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Part of
Towards an Atlas of the History of Interpreting: Voices from around the world
Edited by Lucía Ruiz Rosendo and Jesús Baigorri-Jalón
[Benjamins Translation Library 159] 2023
► pp. 81–119

Chapter 4
An overview of the role of interpreters during the Portuguese expansion through Africa (1415–1600)

| University of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria

Portugal’s great breakthrough between 1415 and 1499 during the Age of Discovery was rounding the African coastline, from Ceuta in the Strait of Gibraltar to Mogadishu in the Horn of Africa. The current chapter, founded on prior research, advances an overview of the strategies adopted by the Portuguese to obtain linguistic mediators as well as the patterns of mediation they applied throughout the successive zones of contact. After a brief presentation of the different historical contexts, the study delves into the types of scenarios that required interpreters, as well as their status and compensation throughout both the initial explorations and the subsequent stages extending to the final years of the 16th century.

Keywords: Portuguese expansion, linguistic intermediaries, alfaqueques , official interpreters, slave-interpreters, lançados
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • The mediators of the Portuguese expansion through Morocco
    • Spies and captives
    • Alfaqueques
    • Official interpreters
  • Mediators in the “Castilian zone”
  • Mediation in Sub-Saharan Western Africa
  • The interpreters of Guinea
    • Slave-interpreters
      • Lançados
      • “Institutional” interpreters
    • Situations and areas requiring interpreters
    • Interpreters’ compensation
  • Interpreters in the Kongo: A special case
    • Interpreters with training and prestige
    • Interpreters for sacramental confessions
    • The end of a communication paradigm
    • Communication with Angola
  • Mediation in Eastern Africa
    • Slave-interpreters and lançados
    • Muslim merchants
  • Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 22 February 2023
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/btl.159.04sar
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