gistog2006 asked:
How does the peninsula impact South America? Travel, trade, climate, weather or what?
that is interesting but it doesn’t really tell me what i need to know…
How does the peninsula impact South America? Travel, trade, climate, weather or what?
that is interesting but it doesn’t really tell me what i need to know…
For starters practically all of S. A. was colonized by either Spain or Portugal. Today nearly every country there has Spanish or Portuguese as its official language and gets many of its customs and laws from those two countries.
Comment by rethinker — February 12, 2009 @ 10:46 pm
Well Portugal colonized Brazil and during the Napoleonic Wars Emperor Dom Pedro II moved his court to Brazil and ruled the Portuguese Empire from there to escape the atrocities of the French. Thus, Brazil is the only Portuguese speaking country in South or Central America.
Spain settled the rest of south and central America (when a corrupt pope arbitrated a longitudinal line of separation). Spain instituted a policy of paying it’s officials only a fraction of what was required to live on…effectively forcing a system of graft and corruption that exists in Latin America to this day. The officials even crafted a saying regarding the Crowns’ requirements to be honest in dealings and to uphold the law. Yo Obisbo y no compleo (not sure of the spelling there, been a few years since I took Latin American History). Means I obey but do not comply.
Much of the Iberian peninsula is semi-arid…and except for Argentina and Chile and Mexico….the rest of Latin America is forests or tropical climates…there is some trade, but not all that much, about what one would expect of second world nations.
Comment by robertmcarthur48 — February 15, 2009 @ 12:52 am