delanceyplace.com 06/13/06 - spain and portugal

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In today's excerpt - the conquistadores of Portugal and Spain.  The seven-century long war against the Moor had battle-hardened and prepared these countries for their subjugation of the New World and solidified them under the Catholic banner, but it is also true that the war against the Moor had to be concluded—as it was in 1492—for the sovereigns of Iberia to truly be in a position to finance the New World exploration.  (Ferdinand and Isabella had expressly declined Columbus due to the cost and uncertainty of the war, and felt comfortable financing him only after the final expulsion of the Moors from Iberia):

"By 1540, in a brief span of less than 50 years, Spain had conquered and was governing territories many times the size of the mother country [and] Portugal had laid a firm hold on Brazil.

"Cortes, with a force never exceeding fifteen hundred Spaniards, had defeated tens of thousands of Aztec warriors. ... Pizarro, with less than four hundred soldiers, had marched straight into the heart of the Inca Empire, where he seized the Inca ruler and subdued his country of several million. ... Quesada, with only one hundred and sixty men ... founded the present capital of Columbia. ... Orellana crossed the Andes from Peru, built a few makeshift boats ... and traveled ... to the Atlantic coast of Brazil. Cabeza de Vaca tramped across ten thousand miles of the United States. ...

"It is fortunate that Spain and Portugal undertook the conquest at this time.  No other European countries were then ready for such an enterprise.  A certain state of mind must precede a successful imperialism, and that state existed nowhere in Europe outside of Spain and Portugal.  Luther, Calvin and other Protestant leaders might spring up in other parts of Europe to disrupt the unity and authority of the state, but not on the Iberian Peninsula.  Here, the state had long since seized on the Church as its tool and weapon and would not relinquish it. Uniformity was not forced on the Spanish and Portuguese.  Centuries of warfare against the Moors had made it an integral part of their being, an expression of the collective will. ...

"Whenever war breaks out on a great scale, there is always a cross and a sword, a reason for fighting. ... Unless victory becomes a religion, defeat in the long run is inevitable, even if the campaign is won. ... Throughout many centuries of Moorish wars, the 'Christian soldier' had been part of their daily living. ... He frequently went among the enemy, flailing about with a spiked mace, and, as the proverb succinctly states, A Dios rogando, y con la maza dando (praying for God's grace, and thumping with his mace)."