The Impressão Régia do Rio de Janeiro and the making of the New Portuguese Empire in America

Abstract

This paper analyzes the political role played by the Impressão Régia do Rio de Janeiro in the context of the installation of the Portuguese court in America. Heir of typographies created in the kingdom in the late eighteenth century, under the Portuguese enlightened reformist project, the Impressão Régia do Rio de Janeiro preserves the pragmatic function of print and dissemination of useful knowledges for the development of the Empire, which characterized typographies such as Arco do Cego, created in 1799. Based on an enlightened model of knowing to intervening in reality, made the dissemination of the Lights in the Portuguese empire not only a cultural but also a political function. In the face of the political tensions that were caused by the new situation created by the Empire seat moving, the Impressão Régia do Rio de Janeiro has played an important role in legitimizing and sustaining of the political project of a new Portuguese Empire creation in America, a long cherished by enlightened Portuguese scholars and statemen. Seeking, thereby, highlight the intrinsic relationship between culture and power in the Portuguese enlightened reformism.