The History of The Azores Archipelago

Stories of islands in the Atlantic Ocean, legendary and otherwise, had been reported since classical antiquity. Utopian tales of the Fortunate Isles (or Isles of the Blest) were sung by poets like Homer and Horace. Plato articulated the legend of Atlantis. Ancient writers like Plutarch, Strabo and, more explicitly, Pliny the Elder and Ptolemy, testified to the real existence of the Canary Islands. The Middle Ages saw the emergence of a new set of legends about islands deep in the Atlantic Ocean. These were sourced in various places, e.g. the Irish immrama, or missionary sailing voyages (such as the tales of Ui Corra and Saint Brendan) and the sagas of Norse adventurers (such as the Grœnlendinga saga and the saga of Erik the Red). The peoples of the Iberian peninsula, who were closest to the real Atlantic islands, and whose seafarers and fisherman may have seen and even visited them, articulated their own tales. Medieval Andalusian Arabs related stories of Atlantic island encounters in the legend of the 9th-century navigator Khashkhash of Cordoba (told by al-Masudi) and the 12th-century story of the eight Maghurin (Wanderers) of Lisbon (told by Muhammad al-Idrisi). From these Greek, Irish, Norse, Arab and Iberian seafaring tales – often cross-fertilizing each other – emerged a myriad of mythical islands in the Atlantic Ocean – Atlantis, the Fortunate Islands, Saint Brendan's Island, Brasil Island, Antillia (or Sete Cidades, the island of the Seven Cities), Satanazes, the Ilhas Azuis (Blue Islands), the Terra dos Bacalhaus (Land of Codfish), and so on, which however uncertain, became so ubiquitous that they were considered fact. According to Bartolomé de las Casas, two dead bodies that looked like those of Amerindians were found on Flores. He said he found that fact in Christopher Columbus' notes, and it was one reason why Columbus presumed that India was on the other side of the ocean. In A History of the Azores, written by Thomas Ashe in 1813, the author talks of the discovery of the islands by Joshua Vander Berg of Bruges, who landed there during a storm on his way to Lisbon. This claim is generally discredited among academics today. As were local stories of a mysterious equestrian statue and coins with Carthaginian writing that were purportedly discovered on island of Corvo, or the strange inscriptions found along the coast of Quatro Ribeiras (on Terceira): all unsubstantiated stories that supported the claims of human visitation to the islands before the official record. But there was some basis in fact, since the Medici maps of 1351 contained seven islands off the Portuguese coast which were arranged in groups of three; there were the southern group, or the Goat Islands (Cabreras), the middle group, or the Wind or Dove Islands (De Ventura Sive de Columbis), and the western islands, or the Brazil Island (De Brazil).

0:00:00 - intro
0:00:12 - Myth and legend
0:04:47 - Early appearance on charts
0:07:59 - Portuguese exploration
0:09:44 - The re-discovery
0:13:04 - Settlement
0:18:03 - Iberian Union
0:19:13 - Liberal wars
0:20:49 - 20th century
0:22:27 - Carnation Revolution
0:22:44 - outro

#Azores#History#TheKnowledgeVideoChannel

[FlordosAçores]

This is so well done with such interesting details. Thank You! Muito Obrigada!

[gordusmaximus]

This is by far the most complete guide/documentary of the history of the Azores. Not that there is much about the Azores in terms of history out there, most people have no idea it exists. That is why, the job for this and the entire video is even more valuable. The Azores is underrated in its role in the last 500 years of western history, you can say the Azores was the "new world" before the new world. The main thing missing in terms of history was the indespendist movement that peaked in 1975. Still Great job.

[Janika-xjbv]

Very interesting and informative. Loved it. Thanks for sharing. Obrigado

[diniscarmo]

I married on the 1st of January 1977. Two days later I moved to Terceira Island where, five days later, I started practicing as a (new) medical doctor.
I stayed there until 1981, being a survivor of the 1st of January 1980 Azorean earthquake.
As a former resident of the islands, I enjoyed this video tremendously so that on a scale of 0-10 I would rate it easily as 8.5 - especially because being a researcher myself in my field of activity, it is not difficult for me to realize the amount of work and research (time !) that the production of this video must have taken.
As mentioned in a previous comment, the Portuguese accent of many of the names & places is quite poor, which is a pity in a video of this quality; maybe that can be fixed in the future. As suggested in another comment, the independence movement that peaked in 1975 after the Portuguese Carnation Revolution, would also be worth mentioning. There was a movement, the FLA (Frente de Libertação dos Açores, or Azores Liberation Movement) that was still quite active during the first years that I stayed there - notably in S. Miguel. I remember being "bullied" from time to time for being a "continental" (a person from Portugal mainland) and being "encouraged" to go back home...
It would also probably be worth mentioning that the majority of Azoreans live not in the Azores but in the EUA and Canada.
In conclusion: congratulations for a great job and many thanks for the video.

[kaumingo]

The robot voice-over makes dozens and dozens of prounuciation errors. Let a real human narrate next time.

[LouisSantos-vukr]

Too bad your pronouncing the names of the islands wrong, especially Sao jorge, you using the Spanish pronunciation instead of portuguese.

[nickoakley]

It seems a pity that the population of the Azores has declined while the Canaries has increased. At one point they both had about 400, 000. But the Azores has fallen back to 230k while the Canaries have more than 2 million.

[michaelgothenburg]

The robots pronunciation destroys an otherwise pretty good documentary and makes it bad. Use a person next time

[SaidAlSeveres]

Amazing video! I’d have spent a little extra time with proper pronunciation of surnames and places. Nonetheless very informative and I’d like to go visit!!!

[antonietacosta]

Impossible to perceive here the importance that Azores (Terceira Island, specially) had on the European development of sea voyages through the Atlantic, which only could happen due to the support that the natural port of Angra did provide! ANGRA (and not Vila Franca, as it is said, or Ponta Delgada) was the big Atlantic port, which gave support between 1450s and late in 1500s to the Atlantic navigations to India and Americas. Comparison between architecture styles of Angra and Ponta Delgada, as well as their structural city designs leaves no doubts. Besides, the absence to refer Angra' s classification as World Heritage (not mentioned in the documentary) shows the intention to mask its real importance. It is regrettable that such a nice and (otherwise) well done documentary gets spoiled by this continuous defraud of History forced by S. Miguel!

[jasperwinehouse]

I was already an expert on the history of the Azores thanks to you I now can pronounce the names of the places hahaha

[AzoresWhatElse]

Impeccable images. Keep up the good work.
I take this opportunity to invite you to follow "Azores, What Else", both here on Youtube, as on Instagram and other social networks.
Best regards.

[robdm]

Is this a text to voice bot or an actual person talking?

[eborges]

I found this video replete with interesting facts and history and is well done; however, as a first generation descendant of Azorean immigrants, I found the pronunciation awful and overly anglicized. This poor pronunciation of Portuguese place names (and even Spanish and Italian names) rather insulting. Otherwise it a well done history of the land of my ancestors.

[dwarfninja]

I really tried watching this but the AI voiceover butchering all the pronounciations grated on my nerves.

[hernanifarias]

passing on half details do not make it facts. i was born in Sao Miguel and have studied history for 45 years. More than anything events prior to 1400ad is from fishermen stories as Basques nd North Portuguese fishermen would follow whales and codfish annual fishing. It is know that since the 1290s ( especially after Portugal took over Algarve) secret voyages where launched but unrecorded to prevent other kings knowing about Portuguese advances .
rest is just nonsense. The mouse DNA are in fact traced to Norwegian Black rats know to spread the bubonic plagues in 5th. 8th 11th and 13 th centuries . there is almost NO mouse/Rat DNA dependable prior to these dates as almost all rodents where unable to withstand the tick carrying plague. in fact in 1421/1427 settlements it is noted that the villagers brought mice with them that populated the island as there was none.
as for structures, the island is very heavy akin to walking stones in desert ie carved by WIND and erosion not by Vikings.

Stories may help tourism but it is a total dis-service to true study of history. false ideals make false conclusions leads to future false decisions. there is no Substitute for real knowledge and education.

[leinad]

Viking most likely discoverd the Azores....if the made it to Newfoundland they could make it there...In teresting though is that no relics have been found....at least not yet

[TagusMan]

Robots make for rubbish narrators. Rage against the the machines.

[jasperwinehouse]

This poor devil freaks me out with some of his pronunciations