Portugal

Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. It is an unitary semi-presidential republic made up by mainland Portugal and two autonomous regions, with Lisbon as both its capital and largest city. The mainland is bordered by Spain to the north and east, with Madeira and the Azores in the Atlantic Ocean. It features the westernmost point in continental Europe. The western Iberian Peninsula has been inhabited since prehistory, with the earliest signs of settlement dating to 5500 BC. Celtic and Iberian peoples arrived in the 1st millennium BC. The region came under Roman control in the 2nd century BC. A succession of Germanic peoples and the Alans ruled from the 5th to 8th centuries. Muslims invaded the Iberia Peninsula in the 8th century, but were gradually expelled during the Reconquista. Portugal was established during this period, initially as a county of the Kingdom of León in 868, and formally as a kingdom in 1179. Portugal was one of the main participants of the Age of Discovery, made several seminal advancements in nautical science and was among the first European countries to explore and discover new territories and sea routes, establishing settlements, colonies, and trading posts that extended mostly along the South Atlantic and Indian Ocean coasts. A dynastic crisis in 1580 resulted in the Iberian Union with Spain until 1640, marking its gradual decline as a global power. The 1755 Lisbon earthquake destroyed the city and further damaged the economy. The Napoleonic Wars drove the relocation of the court to Brazil in 1807, leading to its elevation to a kingdom and then independence in 1822, causing the 1828–1834 Liberal Wars and the abolition of the absolute monarchy. The 5 October 1910 revolution led the monarchy being abolished and replaced by a republic. In 1926, following a coup, the authoritarian Ditadura Nacional was established and later became the Estado Novo. Democracy was restored in 1974 following the Carnation Revolution, which brought an end to the Portuguese Colonial War and its colonial empire. Portugal's colonial history has left a vast cultural legacy, with around 250 million native Portuguese speakers worldwide. It has a developed and advanced economy relying chiefly upon services, industry, and tourism. Portugal is a member of the United Nations, European Union, Schengen Area, and Council of Europe, and one of the founding members of NATO, the eurozone, the OECD, and the Community of Portuguese Language Countries.