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Colonial empire

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A colonial empire is a collective of territories (often called colonies), either contiguous with the imperial center or located overseas, settled by the population of a certain state and governed by that state.

Before the expansion of early modern European powers, other empires had conquered and colonized territories, such as the Romans in Iberia, or the Chinese in what is now southern China. Modern colonial empires first emerged with a race of exploration between the then most advanced European maritime powers, Portugal and Spain, during the 15th century.[1] The initial impulse behind these dispersed maritime empires and those that followed was trade, driven by the new ideas and the capitalism that grew out of the European Renaissance. Agreements were also made to divide the world up between them in 1479, 1493, and 1494. European imperialism was born out of competition between European Christians and Ottoman Muslims, the latter of which rose up quickly in the 14th century and forced the Spanish and Portuguese to seek new trade routes to India, and to a lesser extent, China.

Although colonies existed in classical antiquity, especially amongst the Phoenicians and the Ancient Greeks who settled many islands and coasts of the Mediterranean Sea, these colonies were politically independent from the city-states they originated from, and thus did not constitute a colonial empire.[2] This paradigm shifted by the time of the Ptolemaic Empire, the Seleucid Empire, and the Roman Empire.

History

European colonial empires

Portugal began establishing the first global trade network and one of the first colonial empires[3][4] under the leadership of Henry the Navigator. The empire spread throughout a vast number of territories distributed across the globe (especially at one time in the 16th century) that are now parts of 60 different sovereign states. Portugal would eventually control Brazil, territories such as what is now Uruguay and some fishing ports in north, in the Americas; Angola, Mozambique, Portuguese Guinea, and São Tomé and Príncipe (among other territories and bases) in the North and the Subsaharan Africa; cities, forts or territories in all the Asian Subcontinents, as Muscat, Ormus and Bahrain (amongst other bases) in the Persian Gulf; Goa, Bombay and Daman and Diu (amongst other coastal cities) in India; Portuguese Ceylon; Malacca, bases in Southeast Asia and Oceania, as Makassar, Solor, Banda, Ambon and others in the Moluccas, Portuguese Timor; and the granted entrepôt-base of Macau and the entrepôt-enclave of Dejima (Nagasaki) in East Asia, amongst other smaller or short-lived possessions.

The territorial evolution of modern colonial empires and some of their successor states (such as USSR, Turkey)

During its Siglo de Oro, the Spanish Empire had possession of Mexico, South America, the Philippines, all of southern Italy, a stretch of territories from the Duchy of Milan to the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and Belgium, parts of Burgundy, and many colonial settlements in the Americas, Africa, and Asia. Possessions in Europe, Africa, the Atlantic Ocean, the Americas, the Pacific Ocean, and East Asia qualified the Spanish Empire as attaining a global presence. From 1580 to 1640 the Portuguese Empire and the Spanish Empire were conjoined in a personal union of its Habsburg monarchs during the period of the Iberian Union, but beneath the highest level of government, their separate administrations were maintained.

Subsequent colonial empires included the French, English, Dutch and Japanese empires. By the mid-17th century, the Tsardom of Russia, continued later as the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union, became the largest contiguous state in the world, and the modern Russian Federation continues to be so to this day. Russia today has nine time zones, stretching across about half of the world's longitude.

Throughout the 19th and early 20th century, by virtue of its technological and maritime supremacy, the British Empire steadily expanded to become by far the largest empire in history; at its height ruling over a quarter of the Earth’s land area and 24% of the population. Britain’s role as a global hegemon during this time ushered in a century of “British Peace”, lasting from the end of the Napoleonic Wars to the start of WW1. During the New Imperialism, Italy and Germany also built their colonial empires in Africa.

It is worth noting that, from the 16th to 19th century, there were also large non-European empires, most notably the Qing Empire of China, which conquered a huge area of East and Inner Asia, and the states of the Age of the Islamic Gunpowders, Mughal India, the Ottoman Empire in Asia Minor and Southwest Europe, and Safavid Iran. The British replaced the Mughals in India, and after the Boxer Rebellion in 1901, Imperial China made concessions to the Eight-Nation Alliance (all the Great Powers of the time). By the end of the 20th century most of the previous colonial empires had been decolonized, though the modern nation-states of Russia and China inherited much of the territory of the Romanov and Qing empires, respectively.

Timeline

The chart below[original research?] shows the span of some European colonial empires.

  • Black lines mark the year of the empires largest territorial extent of land area.
  • Red represents that the empire is at that time a monarchy.
  • Blue represents that the empire is at that time a republic.

List of colonial empires

Further information: United Nations list of Non-Self-Governing Territories and Dependent territory

European:





French colonial empire 16th century-20th century







Asian:


Other countries with colonial possessions:

Maps

European:

Asian:

Other countries with colonial possessions:

  • Directly controlled territory of the United States at its greatest extent (1898–1902)
    Directly controlled territory of the United States at its greatest extent (1898–1902)
  • Norwegian Realm
    Norwegian Realm
  • Austro-Hungarian colonies and concessions throughout history
    Austro-Hungarian colonies and concessions throughout history
  • German colonial efforts
    German colonial efforts
  • Chola Empire
    Chola Empire
  • Duchy of Courland and Semigallia
    Duchy of Courland and Semigallia
  • Couronian settlements in Africa
    Couronian settlements in Africa
  • Map of the Hospitaller order's territories in the Caribbean
    Map of the Hospitaller order's territories in the Caribbean
  • Couronian settlements in Americas (New Courland on Tobago)
    Couronian settlements in Americas (New Courland on Tobago)
  • The Crown of Aragon
    The Crown of Aragon
  • Scottish colonization of the Americas
    Scottish colonization of the Americas
  • Map of Morocco and Western Sahara with the Southern Provinces in a darker color.
    Map of Morocco and Western Sahara with the Southern Provinces in a darker color.

See also

Notes and references

  1. ^ Encarta-encyclopedie Winkler Prins (1993–2002) s.v. "kolonie [geschiedenis]. §1.2 De moderne koloniale expansie". Microsoft Corporation/Het Spectrum.
  2. ^ Encarta, s.v. "kolonie [geschiedenis]. §1.1 Oudheid.
  3. ^ William D. Phillips, Jr; Phillips, Carla Rahn (November 12, 2015). "Spain as the first global empire". A Concise History of Spain.
  4. ^ Powell, Philip Wayne ([1991?]). Árbol de odio: la leyenda negra y sus consecuencias en las relaciones entre Estados Unidos y el mundo hispánico. Ediciones Iris de Paz. ISBN 9788440488855. OCLC 55157841
  5. ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-07-20. Retrieved 2011-02-12.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  6. ^ "BnF - Voyage en Orient". expositions.bnf.fr. Retrieved 23 September 2017.
  7. ^ Cheikh Saïd - The territory of Cheikh Saïd was acquired in 1868 by a French company. It is for that reason that it was formerly shown with the French colours on certain atlases. In fact, Cheikh Saïd has been occupied by the Turks since 1870, and by the Yemenis since the First World War., Dictionnaire encyclopédique Quillet, (1985 ed.).
  8. ^ "Drapeau de Rurutu - Tahiti Heritage". www.tahitiheritage.pf. Retrieved 23 September 2017.
  9. ^ "Consulter le sujet - L'Australie serait-elle française ?!... • [Forums". Francedownunder.com. Retrieved 2011-03-26.
  10. ^ Godard, Philippe; Kerros, Tugdual de; Margot, Odette; Stanbury, Myra; Baxter, Sue; Western Australian Museum; Godard, Phillippe; De Kerros, Tugdual; Margot, Odette; Stanbury, Myra; Baxter, Sue (2008), 1772 : the French annexation of New Holland : the tale of Louis de Saint Aloürn, Western Australian Museum, ISBN 978-1-920843-98-4
  11. ^ Philippe Godard, Tugdual de Kerros 2002, "Louis de Saint Aloüarn, un marin breton à la conquête des terres australes", Les Portes du large, Saint-Jacques-de-la-Lande, 331-336
  12. ^ "TAAF". Taaf.fr. Archived from the original on 2012-01-20. Retrieved 2012-01-10.
  13. ^ "Kerguelen – yves trémarec – james cook – asia – hillsborough – rhodes". Kerguelen-voyages.com. Archived from the original on 2013-10-02.
  14. ^ part of the Viceroyalty of New Spain before 1821.
  15. ^ .part of the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata before 1810.
  16. ^ Gregory Smits (1999). Visions of Ryukyu: Early-Modern Thought and Politics. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 143–149·
  17. ^ a b Part of the Holy Roman Empire realm before 1804.
  18. ^ part of the Holy Roman Empire before 1736
  19. ^ The dependencies of Norway are uninhabited, thus as end date is taken the latest date of full Norwegian sovereignty extension to such territory, instead of the date of decolonization or integration in the administrative structures of the mainland. Bouvet Island claimed in 1927, under Norway sovereignty since 1930.
    Peter I Island claimed in 1929, under Norway sovereignty since 1933.
    Queen Maud Land claimed in 1938, under Norway sovereignty since 1957.
    Peter I Island and Queen Maud Land fall under the scope of the Antarctic Treaty System since 1961.
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