Page:European treaties bearing on the history of the United States and its dependencies.djvu/94

 9. Treaty between Spain and Portugal concluded at Tordesillas, June 7, 1494. Ratification by Spain, July 2, 1494. [Ratification by Portugal, September 5, 1494.]

INTRODUCTION.

In the negotiations begun at Barcelona in the middle of August, 1493, Spain insisted that just as her navigators would refrain from visiting the regions reserved to Portugal--which Spain described as the Madeiras, Azores, Cape Verde, and other islands discovered prior to 1479, and the region from the Canaries down towards Guinea--so the Portuguese must keep away from Spain's discoveries. No agreement, however, could be reached, because, as the Spanish sovereigns wrote to Columbus, the Portu­ guese ambassadors were not informed as to what belonged to Spain. Ac­ cordingly, in November, 1493, a magnificent embassy, headed by Garcia de Carvajal, brother of the Spanish ambassador in Rome, and Pedro de Ayala, was despatched to the Portuguese court; but it accomplished nothing. In March, 1494, the Portuguese commissioners, Ruy de Sousa, João de Sousa, his son, and Ayres de Almada, treated directly with the Spanish sovereigns in Medina del Campo. Portugal felt aggrieved by the papal bull, which designated as the eastern limit of the Spanish demarcation a meridian only one hundred leagues west of the Azores or Cape Verde Islands. As their ships were continually sailing to these islands, the Portuguese considered the limits too narrow. They therefore wished another meridian to be agreed on, farther to the west, half-way between the Cape Verde Islands and the lands discovered by Columbus. King John "was certain that within those limits famous lands and things must be found." This new line of demarca­ tion was agreed to by Ferdinand and Isabella, and on June 7,