Abstract

FURTADO, Junia Ferreira  and  MONTEIRO, Nuno Gonçalo. Raynal and the defence of the Portuguese colonization of Brazil: diplomacy and the Memoirs of the Visconde de Balsemão. Anál. Social [online]. 2019, n.230, pp.4-33. ISSN 0003-2573.  https://doi.org/10.31447/AS00032573.2019230.01.

This article addresses and discusses the Memoirs of Luís Pinto de Sousa Coutinho (1735-1804), 1st Viscount of Balsemão, which were used as sources for the production of the 1780 edition of the Histoire des deux Indes, in respect of Brazil. The Memoirs offer a singular and exceptional portrait of the Portuguese empire - in the most precise and well-informed manner known for the time -, and represent a substantive addition to Abbé Raynal’s text and, in particular, a reorientation of its rather uncritical and even apologetic view of the Portuguese colonial administration and of slavery in Brazil.

Keywords : Raynal; Brazil; colonialism; diplomacy; Viscount Balsemão.

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