Africa's Gold Coast Through Portuguese Sources, 1469-1680

Author(s): Kwasi Konadu
Format: Hardback
Publisher: Oxford University Press, United Kingdom
Imprint: Oxford University Press
ISBN-13: 9780197267066, 978-0197267066

Synopsis

The Portuguese produced the earliest records for regions in West Africa, none more important than the Gold Coast. This edited volume provides a unique collection of sources written in Portuguese, Latin, Italian, French, and Spanish for Africas Gold Coast, from the late 15th to 17th century. Students, scholars, and professionals with an avid interest in early modern African, Atlantic, and world history will benefit from the English translations, many appearing for the first time. These sources add to the handful of existing translations, but especially illuminate the late 15th to 17th century relations between the Portuguese empire and the Gold Coast and offer comparative materials for other European interlocutorsSpanish, French, English, and Dutchgarrisoned on the coast or offshore in their vessels. Over that concentrated period, and especially where no other European-supplied records exist, these uncomprehending Portuguese outsiders archived important local ideas, personalities, polities, and cultural forms animating Gold Coast-Portuguese relations.