Portuguese Guinea

Guinea-Bissau, 1588–1974. Draft, not yet reviewed

Portuguese Guinea was a Portuguese overseas province in West Africa until 10 September 1974, when it gained independence as Guinea-Bissau. Bissau, founded in 1687 and re-established as a fortified post in the mid-18th century, became the centre of Portuguese control. The Atlantic slave trade transported an estimated eleven million people from Africa between 1440 and 1870, including two million from Senegambia and Upper Guinea. The fight for independence began in 1956, when Amílcar Cabral founded the African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC).

Seat of power: Bissau

No rulers documented for this era yet.

Culture

• The PAIGC guerrillas declared the independence of Guinea-Bissau on September 24, 1973, in the town of Madina do Boe in the southeasternmost area of the territory, near the border with neighbouring Guinea.
• On 3 August 1959, fifty striking dockworkers were killed, and after this, the PAIGC changed strategy, avoiding public demonstrations and concentrating instead on organising the rural peasants. In 1961, after a purely political campaign for independence had made little progress, the PAIGC adopted guerrilla tactics.
• Between the 1930s and 1960s, the colony supplied Portugal with about one-third of its vegetable oil, from peanuts.

Picture

The city was founded in 1687 as a Portuguese trading post.

Image: Original: Colleen Taugher from Lewiston Idaho, USA Modifications: The original uploader was Cornischong at Luxembourg..., CC BY 2.0, file

Sources

• Portuguese Guinea (Wikipedia)
• Portuguese Guinea (Wikidata)
• About the picture (Wikipedia)

Text adapted from the Wikipedia articles listed as sources, CC BY-SA 4.0.