throne, nor did he, but from an early age he seems to have made clear that he was also never going to be subordinated. Not that he ever tried to seize the throne; rather, he just acted, very frequently, almost as if he were king, and his father, brother, and nephew, kings throughout Henry’s life, usually went along, either presented with a fait accompli or overawed by Henry’s personality and drive.
When Henry was born, Portugal was a very poor country, on the far edge of Europe, with a population of perhaps one million. It was still recovering from its wars against the Castilians, revolving around the Castilian attempt to use a disputed royal succession to annex Portugal. The wars had been won by King John, but the Portuguese were still on prickly terms with the Castilians. Henry was highly educated (something in which his mother took a direct hand), both in matters spiritual and matters temporal, including in astronomy and cartography, for which he showed an early interest. King John had to scrape around to grant barely adequate lands as a patrimony to his sons, and foreign adventuring was the obvious way for someone with great ambition, such as Henry, to both satisfy the demand for chivalric honor and to acquire more lands of his own (although he never married). So at twenty-one, he launched a fresh war.
The war was not against Christians, but against the Marinids, the Muslim dynasty which at the time controlled Morocco. The target was the crucial city of Ceuta, located on the Mediterranean just east of the Strait of Gibraltar. What permeates the discussion about how this war was conceived and launched is the Portuguese cultural mood, one of growing self-confidence and expansionary desire. This translated, inevitably at that time and place, to the crusading impulse, and Henry was the main force in converting that largely inchoate desire into a permanent desire for expansion by the Portuguese elite, beginning with the plan to capture Ceuta. It was not necessarily a hard sell; the Portuguese elite, especially the younger generation, were eager to find a new outlet for chivalric ambitions, now that the wars with Castile were over. But it was Henry who took and focused these desires—as always, the great man theory of history is the only theory with any demonstrable connection to reality.
Ceuta both dominated the sea inside the Straits and was an important trading port for trans-Saharan trade, where Arab traders transported goods from African kingdoms further south and east. It also sheltered pirates who preyed on Christian shipping and who raided the Iberian coast to take slaves. Conquering Ceuta would not really expand trade for the Portuguese, or the Spanish, however—Christian merchants were welcome to trade at Ceuta, and often did so. Thus both the Aragonese and Castilians were less than thrilled with Henry hampering their ability to trade by attacking Muslims with whom they had a working relationship. It was not that Henry wanted to capture the trading networks and profit thereby. Rather his conquest was about, plainly and simply, gloriously reconquering Christian lands from the infidel. After tireless effort, Henry persuaded King John to approve the expedition, which was extremely expensive for the country, requiring not just the collection of thousands of troops but the renting of several hundred ships from foreigners. Amazingly, though all Europe knew of the coming expedition, its target was kept secret.
In July, 1415, the Portuguese launched their ships. Interestingly, given our own recent solar eclipse, they launched shortly after Portugal experienced a total eclipse of the sun. Perhaps that was a portent; at about the same time Queen Philippa died, at age fifty-five, though not before issuing injunctions to her sons and giving them specially-made swords to use in the conquest of Ceuta, or so the chroniclers say. Among her injunctions were to Henry, “that he should make it his special responsibility to watch over the interests of all the lords, knights, fidalgos and squires of the kingdom, making sure their rights were defended and that the royal grants they were entitled to receive were duly made to them.” Her rationale was, perhaps thinking of troubles in England, that “it often happens that kings, misled by false information and exaggerated assertions made by other people, do to some what they should not do.” We see here how very different medieval monarchy was compared to the propaganda version we moderns are fed. Monarchs for the most part cared deeply about their responsibilities to God and their people, and every monarch was constrained within a web of custom, relationships, and duties, including with powerful men not king, such as Henry. Monarchs were not the extractive, all-powerful monsters portrayed by hostile later thinkers of the so-called Enlightenment. And, as usual in the West, women played a crucial role, but a role mostly behind the scenes, as it should be.
When the Portuguese landed, only announcing their destination to the fleet a few days before landing, it took them a mere thirteen hours to conquer the city, which Russell says “was by any standard a most remarkable victory in the annals of medieval warfare.” Part of success was luck, part was very high morale among the Portuguese, and part was “the tactical insight and determination of their leaders.” Henry fought in the front, earning “his lifelong reputation as an exceptionally brave but also impetuous and imprudent soldier.” The victory “astonished Christian Europe,” which did not usually think much about Portugal. Still, now that they had the city, it was an expensive burden for a poor kingdom to maintain—both to supply it with food, given the Marinids were certainly not going to do that, and to protect it from counterattack. Here, as several times throughout this book, Russell details written discussions among the Portuguese who advised the king, where arguments varied widely in their quality, and oftentimes involved groups talking past each other, along with frequent ignoring of practical arguments in favor of chivalric arguments, buttressed by “God wills it!” These writings are a fascinating slice of medieval life.
The conquest of Ceuta set the pattern for the rest of Henry’s life—but it was by far the most successful military conquest he made. King John assigned to him the financing and provisioning of the new Portuguese outpost, which Henry accomplished with drive and verve, showing preternatural organizational skill, something he applied throughout his life. It was probably also at this time that Henry began to realize the possibilities of using, and improving, the caravel, a wholly Portuguese-invented ship of unique sailing flexibility, most importantly in its ability to tack almost directly into the wind, which was crucial in his later African explorations. Henry was creative in his financing, obtaining various special taxes and using other sources of funds, including redirecting money from religious knightly orders which he controlled (notably the Order of Christ, which had succeeded to the Templars in Portugal), and he also went into debt himself (something regarded as a virtue, not a vice, in those days of chivalric magnanimity).
The Portuguese held Ceuta until the seventeenth century (when it passed to the Spanish, who hold it to this day). Henry saw it as a beachhead for further Moroccan conquest, of which more later. In the meantime, he had been spreading his wings elsewhere. In the 1420s, he began to try to conquer the seven islands of the Canaries, which while they had some French and Castilian settlers, were mostly occupied by a pagan, white, Stone Age people who resisted conquest vigorously. After a defeat in 1424 of an attempt to conquer Grand Canary, this effort continued the rest of Henry’s life, but was never completed by the Portuguese. With less difficulty and cost, he occupied the (inhabitant-free) Madeira and the Azores, both of which proved to be richly rewarding for the Portuguese (and are Portuguese possessions even now), and both of which he administered as personal possessions during his life. He did none of these conquests in person, however—for a man with the sobriquet “the Navigator,” Henry very rarely set to sea himself, and never for any great distance. But he was the sole driving force behind all of it.
The Age of Exploration really began, however, in 1434. Henry wanted to explore the coast of Africa by sea, which nobody had ever done, and directly access the African kingdoms that were the basis of the trans-Saharan trade. Part of this was crusade; the Muslims completely controlled the trans-Saharan trade, which was unacceptable on its face. Europeans knew that south and east of Muslim-controlled lands lay African nations that were not Muslim (though some were) and that some were rich in gold and other valuable commodities. For example, two-thirds of all gold used in Europe came from this trade, mostly from the Guinea region (although the idea that the Malian king Mansa Musa was the richest man ever to walk the earth is ludicrous modern ethnonarcissism; most of the profit was made by Arab traders). Moreover, many believed that a large river, the Rio de Oro, or alternatively a giant gulf, the Sinus Aethiopicus, bisected Africa south of the Sahara, and that by sailing east they could reach the fabled Christian kingdom of Prester John, south of Ethiopia, and perhaps join forces to crush the Muslims in a pincer movement.
In the early 1430s Henry correctly predicted, based on his scientific study, that ships sent south of Cape Bojador, “a promontory traditionally accepted by cosmographers, cartographers, and mariners, Arab and Christian, to mark the furthermost southerly point on the coast of West Africa as far as which it was safe to navigate,” would face no problems passing beyond. This was proven, after several abortive attempts, by ships sent by Henry, in 1434. From the beginning, Henry constantly discussed navigation and cartography with his ship captains, before and after each voyage, in a cycle of ever-reinforcing confidence in his decisions and commands. He and his mariners also developed the new science of oceanic wind patterns, realizing that by sailing in counterintuitive directions it was easier to reach certain locations.
Henry’s opening of the way south set off decades and centuries of Portuguese expansion. In Henry’s lifetime, his mariners reached as far south as the Senegal and Gambia, the area generally called at the time Guinea—that is to say, not all that far down the western African coast, and very far from the Cape of Good Hope, but much further than any person, European or not, had gone before. They sailed up the major rivers and initiated trading relationships, though they never found Prester John, of course.
These successes bolstered Henry’s reputation. But he had not forgotten crusade, though his proposed further Moroccan adventures engendered more domestic opposition, both elite and non-elite, which increased after a disastrous attempt to march to Tangier and conquer it in 1437. That project had been broadly opposed from its inception, as more arguments from the time (again requested by the king as part of the decision process) show. In part it was opposed on economic grounds, but also on practical military grounds and on grounds of canon law (part of the larger Western debate about just war, revolving around whether war against the infidel was automatically justified in all cases, or had to be justified more specifically, including with reference to the burdens placed on the population of the Christian nation proposing to fight the infidel). The main argument by Henry and his allies for this new crusade was simply that it was a crusade, and necessary for the Portuguese elite to fight for both God and glory.
Henry was obliquely criticized as both rash and monomaniacal, including by his family members. But his Tangier project won out in the end. It was problematic from the start—recruitment flagged, and the Portuguese shipped out with far fewer men than wanted and needed. Morale was again very high, but it was not enough. Tangier was a tough nut to crack; the Marinids were expecting them this time and had prepared well; and the strategic brilliance on display in the conquest of Ceuta was nowhere to be found. When Arab reinforcements arrived, trapping the Portuguese, they had to agree to a humiliating capitulation to avoid annihilation—including agreeing to return Ceuta, and leaving Henry’s younger brother as a hostage to guarantee the deal. In an example of realpolitik, the Portuguese, that is to say Henry, reneged, and his brother died an ill-treated prisoner in Fez. That was the end of military crusade for Henry.
At about the same time, the king (now Henry’s brother, John I having died in 1433) also died, leaving a minor heir, resulting in another succession crisis. This distraction benefitted Henry, who slowly rebuilt his reputation, refocusing solely on exploration (with a veneer of crusade). His sailors pushed further and further down the African coast, making new discoveries (including the uninhabited Cape Verde islands) and carefully charting the land, the ocean, and the winds, while opening new trade routes, precisely as Henry planned. Conversion of the heathen, both by conquest and by persuasion, took a back seat, although Henry was always certain to talk a big game to the Church about his activities in that regard. Military conquest of any kind soon took a back seat; it harmed trade, and the natives were mostly no slouches at fighting, nor were they overly impressed with cannon and muskets. Experience pointed the way to the successful strategy used for centuries by the Portuguese—ruling, or at least influencing, the lands of others by building strong fortress-cities which dominated the coast. In this way, the Portuguese captured much of what had been the trans-Saharan trade, and rapidly became rich (for example, they were able to mint gold coins, something they had been too poor to do before).
And so, never tiring, never dissuaded by failure, Henry died in 1460. Perhaps unsurprisingly . . . . [Review completes as first comment.]
Detailed hard information about the Prince is fairly sparse. The author, the late Peter Russell (this book was published twenty-five years ago), dials back past hagiography somewhat, mostly by closely examining semi-official biographies about the Prince written contemporaneously or near-contemporaneously with his life, but this is not a revisionist biography in the sense of one trying to tear down old verities. Russell also uses other sources, such as a famous autobiography by the Venetian explorer Cadamosto about his voyages to Guinea in 1455 and 1456, which were sponsored and directed by Henry, as well as the only private letter surviving written by Henry, to his father in 1428, written from the wedding of his older brother, which shows a lighthearted side of Henry otherwise missing from the historical record.
Beyond these sources which revolve around Henry, Russell spent much of his long life examining many different types of medieval Portuguese documents, so he was the ideal man for the task of finding new information about Henry, and about Henry’s times. Even so, most documents surviving today are official government documents, from the royal chancery, and Henry, not being king, did much of what he did, including nearly all the exploration he initiated and directed, as personal business, the records of which were not retained as official records. As a result, much of the light shed on Henry is oblique. Moreover, many records of all types were destroyed in the great Lisbon earthquake of 1755. Still, Russell seems to have compiled what will probably always be the most detailed view of the Prince.
Before our twentieth-century loss of confidence and falling back in confusion, Henry was correctly seen by Western elites as the ideal leader: a man who combined zeal for scientific inquiry, directed at improving the flourishing of mankind, with zeal for spreading the Gospel. He certainly exemplified muscular Christianity, in a time when the Muslim invaders who had occupied much of Iberia for hundreds of years were losing ground to Christian counter-attack, gold and glory often took precedence in his mind and actions, he certainly had a curious, spacious mind, and encouraged, directed, and guided many other men who drove the West forward.
Henry was half English, which in part explains his prominence in the self-told stories of the Anglosphere during its era of confidence. His mother was Philippa of Lancaster, daughter of John of Gaunt, sister of the English king Henry IV, and wife to the Portuguese king John I. While Philippa’s was a political marriage (aimed at benefitting joint Portuguese and English interests against the Castilians, at a time when Spain was still fragmented), it was also an extremely successful one. Philippa, considered old to be married for the first time at twenty-seven, bore nine children. Henry was the third son, so never likely to ascend to the throne, nor did he, but from an early age he seems to have made clear that he was also never going to be subordinated. Not that he ever tried to seize the throne; rather, he just acted, very frequently, almost as if he were king, and his father, brother, and nephew, kings throughout Henry’s life, usually went along, either presented with a fait accompli or overawed by Henry’s personality and drive.
When Henry was born, Portugal was a very poor country, on the far edge of Europe, with a population of perhaps one million. It was still recovering from its wars against the Castilians, revolving around the Castilian attempt to use a disputed royal succession to annex Portugal. The wars had been won by King John, but the Portuguese were still on prickly terms with the Castilians. Henry was highly educated (something in which his mother took a direct hand), both in matters spiritual and matters temporal, including in astronomy and cartography, for which he showed an early interest. King John had to scrape around to grant barely adequate lands as a patrimony to his sons, and foreign adventuring was the obvious way for someone with great ambition, such as Henry, to both satisfy the demand for chivalric honor and to acquire more lands of his own (although he never married). So at twenty-one, he launched a fresh war.
The war was not against Christians, but against the Marinids, the Muslim dynasty which at the time controlled Morocco. The target was the crucial city of Ceuta, located on the Mediterranean just east of the Strait of Gibraltar. What permeates the discussion about how this war was conceived and launched is the Portuguese cultural mood, one of growing self-confidence and expansionary desire. This translated, inevitably at that time and place, to the crusading impulse, and Henry was the main force in converting that largely inchoate desire into a permanent desire for expansion by the Portuguese elite, beginning with the plan to capture Ceuta. It was not necessarily a hard sell; the Portuguese elite, especially the younger generation, were eager to find a new outlet for chivalric ambitions, now that the wars with Castile were over. But it was Henry who took and focused these desires—as always, the great man theory of history is the only theory with any demonstrable connection to reality.
Ceuta both dominated the sea inside the Straits and was an important trading port for trans-Saharan trade, where Arab traders transported goods from African kingdoms further south and east. It also sheltered pirates who preyed on Christian shipping and who raided the Iberian coast to take slaves. Conquering Ceuta would not really expand trade for the Portuguese, or the Spanish, however—Christian merchants were welcome to trade at Ceuta, and often did so. Thus both the Aragonese and Castilians were less than thrilled with Henry hampering their ability to trade by attacking Muslims with whom they had a working relationship. It was not that Henry wanted to capture the trading networks and profit thereby. Rather his conquest was about, plainly and simply, gloriously reconquering Christian lands from the infidel. After tireless effort, Henry persuaded King John to approve the expedition, which was extremely expensive for the country, requiring not just the collection of thousands of troops but the renting of several hundred ships from foreigners. Amazingly, though all Europe knew of the coming expedition, its target was kept secret.
In July, 1415, the Portuguese launched their ships. Interestingly, given our own recent solar eclipse, they launched shortly after Portugal experienced a total eclipse of the sun. Perhaps that was a portent; at about the same time Queen Philippa died, at age fifty-five, though not before issuing injunctions to her sons and giving them specially-made swords to use in the conquest of Ceuta, or so the chroniclers say. Among her injunctions were to Henry, “that he should make it his special responsibility to watch over the interests of all the lords, knights, fidalgos and squires of the kingdom, making sure their rights were defended and that the royal grants they were entitled to receive were duly made to them.” Her rationale was, perhaps thinking of troubles in England, that “it often happens that kings, misled by false information and exaggerated assertions made by other people, do to some what they should not do.” We see here how very different medieval monarchy was compared to the propaganda version we moderns are fed. Monarchs for the most part cared deeply about their responsibilities to God and their people, and every monarch was constrained within a web of custom, relationships, and duties, including with powerful men not king, such as Henry. Monarchs were not the extractive, all-powerful monsters portrayed by hostile later thinkers of the so-called Enlightenment. And, as usual in the West, women played a crucial role, but a role mostly behind the scenes, as it should be.
When the Portuguese landed, only announcing their destination to the fleet a few days before landing, it took them a mere thirteen hours to conquer the city, which Russell says “was by any standard a most remarkable victory in the annals of medieval warfare.” Part of success was luck, part was very high morale among the Portuguese, and part was “the tactical insight and determination of their leaders.” Henry fought in the front, earning “his lifelong reputation as an exceptionally brave but also impetuous and imprudent soldier.” The victory “astonished Christian Europe,” which did not usually think much about Portugal. Still, now that they had the city, it was an expensive burden for a poor kingdom to maintain—both to supply it with food, given the Marinids were certainly not going to do that, and to protect it from counterattack. Here, as several times throughout this book, Russell details written discussions among the Portuguese who advised the king, where arguments varied widely in their quality, and oftentimes involved groups talking past each other, along with frequent ignoring of practical arguments in favor of chivalric arguments, buttressed by “God wills it!” These writings are a fascinating slice of medieval life.
The conquest of Ceuta set the pattern for the rest of Henry’s life—but it was by far the most successful military conquest he made. King John assigned to him the financing and provisioning of the new Portuguese outpost, which Henry accomplished with drive and verve, showing preternatural organizational skill, something he applied throughout his life. It was probably also at this time that Henry began to realize the possibilities of using, and improving, the caravel, a wholly Portuguese-invented ship of unique sailing flexibility, most importantly in its ability to tack almost directly into the wind, which was crucial in his later African explorations. Henry was creative in his financing, obtaining various special taxes and using other sources of funds, including redirecting money from religious knightly orders which he controlled (notably the Order of Christ, which had succeeded to the Templars in Portugal), and he also went into debt himself (something regarded as a virtue, not a vice, in those days of chivalric magnanimity).
The Portuguese held Ceuta until the seventeenth century (when it passed to the Spanish, who hold it to this day). Henry saw it as a beachhead for further Moroccan conquest, of which more later. In the meantime, he had been spreading his wings elsewhere. In the 1420s, he began to try to conquer the seven islands of the Canaries, which while they had some French and Castilian settlers, were mostly occupied by a pagan, white, Stone Age people who resisted conquest vigorously. After a defeat in 1424 of an attempt to conquer Grand Canary, this effort continued the rest of Henry’s life, but was never completed by the Portuguese. With less difficulty and cost, he occupied the (inhabitant-free) Madeira and the Azores, both of which proved to be richly rewarding for the Portuguese (and are Portuguese possessions even now), and both of which he administered as personal possessions during his life. He did none of these conquests in person, however—for a man with the sobriquet “the Navigator,” Henry very rarely set to sea himself, and never for any great distance. But he was the sole driving force behind all of it.
The Age of Exploration really began, however, in 1434. Henry wanted to explore the coast of Africa by sea, which nobody had ever done, and directly access the African kingdoms that were the basis of the trans-Saharan trade. Part of this was crusade; the Muslims completely controlled the trans-Saharan trade, which was unacceptable on its face. Europeans knew that south and east of Muslim-controlled lands lay African nations that were not Muslim (though some were) and that some were rich in gold and other valuable commodities. For example, two-thirds of all gold used in Europe came from this trade, mostly from the Guinea region (although the idea that the Malian king Mansa Musa was the richest man ever to walk the earth is ludicrous modern ethnonarcissism; most of the profit was made by Arab traders). Moreover, many believed that a large river, the Rio de Oro, or alternatively a giant gulf, the Sinus Aethiopicus, bisected Africa south of the Sahara, and that by sailing east they could reach the fabled Christian kingdom of Prester John, south of Ethiopia, and perhaps join forces to crush the Muslims in a pincer movement.
In the early 1430s Henry correctly predicted, based on his scientific study, that ships sent south of Cape Bojador, “a promontory traditionally accepted by cosmographers, cartographers, and mariners, Arab and Christian, to mark the furthermost southerly point on the coast of West Africa as far as which it was safe to navigate,” would face no problems passing beyond. This was proven, after several abortive attempts, by ships sent by Henry, in 1434. From the beginning, Henry constantly discussed navigation and cartography with his ship captains, before and after each voyage, in a cycle of ever-reinforcing confidence in his decisions and commands. He and his mariners also developed the new science of oceanic wind patterns, realizing that by sailing in counterintuitive directions it was easier to reach certain locations.
Henry’s opening of the way south set off decades and centuries of Portuguese expansion. In Henry’s lifetime, his mariners reached as far south as the Senegal and Gambia, the area generally called at the time Guinea—that is to say, not all that far down the western African coast, and very far from the Cape of Good Hope, but much further than any person, European or not, had gone before. They sailed up the major rivers and initiated trading relationships, though they never found Prester John, of course.
These successes bolstered Henry’s reputation. But he had not forgotten crusade, though his proposed further Moroccan adventures engendered more domestic opposition, both elite and non-elite, which increased after a disastrous attempt to march to Tangier and conquer it in 1437. That project had been broadly opposed from its inception, as more arguments from the time (again requested by the king as part of the decision process) show. In part it was opposed on economic grounds, but also on practical military grounds and on grounds of canon law (part of the larger Western debate about just war, revolving around whether war against the infidel was automatically justified in all cases, or had to be justified more specifically, including with reference to the burdens placed on the population of the Christian nation proposing to fight the infidel). The main argument by Henry and his allies for this new crusade was simply that it was a crusade, and necessary for the Portuguese elite to fight for both God and glory.
Henry was obliquely criticized as both rash and monomaniacal, including by his family members. But his Tangier project won out in the end. It was problematic from the start—recruitment flagged, and the Portuguese shipped out with far fewer men than wanted and needed. Morale was again very high, but it was not enough. Tangier was a tough nut to crack; the Marinids were expecting them this time and had prepared well; and the strategic brilliance on display in the conquest of Ceuta was nowhere to be found. When Arab reinforcements arrived, trapping the Portuguese, they had to agree to a humiliating capitulation to avoid annihilation—including agreeing to return Ceuta, and leaving Henry’s younger brother as a hostage to guarantee the deal. In an example of realpolitik, the Portuguese, that is to say Henry, reneged, and his brother died an ill-treated prisoner in Fez. That was the end of military crusade for Henry.
At about the same time, the king (now Henry’s brother, John I having died in 1433) also died, leaving a minor heir, resulting in another succession crisis. This distraction benefitted Henry, who slowly rebuilt his reputation, refocusing solely on exploration (with a veneer of crusade). His sailors pushed further and further down the African coast, making new discoveries (including the uninhabited Cape Verde islands) and carefully charting the land, the ocean, and the winds, while opening new trade routes, precisely as Henry planned. Conversion of the heathen, both by conquest and by persuasion, took a back seat, although Henry was always certain to talk a big game to the Church about his activities in that regard. Military conquest of any kind soon took a back seat; it harmed trade, and the natives were mostly no slouches at fighting, nor were they overly impressed with cannon and muskets. Experience pointed the way to the successful strategy used for centuries by the Portuguese—ruling, or at least influencing, the lands of others by building strong fortress-cities which dominated the coast. In this way, the Portuguese captured much of what had been the trans-Saharan trade, and rapidly became rich (for example, they were able to mint gold coins, something they had been too poor to do before).
And so, never tiring, never dissuaded by failure, Henry died in 1460. Perhaps unsurprisingly . . . . [Review completes as first comment.]
February 23, 2019
Very good, highly detailed, wrll researched.
December 9, 2025
Peter Russell provides a ‘warts and all’ portrait of Prince Henry ‘the Navigator’ of Portugal (1394-1460), the context of his times and his accomplishments. The confirmed bachelor Henry was no navigator but he was an entrepreneur- a sponsor of exploration and colonisation of Atlantic islands eg the previously uninhabited Madeira, and of the coast of Africa from the Canaries to Senegal. In other words he was an initiator of subsequent Portuguese (and European) colonialism. He was also behind attempted crusades in Morocco.
The third son of King Juan 1 and Queen Philippa (Plantagenet sister of King Henry IV of England), Henry saw himself as a man of destiny, motivated by notions of chivalry and religious military service to the papacy. He was a successful lobbyist of the king and the pope in these ventures. But despite early success taking the island fortress of Ceuta from the Moors (subsequently a costly drain on the royal finances), many of these ventures were embarrassing failures eg his attempts to conquer the Canary Islands and the port of Tangier. He was no military strategist. And his motives for exploration were baser: the search for gold, the taxing of all Atlantic-based trade and the import of African slaves. At times, Russell’s laborious scholarship becomes a sardonic piece of character assassination, written with barely disguised ridicule and contempt. But at other times there is more respect for Henry’s persistence and desire to discover.
A particular strength of the book is the way Russell explains the Medieval context. The rounding of Cape Bajador not far south of the Canaries, in 1434, was significant because European mariners until then believed that no European ship could survive southwards beyond that point. There was then a belief that ships journeying southwards along the west coast of Africa would come upon a huge gulf indented into the continent which would give them access from the west to the legendary Christian kingdom of Prester John (Ethiopia), making possible a winning military alliance against the forces of Islam. And there were new debates among papal jurists about whether the Pope could legitimately authorise a crusade against a peaceful non-Christian country. Russell also focuses on the fast and manoeuvrable caravel as the explorers’ and traders’ ship of choice for the West African coast and waterways.
Russell is also strong on sources, delving and commenting for instance into the writing of Zurara (Henry’s hagiographer), the accounts of the mariner-explorers Cadomosto and Diogo Gomes, and the contents of Henry’s will and testament.
It is a slow, fascinating read, and this convincing assessment of Prince Henry contrasts with his almost mythical reputation.
The third son of King Juan 1 and Queen Philippa (Plantagenet sister of King Henry IV of England), Henry saw himself as a man of destiny, motivated by notions of chivalry and religious military service to the papacy. He was a successful lobbyist of the king and the pope in these ventures. But despite early success taking the island fortress of Ceuta from the Moors (subsequently a costly drain on the royal finances), many of these ventures were embarrassing failures eg his attempts to conquer the Canary Islands and the port of Tangier. He was no military strategist. And his motives for exploration were baser: the search for gold, the taxing of all Atlantic-based trade and the import of African slaves. At times, Russell’s laborious scholarship becomes a sardonic piece of character assassination, written with barely disguised ridicule and contempt. But at other times there is more respect for Henry’s persistence and desire to discover.
A particular strength of the book is the way Russell explains the Medieval context. The rounding of Cape Bajador not far south of the Canaries, in 1434, was significant because European mariners until then believed that no European ship could survive southwards beyond that point. There was then a belief that ships journeying southwards along the west coast of Africa would come upon a huge gulf indented into the continent which would give them access from the west to the legendary Christian kingdom of Prester John (Ethiopia), making possible a winning military alliance against the forces of Islam. And there were new debates among papal jurists about whether the Pope could legitimately authorise a crusade against a peaceful non-Christian country. Russell also focuses on the fast and manoeuvrable caravel as the explorers’ and traders’ ship of choice for the West African coast and waterways.
Russell is also strong on sources, delving and commenting for instance into the writing of Zurara (Henry’s hagiographer), the accounts of the mariner-explorers Cadomosto and Diogo Gomes, and the contents of Henry’s will and testament.
It is a slow, fascinating read, and this convincing assessment of Prince Henry contrasts with his almost mythical reputation.
April 22, 2023
Finished the book over spring break that’s why it took longer than usual. This book was actually really fun and entertaining, hearing about Prince Henry’s life was so cool. From his birth and vague upbringing to his role in the capture of Ceuta and the crusades in Morocco to his role in the trading that occurred on the west coast of Africa. His life was really interesting to read about. His religiousness and decisions were really interesting too. The crusades while not always being the best did lead to new territories for Portugal and the trading along Africa eventually led to the rounding of South Africa, though not in his life which I didn’t know before. I really didn’t know much about his life before this book. The book isn’t really in strict chronological order which at first I didn’t like but then came around to appreciate how it was near the middle point. It covers everything significant in his life and keeps a looser structure on it all. It covers things as they happen somewhat and also what they are and where they fit into the story. Naturally the larger scale trading aspects of his life are near the end of the book while his early life and crusading against Morocco are early to midway through the book. The looser structure though allows for more things to be covered in better detail. This book while not long page wise was dense in the amount of words. It was a longer read but still super fun and interesting, I recommend this to anyone interested in Portugal, history, sailing, Europe, etc! It was really good!
4.5/5
4.5/5
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 12, 2025
This was included on a list of non-fiction books recommended to travelers to Portugal. I genuinely doubt whoever decided to include this on the list actually read it. This is yet another historical biography in which the author reviews writing from the period and disputes the accuracy of the descriptions of the subject in that period writing. In every chapter. The casual reader can learn by skimming through it, but it is written by a historian for a scholarly audience. I learned about the early growth of the Portuguese empire, late phase christian crusades and Portugal's important role in the 15th century international slave trade. Henry badgered the various kings to seize ports in northern Africa and use them for converting the infidels to Christianity and to "tax" passing merchant vessels. Henry apparently used his position as lay administrator of the Order of Christ to fund his mapping/enslaving expeditions on the western coast of Africa (and nearby islands.). They didn't find the gold they were looking for and so brought back slaves instead. Apparently he showed up for his military invasions, but directed the exploration expeditions from home. My favorite vignette would be Henry causing an the death of a famous Portuguese general by by rashly getting cut off from his troops inside the Ceuta fort and thus requiring rescue.
November 29, 2025
This was not a flat out biography of Henry's life starting from his birth and telling his life till his death. It focuses on certain parts of his life, mainly the Canaries, North Africa and the exploration of Southern Africa including the slave trade. A lot of the book entails examining the different people who wrote about Henry and the accuracy of it rather than just telling the tale of his life.
May 18, 2023
I definitely learned that Prince Henry wasn’t a great person, but due to the lack of historical documents from his lifetime, this was more a discussion about events during his time and not so much about him. It was interesting, but not what I was anticipating!
February 27, 2019
More than anyone needs to know about Prince Henry, however it’s an excellent book!
May 31, 2024
Lot of information but not good
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