 The Portuguese returned six years later to the island of São Tiago to found Ribeira Grande (now Cidade Velha), in 1462—the first permanent European settlement city in the tropics.In Spain the Reconquista war was growing in its mission to re-Christianize Iberia and expel the Muslim Moors who had first arrived as invaders and colonists in the 8th century.In 1492 the Spanish Inquisition also emerged in its fullest expression of anti-Semitism.