Portugal is a not very big country on the south-west of Europe. But this country have a very glorious history. It is good known, that Portugueses was the best sailors during a several centuries and they started the Great Geographical Discoveries in the XVth & XVIth ceenturies. Portugueses founded many colonies in Africa, Asia & Southern America. And they minted very interesting colonial coins! In this thread I use the information from WIKIPEDIA.
History of Cape Verde In 1462, Portuguese settlers arrived at Santiago and founded Ribeira Grande (now Cidade Velha), the first permanent European settlement city in the tropics. They named the islands Cabo Verde (from which the English Cape Verde derives), after the nearby Cap Vert on the Senegalese coast. In the 16th century, the archipelago prospered from the transatlantic slave trade. Pirates occasionally attacked the Portuguese settlements. Sir Francis Drake sacked Ribeira Grande in 1585.After a French attack in 1712, the city declined in importance relative to Praia, which became the capital in 1770. With the decline in the slave trade, Cape Verde's early prosperity slowly vanished. However, the islands' position astride mid-Atlantic shipping lanes made Cape Verde an ideal location for re-supplying ships. Because of its excellent harbor, Mindelo (on the island of São Vicente) became an important commercial center during the 19th century. Portugal changed Cape Verde's status from a colony to an overseas province in 1951 in an attempt to blunt growing nationalism. Nevertheless, in 1956, Amilcar Cabral, a Cape Verde, and a group of Cape Verdeans and Guinean organized (in Portuguese Guinea) the clandestine African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC), which demanded improvement in economic, social, and political conditions in Cape Verde and Guinea and formed the basis of the two nations' independence movement. Moving its headquarters to Conakry, Guinea in 1960, the PAIGC began an armed rebellion against Portugal in 1961. Acts of sabotage eventually grew into a war in Portuguese Guinea that pitted 10,000 Soviet bloc-supported PAIGC soldiers against 35,000 Portuguese and African troops. By 1972, the PAIGC controlled much of Portuguese Guinea despite the presence of the Portuguese troops, but the organization did not attempt to disrupt Portuguese control in Cape Verde. Portuguese Guinea declared independence in 1973 and was granted de jure independence in 1974. Following the April 1974 revolution in Portugal, the PAIGC became an active political movement in Cape Verde. In December 1974, the PAIGC and Portugal signed an agreement providing for a transitional government composed of Portuguese and Cape Verdeans. On June 30, 1975, Cape Verdeans elected a National Assembly, which received the instruments of independence from Portugal on July 5, 1975. 20 centavos 1930, bronze, mintage - 1500000. 1 escudo 1968, bronze, mintage - 500000.
Though the Kingdom of Portugal had claimed the area four years earlier, Portuguese explorer Nuno Tristão sailed around the coast of West Africa, reaching the Guinea area in about 1450, searching for the source of gold, other valuable commodities, that had slowly been trickling up into Europe via land routes for the preceding half century. Sometime later, slaves were also added to the list. Portuguese Guinea had been part of the Sahel Empire, and the local Landurna and Naula tribes traded in salt and grew rice. Like in many other regions across Africa, powerful indigenous kingdoms along the Bight of Benin relied heavily on a long established slave trade. The Ashanti exploited their military predominance to bring slaves to coastal forts established first by Portugal after 1480, and then soon afterwards by the Dutch, Danish, and English. The slaving network quickly expanded deep into the Sahel, where the Mossi diverted an ancient slaving trade away from the Mediterranean towards the Gold Coast. With the help of local tribes in about 1600, the Portuguese, and numerous other European powers, including France, Britain and Sweden, set up a thriving slave trade along the West African coast. However, the local black African rulers in Guinea, who prospered greatly from the slave trade, had no interest in allowing the white Europeans any further inland than the fortified coastal settlements where the trading took place. The Portuguese presence in Guinea was therefore largely limited to the port of Bissau and Cacheu. For a brief period in the 1790s the British attempt to establish a rival foothold on an offshore island, at Bolama. But by the 19th century the Portuguese were sufficiently secure in Bissau to regard the neighbouring coastline as their own special territory, also in part of present southern Senegal. 1 escudo 1946, bronze.
Angola is a country in south-central Africa bordered by Namibia on the south, Democratic Republic of the Congo on the north, and Zambia on the east; its west coast is on the Atlantic Ocean. The exclave province of Cabinda has a border with the Republic of the Congo and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Angola was a Portuguese overseas territory from the 16th century to 1975. 1 escudo 1974, bronze & 2 1/2 escudos 1967, copper-nickel.
Republic of Mozambique is a country in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi and Zambia to the northwest, Zimbabwe to the west and Swaziland and South Africa to the southwest. The area was explored by Vasco da Gama in 1498 and colonized by Portugal in 1505. Mozambique became independent in 1975, and became the People's Republic of Mozambique shortly thereafter. It was the scene of an intense civil war lasting from 1977 to 1992. 10 centavos 1960, bronze & 20 centavos 1974, bronze.
Saint Thomas and Prince. This islands was discovered in 1470. During 1493-1500 Portugueses established their first colonies on these islands. In the XVIth centurie St. Thomas & Prince colonies was the main suppliers of a sugar in Europe. During the XIXth century St. Thomas & Prince become the main supplier of cocoa. In 1975 this colony become an independent state. 20 centavos 1929, copper-nickel, mintage - 250000. 50 escudos 1970, silver .650, 18 g., mintage - 150000.
Timor is an island at the southern end of Maritime Southeast Asia, north of the Timor Sea. It is divided between the independent state of East Timor, and West Timor, belonging to the Indonesian province of East Nusa Tenggara. First Portugueses visited this island in 1512. In 1556 first Catholic missioners arrived in Timor. Since 1702 Timor - Portuguese colony. In 1975 this country got own independence. 20 & 50 centavos 1970, bronze.
