Late Middle Ages · Africa · Exploration
1415
Portugal Captures Ceuta
August 21, 1415
Prince Henry, later called the Navigator, crossed the Strait of Gibraltar with his father King Joao and stormed the Moroccan port in a single day. The conquest was strategically useless but psychologically enormous: Portugal had crossed into Africa. The age of European overseas empire started here. Prince Henry developed an obsessive curiosity about what lay beyond Morocco, driving Portuguese exploration for fifty years.
In context
Also in 1415 (4 other events on record)
- Jan Hus Burned at the Stake · Europe · Religion
- Battle of Agincourt · Europe · War
- Ming Currency Collapse · East Asia · Politics
- Frederick of Hohenzollern Made Margrave of Brandenburg · Europe · Politics
Before and after in Africa
Before and after in Exploration
Era
Late Middle Ages (1301–1500), one of 874 events from that era on Saeculum.