| rdfs:comment | - When the Portuguese India Armadas were in India (August to January), the Portuguese position in India was safe - the Calicut fleet was no match against the superior Portuguese naval and cannon technology of the armada. But in the Spring and Summer months, when the armada was absent, the Portuguese factories were very vulnerable. The armies of the Zamorin of Calicut had nearly overrun Cochin twice in the intervening years. The Fifth Armada (1503) under Afonso de Albuquerque had erected a small timber fortress, (Fort Sant'Iago, soon to be renamed Fort Manuel), to protect the factory in Cochin. The Sixth Armada (1504), under Lopo Soares de Albergaria had dropped off a larger Portuguese garrison and a small coastal patrol to harass Calicut and protect the allied cities. But this was not nearly
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| abstract | - When the Portuguese India Armadas were in India (August to January), the Portuguese position in India was safe - the Calicut fleet was no match against the superior Portuguese naval and cannon technology of the armada. But in the Spring and Summer months, when the armada was absent, the Portuguese factories were very vulnerable. The armies of the Zamorin of Calicut had nearly overrun Cochin twice in the intervening years. The Fifth Armada (1503) under Afonso de Albuquerque had erected a small timber fortress, (Fort Sant'Iago, soon to be renamed Fort Manuel), to protect the factory in Cochin. The Sixth Armada (1504), under Lopo Soares de Albergaria had dropped off a larger Portuguese garrison and a small coastal patrol to harass Calicut and protect the allied cities. But this was not nearly enough against a Zamorin that could call on an army of tens of thousands. While the Zamorin's vast army had been humiliated at the Battle of Cochin (1504), it was a close-run thing, and he might have better luck next time. The Zamorin was quick to realize the urgency of rectifying the imbalance in naval and cannon power. To this end, he called on his old partners in the spice trade. The Venetians had already dispatched a couple of military engineers to help the Zamorin forge European cannon. The Ottomans had dispatched some shipments of firearms. But the critical missing factor was a fleet that could match the Portuguese at sea. This was something only the Mameluke sultanate of Egypt could provide. The Mameluke sultan had several Red Sea ports available (notably, Jeddah, recently expanded) where a fleet could be built. But, despite the entreaties of the Zamorin, the Venetian Republic, the Sultan of Gujarat and the overseas Arab merchant community, the Mameluke sultan had been slow to react to the Portuguese threat in the Indian Ocean. It was really only in 1503 or 1504, when his own treasury officers reported that the disruptive Portuguese activities were beginning to make a dent in the Mameluke treasury (dwindling revenues from customs dues on the spice trade and pilgrim traffic), that the Mameluke sultan was finally roused to action. Secret preparations began for the construction of a coalition fleet in the Red Sea ports, to drive the Portuguese out of the Indian Ocean. In September/October 1504 (or perhaps 1503?), the Mameluke sultan Al-Ashraf Qansuh al-Ghawri of Egypt dispatched an embassy to Rome, angrily demanding that the pope reign in the Portuguese, threatening to mete out the same treatment on Christian pilgrims to the Holy Land as the Portuguese had been handing Muslim pilgrims to Mecca. The sultan's complaint was forwarded to Lisbon by a worried Pope Julius II. But it only served to alert King Manuel I of Portugal that the sleeping Mameluke giant had been awakened, that something large was afoot, and that the Portuguese had better secure their position in the Indian Ocean before it was too late. The Portuguese position was indeed precarious - not only in India, but also in East Africa. The Portuguese had an old reliable ally in Malindi (Melinde), but the stages up to Malindi were weak. The powerful city-state of Kilwa (Quíloa), which dominated the East African coast, was inherently hostile to the Portuguese interlopers, but had thus far restrained her hand for fear of reprisals. (Kilwa had been forced to pay tribute by Vasco da Gama in 1502). But should a serious Muslim fleet challenge the Portuguese in the Indian Ocean, Kilwa would likely take the opportunity for action. As putative overlord of the Swahili Coast, Kilwa could probably close down all the Portuguese staging points in East Africa - including the all-important Mozambique Island (the critical stop after the Cape crossing) and the attractive port of Sofala (the entrepot of the Monomatapa gold trade, which the Portuguese were trying to tap into). Mombasa (Mombaça), would only be too happy to overrun its neighbor and rival Malindi, depriving the Portuguese of their only ally in the region. So the Almeida expedition of 1505, the 7th Armada to the Indies, had the double objective of securing the Portuguese position in India against Calicut and in East Africa against Kilwa, before the Egyptian-led coalition cobbled their naval strike force together.
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