[AUDIO EN BLANCO] [AUDIO EN BLANCO] You have talked about the few naval battles occurred in the XVIth century. Beyond strategy, there were others reasons to avoid them? >> Andrea Doria was >> member of a wealthy family from Genoa. His economic activity led him to build a great warrior navy. He was converted a naval condottiero in the service of France until 1528, when he changed side and went with Spain, a decision that conditioned the history of the Spanish Monarchy and Genoa for more than a century. He put his navy in the service of the emperor Charles V for cash. He was not the only one: the majority of admirals were owners of their war galleys. On September 28th in 1538, the coallied navy between Papacy, Venice and the Empire, led by Doria, retired after a fight journey against Barbarossa navy in Prevesa waters, although Venetian and Papal captains asked to keep on fighting. Although the Christian navy was being defeated, Venetian had no doubt in accusing the Genoese admiral of avoiding collision. They said that Doria didn'y want to take any risk and also that he didn't want to share a victory with the Venetians. True or not, Euldi Alà bey, who strengthened the Ottoman navy with one hundred galleys more in Lepanto 1571, was accused of retiring them when he noticed the defeat. Nevertheless, he received honors by the caliph, afterwards. >> How happen that the "Atlantic powers" entered in the Mediterranean? >> English and Dutch were convinced that they had to reach an own port in that zone. In 1636, there were rumors in Madrid about the contact between Charles I Stuart and the king of Morocco, for taking Ceuta together. In 1661-1683 the English invaded Tanger, what they could not maintain, but announced the English interest to establish military basis in the Strait of Gibraltar and the Mediterranean Sea. It would be after the War of Spanish Succession when Great Britain made its eagerness real thanks to the Dutch, who more or less looked for the same. Gibraltar and Menorca later were kept by the British the new arbiters of the Mediterranean. >>Then, there was not a clear division between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean world. >> Truly. We need to review the old idea that the world moves towards the Atlantic and the Mediterranean is isolated. That idea, partly expanded by the Anglo-Saxon historiography, has characterized the Mediterranean as a decadent area. For instance, when they talk about the technological naval evolution, they hardly mention the galleys revolution, to the extent that Mediterranean naval changes have been ignored in studies about military revolution. On the other side the pirates phenomenon has been characterized as an activity related to delayed zones, that is Mediterranean. ignoring the presence of Dunquerque pirates or the English ports. Currently, is no more acceptable the vision of two separated worlds with different social, economic and political contexts. Another example: until few years, banditry was considered a phenomenon related to southern Europe, rooted in border societies, mountainous or too poor to maintain its population excesses. Currently, some investigations have enlarged its geographic zone to the Carpathians and the north of the continent. We cannot deny the characteristics of the Mediterranean societies, but we cannot accept the idea of an Europe divided in compartments, although they were not completely isolated. >>Beyond the "great history" of the Mediterranean, would it be useful to talk about the human experience in this sea in constant conflict?? >> It is true. Thanks to Braudel, we see the Mediterranean world as a mechanism and not as a set of societies and, actually, people. And through most of the little stories of people -some very popular, other anonymous-, we can notice a really complex reality. We must think in Jewish, expelled from Hispanic kingdoms in 1492 and their expansion for Italy and the Ottoman Empire, they favored their hosting societies and maintained alive their community feelings. And we frequently forget that the Spanish Muslim, -even if they were never called so- were forced to conversion and, since then, were called Moors. And finally expelled from their lands in 1609. They lived a double drama: the expulsion and their implantation in northern Africa, Where they were usually unwelcome. Barbarossa, as you know, was a Christian renegade son and he negotiated with Charles V between 1537 and 1540 to put himself in Hispanic service. And he had an adopted Italian son. We should also talk about Berber privateers, who are converted Christians, and not just Italian or Spanish, but even Dutch! And we don't have to forget thousands of people who, along three centuries, were captured, taken far from their countries and converted in slaves, both in Christian and Muslim countries. We are also descendants of these forced crossbreeds. [AUDIO EN BLANCO]