Portugal crept south for eighty years; Castile gambled westward once. Then two crowns divided a planet neither had seen, using a line of longitude and a papal blessing. Scrub the years to watch the coast open, then drag the meridian and find out how few leagues stood between Brazil speaking Portuguese and Brazil speaking Spanish.
The Atlantic, 1415–1530
east of the line — Portugalwest of the line — Castile
1415
CeutaZaragoza
370
0 — on the islands800 — deep in the Pacific
Who gets what, under your line
Places appear as Europeans reach them. The chip is decided by one thing only: which side of the meridian the coast sits on.