1808: The Flight of the Emperor by Laurentino Gomes

Author:Laurentino Gomes
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Lyons Press
Published: 2013-09-02T16:00:00+00:00

Whoever wants to buy a residence of multi-story houses facing Santa Rita, talk to Anna Joaquina da Silva, who lives in these houses, or with Captain Francisco Pereira de Mesquita, who has orders to sell them.

For sale: a good horse, a carriage leader. If you have an intention to buy, look for Francisco Borges Mendes, who lives above a shop on the corner of João Baptista alley.25

From 1810, however, the tone and content of these announcements change radically. Instead of horses, houses, and slaves, they offer books, champagne, cologne, fans, gloves, linen, paintings, pianos, porcelain vases, silk sheets, watches, and countless other imported merchandise. “I can’t even begin to explain the abundance and surfeit of French fabrics and bric-a-brac which have flooded the city,” wrote Royal Archivist Luiz dos Santos Marrocos to his sister in Lisbon in 1816. “One no longer sees English fabrics that have all been abandoned, as everyone goes adorned in the French style, except me, as I am of Old Portugal, and no one shall tear me from this fixation.”26 In the March 2, 1816, edition of the Gazette, a Frenchman named Girard announces himself as “the hairdresser of Her Royal Highness Lady D. Carlota, Princess of Brazil, of her Royal Highness the Princess of Wales, and of her Royal Highness the Duchess of Angoulême” and offers the following services: “To provide hairstyles in the latest fashions of Paris and London, to cut men and ladies’ hair, to coif men and women’s hair, to dye with the ultimate perfection hair, eyebrows, and sideburns, without causing any damage to skin or clothing; and to provide a pomade that makes one’s hair grow and thicken.” On November 13 of the same year, on 8 Rua do Ouvidor [Ombudsman’s Road], House of Bellard advertises having received “a new assortment of real and fake jewelry, ladies’ hats, French books, dresses and adornments for modern women, scents of all varieties, pendulums, shotguns, and fans.”

Despite the flood of British goods, in time the French influence left its mark. The stores of Rio teemed with novelties from Paris. In the June 26, 1817, edition of the Gazette, merchant Carlos Durante advertises to his clients that he has moved from 28 Rua do Ouvidor to 9 Rua Direita, where he offered,

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.