Manuel I of Portugal

King Manuel's royal standard, depicting an armillary sphere, became a symbol of the Portuguese Empire's global expanse and eventually Portugal itself. It can still be seen in Portugal's coat of arms and its flag.

Manuel would prove a worthy successor to his cousin John II for his support of Portuguese exploration of the Atlantic Ocean and development of Portuguese commerce. During his reign, the following achievements were realized:

1498 – The discovery of a maritime route to India by Vasco da Gama.
1500 – The discovery of Brazil by Pedro Álvares Cabral.
1501 – The discovery of Labrador by Gaspar and Miguel Corte-Real.
1505 – The appointment of Francisco de Almeida as the first viceroy of India.
1503–1515 – The establishment of monopolies on maritime trade routes (mare clausum) to the Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf by Afonso de Albuquerque.

The capture of Malacca in modern-day Malaysia in 1511 was the result of a plan by Manuel I to thwart the Muslim trade in the Indian Ocean by capturing Aden, blocking trade through Alexandria, capturing Ormuz to block trade through the Persian Gulf and Beirut, and capturing Malacca to control trade with China.[1]

All these events made Portugal wealthy from foreign trade as it formally established a vast overseas empire. Manuel used the wealth to build a number of royal buildings (in the "Manueline" style) and to attract scientists and artists to his court.

Commercial treaties and diplomatic alliances were forged with Ming dynasty of China and the Persian Safavid dynasty. Pope Leo X received a monumental embassy from Portugal during his reign designed to draw attention to Portugal's newly acquired riches to all of Europe.[2]

In Manuel's reign, royal absolutism was the method of government. The Portuguese Cortes (the assembly of the kingdom) met only three times during his reign, always in Lisbon, the king's seat.

Stained-glass depiction of Manuel at Batalha Monastery; attributed to Francisco Henriques, c. 1514-18.

He reformed the courts of justice and the municipal charters with the crown, modernizing taxes and the concepts of tributes and rights. During his reign, the laws in force in the kingdom of Portugal were recodified with the publication of the Manueline Ordinations.

Manuel with his second wife Maria of Aragon and their eight children; by Colijn de Coter, c. 1515-17.

Manuel was a very religious man and invested a large amount of Portuguese income to send missionaries to the new colonies, among them Francisco Álvares, and sponsor the construction of religious buildings, such as the Monastery of Jerónimos. Manuel also endeavoured to promote another crusade against the Turks.

His relationship with the Portuguese Jews started out well. At the outset of his reign, he released all the Jews who had been made captive during the reign of John II. Unfortunately for the Jews, he decided that he wanted to marry Infanta Isabella of Aragon, then heiress of the future united crown of Spain (and widow of his nephew Prince Afonso). Her parents Ferdinand and Isabella had expelled the Jews in 1492 and would never marry their daughter to the king of a country that still tolerated their presence. In the marriage contract, Manuel I agreed to persecute the Jews of Portugal.

In December 1496, it was decreed that all Jews either convert to Christianity or leave the country without their children.[3] However, those expelled could only leave the country in ships specified by the king. When those who chose expulsion arrived at the port in Lisbon, they were met by clerics and soldiers who tried to use coercion and promises in order to baptize them and prevent them from leaving the country.

This period of time technically ended the presence of Jews in Portugal. Afterwards, all converted Jews and their descendants would be referred to as "New Christians", and they were given a grace period of thirty years in which no inquiries into their faith would be allowed; this was later extended to end in 1534.[4]

During the course of the Lisbon massacre of 1506, people invaded the Jewish Quarter and murdered thousands of accused Jews; the leaders of the riot were executed by Manuel.

In December 1521, while Lisbon was dealing with an outbreak of the Black Plague, Manuel and his court were quarantined inside Ribeira Palace. Beginning on the 4th of December, Manuel began displaying symptoms of an intense fever, which incapacitated Manuel by the 11th. He died two days later, on 13 December 1521, at the age of 52, being succeeded by his son, John III of Portugal, as king.

The day after his death, on 14 December, his body transported to the Belém district of Lisbon, in a black velvet-draped coffin, followed by masses of mourners. He was provisionally buried at Restelo Church, while the royal pantheon of the House of Aviz was funished inside Jerónimos Monastery. His coffin was buried by four of the most prominent nobles of the kingdom, the Duke of Braganza, the Duke of Coimbra, and the Marquis of Vila Real, in a private ceremony attended only by the royal family and the Portuguese nobility. His remains were transferred to Jerónimos Monastery only in 1551, along with his second wife Maria of Aragon.