1.
Piet Hein (scientist)
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Piet Hein was a Danish mathematician, inventor, designer, author, and poet, often writing under the Old Norse pseudonym Kumbel meaning tombstone. His short poems, known as gruks or grooks, first started to appear in the daily newspaper Politiken shortly after the Nazi occupation in April 1940 under the pseudonym Kumbel Kumbell. Hein, a descendant of Piet Pieterszoon Hein, the 17th-Century Dutch naval hero, was born in Copenhagen. He studied at the Institute for Theoretical Physics of the University of Copenhagen, yale awarded him an honorary doctorate in 1972. He died in his home on Funen, Denmark in 1996, Piet Hein, who, in his own words, played mental ping-pong with Niels Bohr in the inter-War period, found himself confronted with a dilemma when the Germans occupied Denmark. He felt that he had three choices, Do nothing, flee to neutral Sweden or join the Danish resistance movement, as he explained in 1968, Sweden was out because I am not Swedish, but Danish. I could not remain at home because, if I had, taking as his first weapon the instrument with which he was most familiar, the pen, he wrote and had published his first grook. It passed the censors who did not grasp its real meaning, CONSOLATION GROOK Losing one glove is certainly painful, but nothing compared to the pain of losing one, throwing away the other, and finding the first one again. The Danes, however, understood its importance and soon it was found as graffiti all around the country, after Liberation, Scandinavian architects, tired of square buildings but cognizant that circular buildings were impractical, asked Piet Hein for a solution. Applying his mathematical prowess to the problem, Piet Hein proposed to use the superellipse which became the hallmark of modern Scandinavian architecture. In addition to the thousands of grooks he wrote, Piet Hein devised the games of Hex, Tangloids, Tower, Polytaire, TacTix, Nimbi, Qrazy Qube, Pyramystery, and he advocated the use of the superellipse curve in city planning, furniture making and other realms. He also invented a perpetual calendar called the Astro Calendar and marketed based on the superellipse. Piet Hein was married four times and had five sons from his last three marriages and this was published in the puzzles instruction manual as Jotuns Proof. He later became a Professor of Bioinformatics in the Department of Statistics of the University of Oxford and he was previously the director of the Bioinformatics Research Centre at Aarhus University, Denmark. Grooks –20 volumes, originally published between 1940 and 1963, all currently out-of-print, Grooks 1, Doubleday & Co.1969. Grooks 2, Doubleday & Co.1968, Grooks 3, Doubleday & Co.1970. Grooks 4, Doubleday & Co.1973, Grooks 5, Doubleday & Co.1973. Grooks 6, Borgens Pocketbooks 154,1996, Grooks 7, Borgens Pocketbooks 174,1984
2.
Jan Daemen Cool
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Jan Daemen Cool, was a Dutch Golden Age painter. According to the RKD he was probably a pupil of the painter Daemen Cool and he married in Delft in 1613 to Agniesje Jaspersdr. In 1614, he was admitted into the Guild of St. Luke at Delft, but by 1618 he had returned to Rotterdam, and in 1623 he married Lysbeth and he is known as a follower of Michiel Jansz. van Mierevelt and made dated portraits. He influenced the painters Adam and Isaac Colonia and Ludolf de Jongh, Cool died there in 1660, and was buried in the church of the institution. The work, which he executed in accordance with the agreement, was the one known to be by him when Michael Bryan was writing. It is dated 1653, and represents Five Governors, clothed in black, today several of his works hang in the Historisch Museum Rotterdam
3.
Delfshaven
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Delfshaven is a borough of Rotterdam on the right bank of river Nieuwe Maas, in South Holland, the Netherlands. It was a municipality until 1886. The town of Delfshaven grew around the port of the city of Delft, on 1 August 1620 the Pilgrim fathers left Delfshaven with the Speedwell. Since then, the towns Oude Kerk has also known as the Pelgrimskerk, or in English. Fishing, shipbuilding and the distillery of jenever were the sources of income. The Dutch East India Company had important wharfs and warehouses in Delfshaven, Delfshaven belonged to the city and municipality of Delft until 1811, when it became a separate municipality. Delfshaven was annexed by Rotterdam in 1886 at its own request, the current borough has about 73,000 inhabitants. Its small historic centre has been carefully preserved and it features modest local museums, a brewery and various dining and drinking facilities. Delfshaven escaped the bombing of Rotterdam by the Luftwaffe on May 14,1940, later during the Second World War, the area around the Groot Visserijplein and other parts of the western city of Rotterdam were destroyed by allied bombing on March 31,1943. Video tour of Delfshaven, English language video tour of Delfshaven Historic Delfshaven, pages in English, museum and shipyard are open to visitors
4.
County of Holland
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The territory of the County of Holland corresponds roughly with the current provinces of North and South Holland in the Netherlands. The oldest sources refer to the not clearly defined county as Frisia, before 1101, sources talk about Frisian counts, but in this year Floris II, Count of Holland is mentioned as Florentius comes de Hollant. This title was used after Holland was united with Hainault, Bavaria-Straubing. The titles eventually lost their importance, and the last count, Philip II of Spain, around 800, under Charlemagne, the Frankish Empire covered a great deal of Europe. In much of this empire an important unit of administration, corresponding roughly to a shire or county in England, was the gau. A comes or Count ruled over one or more gaue, because of the low trade, the negative trade balance with the Byzantine Empire and the Muslim states, and the disappearance of currency, the economy was more or less reduced to bartering. The kings vassals could only be rewarded by giving them land, from this the system of Feudalism developed. The vassals, who were appointed by the king, strove for a system of inheritance. This become more and more the rule, and in 877 it was legalised in the Capitulary of Quierzy, upon the death of a king, the Frankish kingdom was frequently divided among his heirs. This partible inheritance often caused internal struggle which made centralized government problematic, the Viking Raids further undermined centralized government. At the end of the reign of Emperor Louis the Pious, the power had weakened because of the flood of 838. Upon Lothairs death in 855, the part of Middle Francia was awarded to his second son Lothair II. The Treaty of Ribemont in 880 added the Kingdom of Lotharingia — of which the Low Countries were part — to East Francia, which attempted to integrate it. However, there were no connections there were between the four German Stem Duchies of east Francia, the Franconia, the Saxony, the Bavaria. Lotharingia took a position with a large amount of self-determination. This became clear when Louis the Child, the last Carolingian of East Francia, while the Stem Duchies flocked to Duke Conrad I of Franconia, Lotharingia chose for the Carolingian Charles the Simple, king of West Francia. In Frisia the situation was complex, the power was in the hands of Roriks successor Godfrid the Sea King, who became embroiled in the high politics of the Frankish empire. He was allied with the children of the former Carolingian Lotharingian king Lothair II, the main actor in this murder was Everard Saxo, the count of Hamaland
5.
Oude Kerk (Delft)
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The Oude Kerk, nicknamed Oude Jan and Scheve Jan, is a Gothic Protestant church in the old city center of Delft, the Netherlands. Its most recognizable feature is a 75-meter-high brick tower that leans about two meters from the vertical, the Oude Kerk was founded as St. Bartholomews Church in the year 1246, on the site of previous churches dating back up to two centuries earlier. The layout followed that of a basilica, with a nave flanked by two smaller aisles. The tower with its spire and four corner turrets was added between 1325–50, and dominated the townscape for a century and a half until it was surpassed in height by the Nieuwe Kerk. During its construction the foundations were not strong enough to support the building, as work continued, the builders tried to compensate for its lean on each layer of the tower, but to this day only the four turrets at the top are truly vertical. It is possible that the course of the adjacent canal had to be shifted slightly to make room for the tower, leaving an unstable foundation that caused the tilt. By the end of the 14th century, expansion of the aisles to the height of the nave transformed the building into a hall church. The church again took on a typical basilican cross-section with the construction of a higher nave between about 1425 and 1440. The Delft town fire of 1536 and the turmoil of the Protestant Reformation brought an end to an ambitious expansion project led by two members of the Keldermans family of master builders. This construction phase resulted in the flat-roofed, stone-walled northern transept arm that differs markedly in style from the older parts. The great fire, iconoclasm, weather, and the explosion of the gunpowder store in 1654 took their toll on the church and its furnishings. During one renovation, the turrets were rebuilt in a more vertical alignment than the leaning body below. The current stained-glass windows were crafted by the master glazier Joep Nicolas in the mid-20th century, the church possesses three pipe organs, from the years 1857,1873 and 1770. The massive bell is sounded during disasters, when local air-raid sirens are sounded. Approximately 400 people are entombed in the Oude Kerk, including the following notables, Elizabeth Morgan, daughter of nobleman Marnix van St.1660
6.
Delft
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Delft is a city and a municipality in the Netherlands. It is located in the province of South Holland, to the north of Rotterdam, the city of Delft came into being aside a canal, the Delf, which comes from the word delven, meaning delving or digging, and led to the name Delft. It presumably started around the 11th century as a landlord court, from a rural village in the early Middle Ages, Delft developed to a city, that in the 13th century received its charter. The towns association with the House of Orange started when William of Orange, nicknamed William the Silent, at the time he was the leader of growing national Dutch resistance against Spanish occupation, known as the Eighty Years War. By then Delft was one of the cities of Holland. An attack by Spanish forces in October of that year was repelled, after the Act of Abjuration was proclaimed in 1581, Delft became the de facto capital of the newly independent Netherlands, as the seat of the Prince of Orange. When William was shot dead in 1584, by Balthazar Gerards in the hall of the Prinsenhof, therefore, he was buried in the Delft Nieuwe Kerk, starting a tradition for the House of Orange that has continued to the present day. The Delft Explosion, also known in history as the Delft Thunderclap, occurred on 12 October 1654 when a gunpowder store exploded, over a hundred people were killed and thousands were wounded. About 30 tonnes of gunpowder were stored in barrels in a magazine in a former Clarissen convent in the Doelenkwartier district, cornelis Soetens, the keeper of the magazine, opened the store to check a sample of the powder and a huge explosion followed. Luckily, many citizens were away, visiting a market in Schiedam or a fair in The Hague, Delft artist Egbert van der Poel painted several pictures of Delft showing the devastation. Historical buildings and other sights of interest include, Oude Kerk, buried here, Piet Hein, Johannes Vermeer, Anthony van Leeuwenhoek. Nieuwe Kerk, constructed between 1381 and 1496 and it contains the Dutch royal familys burial vault, which between funerals is sealed with a 5,000 kg cover stone. A statue of Hugo Grotius made by Franciscus Leonardus Stracké in 1886 and this is the only remaining gate of the old city walls. The Gemeenlandshuis Delfland, or Huyterhuis, built in 1505, which has housed the Delfland regional water authority since 1645, the Vermeer Centre in the rebuilt Guild house of St. Luke. Windmill De Roos, a mill built c.1760. Restored to working order in 2013, another windmill that formerly stood in Delft, Het Fortuyn, was dismantled in 1917 and re-erected at the Netherlands Open Air Museum, Arnhem, Gelderland in 1920. Delft is well known for the Delft pottery ceramic products which were styled on the imported Chinese porcelain of the 17th century, the city had an early start in this area since it was a home port of the Dutch East India Company. It can still be seen at the pottery factories De Koninklijke Porceleyne Fles, the painter Johannes Vermeer was born in Delft
7.
Netherlands
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The Netherlands, also informally known as Holland is the main constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is a densely populated country located in Western Europe with three territories in the Caribbean. The European part of the Netherlands borders Germany to the east, Belgium to the south, and the North Sea to the northwest, sharing borders with Belgium, the United Kingdom. The three largest cities in the Netherlands are Amsterdam, Rotterdam and The Hague, Amsterdam is the countrys capital, while The Hague holds the Dutch seat of parliament and government. The port of Rotterdam is the worlds largest port outside East-Asia, the name Holland is used informally to refer to the whole of the country of the Netherlands. Netherlands literally means lower countries, influenced by its low land and flat geography, most of the areas below sea level are artificial. Since the late 16th century, large areas have been reclaimed from the sea and lakes, with a population density of 412 people per km2 –507 if water is excluded – the Netherlands is classified as a very densely populated country. Only Bangladesh, South Korea, and Taiwan have both a population and higher population density. Nevertheless, the Netherlands is the worlds second-largest exporter of food and agricultural products and this is partly due to the fertility of the soil and the mild climate. In 2001, it became the worlds first country to legalise same-sex marriage, the Netherlands is a founding member of the EU, Eurozone, G-10, NATO, OECD and WTO, as well as being a part of the Schengen Area and the trilateral Benelux Union. The first four are situated in The Hague, as is the EUs criminal intelligence agency Europol and this has led to the city being dubbed the worlds legal capital. The country also ranks second highest in the worlds 2016 Press Freedom Index, the Netherlands has a market-based mixed economy, ranking 17th of 177 countries according to the Index of Economic Freedom. It had the thirteenth-highest per capita income in the world in 2013 according to the International Monetary Fund, in 2013, the United Nations World Happiness Report ranked the Netherlands as the seventh-happiest country in the world, reflecting its high quality of life. The Netherlands also ranks joint second highest in the Inequality-adjusted Human Development Index, the region called Low Countries and the country of the Netherlands have the same toponymy. Place names with Neder, Nieder, Nether and Nedre and Bas or Inferior are in use in all over Europe. They are sometimes used in a relation to a higher ground that consecutively is indicated as Upper, Boven, Oben. In the case of the Low Countries / the Netherlands the geographical location of the region has been more or less downstream. The geographical location of the region, however, changed over time tremendously
8.
Piracy
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Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship- or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and other valuable items or properties. Those who engage in acts of piracy are called pirates, the earliest documented instances of piracy were in the 14th century BC, when the Sea Peoples, a group of ocean raiders, attacked the ships of the Aegean and Mediterranean civilizations. Narrow channels which funnel shipping into predictable routes have long created opportunities for piracy, as well as for privateering and commerce raiding. Historic examples include the waters of Gibraltar, the Strait of Malacca, Madagascar, the Gulf of Aden, a land-based parallel is the ambushing of travelers by bandits and brigands in highways and mountain passes. While the term can include acts committed in the air, on land, or in major bodies of water or on a shore. It does not normally include crimes committed against people traveling on the vessel as the perpetrator. Piracy or pirating is the name of a crime under customary international law. They also use larger vessels, known as ships, to supply the smaller motorboats. The international community is facing challenges in bringing modern pirates to justice. In the 2000s, a number of nations have used their naval forces to protect ships from pirate attacks. The English pirate is derived from the Latin term pirata and that from Greek πειρατής, brigand, in turn from πειράομαι, I attempt, from πεῖρα, attempt, the meaning of the Greek word peiratēs literally is one who attacks. The word is cognate to peril. The term is first attested to c, spelling was not standardised until the eighteenth century, and spellings such as pirrot, pyrate and pyrat were used until this period. It may be reasonable to assume that piracy has existed for as long as the oceans were plied for commerce, the earliest documented instances of piracy are the exploits of the Sea Peoples who threatened the ships sailing in the Aegean and Mediterranean waters in the 14th century BC. In classical antiquity, the Phoenicians, Illyrians and Tyrrhenians were known as pirates, the ancient Greeks condoned piracy as a viable profession, it apparently was widespread and regarded as an entirely honourable way of making a living. References are made to its perfectly normal occurrence many texts including in Homers Iliad and Odyssey, by the era of Classical Greece, piracy was looked upon as a disgrace to have as a profession. In the 3rd century BC, pirate attacks on Olympos brought impoverishment, among some of the most famous ancient pirateering peoples were the Illyrians, a people populating the western Balkan peninsula. Constantly raiding the Adriatic Sea, the Illyrians caused many conflicts with the Roman Republic and it was not until 229 BC when the Romans finally decisively beat the Illyrian fleets that their threat was ended
9.
Dutch Republic
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It preceded the Batavian Republic, the Kingdom of Holland, the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, and ultimately the modern Kingdom of the Netherlands. Alternative names include the United Provinces, Seven Provinces, Federated Dutch Provinces, most of the Low Countries had come under the rule of the House of Burgundy and subsequently the House of Habsburg. In 1549 Holy Roman Emperor Charles V issued the Pragmatic Sanction, Charles was succeeded by his son, King Philip II of Spain. This was the start of the Eighty Years War, in 1579 a number of the northern provinces of the Low Countries signed the Union of Utrecht, in which they promised to support each other in their defence against the Spanish army. This was followed in 1581 by the Act of Abjuration, the declaration of independence of the provinces from Philip II. In 1582 the United Provinces invited Francis, Duke of Anjou to lead them, but after an attempt to take Antwerp in 1583. After the assassination of William of Orange, both Henry III of France and Elizabeth I of England declined the offer of sovereignty, however, the latter agreed to turn the United Provinces into a protectorate of England, and sent the Earl of Leicester as governor-general. This was unsuccessful and in 1588 the provinces became a confederacy, the Union of Utrecht is regarded as the foundation of the Republic of the Seven United Provinces, which was not recognized by the Spanish Empire until the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. During the Anglo-French war, the territory was divided into groups, the Patriots, who were pro-French and pro-American and the Orangists. The Republic of the United Provinces faced a series of revolutions in 1783–1787. During this period, republican forces occupied several major Dutch cities, initially on the defence, the Orangist forces received aid from Prussian troops and retook the Netherlands in 1787. After the French Republic became the French Empire under Napoleon, the Batavian Republic was replaced by the Napoleonic Kingdom of Holland, the Netherlands regained independence from France in 1813. In the Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1814 the names United Provinces of the Netherlands, on 16 March 1815, the son of stadtholder William V crowned himself King William I of the Netherlands. Between 1815 and 1890 the King of the Netherlands was also in a union the Grand Duke of the sovereign Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. After Belgium gained its independence in 1830, the state became known as the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The County of Holland was the wealthiest and most urbanized region in the world, the free trade spirit of the time received a strong augmentation through the development of a modern, effective stock market in the Low Countries. The Netherlands has the oldest stock exchange in the world, founded in 1602 by the Dutch East India Company, while Rotterdam has the oldest bourse in the Netherlands, the worlds first stock exchange, that of the Dutch East-India Company, went public in six different cities. Later, a court ruled that the company had to reside legally in a city so Amsterdam is recognized as the oldest such institution based on modern trading principles
10.
Eighty Years' War
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The Eighty Years War or Dutch War of Independence was a revolt of the Seventeen Provinces against the political and religious hegemony of Philip II of Spain, the sovereign of the Habsburg Netherlands. After the initial stages, Philip II deployed his armies and regained control over most of the rebelling provinces, under the leadership of the exiled William the Silent, the northern provinces continued their resistance. They eventually were able to oust the Habsburg armies, and in 1581 they established the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands, after a 12-year truce, hostilities broke out again around 1619 which can be said to coincide with the Thirty Years War. An end was reached in 1648 with the Peace of Münster, in the decades preceding the war, the Dutch became increasingly discontented with Habsburg rule. A major cause of discontent was heavy taxation imposed on the population, while support. At that time, the Seventeen Provinces were known in the empire as De landen van herwaarts over, the presence of Spanish troops, under the command of the Duke of Alba, brought in to oversee order, further amplified this unrest. Spain also attempted a policy of religious uniformity for the Catholic Church within its domains. The Reformation meanwhile produced a number of Protestant denominations, which gained followers in the Seventeen Provinces and these included the Lutheran movement of Martin Luther, the Anabaptist movement of the Dutch reformer Menno Simons, and the Reformed teachings of John Calvin. This growth lead to the 1566 Beeldenstorm, the Iconoclastic Fury which saw many churches in northern Europe stripped of their Catholic statuary, in October 1555, Emperor Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire began the gradual abdication of his several crowns. The balance of power was heavily weighted toward the local and regional governments, Philip did not govern in person but appointed Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy as governor-general to lead the central government. When Philip left for Spain in 1559 political tension was increased by religious policies, not having the liberal-mindedness of his father Charles V, Philip was a fervent enemy of the Protestant movements of Martin Luther, John Calvin, and the Anabaptists. Towards the end of Charles reign enforcement had become lax. Philip, however, insisted on rigorous enforcement, which caused widespread unrest, the new hierarchy was to be headed by Granvelle as archbishop of the new archdiocese of Mechelen. The reform was unpopular with the old church hierarchy, as the new dioceses were to be financed by the transfer of a number of rich abbeys. Granvelle became the focus of the opposition against the new governmental structures, after the recall of Granvelle, Orange persuaded Margaret and the Council to ask for a moderation of the placards against heresy. Philip delayed his response, and in this interval the opposition to his religious policies gained more widespread support, Philip finally rejected the request for moderation in his Letters from the Segovia Woods of October 1565. This Compromise of Nobles was supported by about 400 nobles, both Catholic and Protestant, and was presented to Margaret on 5 April 1566, impressed by the massive support for the compromise, she suspended the placards, awaiting Philips final ruling. The first half of the Eighty Years War between the Spanish Empire and the Dutch Republic was fought between 1566 and 1609, when the Twelve Years Truce was signed in 1609, ending this first phase of war, the northern Netherlands had achieved de facto independence
11.
Spain
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By population, Spain is the sixth largest in Europe and the fifth in the European Union. Spains capital and largest city is Madrid, other urban areas include Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Bilbao. Modern humans first arrived in the Iberian Peninsula around 35,000 years ago, in the Middle Ages, the area was conquered by Germanic tribes and later by the Moors. Spain is a democracy organised in the form of a government under a constitutional monarchy. It is a power and a major developed country with the worlds fourteenth largest economy by nominal GDP. Jesús Luis Cunchillos argues that the root of the span is the Phoenician word spy. Therefore, i-spn-ya would mean the land where metals are forged, two 15th-century Spanish Jewish scholars, Don Isaac Abravanel and Solomon ibn Verga, gave an explanation now considered folkloric. Both men wrote in two different published works that the first Jews to reach Spain were brought by ship by Phiros who was confederate with the king of Babylon when he laid siege to Jerusalem. This man was a Grecian by birth, but who had given a kingdom in Spain. He became related by marriage to Espan, the nephew of king Heracles, Heracles later renounced his throne in preference for his native Greece, leaving his kingdom to his nephew, Espan, from whom the country of España took its name. Based upon their testimonies, this eponym would have already been in use in Spain by c.350 BCE, Iberia enters written records as a land populated largely by the Iberians, Basques and Celts. Early on its coastal areas were settled by Phoenicians who founded Western Europe´s most ancient cities Cadiz, Phoenician influence expanded as much of the Peninsula was eventually incorporated into the Carthaginian Empire, becoming a major theater of the Punic Wars against the expanding Roman Empire. After an arduous conquest, the peninsula came fully under Roman Rule, during the early Middle Ages it came under Germanic rule but later, much of it was conquered by Moorish invaders from North Africa. In a process took centuries, the small Christian kingdoms in the north gradually regained control of the peninsula. The last Moorish kingdom fell in the same year Columbus reached the Americas, a global empire began which saw Spain become the strongest kingdom in Europe, the leading world power for a century and a half, and the largest overseas empire for three centuries. Continued wars and other problems led to a diminished status. The Napoleonic invasions of Spain led to chaos, triggering independence movements that tore apart most of the empire, eventually democracy was peacefully restored in the form of a parliamentary constitutional monarchy. Spain joined the European Union, experiencing a renaissance and steady economic growth
12.
Spanish treasure fleet
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Passengers and goods such as textiles, books and tools were transported in the opposite direction. The West Indies fleet was the first permanent transatlantic trade route in history, similarly, the Manila galleons were the first permanent trade route across the Pacific. Spanish ships had brought goods from the New World since Christopher Columbuss first expedition of 1492, the Spanish government started a system of convoys in the 1560s in response to the sacking of Havana by French privateers. The main procedures were established after the recommendations of Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, the treasure fleets sailed along two sea lanes. A secondary route was that of the Manila Galleons or Galeón de Manila which linked the Philippines to Acapulco in Mexico across the Pacific Ocean, from Acapulco, the Asian goods were transhipped by mule train to Veracruz to be loaded onto the Caribbean treasure fleet for shipment to Spain. To better defend this trade, Pedro Menéndez de Avilés and Álvaro de Bazán designed the model of the galleon in the 1550s. Spain controlled the trade through the Casa de Contratación based in Seville, by law, the colonies could trade only with the one designated port in the mother country, Seville. Maritime archaeology has shown that the quantity of goods transported was sometimes higher than recorded at the Archivo General de Indias. Spanish merchants and Spaniards acting as fronts for foreign merchants sent their goods on these fleets to the New World, some resorted to contraband to transport their cargoes untaxed. The Crown of Spain taxed the wares and precious metals of private merchants at a rate of 20%, Spain became the richest country in Europe by the end of the 16th century. The flow of precious metals also made many traders wealthy both in Spain and abroad, the increase in gold and silver on the Iberian market sometimes caused high inflation in the 17th century, affecting the Spanish economy. As a consequence, the Crown was forced to delay the payment of some major debts, by 1690 some of these lenders could no longer offer financial support to the Crown. The Spanish monopoly over its West and East Indies colonies lasted for two centuries. The economic importance of exports later declined with the drop of production of the American precious metals mines, however, the growth in trade was strong in the early years. Numbering just 17 ships in 1550, the fleets expanded to more than 50 much larger vessels by the end of the century, by the second half of the 17th century, that number had dwindled to less than half of its peak. The Spanish trade of goods was sometimes threatened by its colonial rivals who tried to seize islands as bases along the Spanish Main and in the Spanish West Indies, however, the Atlantic trade was largely unharmed. The English acquired small islands like St Kitts in 1624, expelled in 1629 they returned in 1639, French pirates established themselves in Saint-Domingue in 1625, were expelled only to return later and the Dutch occupied Curaçao in 1634. In 1739, British Admiral Edward Vernon raided Portobello, but in 1741 his campaign against Cartagena de Indias ended in defeat with heavy losses of men and ships
