Why Italy?

Prince Henry the Navigator, true father of the Renaissance, and quite possible the most influential European who ever lived. Certainly worth the longest picture caption in the history of Od's Blog, in any event.

Okay, I know what you're thinking. You needn't say a word.

You want to know why, if the Renaissance was caused, as I say in my new Grand Theory of History and Everything, by the early explorations of Henry the Navigator of Portugal, the Renaissance started in Italy instead of right there in Portugal. Granted that all of Europe was wired together, still, why Italy?

Here's why. Nominally, Henry's expeditions were Portuguese, but in real terms, the Portguguese mariners were mostly the agents of Florence and Genoa. The Florentines were the financial backers for the expeditions. When the enterprise proved valuable, the Florentines were the first to profit and the first to know. Then, once the new trade routes had opened, who had the kit and the expertise for the cargo trade? Not the Portuguese; they were fishermen. The Genoese and Florentines had been in the business for centuries around the Mediterranean, along with Venice. As soon as Madeira was discovered, it was the Genoese traders who brought in and planted sugar cane and sugar beets, opened the entrepots at either destination, started the various supporting businesses, and hauled the “sweet salt” back to Europe, in Genoese and Florentine ships manned by Genoese and Florrentine sailors.

Henry took the trouble to train his own shipbuilders and navigators. When other European monarchs wanted to get in on the action, they took the quick and dirty route. They hired Genoese and Florentine captains, Europe's most experienced. The Spanish contracted with Christopher Columbus, and the English with John Cabot, both from Genoa. The French cut a deal with Verrazano and the Spanish another with Amerigo Vespucci, both from Florence.

Amerigo Vespucci, after whom the Americas are named. Kind of like naming an entire hemisphere "Bob," actually.

In sum, once the rush to the new lands began, it was the Italians who had the greatest opportunities, as sea captains, sailors, traders, and merchants; as everything but farmers. The opportunity to settle and farm was open to just about anyone in Europe, but the Portuguese themselves did not seem especially eager to seize the chance. Flanders, then also under the Spanish or Portuguese crowns, seemed more active in sending actual settlers—perhaps not coincidentally, Flanders became the second great site of the Renaissance.

Kind of makes you think.