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The typical landscape of the Douro Valley

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
ortugal is a country located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of mainland Europe and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west and south and by Spain to the north and east. The Atlantic archipelagos of the Azores and Madeira are also part of Portugal. The land within the borders of today's Portuguese Republic has been continuously settled since prehistoric times. Gallaeci, Lusitanians, Celtici, Cynetes, Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Romans and many Germanic tribes such as the Suevi, the Buri and the Visigoths, all left its influence on what is today Portuguese territory. In the early 8th century, the Moors conquered the Christian Germanic Kingdoms, eventually occupying most of the Iberian Peninsula. Later, in the early 1100s, during the Christian Reconquista, Portugal appeared as a kingdom independent of its neighbour, the Kingdom of León and Galicia. In 1249, Portugal would establish almost its entire modern-day borders.
The 1755 Lisbon earthquake, French and Spanish invasions, and the loss of its largest territorial possession abroad, Brazil, resulted in both the disruption of political stability and potential economic growth as well as the reduction of Portugal's international status as a global power during the 19th century. After the overthrow of the monarchy in 1910, a republic was established that was then followed by a dictatorship. With the Portuguese Colonial War and the Carnation Revolution coup d'état in 1974, the ruling dictatorship was deposed in Lisbon and the country handed over its last overseas provinces in Africa; the last overseas territory, Macau, was handed over to China in 1999.