Henry the Navigator's interest in exploration sparked the European expansion.
Following its heyday as a world power during the 15th and 16th centuries, Portugal lost much of its wealth and status with the destruction of Lisbon in a 1755 earthquake, occupation during the [Napoleonic Wars]?, and the loss of its Brazilian? colony in 1822. A 1910 revolution deposed the monarchy; for most of the next six decades repressive governments ran the country. In 1974, a left-wing military coup installed broad democratic reforms. The following year Portugal granted independence to all of its African? colonies. Portugal entered the EC in 1985.
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