Page 365 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Portugal

Wild flora blooming near the coast of Santa Maria

THE AZORES

Santa Maria was the first of the nine islands of
the Azores to be discovered by the Portuguese
(in 1427), beginning a wave of settlement in the
15th and 16th centuries by colonists from Portugal
and Flanders. The archipelago was named after the
buzzards the early explorers saw flying overhead
and mistook for goshawks (açores).
The Azores have profited from their far-flung
position in the Atlantic. Between 1580 and
1640, when Portugal came under Spanish rule,
the ports of Angra do Heroísmo on Terceira and
Ponta Delgada on São Miguel prospered from the
trade with the New World. In the 19th century,
the islands were a regular port of call for American
whaling ships, and during the 20th century
they benefited from their use as stations for
transatlantic cable companies, meteorological
observatories and military air bases.
Today, the majority of islanders are involved in
either dairy farming or fishing, and close links are
maintained with both mainland Portugal and the
sizeable communities of emigrant Azoreans in the
United States and Canada. Once a brave new world
of pioneer communities, the Azores are now an
autonomous region of Portugal and an exotic
corner of the European Union.
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