Nicholas Mirkovich in his study “Ragusa and the Portuguese Spice Trade”, Slavonic and Eastern European Review, London, March 1943, wrote the following: “During the absence of Venice the largest part of the oriental trade was taken over by Ragusa, which about 1530-1540 had a virtual monopoly of that trade. For a decade or two there existed a sharp competition between Ragusa and Portugal, which was carried on also in Portugal’s own East Indian empire. The Ragusan (i.e. Dubrovnik) colony Sao Braz (Saint Vlaho) near Goa is one of the strangest and most interesting examples of the economic expansion of that little Republic in the period of the commercial revolution.” Article by Adam S. Eterovich Bracanin, on the left.