DRAKE AND THE SULTAN
[This Monday’s Archive was originally published on July 15, 2016. It’s one of TTP’s Histories in a Nutshell, and I thought you’d enjoy it simply as fascinating and informative history, just to take a break from all the current lunacy we are all enduring.]
TTP, July 15, 2016 – all photos ©Jack Wheeler
Ternate, Spice Islands of the Moluccas, present day Indonesia. I am here in the place that started the Western exploration of the world.
It was the goal of Columbus in 1492 to get here – which of course he never did with the American continents getting in the way. Vasco da Gama decided to try the other way around Africa – which he did, reaching the southwest coast of India in 1498.
By 1512, Vasco’s fellow Portuguese made it all the way – to the fabled Spice Islands, the only source on earth for nutmeg, mace, and cloves. Since the Middle Ages, they were esteemed by Europeans for their medicinal and culinary properties.
As such, they were fantastically expensive, especially because the Arabs had a monopoly on the overland trade routes. Breaking the monopoly with sea routes meant unbelievable profits. So the Portuguese cashed in. A pocketful of nutmeg seed pods could buy you a home. Imagine what an entire shipload was worth.
Ferdinand Magellan convinced Portugal’s rival, Spain led by Charles V, that he could break the Portuguese spice monopoly by sailing west – for by now (1518) everyone knew there was an ocean on the other side of the Americas but no one had crossed it. Magellan did it, but was killed in the Philippines in 1521 before he got here.
So the Portuguese got to keep the Spice Islands, where they built their first fort – called Kastela – here on Ternate in 1522. The Spanish found there were almost unimaginable amounts of gold and silver for the taking in their new colonies along the west coast of South America and forgot about the Pacific Ocean.
Fifty years later, history was about to shift.
In the Mediterranean, experienced travelers know the French Riviera from St. Tropez to Menton, and the Italian Riviera from Ventimiglia to Cinque Terre. There is one Riviera in the Med they may not know – Albania’s. The Med has many beautiful coastlines, and just about all of them have been “discovered” by jet-setters to backpackers. Not yet, however, for Albania from Saranda in the south across from Greece’s Corfu to Vlora across from the tip of Italy’s Boot Heel.
