Portuguese Explorations and West Africa The expeditions were sponsored by Prince Henry of Portugal, who founded a center for seamanship around 1420 and earned himself the title of the Navigator. Portugal established Cape Verde around 1440 and continued to build successful colonies through the early 20 th century. The Portuguese Colonial War (Portuguese: Guerra Colonial Portuguesa), also known in Portugal as the Overseas War (Guerra do Ultramar) or in the former colonies as the War of Liberation (Guerra de Libertação), was a thirteen year long conflict fought between Portugal's military and the emerging nationalist movements in Portugal's African colonies between 1961 and 1974. The Portuguese also held important islands in the Atlantic off the coast of Africa. For 500 years Portugal had colonies in Africa. During this period Portuguese colonies, especially Angola, remained the supply base for the Brazilian slave trade. Due to several technological and cultural advantages, Portugal dominated world trade for nearly 200 years, from the fifteenth to the sixteenth century. These are the remains of the first European country that explored the world in search of spices and souls. For more than a decade prior to 1974 Portugal fought insurgencies in Angola, Portuguese Guinea, and Mozambique. The Portuguese were the first to explore and settle in Sub-Saharan Africa as they made their way along the African coast in the 1400s. Wars of Colonial Portuguese Africa. The Portuguese inhabitants of Cape Verde initiated new types of tropical agriculture and farming. Anywhere on the coasts of Asia, America and Africa you can find a fort, a church, a geographical name or a family name, reminiscent of Portugal. The Portuguese-speaking African countries (Portuguese: Países Africanos de Língua Oficial Portuguesa; PALOP), also known as Lusophone Africa, consist of six African countries in which the Portuguese language is an official language: Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, São Tomé and Príncipe and, since 2011, Equatorial Guinea. By 1750 Portuguese colonies in Africa were limited to Angola, Mozambique, and Guinea, but colonial rule was more pronounced in the first two colonies. By the late eighteenth century, the Portuguese had managed to retain in Africa only the small colonies of Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, and São Tomé and Princípe in West Africa and the much more extensive but largely undeveloped colonies of Angola and Mozambique in southern Africa. The Portuguese also held important islands in the Atlantic off the coast of Africa. Access to commodities such as fabrics, spices, and gold motivated a European quest for a faster means to reach South Asia. 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