Sometimes, I like to read about other countries’ independence to see what happened there. What I’ve found, so far, is that Brazil’s independence seems to have been… unusual? It had a lot of improbable events that led to a (somewhat) less bloody resolution than in a lot of other colonies. Like, it all started with the Napoleonic Wars, where the Portuguese court fled to Brazil to escape the French. What did they do in Brazil, besides hiding from the war?
They made Rio de Janeiro, in the colony, the f*cking capital of their empire.
Brazil, or at least Rio, went from colony to capital of the metropolis. And they did rule the Portuguese Empire from there. After the Napoleonic Wars ended, the court was pretty happy staying in Brazil, but not everyone. Also, there was some discontent stirring up Portugal, so the court decided to return. What happened then?
The prince rebelled against his father and declared independence, for a number of reasons, which can be summarized as “because he wanted to stay in Brazil”.
He also had a lot of support from the local oligarchy because, you see, Brazil as a colony was pretty much left to its own devices (as long as they sent products to Europe and paid colonial taxes), unlike other places where the metropolis had a “heavier hand”, and this gave rise to a lot of rich colonial people who ruled their own territories and didn’t like to pay the exorbitant taxes required to keep their rule. And after returning to Portugal, the court wanted to demote Brazil from kingdom back to colony, an idea many Brazilians didn’t like.
So yeah, the prince declared the colony’s independence, fought a 2-year war against his family that ended up driving the Portuguese completely out of the continent, and became an emperor. Yeah, the dude created created the Empire of Brazil. Brazil was briefly an internationally recognized continental empire, founded by the ex-colony’s prince. Crazy.
Even funnier, the prince-who-became-emperor later returned to Portugal anyway because there was some sort of family infighting going on about the Portuguese throne, and ended up fighting against absolutism and winning, leading the way for Portugal to become a semi-constitutional monarchy and, later, a republic. He is the reason why the city of Porto, in Northern Portugal, is known as “Cidade Invicta” (Unconquerable/Undefeated City), since he launched his attack and held the lines from there. This dude was known as D. Pedro I in Brazil and D. Pedro IV in Portugal, called “The Liberator” in both places for different reasons. And I kid you not, his body is buried in Brazil (in the spot where he declared independence, nowadays a museum), and his mummified heart is kept in Portugal (in the city of Porto).
Anyway, the dude left his son, D. Pedro II, in Brazil to rule in his place. He went on to develop the country further than ever before, but later lost the throne when the monarchy was abolished due to the machinations of the… oligarchy. He gave up the throne willingly, supposedly tired of the political fights against the parliament, and died in exile, supposedly dreaming of a day when he would be allowed to return to Brazil (not as monarch, though, because he supposedly never had any desire for power). It was, truly, a miserable and melancholic death. And, as far as I know, it was probably one of the smoothest transitions a country had from monarchy to republic.
By the by, the oligarchy still kinda rules Brazil. Lots of families involved in politics have been there since the 16th or 17th century, shaping things at their whim. Brazil’s Old Republic (haha) was ruled by them, then the country went through a dictatorship, then another Republic, then another dictatorship, and then, finally, to the current democratic state. But a lot of the old players are still entrenched in the parliament, including some leftovers from the imperial family (who don’t hold any official noble title, but still act as if nobility exists in modern Brazil).
Also, when I said “the Portuguese court fled to Brazil”, I didn’t mean just the king and his family, I meant ~10,000 people. And they did it while under the protection of the English navy, which was also ready to blow everyone up in case the Portuguese allied with the French.
It’s so very intriguing how much Brazil’s and Portugal’s history was entangled in the 19th century, and how much it shaped both countries.
There are tons of things we see and think “this could only happen in fiction”, but actually already happened in the real world.
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