Navigations

Reviews / Votes

Malyn Newitt writes with the breadth of knowledge that one would expect from a man who was the Charles Boxer Professor of History at King's College . . . Reaktion has issued a series of books on Renaissance lives for which Navigations will make a welcome companion . . . the impact of the voyages undertaken in the hundred years covered by this book fully deserve a detailed, wide-ranging forensic study such as Newitt provides. -- David Childs * Naval Review * Navigations is at once a history of the politics and economy of the world that drew Portuguese mariners ever further from their home ports and an exploration of the complex networks of people who facilitated their voyages, ranging from women in royal households to ship crews and local pilots who guided Portuguese ships to safe anchorages. Drawing on a long career as a historian and synthesizing the most recent scholarship, Malyn Newitt transforms the Portuguese age of discovery from the exploits of a few dozen heroic men into a scholarly discovery of contested interactions among technology, economics, cultural encounters, human frailties, and social ambitions. This book is an engaging and at times unsettling meditation on the long-term consequences of discovery and our need to reexamine their continuing global impacts. * Elizabeth Mancke, Professor of History and Canada Research Chair in Atlantic Canadian Studies, University of New Brunswick * Few living scholars know as much about the Portuguese empire as Malyn Newitt. None writes about it with more confidence, clarity, critical acuity and common sense. His new book is the precious gift of a long lifetime's work and reflection, enlivened by moments of subtle humour and distinguished by objectivity, reliability and restraint in judgement. * Felipe Fernandez-Armesto, William P. Reynolds Professor of History, University of Notre Dame, and author of Straits: Beyond the Myth of Magellan * Navigations provides a much-needed re-examination of the Portuguese Empire of the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, one that considers a varied and wide cast of participants. Persuasively argued and masterfully written, this book interlaces Portugal's "Age of Discoveries" with its European antecedents, context and impacts in vital ways. * Jorge Flores, University of Lisbon * One of the seminal episodes in world history was the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century Portuguese discovery of and expansion into Asia, Africa, and the Americas. The historiography of the period, written mostly by Portuguese scholars, often portrayed this history as a series of celebrated events led by heroic personalities whose successes furthered Portugal's achievements and greatness. Questioning this formidable historiography, Newitt de-emphasizes these traditional portrayals and places the discoveries within the context of the European Renaissance and the less recognized parallel rise of comparable empires in Asia. Newitt envisions this history not as a series of dramatic enterprises but as a continuation of patterns already in process in both parts of the world. Written in a readable style, this volume shows the history as a collaborative effort between already famous discoverers and an often ignored, supporting cast of crews, soldiers, women, Sephardic Jews, and African captives. As the author suggests, the Portuguese discoveries were important for establishing commercial and cultural networks between rising world powers in the East and the West. This volume is an appreciated addition to the author's recent publications reinterpreting the international Portuguese historical experience. Highly recommended. * Choice *