CIAO DATE: 10/2008
February 2008
Center for German and European Studies, University of California, Berkeley
Napoleon and the European war were not the primary concerns of Brazil's inhabitants. They had their own agenda and saw the British as their mercantile competitors. Most of all they resented the 1810 treaty of alliance and the article on the abolition of slave trade. Not even a Constitution was asked for in Brazil because Brazilians were happy enough with the presence of the royal family to think of a change in government.
The paper was presented at the conference on The End of the Old Regime in the Iberian World sponsored by the Spanish Studies Program and the Portuguese Studies Program of UC Berkeley on February 8-9, 2008.
Resource link: The Royal Court in Rio de Janeiro and Napoleon’s Black Legend [PDF] - 131K