Empire of Brazil: Map & History

History

The territory which would come to be known as Brazil was claimed by Portugal on 22 April 1500, when the navigator Pedro Álvares Cabral landed on its coast. Permanent settlement followed in 1532, and for the next 300 years the Portuguese slowly expanded westwards until they had reached nearly all of the borders of modern Brazil. In 1808, the army of French Emperor Napoleon I invaded Portugal, forcing the Portuguese royal family—the House of Braganza, a branch of the thousand-year-old Capetian dynasty—into exile. They re-established themselves in the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro, which became the unofficial seat of the Portuguese Empire.

Government

Article 2 of Brazil's 1824 Constitution defined the roles of both the emperor and the General Assembly of Brazil which in 1824 was composed of 50 senators and 102 general deputies, as the nation's representatives. The Constitution endowed the Assembly with both status and authority, and created legislative, moderating, executive and judicial branches as "delegations of the nation" with the separation of those powers envisaged as providing balances in support of the Constitution and the rights it enshrined.

The prerogatives and authority granted to the legislature within the Constitution meant that it could and would play a major and indispensable role in the functioning of the government—it was not a mere rubber stamp.

Economy

The unit of currency from the Empire's founding, and until 1942, was the real ("royal" in English, its plural form was réis and is reais in modern Portuguese), and was derived from the Portuguese real. It was usually called milréis (English: thousand royals) and written as 1$000. A thousand milréis (1:000$000)—or one million réis—was known as conto de réis. One conto de réis was represented by the symbol Rs written before the value and by a dollar sign was written before any amounts lower than 1,000 réis. Thus, 350 réis was written as "Rs 350"; 1,712 réis as "Rs 1$712"; and 1,020,800 réis was written as "Rs 1:020$800". For millions, a period was used as a separator between millions, billions, trillions, etc. (e.g., 1 billion réis was written as "Rs 1.000:000$000").

Culture

According to historian Ronald Raminelli, "visual arts underwent huge innovations in the Empire in comparison to the colonial period." With independence in 1822, painting, sculpture and architecture were influenced by national symbols and the monarchy, as both surpassed religious themes in their importance. The previously dominant old Baroque style was superseded by Neoclassicism. New developments appeared, such as the use of iron in architecture and the appearance of lithography and photography, which revitalized the visual arts.