 joÃ£o de barros () (1496 â 20 october 1570), called the portuguese livy, is one of the first great portuguese historians, most famous for his dÃ©cadas da Ãsia ("decades of asia"), a history of the portuguese in india, asia, and southeast africa. ==early years== educated in the palace of manuel i of portugal, he composed, at the age of twenty, a romance of chivalry, the chronicle of the emperor clarimundo, in which he is said to have had the assistance of prince john (afterwards king john iii). upon ascending the throne, he awarded barros the captaincy of the fortress of st george of elmina, to which he proceeded in 1522. in 1525, he obtained the post of treasurer of the india house, which he held until 1528. to escape from an outbreak of bubonic plague in 1530 barros moved from lisbon to his country house near pombal, where he finished a moral dialogue, rho pica pneuma, which was cheered by juan luÃ­s vives. on his return to lisbon in 1532 the king appointed barros factor (agent) of the "casa da Ãndia e da mina" (house of india and mina)â a position of great responsibility and importance at a time when lisbon was the european center for the trade of the east. barros proved a good administrator, displaying great industry and an honesty rare at the time, with the result that he made little profit compared to his predecessors, who had amassed fortunes. ==the failed captaincy in brazil and shipwreck== at this time, john iii, wishing to attract settlers to brazil, divided it into captaincies and attributed to barros that of maranhÃ£o. barros with two partners, prepared an armada of ten vessels, carrying nine hundred men each, which set sail in 1539. owing to the ignorance of the pilots, the whole fleet was shipwrecked, which entailed serious financial loss to barros. as a gesture of goodwill, barros subsequently paid the debts of those who had perished in the expedition. thumb|left|titlepage of joÃ£o de barros 's grammatica, (1539) during these years he had continued his studies in his leisure hours, and shortly after the brazilian disaster he offered to write a history of the portuguese in india, the dÃ©cadas da Ãsia, which the ki
1496_births 1570_deaths 16th-century_Portuguese_people Captain-majors_of_Portuguese_Gold_Coast Grammarians_from_Portugal Maritime_history_of_Portugal Portuguese_Renaissance_humanists Portuguese_chroniclers Portuguese_historians Portuguese_travel_writers