Portuguese Royal Court Flees to Brazil
The Portuguese royal family sailed from Lisbon on 29 November 1807, hours ahead of a French army, and moved the seat of the empire to Brazil. Napoleon's Berlin Decree of 1806 had closed continental Europe to British trade, and Portugal — Britain's oldest ally, dependent on British shipping and the Brazil trade — could not comply without ruin and could not refuse without invasion. Prince Regent João temporised for a year and ran out of time when Junot crossed the frontier. The evacuation was arranged in about a week under British naval protection. Somewhere between ten and fifteen thousand people embarked — the regent, the mad queen Maria I, the court, the ministries, the treasury, and the royal library of some 60,000 volumes — in about thirty-six vessels. Many were carried in appalling conditions, and women shaved their heads after lice took hold at sea. It is the only case of a European monarchy relocating to a colony. Rio de Janeiro became the capital of a transatlantic empire. João opened Brazilian ports to friendly nations within weeks of landing at Salvador, which ended three centuries of the colonial monopoly and could never be reversed, and founded a bank, a press, a naval academy, a botanical garden and a medical school. Brazil was raised to a kingdom equal with Portugal in 1815. João went home in 1821 under pressure from a liberal revolution and left his son Pedro as regent, telling him to take the crown himself if separation came. It came the following year.
- Year: 1807 CE
- Category: Political
