Tidore

volcanic islands that used to be the only places on Earth where you could find cloves.

Each one is ruled by a sultan, and rivalry between the main islands, Ternate, and its near neighbor, Tidore, was and remains fierce.

So when the Europeans first arrived, the Portuguese, both sultanates were keen to get them on side, because an alliance with these rich, well-armed strangers would give them the upper hand.

It was the Sultan of Ternate who won the day and the Portuguese trade and gave them the monopoly over cloves for over half a century.

And because I've been writing about especially trade in the Indian Ocean for a long time, I've known about the history of, let's say, the spice trade for a long time.

Now, the Ternate and Tidore are such interesting places because...

They are the places where the clove tree was endemic in that region around Halmahera and these other islands.

And the clove tree was found nowhere else.

And in the 16th century in Amsterdam, you could buy a house for a handful of nutmeg.

That was the kind of value that they had.

So the Portuguese, after they entered the Indian Ocean, went straight to Ternate, Tidore, and then to the Banda Islands, which they reached in 1511.

But they were more or less content to trade because, you know, the Portuguese just didn't have enough people to try and grab the whole place.