1494: How a Family Feud in Medieval Spain Divided the World in Half

“This is a starry love story a tale of seething jealousies and subterfuge a political imbroglio and religious cruelties. It sounds like Shakespeare and it could have very well been the plot of one of his plays.” –Toronto Star In 1494 award-winning author Stephen R. Bown tells the untold story of the explosive feud between monarchs clergy and explorers that split the globe between Spain and Portugal and made the worlds oceans a battleground. When Columbus triumphantly returned from America to Spain in 1493 his discoveries inflamed an already-smouldering conflict between Spains renowned monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella and Portugals Joo II. Which nation was to control the worlds oceans? To quell the argument Pope Alexander VIthe notorious Rodrigo Borgiaissued a proclamation laying the foundation for the Treaty of Tordesillas of 1494 an edict that created an imaginary line in the Atlantic Ocean dividing the entire known (and unknown) world between Spain and Portugal. Just as the worlds oceans were about to be opened by Columbuss epochal voyage the treaty sought to limit the seas to these two favored Catholic nations. The edict was to have a profound influence on world history: it propelled Spain and Portugal to superpower status steered many other European nations on a collision course and became the central grievance in two centuries of international espionage piracy and warfare. The treaty also began the fight for “the freedom of the seas”the epic struggle to determine whether the worlds oceans and thus global commerce would be controlled by the decree of an autocrat or be open to the ships of any nationa distinctly modern notion championed in the early seventeenth century by the Dutch legal theorist Hugo Grotius whose arguments became the foundation of international law. At the heart of one of the greatest international diplomatic and political agreements of the last five centuries were the strained relationships and passions of a handful of powerful individuals. They were linked by a shared history mutual animosity and personal obligationsquarrels rivalries and hatreds that dated back decades. Yet the struggle ultimately stemmed from a young womans determination to defy tradition and the king and to choose her own husband.