Between the dream and the conquest: settlement and daily life of the Portuguese in North Africa (15th-16th centuries)

Summary

The Portuguese presence in North Africa was materialized through the occupation of cities and fortresses along the coast, especially during the 15th and the first half of the 16th century. Traditional historiography has stressed the limited contact these strongholds held with their surrounding territory, underlining their highly military nature.                                   

In this paper we wish to re-evaluate this theory, mainly through the archaeological work we've been developing since 2008 in three old cities occupied by the Portuguese in Morocco: Ksar es-Seghir, Azemmour and Safi.

We will analyze structures such as fortifications, religious buildings or houses, and examine the material culture that has been identified during the archaeological research. The final purpose is to understand the daily life in those places and the Portuguese settlement strategies in North Africa.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Territory, settlement and material culture in the Iberian colonial empires (16-18th centuries)   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2013

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Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 471