Fuerteventura History & Interesting facts!

By Bernie Power.

Bernie has now published: 'The History of Fuerteventura Island. A condensed study of the Fortunate Island'.

FUERTEVENTURA - A RECENT HISTORY (Part 1)

The king of Castile in the year 1402 was Henry III. Unfortunately recorded in history as Henry the Infirm. In Spanish, Enrique el Doliente (the sufferer); quite different!!! He was married to the English noble woman, Katherine of Lancaster daughter of the Ist duke of Lancaster, John of Gaunt, who also was father of king Henry IV of England and the first of the Lancastrian monarchs.

Henry the infirm decided to 'grab' a bit of real estate to make his Kingdom more powerful in a time when Castile, Aragon and various other Kingdoms in what is now Spain, were constantly at war about  territory and privilege. He hired a group of French pirates from Normandy, commanded by Jean de Bethencourt and Gadifer de La Salle who, putting up a fair amount of the cost of the expedition, set off to take the Canary Islands for the Crown of Castile. This was easily achieved as the present inhabitants were living as stone age people did. They had no weapon equal to the invaders and were unable to resist. They quickly took sides with or against the invaders for many reasons.

After subjugating Lanzarote, Bethencourt went back to Castile to give Henry the good news and get more supplies and men. Henry was so pleased he made Jean the king of the Canaries, the first and the last, although he was still under the authority of the Castilian Crown. When he got back again to Lanzarote he had a civil war on his hands. Gadifer de la Salle had decided to attack Fuerteventura and landed on the coast not far from Ajuy. He had argued with his men and the local chiefs had took sides to save their lives. This caused a massive slaughter on both sides. Bethencourt managed to sort out the situation but De la Salle was very angry he had been made King while he got nothing. In 1404 they founded the city of Betancuria together before he packed up and left for good.

THE GAUNCHES

'The Gaunches' was the term applied to all Canary Islanders after the conquest of the 14th & 15th Centuries. It derives from Achinet or Guanchinet, meaning Person-Guan...

Fuerteventura people were the Majoreros; a type of goat skin shoe! Or, the more popular 'Mejoreros' - the best!

The island was reasonably isolated from the others until the invasion of Europeans in the 14th Century. The first contact with the Europeans was in 1341 when Niccolosso da Recco first reported the island and commented on the the language in Tenerife.

The Roman writer Pliny mentions the expedition of King Jubla of Mauritania in 50 BC as having seen the ruins of great buildings but no sign of civilization, so maybe somebody came and went before the Gaunches, who are thought to have arrived around 500 BC.

Women were highly respected in the Gaunche society and for an armed man to insult a woman was a capital offence, punishable by death!

The Numidians, Carthaginians and Phoenicians all knew of the islands and were frequent visitors. The Romans visited between the 1st and 4th Centuries as they occupied north Africa.

Roman artefects have been found in Lanzarotte but most of the island was covered in the 1700s by the volcanic eruptions of Timanfaya.

A BRIEF RECENT HISTORY

Apart from Arab slavers frequently attacking, the islands were isolated from Europe until 1402 when Juan de Bethencourt and Gadifer De La Salle invaded. They were Norman French pirates who were employed by the Kingdom of Castille to take the islands for the Crown.

They attacked and defeated the peoples of Lanzarotte and Bethencourt went to Spain to report their success. Left in charge, De La Salle caused civil war amongst his French soldiers and caused the slaughter of many locals. He went on to 'conquer' the island of Fuerteventura, killing many, many more (almost stone-age) people.

Bethencourt returned in 1404 and brought reinforcements and supplies. Together, they founded the city of Betancuria in 1405. Bethencourt was named as King of the Canaries by Henry III of Castille and De La salle felt badly rewarded and insulted. He left for France never to return. The island quickly began to settle and became Spanish speaking.

Eventually, Jean De Bethencourt left, also for France and he left his nephew in control. It was inherited by the Herrera Perazas and was subjected to corruption, injustice, nepotism and unfair taxation for the next 300 years.

Due to its feudal lordship governments, high taxes, barren landscape and lack of water, it lost out to the boom to affect Gran Canaria and Tenerife.

In 1708, the regime of the hereditary militia was created, led by the Colonels. They built their base in La Oliva and the main house is still to be seen. They ruled as they willed and even arranged marriages to help maintain their power for more than 100 years.

The Capital moved in 1808 to Antigua and following a period of conflict between the North and the South which abolished the feudal system, the Capital moved again in 1835 to Puerto de Cabras (Port of the Goats). It was renamed without consultation in 1959 to Puerto del Rosario (Port of the Rosary).