They were well placed to be the most powerful trading nation in western Europe, rivaled only by Castile. In the early sixteenth century, the experienced navigator Duarte Pacheco Pereira (nicknamed the Portuguese Achilles) laid the credit for this extraordinary program of expansion squarely with Henry. “The benefits conferred on [Portugal] by the virtuous Prince Henry are such that its kings and people are greatly indebted to him,” wrote Pereira, “for in the land which he discovered a great part of the Portuguese people now earn their livelihood and the kings [of Portugal] derive great profit
...more
