Rose-colored map

   The famous map presented to the Chamber of Deputies in 1887, which indicated that Lisbon intended to occupy, claim, and annex a disputed corridor of central African territory. The pink or rose-colored area on the map was the area that linked up the Portuguese colonies of Angola in West Africa and Mozambique in East Africa. Portugal's territorial interests in tropical Africa shifted from the coasts to the interior after the settlement reached at the 1884-85 Berlin West Africa Conference. Thereafter, Portugal concentrated on participating in the European race for central Africa, part of the larger movement, the "Scramble for Africa."

   By means of dispatching expeditions of explorers and soldiers to the hinterlands of both Angola and Mozambique, Portugal sought to fulfill the Berlin Conference's "rule" about "effective occupation." In Portugal, the old colonialists' dream of linking up the interiors of Angola and Mozambique, a notion that dated at least to the mid-l8th century, was known as the contra-costa ("opposite coast") project. Much of the rose-colored section of the map comprises what is now Zambia, Malawi, and Zimbabwe. The plan failed when Great Britain opposed Portuguese expansion into this disputed area in 1890 and sent Lisbon a threatening ultimatum that obliged Portugal to back down.

   See also Ultimatum, English.