Portugal

From a frontier county of the Reconquista to a seaborne empire, holding one of Europe's oldest borders.

Portugal is among the oldest nation-states in Europe, born as a frontier county on the Atlantic edge of the Iberian Reconquista. Afonso Henriques, count of Portugal, broke away from the kingdom of Leon, took the royal title after his victory at Ourique in 1139, won recognition of his autonomy in 1143, and in 1179 had his crown and the independence of Portugal confirmed by Pope Alexander III. The frontier with Castile, largely fixed by the Treaty of Alcanices in 1297, is one of the most stable borders in the world. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries Portugal led Europe's Age of Discovery, opening the sea route to India under Vasco da Gama and reaching Brazil under Cabral, and divided the unexplored world with Castile at Tordesillas in 1494. The country lost its independence to the Spanish Habsburgs in the Iberian Union of 1580 to 1640, recovered it under the House of Braganza, was devastated by the great Lisbon earthquake of 1755, invaded during the Napoleonic Wars, and saw Brazil declare independence in 1822. After the long Estado Novo dictatorship, the Carnation Revolution of 1974 restored democracy and led to decolonisation; Portugal joined the European Communities in 1986. Two territorial questions remain open with Spain: the town of Olivenca, held by Spain since 1801, and the maritime zone around the Savage Islands.