According to the text above, ‘500 Years of Brazil’s Discove...
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‘500 Years of Brazil’s Discovery’
By GAIL FINEBERG
Our territory was already inhabited before 1500 A.D., by a large population, estimated in the 1500s at 3 million Indians, with their own communal organization and traditions.
The encounter occurred on April 22, 1500, when Pedro Álvares Cabral, commander of a Portuguese armada, sighted the South American mainland and staked a claim for Portugal.
The encounter occurred on April 22, 1500, when Pedro Álvares Cabral, commander of a Portuguese armada, sighted the South American mainland and staked a claim for Portugal.
The Portuguese found Brazil attractive, as did the French, Dutch and Spanish. The first agreement between Spain and Portugal on frontiers was not reached until 1750.
The Jesuits were enterprising, and their missionary efforts spread throughout the country between 1625 and 1759.
The religious influence was responsible for an extraordinarily beautiful Brazilian baroque architecture.
Thoughts of independence began to take root in the late 18th century. Revolutionary events in Europe had a profound effect on Brazil. Napoleon’s invasion of Portugal prompted the Portuguese prince regent, Dom João, to move the Portuguese court to Brazil in 1808.
Brazil matured quickly as the seat of the Portuguese empire. The prince opened Brazilian ports to trade with friendly nations, including Great Britain, and also government offices in Rio de Janeiro, a supreme court, a bank, the royal treasury, mint, printing office, a national library with holdings from the Portuguese National Library and other academic institutions.
With the death of Portugal’s queen, Maria I, in 1816, the regent became King João VI. He returned to Portugal in 1821 to contain a revolution there and appointed his son, Dom Pedro, as regent in Brazil. Dom Pedro refused orders a few months later to return to Lisbon, established a legislative assembly in São Paulo and proclaimed Brazil’s independence from Portugal on Sept. 7, 1822.
Dom Pedro I was crowned emperor in 1822, but after a troubled reign marked by conflict with the assembly, he abdicated in favor of 5-year- old Dom Pedro de Alcântara in 1831. For the next nine years, Brazil seethed with civil unrest until both houses of parliament declared the young regent had reached majority in 1840. The Brazilian Empire lasted to 1889.
Dom Pedro II proved to be an enlightened leader. Brazil grew and prospered under his reign, and the country enjoyed a great deal of stability. (The country’s population grew from 4 million to 14 million; railroads built 5,000 miles of track; and public revenues and products multiplied.) However, support for a republic grew, and the empire finally collapsed in 1889, when the royal family went to exile in Europe.
The country’s 19th century economy relied on slave-based agriculture. Slave trade with Africa did not cease until 1853. At the dawn of the 21st century, Brazil, with an economy that is the eighth largest in the world, is a contributor of music, painting, literature and other arts to the world’s culture.
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