Atlantic Transformations and Brazil's Imperial Independence
Document Type
Book Chapter
Publication Date
2016
Journal Title
New Countries: Capitalism, Revolutions, and Nations in the Americas, 1750-1870
Editor
John Tutino
Publisher
Duke University Press
City
Durham
Abstract
Brazil became independent with less political and social conflict than most regions of the Americas. Beginning as a Portuguese colony, it remained tied to Britain through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It flourished after 1800 as sugar, coffee, and slavery expanded to fill markets abandoned by revolutionary Haitians. Focusing on coffee, Brazil ruled the rising market for stimulants in the industrializing world. The chapter details how Portugal tied Brazil to Britain in the early eighteenth century, as gold mined by slaves became a key export. It explores the persistence of those ties as gold waned, sugar revived, and Britain escorted the Portuguese monarchy to Rio in the face of Napoleon’s Iberian invasion. Brazil’s wealth funded Britain years of war. When the king returned to Lisbon, his son Dom Pedro in 1822 proclaimed a Brazilian monarchy tied to Britain and sustained by sugar, coffee, and slave imports that expanded until 1850 despite England’s loud opposition.
Recommended Citation
Schultz, Kirsten, "Atlantic Transformations and Brazil's Imperial Independence" (2016). Department of History Publications. 8.
https://scholarship.shu.edu/history-publications/8
