A piece on the board: a prince in the fourteenth-century expansion

Abstract

The article’s purpose is to reflect on a character, that of D. Henrique of Portugal, whose action was accepted, throughout the centuries, as decisive in the process of European expansion. Despite some contradictory and derogatory judgments, the traces of his image that have come to us are predominantly favorable and constitute a fertile field for the consideration of the reasons alleged in the 15th century Iberian kingdoms in defense of combat and conversion in foreign lands, or rather, to conjecture about what was understood as good, right and necessary. Returning to sources that were fundamental in the diffusion of expansionist ideas and ideals, starting with later famous Portuguese authors who ensured the fortune of his image, the study, without claiming to defend that his personal virtues reiterated in the sources attest to his historical performance, examines particularly the deliberate actions described in the fifteenth-century narratives, his unfortunate choices and the hazards that favored his prominence in a historical process that went far beyond his life. The study aims to scrutinize the qualities and actions that translate a sharing of values that favored his importance or his elevation over his brothers, both by the deeds attributed to the prince and by the combination of later events that led to the distinction of some conquerors in relation to others.