Portugal » History

In 1910 a republican revolution deposed the Portuguese monarchy, starting the First Republic. Political chaos, strikes, a deteriorated relationship with the Catholic Church, and considerable economic problems aggravated by a disastrous military intervention in the First World War led to a military coup d'état on May 28 of 1926, later, the military administration gave way to the New State in 1933, led by António de Oliveira Salazar. This New State was a right-wing, Catholic dictatorship. The regime dominated the country during the following decades, helped by a strong political police, the PIDE. In the early 1960s, independence movements became active in the colonies of Angola, Mozambique and Portuguese Guinea, starting the colonial wars.

The burden of the many colonial overseas wars and the lack of political and civil liberties led to the end of the regime after the Carnation Revolution in April 25 of 1974, a bloodless left-wing military coup that instated a democratic regime. In 1975, Portugal had its first free elections since 1926 and granted independence to its colonies in Africa. During the post-revolutionary period, the left-wing promoted several changes, such as the nationalisation of the key sectors of the economy and the creation of a social welfare network. In 1976, a democratic Constitution, still in force today, was approved.

Immediately after the revolution, membership in the EEC became an objective of the new government. This was achieved in 1986; since then Portugal has been engaged in a process of economic convergence. However, the country remains one of the least developed in the EU.

In 1999 the Asian dependency of Macau was returned to Chinese sovereignty, a process considered a success by China and Portugal, signaling the end of the Portuguese colonial rule.

Longer Historical Perspective

In the early first millennium BC, several waves of Celts invaded Portugal from Central Europe and intermarried with local peoples, the Iberians, forming the Celt-Iberians. Early Greek explorers named the region "Ophiussa" (Greek for "land of serpents") because the natives worshipped serpents. In 238 BC, the Carthaginians occupied the Mediterranean coasts of the Peninsula. At this time several small tribes occupied the territory, of which the most important ones were the Lusitanians, who lived between the Douro and Tagus rivers, and the Callaeci who lived north of the Douro river. The Cynetes or Conii, influenced by Tartessos, were long established in Algarve. The Celtici, a later wave of Celts, settled in Alentejo.

In 219 BC, the first Roman troops invaded the Iberian Peninsula, driving the Carthaginians out during the Punic Wars. The Roman conquest of Portugal started from the south, where they found friendly natives, the Conii. Over decades, the Romans increased their sphere of control. But in 194 BC a rebellion began in the north, and the Lusitanians successfully held off the Romans, taking back land and ransacking Conistorgis, the Conii capital, because of their alliance with Rome. Viriathus, born in Lorica, today's Loriga, in Portugal, was the Lusitanian leader. Viriathus waged a successful, protracted war against Rome, which prevailed only by bribing Lusitanian officials to kill their own leader. After the conquest, the process of Romanization began.