Tropical Versailles

by Schultz,Kirsten

• ISBN13: 9780415929882
• ISBN10: 0415929881
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 2001-08-24
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

In 1807, to escape an invading Napoleonic army, the Portuguese Prince Regent and some 10,000 functionaries set sail for Brazil. Following the transfer of the court, Rio de Janeiro became a "tropical Versailles," a new world seat of European imperial power. In discourse and practice, residents and royal officials in Rio set out to transform a colonial capital into a royal court and to redefine the bases for the political legitimacy of an empire and monarchy centered in America. With the capital of the Portuguese empire in Brazil for the next thirteen years, an extraordinary inversion of political, economic, and cultural hierarchies that had governed colonial relations for centuries came to pass. Schultz's penetrating study provides an engaging look at a unique and riveting historical episode.

Author Biography

Kirsten Schultz is a Fellow in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at The Cooper Union in New York City

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	vii
A Note on Portuguese Orthography	x
Abbreviations	xi
Introduction	1	(14)
``Brighter Glory in the Western Sphere'': Monarchy, Empire, and the New World	15	(24)
Preeminence and Its Price: Eighteenth-Century Rio de Janeiro	39	(28)
Tragedy and Triumph: The Politics of Royal Exile	67	(34)
The New City of Rio de Janeiro: Reconstructing the Portuguese Royal Court	101	(50)
``Tropical Versailles'': The Politics of Monarchy in the New World	151	(38)
``Imperio Florescente'': Remaking the Portuguese Empire	189	(46)
Legacies and Liberties: Constitutionalism in Rio de Janeiro	235	(42)
Epilogue	277	(6)
Appendix: The Pasquinades of 1821	283	(12)
References	295	(24)
Index	319