# @itsaihistory on Instagram

- **Type:** Video
- **Original URL:** https://www.instagram.com/p/DdwVwBtpeAT
- **Gondola URL:** https://gondola.cc/posts/70868369-itsaihistory-instagram
- **Thumbnail:** https://img.gondola.cc/tr:w-,h-,fo-auto/postThumbnails/a87616b03e.jpg
- **Posted:** 2026-09-26T15:19:49.000+00:00
- **Account Owner:** Parker Gordon (@itsaihistory) — https://gondola.cc/itsaihistory

## Caption

🪵 1500 | The Portuguese in Brazil | Part I

What you’re seeing:
Pedro Álvares Cabral’s fleet, bound for India, reaching the coast of what is now Bahia in April 1500, and the days the Portuguese spent there, as told by the fleet’s scribe, Pero Vaz de Caminha.

Why did the fleet sail?
Two years earlier, Vasco da Gama had reached India by sea, opening a direct route to spices that came to Europe via Arab and Venetian middlemen. King Manuel I sent 13 ships under Cabral to trade at Calicut and win Portugal a foothold in India. The king himself handed Cabral the royal banner at Belém, just outside Lisbon.

Was Brazil found by accident?
Historians still debate it. The fleet swung far into the Atlantic to catch the winds for the Cape of Good Hope. No eyewitness says whether the landfall was chance or a planned look west. The Treaty of Tordesillas (1494) had already placed this coast on Portugal’s side of the line.

Who were the people on the beach?
Caminha never names them. Later sources place Tupi-speaking Tupiniquim on this coast. He describes lip plugs, red and black body paint, yellow feathers and long bows.

What did Caminha write?
A letter to King Manuel I, dated 1 May 1500, kept in Lisbon’s Torre do Tombo and often called Brazil’s birth certificate. The line spoken in the film is his own: “Esta gente é boa e de boa simplicidade.”

Where does the name Brazil come from?
From pau-brasil, a tree whose red dye was prized in Europe. Cabral called the land Terra de Vera Cruz. The mountain they first saw is still called Monte Pascoal.

What happened to the fleet?
Four of the 13 ships were lost in a storm on the way to the Cape of Good Hope, one captained by Bartolomeu Dias. Cabral reached India in September 1500.

Sources:
Caminha, Letter to King Manuel I (1500); Mestre João (1500); Anonymous Pilot (1507); Barros, Década I (1552); Livro das Armadas (c. 1568); Pero Lopes de Sousa (1530-32).

🎥 All visuals are original AI-assisted recreations produced by @itsaihistory for educational and documentary purposes. © 2026 ItsAI LLC

#itsaihistory #history #brasil #portugal #brazil

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