Portuguese Colonial Cities in the Early Modern World (Empire and the Making of the Modern World, 1650-2000) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0754663132 ISBN 13: 9780754663133

Publisher: Routledge, 2008

Synopsis

Portuguese Colonial Cities in the Early Modern World is a collection of essays on the cities of the Portuguese empire written by the leading scholars in the field. The volume, like the empire it analyzes, has a global scope and a chronological span of three centuries. The contributions focus on the social, political, and economic aspects of city life in settlements as far apart as Rio de Janeiro, Mozambique Island, and Nagasaki. Despite the seeming (and real) disparities between the colonial cities located in South America, Africa, and Asia, this volume demonstrates that they possessed a range of commonalities. Beyond their shared language, these cities had similar social, religious, and political institutions that shaped their identities. In many cases, the civic bodies analyzed in these essays such as the city councils or the Misericórdias (charitable brotherhoods), no less than the convents and houses of Catholic religious orders, contributed more to making these cities Portuguese than their allegiance to the crown in Lisbon. Rather than dividing the globe into Atlantic and Indian Ocean spheres, Portuguese Colonial Cities in the Early Modern World takes the novel approach of bringing together analyses of the social history of these cities in order to stress their shared aspects as well as to suggest paths for fruitful comparisons. By encouraging further scholarship in this rich, yet understudied subject, this collection will not only further comparisons between cities found within the Portuguese empire, but also raise important issues that will be of interest to historians of other European empires, as well as urban historians generally.

About this title

About the Author:

Liam Matthew Brockey is a specialist in early modern European history, with a focus on the Portuguese Empire and religious history. He is currently an Associate Professor of History at Michigan State University, USA. Brockey's studies have focused on Jesuit missionaries in China and India in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

Review:

'This collection makes a key contribution to the historical development of urban Portuguese societies... The chapters all share a high level of historical research and writing, with the authors drawing on little known documents to illuminate aspects of Portuguese imperial history.' Reviews in History 'Its vibrant, engaging prose and stimulating conclusions are a testament to the author's erudition and explanatory skill, Brockey's fine editing and (in some essays) the translating skills of Brockey and Monica Leal da Silva.' Journal of Urban History 'Editor Liam Brockey and his contributing authors have produced an exceptionally useful and insightful book that draws out important themes in comparative colonial studies by examining sundry Portuguese held port cities in Brazil, east and west Africa, coastal western India, southern China and Japan.' Bulletin of Spanish Studies 'I recommend this volume to all those interested in investigating the social, political, religious, and economic organization and accompanying tensions common to all hybrid colonial environments, as well as to those specializing in the imperial history of the Iberian Peninsula.' Sixteenth Century Journal 'The book is avowedly targeted at urban historians, and hence rather specialised, but does contain material of interest to other scholarly discourses such as my own - and thus serves as an important access route to such detailed contextualisation of early forms of (colonial) urban-ism.' Cadernos de Estudos Africanos

About this edition

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0754663132
• ISBN 13: 9780754663133
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 298
• Editor: Brockey Liam Matthew