ALMEI'DA, DON FRANCESCO D', a famous Portuguese warrior, who flourished in the latter part of the 15th and the beginning of the 16th c. He was the seventh son of the count of Abrantes, and at an early period distinguished himself in the wars with the Moors, but especially at the conquest of Granada, in 1492. In 1505, his sovereign, Eman uel I., in consideration of his great abilities, appointed him viceroy of the Portuguese possessions in the East Indies. On the 25th of March he set sail from Lisbon with a fleet of 36 vessels, containing 1500 men, many of whom were noblemen, and all of good family. On the 22d of July he reached Quiloa, on the Mozambique coast, where he was soon involved in a quarrel with the king of that city, the result of which was that A. deprived him of his crown, built a fortress to overawe the inhabitants, and proceeding to Zanzibar, destroyed the t. of Mombaza. He then sailed for the Indies, asserting every where the superiority of the Portuguese flag. At Cananor, Cochin, Coulan, Ceylon, and Sumatra, he either built fortresses to protect the factories and commercial interests of his nation, or established new factories. With the king of Malacca a commercial treaty was formed about the same time. His son, Lorenzo, carried on several expeditions as his father's lieutenant, visited Ceylon, and discovered the Maldive islands and Madagascar. The chief design of A. was to make the Portuguese sole masters of the Indian seas, and, by blockading the Persian and Arabian gulfs, to exclude the Egyptians and Venetians from commerce with the east. To frustrate his endeavors, the Egyptian sultan fitted out, by the help of the Venetians, a large fleet, which, under command of the Persian, 3fir•Hakim (or Hossein, according to others), was sent to the assistance of the king of Calicut. In the port of Chant, young Lorenzo was attacked in very disadvantageous
circumstances by Mir-Hakim. lie fought with astonishing bravery ; his ships had all but made their escape out to the open sea, when his own was separated from the others and struck upon a rock; one chance shot carried off one of his legs, and another, tearing away a part of his side, killed him. His father speedily took measures to revenge the death of his son upon the hated Mussulmans, when Alfonso d'Albuquerque appeared on the scene (1507), having been sent out by the Portuguese government to supersede A., whom it had begun to distrust on account of his brilliant successes. The latter refused to recognize Albuquerque as viceroy, and for some months kept him prisoner at Cochin. He now sailed along the coasts, burning and plundering various sea-ports, amon,gst others Goa, and at length utterly destroyed the Egyptian fleet at Diu. From this fierce and avenging expedition he returned to Cochin, res,irmed his office into the hands of his suc cessor, and set out on his homeWard voyage, Nov. 13, 1508. But lie was not destined to see his native land again, for he was slain In an obscure affray With the savages at cape Saldanha, in the s. of Africa, where his men had landed. He was a man of stern, vigorous, and yet impulsive character, capable of severe retaliation of injuries, but not destitute of clemency and generosity.