A concise history of Portugal

Abstract

“Portugal is one of history’s most successful survivors. It is but a small country whose population rose slowly from one million to nine million over eight hundred years. In that time it acquired a political and cultural autonomy within Europe. It also made its mark on every corner of the globe through colonisation, emigration and commerce. Unlike the more prosperous Catalonia it succeeded in escaping from Spanish captivity in the seventeenth century.”–Provided by publisher