Fernão de Loronha
Portuguese merchant of Lisbon, of Jewish descent
1470 CE to 1540 CE
Fernão de Loronha (c. 1470 or before – Lisbon, c. 1540), whose name is often corrupted to Fernando de Noronha or Fernando della Rogna, is a prominent sixteenth-century Portuguese merchant of Lisbon, of Jewish descent.
He is the first charter-holder (1502–1512), the first donatary captain in Brazil and sponsor of numerous early Portuguese overseas expeditions.
The islands of Fernando de Noronha off the coast of Brazil, discovered by one of his expeditions and granted to Loronha and his heirs as a fief in 1504, are named after him.
World
South America and The Eastern Isles
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The growth of Portuguese interests in the Americas is slow, the king being absorbed with establishing Portuguese hegemony in Asia.
In addition, the Treaty of Tordesillas of 1494, arranged by Pope Alexander VI, had divided the unexplored world between Spain and Portugal and forbids Portugal from exploring beyond a meridian drawn three hundred and seventy leagues (2,193 kilometers, 1,362 statute miles, or 1,184 nautical miles) west of the Cape Verde Islands.
In 1502 Fernão de Loronha is given a three-year commercial monopoly on dyewood in return for exploring three hundred leagues (about fifteen hundred kilometers) of the Brazilian coast each year.
During the last years of Manuel I's reign, the first colonists are sent to Brazil to establish a sugar industry.
Additional colonists are sent during the reign of Joao III, and, in 1530, Martim Afonso de Sousa is named major captain of Brazil and invested with the power to distribute land among captains or donatários, much as had been done in Madeira when it was colonized a century before.
These captaincies are large strips of land that extend from the coast into the interior.
The captains settle colonists in their respective captaincies and are required to provide them protection and justice.