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Porto Santo Island
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Porto Santo Island
Porto Santo Island (Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈpoɾtu ˈsɐ̃tu] ⓘ; Portuguese: Ilha do Porto Santo) is a Portuguese island and municipality 43 kilometres (23 nautical miles) northeast of Madeira Island in the North Atlantic Ocean; it is the northernmost and easternmost island of the archipelago of Madeira, located in the Atlantic Ocean west of Europe and Africa. The municipality of Porto Santo occupies the entire island and small neighbouring islands. It was elevated to city status on 6 August 1996. The sole parish of the municipality is also named Porto Santo. The population in 2011 was 5,483, in an area of 42.59 km2. The main settlement on the island is Vila Baleira.
It appears that some knowledge of Atlantic islands, such as Madeira, existed before the discovery and settlement of these lands, as the islands appear on maps as early as 1339. From a portolan dating to 1351, and preserved in Florence, Italy, it would appear that the islands of Madeira had been discovered long before being claimed by the Portuguese expedition of 1418. In Libro del Conocimiento (1348–1349), a Castilian monk also identified the location of the islands in their present location, with the names Leiname (modern Italian legname with the same meaning as Portuguese madeira, "wood"), Diserta and Puerto Santo. Indeed, the move by Portugal to claim the Madeiran islands was probably a response to Spain's efforts at the time to claim and subdue the Canary Islands.
However, humans never recorded the discovery of Porto Santo Island or the other Madeira islands until 1418 when captains were storm blown into its sheltered harbor. They were in the service of Infante Henrique of Portugal. João Gonçalves Zarco and Tristão Vaz Teixeira had been ordered by King John I to discover new territory west of Africa and had been sent off-course by a storm while making the volta do mar westward swing return voyage. The island's name Porto Santo (en: "Holy Harbour") was derived from the sailors' stories of their discovery of a sheltered bay during the tempest, which was interpreted as divine deliverance. The first Portuguese settlers arrived in the 1420s.
Bartolomeu Perestrelo, a member of the team that later explored the Madeira Islands, became the first Captain-donatário of Porto Santo, by royal award in November 1445. It was he who released a female rabbit that had littered on the voyage, with her offspring, which multiplied catastrophically in a xeric island ecosystem that had evolved in isolation and had never known a flightless mammal. The loss of the native flora laid the island slopes open to erosion and colonization by European weeds that accompanied the settlers.
During the first centuries of settlement, life on Porto Santo was harsh, owing to the scarcity of potable water and the depredations of feral rabbits; there were also constant attacks by Barbary Coast pirates and French privateers. In 1617 Barbary Pirates took 663 of the island's inhabitants as slaves following their Sack of Madeira.
The New World explorer Christopher Columbus married the Portuguese noblewoman Filipa Moniz Perestrelo, the daughter of Bartolomeu Perestrelo. For a while they lived on Porto Santo. The home is now a museum.
The island is characterized by two areas: the accidented northeast (mountainous, with rocky ledges and cliffs), and a coastal plain in the southwest (that includes a nine-kilometer long white sand beach, giving the island an advantage over neighboring Madeira). The mountainous northeast part of the island, consists of two geomorphological structures that includes: an area of peaks, Pico do Castelo (437 meters), Pico da Juliana (447 meters), Pico da Gandaia (499 meters) and Pico do Facho (517 meters); and between the eastern coast and this area, a series of minor peaks, Pico do Maçarico (285 meters), Pico do Concelho (324 meters) and Pico Branco (450 meters).
The southwest part of the island, although relatively flat, includes a series of elevations 100 meters in height or greater, such as Pico Ana Fereira (283 meters), Pico do Espigão (270 meters) and the Cabeço do Zimbralinho (183 meters). The slope of the western part of the island slopes from 150 meters to the south coast reaching the sandy beaches of Porto Santo. A third system, in the west-northwest, that includes Cabeço da Bárbara Gomes (227 meters) and Cabeço das Canelinhas (176 meters) is distinct from the areas identified. The island is encircled by an oceanic platform between 20 and 37 km2, with a minimum depth of 8 meters (Baixa do Noroeste), and limited by the flanks of a large submarine volcano.
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Porto Santo Island
Porto Santo Island (Portuguese pronunciation: [ˈpoɾtu ˈsɐ̃tu] ⓘ; Portuguese: Ilha do Porto Santo) is a Portuguese island and municipality 43 kilometres (23 nautical miles) northeast of Madeira Island in the North Atlantic Ocean; it is the northernmost and easternmost island of the archipelago of Madeira, located in the Atlantic Ocean west of Europe and Africa. The municipality of Porto Santo occupies the entire island and small neighbouring islands. It was elevated to city status on 6 August 1996. The sole parish of the municipality is also named Porto Santo. The population in 2011 was 5,483, in an area of 42.59 km2. The main settlement on the island is Vila Baleira.
It appears that some knowledge of Atlantic islands, such as Madeira, existed before the discovery and settlement of these lands, as the islands appear on maps as early as 1339. From a portolan dating to 1351, and preserved in Florence, Italy, it would appear that the islands of Madeira had been discovered long before being claimed by the Portuguese expedition of 1418. In Libro del Conocimiento (1348–1349), a Castilian monk also identified the location of the islands in their present location, with the names Leiname (modern Italian legname with the same meaning as Portuguese madeira, "wood"), Diserta and Puerto Santo. Indeed, the move by Portugal to claim the Madeiran islands was probably a response to Spain's efforts at the time to claim and subdue the Canary Islands.
However, humans never recorded the discovery of Porto Santo Island or the other Madeira islands until 1418 when captains were storm blown into its sheltered harbor. They were in the service of Infante Henrique of Portugal. João Gonçalves Zarco and Tristão Vaz Teixeira had been ordered by King John I to discover new territory west of Africa and had been sent off-course by a storm while making the volta do mar westward swing return voyage. The island's name Porto Santo (en: "Holy Harbour") was derived from the sailors' stories of their discovery of a sheltered bay during the tempest, which was interpreted as divine deliverance. The first Portuguese settlers arrived in the 1420s.
Bartolomeu Perestrelo, a member of the team that later explored the Madeira Islands, became the first Captain-donatário of Porto Santo, by royal award in November 1445. It was he who released a female rabbit that had littered on the voyage, with her offspring, which multiplied catastrophically in a xeric island ecosystem that had evolved in isolation and had never known a flightless mammal. The loss of the native flora laid the island slopes open to erosion and colonization by European weeds that accompanied the settlers.
During the first centuries of settlement, life on Porto Santo was harsh, owing to the scarcity of potable water and the depredations of feral rabbits; there were also constant attacks by Barbary Coast pirates and French privateers. In 1617 Barbary Pirates took 663 of the island's inhabitants as slaves following their Sack of Madeira.
The New World explorer Christopher Columbus married the Portuguese noblewoman Filipa Moniz Perestrelo, the daughter of Bartolomeu Perestrelo. For a while they lived on Porto Santo. The home is now a museum.
The island is characterized by two areas: the accidented northeast (mountainous, with rocky ledges and cliffs), and a coastal plain in the southwest (that includes a nine-kilometer long white sand beach, giving the island an advantage over neighboring Madeira). The mountainous northeast part of the island, consists of two geomorphological structures that includes: an area of peaks, Pico do Castelo (437 meters), Pico da Juliana (447 meters), Pico da Gandaia (499 meters) and Pico do Facho (517 meters); and between the eastern coast and this area, a series of minor peaks, Pico do Maçarico (285 meters), Pico do Concelho (324 meters) and Pico Branco (450 meters).
The southwest part of the island, although relatively flat, includes a series of elevations 100 meters in height or greater, such as Pico Ana Fereira (283 meters), Pico do Espigão (270 meters) and the Cabeço do Zimbralinho (183 meters). The slope of the western part of the island slopes from 150 meters to the south coast reaching the sandy beaches of Porto Santo. A third system, in the west-northwest, that includes Cabeço da Bárbara Gomes (227 meters) and Cabeço das Canelinhas (176 meters) is distinct from the areas identified. The island is encircled by an oceanic platform between 20 and 37 km2, with a minimum depth of 8 meters (Baixa do Noroeste), and limited by the flanks of a large submarine volcano.
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