• After Vasco da Gama rounded the southern end of Africa in 1498, Portugal became the first European power to gain sea access to Asia.
• Although the Portuguese were quick to explore and lay claim to various coastal parts of India, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, and China.
• Its power faded in the 17th and 18th centuries and the British, Dutch, and French were able to push Portugal out of most of its Asian claims.
• By the 20th century, what remained was Goa, on the southwest coast of India, East Timor and the southern Chinese port at Macau.
• Although Portugal was not the most intimidating European imperial power, it had the most staying power. Goa remained Portuguese until India annexed it by force in 1961.
• Macau was Portuguese until 1999 when the Europeans finally handed it back to China, and East Timor or Timor-Leste formally became independent only in 2002.
• Portuguese rule in Asia was by turns ruthless (as when they began capturing Chinese children to sell into enslavement in Portugal), lackadaisical, and underfunded.
• Like the French, Portuguese colonists were not opposed to mixing with local peoples and creating creole populations.
• Perhaps the most important characteristic of the Portuguese imperial attitude was Portugal’s stubbornness and refusal to withdraw, even after the other imperial powers had closed up shop.
• Portuguese colonialism was driven by a sincere desire to spread Catholicism and make tons of money.

It was also inspired by nationalism and a desire to prove the country’s might as it came out from under Moorish rule, and in later centuries, the proud insistence on holding onto the colonies as an emblem of past imperial glory.