Defending metropolitan identity through colonial politics: The role of Portuguese naturalists (1870–91)

Introduction

Only recently have historians been exploring the role of science and technology in the shaping of national identity. A volume of Osiris dedicated to the topic, published in 2009, constituted one of the first systematized attempts to draw attention to the potential of analyses focusing on the relationship between these two domains, by presenting case studies from a variety of national backgrounds. ¹ Nineteenth-century Europe offers the historian invaluable opportunities to study this relationship. It was during the nineteenth century that several European states consolidated politically through the construction of a national identity, and for this task not only were narratives from the past invented, but also common projects directed to the future, often deploying recent scientific and technological advances. ² Political elites promoted the training of specialists in strategic scientific and technological areas and requested their services in order to modernize state administration and foster economic growth. ³ As a consequence, various types of specialists attained privileged positions in the social hierarchy of both powerful and smaller European states. ⁴

Current historiography of science has paid much attention to the action of technologists and engineers for the modernization of nation-states, by analyzing the construction of large-scale projects, such as bridges, railways, and factories. Their specialized knowledge had obvious political relevance to the control of national territories and the generation of wealth in an increasingly competitive and globalized economy. Therefore, it is not surprising that their authority in technoscientific matters has led them to attain political influence. ⁵ Naturalists have also played important roles in the formation of nation-states by exploring and defining their natural resources, determining national boundaries, and transforming the landscape. ⁶ Working in their different areas of expertise, these specialists have contributed to forging the national identity of several states, but they seldom did it while heading crucial governmental offices. In this paper, the cases of João de Andrade Corvo (1824–90), a specialist in botany and agriculture, and José Vicente Barbosa du Bocage (1823–1907), a zoologist, are presented as exceptions to this historiography on the intersection between nation building and science and technology. They were both appointed to important government offices, in which they took relevant decisions for the future of Portugal, because of the authority they derived from their scientific activities and the knowledge they acquired through them. ⁷

Unlike European countries such as Belgium and Greece, which attained their independence during the nineteenth century, or that, like Italy and Germany, were still in the process of forming their respective national identities following unification, Portugal was in a very different situation. The country had defined borders for centuries, a general consensus on the salient features of its identity, and no separatist movements in any way comparable to the situation of regions such as Catalonia in Spain. ⁸ Yet, Portugal’s national identity was not totally immune to the transformations that took place on the European chessboard during the second half of the nineteenth century. As it will be shown, the country’s sovereignty was challenged on two occasions that brought into question its ancient national identity. The first was associated with the political crisis emerging in neighboring Spain, after the overthrow of the Bourbon monarchy, in 1868. Following the then current impetus for the annexation of contiguous territories, which ultimately brought the unification of Italy and Germany, the leaders of the provisional government in Spain strove for their country’s unification with Portugal. Such proposals were met with suspicion by most Portuguese politicians because they feared Spain would come to dominate their smaller kingdom. ⁹ The bigger and much longer lasting challenge, however, was the competition over Portuguese colonies in Africa. European powers, most notably Britain, attempted to exert control over African territories that had been associated with Portugal’s sphere of influence since the Age of Discovery. Such an attack on Portugal’s imperial identity struck a sensitive chord in the country’s national brio, since it menaced the last remains of what was considered its golden era. In fact, the possession of colonial territories was deemed so important by most nineteenth-century Portuguese that they saw it as a prerequisite for the country’s independence. When, in 1890, a diplomatic crisis with Britain threatened authority over African territories of mutual interest, the reaction grew to unprecedented proportions in Portugal, leading to a major political crisis. Aside from commercial and economic aims, the defense of Portugal’s colonies served an important ideological role in the strengthening of metropolitan identity, in an attempt to compensate for its small political relevance in Europe. Portuguese historiography has only recently begun to explore this dimension of nineteenth-century imperialism in Portugal. ¹⁰ Such a dimension also provides a complementary perspective to the rich and much discussed historiography on science and imperialism, which emphasizes the commercial dimension of colonialism and its role in the construction of metropolitan science. ¹¹

In spite of their different areas of scientific expertise, career pathways, and interests, both Corvo and Bocage became involved in colonial politics during a critical period when European powers embarked on a race for Africa, and played important diplomatic roles. The links between science, technology, and international affairs have already been established in recent historiography, but they have concentrated on the post-World War II decades and on the discussions around the regulation of nuclear power use. ¹² Although science and technology have only become permanently inscribed at the core of political processes during this period, it was in the nineteenth century that such a relationship started to have a direct impact in political contexts. Corvo and Bocage provide two important cases of naturalists who pursued a colonial agenda that favored the strengthening of Portugal’s identity as an imperial nation for the defense of colonial interests in the international arena, thus shedding light on the circumstances under which these types of specialists were able to engage directly in the political sphere of their time.

Andrade Corvo: from botany and agriculture to politics

Corvo (Figure 1) was born in 1824 into a family of relatively modest landowners. He studied in schools with a strong military component, such as the Lisbon Polytechnic School and the Army School, and he graduated around 1848 from the latter with a degree in military engineering. ¹³ Corvo’s interest in agriculture arose after he was accepted as a substitute professor of botany at the Lisbon Polytechnic School in 1844. ¹⁴ Inspired by the French École Polytechnique, the Lisbon Polytechnic was a higher education institution that had been founded in 1837 by the Portuguese government with the main aim of providing preparatory scientific courses to future military officers and engineers. The nascent Liberal regime deemed the training in scientific and technological areas fundamental to the modernization and economic development of the country. ¹⁵ Unlike the École Polytechnique, however, the Lisbon Polytechnic provided students with preparatory courses in zoology and botany prior to their enrolment in, respectively, medicine or pharmacy at the Lisbon Medical and Surgical School. ¹⁶ The botany courses were also mandatory for all engineering students, so that they would be able to perform the broadest possible range of tasks, including the identification of plant species with commercial value.

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Figure 1.

Portrait of Andrade Corvo at a mature age. In Rui Teles Palhinha, Escola Politécnica de Lisboa: a IX cadeira e os seus professores (Lisboa: João Pinto, Lda., 1937).

Shortly after finishing his preparatory instruction in the Lisbon Polytechnic School, Corvo applied for the vacant position for substitute professor of botany and was ultimately chosen. In the following years, while he attended the Army School, he helped José Maria Grande (1799–1857), the school’s full professor of botany, who in addition to teaching was in charge of the classification of plants at the school’s botanic garden. Grande had Saint-Simonian inclinations and he wished to modernize his country by implementing Liberal reforms in multiple areas. A man of strong Liberal convictions, he had been actively involved in the Portuguese Liberal Wars (1828–34), a period of great political instability and civil war between the supporters of pro-Absolutist ruler Prince Miguel and the pro-Liberal forces of his older brother Prince Pedro. ¹⁷ Grande had risen to political prominence among the Liberals by gathering support for the cause and organizing attacks on Absolutist outposts during the civil war, and now that his allies had won and established a parliamentary system he wanted to see Liberal reforms extending over the whole territory of the realm. ¹⁸ Grande turned his attention to agriculture because he knew that it was the country’s main economic activity, common to around three-quarters of the population, and he recognized that its backward practices hampered the country’s development. ¹⁹ Modernizing agriculture would be the most effective means of building an economically prosperous nation. Corvo was also strongly committed to the Liberal cause, opposing his family’s sympathies for the Absolutists, which went as far as both his father and his uncle having fought in their armies, and he found in Grande someone who understood what needed to be done to properly reform Portugal. ²⁰ Corvo’s adherence to his colleague’s ideas from at least 1848 is attested by the periodical he founded with a friend, entitled A Epoca (The Epoch), in which, among other topics, he published articles on improvements in agricultural machines and techniques, and to which Grande contributed on a regular basis. ²¹

Corvo’s contributions to the improvement of agriculture, however, were only noteworthy from the 1850s onward, in a more favorable political context. Until then, recurrent dissensions opposing left- and right-wing Liberals undermined the stability of several reforms. The resolution of the main sources of disagreement in 1852 opened an era of greater political stability known as the Regeneration (Regeneração), in which different political factions pursued the same goal of developing the country’s infrastructure as a means to foster economic growth. One of the exponents of these Saint-Simonian policies was the young military engineer António Maria Fontes Pereira de Melo (1819–87), who created the Ministry of Public Works, Trade and Industry (Ministério das Obras Públicas, Comércio e Indústria) in 1852, with the specific purpose of planning and implementing Liberal reforms on all these fronts, including agriculture. ²² Like many other Portuguese intellectuals, Corvo and Grande adhered to Fontes’s plan, and they did it because they saw an opportunity to materialize their proposals for the modernization of agriculture in this more favorable political environment.

At first Corvo played only a supporting role, as Grande had greater political influence. After the end of the civil war in 1834, Grande’s achievements in defense of the Liberal cause made him rise to prominence and become a member of the parliament. In this capacity, he had already contributed to smaller reforms in areas such as public health, the prison system, and education, as well as in agriculture. ²³ Joining the impetus for Saint-Simonian reforms brought by the political rise of Fontes, Grande took part in 1852 in the preparation of a bill on education aimed at promoting a greater reform in agriculture: the creation of technical schools providing training in agricultural professions, a necessary step to modernize agricultural practices. By the end of the year, the bill passed in parliament with the backing of Fontes, and both Corvo and Grande could now start to implement their plans. ²⁴

The new law established technical schools at elementary, intermediate, and advanced levels. One of those schools, the Agrarian Institute (Instituto Agrícola), was planned to be established in Lisbon and provide advanced training to future agronomists. Grande’s political allegiances and knowledge of botany and agronomy influenced the government’s decision to choose him as its first director, and he acquired the new function with the professorship at the Lisbon Polytechnic. ²⁵ Benefiting from Fontes’s permanent support, Grande rapidly organized the institute by remodeling an old palace to house classrooms, an agronomical library, agricultural tools, and instruments to study the properties of the soil and the climate. The lands around an old estate were also prepared to serve the practical courses, where students learned to cultivate plants with economic interest, such as vines, and to perform experiments in the hybridization and the acclimatization of some species. In 1855, Grande broadened the scope of the institute with the incorporation of the Veterinary School. The students of the Agrarian Institute had a general education in scientific subjects, as well as in management accounting, and the courses were markedly technical and explored practical applications. ²⁶ Unlike other European agricultural schools, there was no special emphasis on agricultural chemistry or plant physiology, as the aims were more modest: to make farmers adopt modern cultivation techniques and instruments. ²⁷

Corvo supported the foundation of the Agrarian Institute, since, as he had written in his newspaper A Epoca, the modernization of Portuguese agriculture “can only be achieved through instruction: without practical instruction, without persuasive examples, it is not possible to prompt farmers to transform their methods of cultivation, to abandon their old tools and the routine they have learnt from their ancestors.” ²⁸ He became directly involved in this project and was appointed to a professorship at the Agrarian Institute because he was recognized as one of the few specialists in botany and agriculture in the country. His proximity to Grande also favored this appointment, but it was Corvo’s knowledge as a specialist that ultimately determined it, since Grande would never agree with his colleague’s presence at the institute if he lacked the necessary requirements. Besides teaching, one of Corvo’s most significant contributions to the institution was the acquisition of modern agricultural devices and tools for the teaching collections in 1855, when he traveled to Paris for the Exposition Universelle. ²⁹

Corvo’s recognition as a specialist in agriculture, however, did not rely only on his teaching. In the 1850s, he was also driven to study agricultural problems that severely affected the economy of the country and the lives of its inhabitants. The first of them concerned a pest that devastated Portuguese vineyards, one of the most economically relevant cultures of the country, since wine production accounted for approximately half of all the revenues obtained in agriculture. ³⁰ The pest was a powdery mildew that prevented the maturation of the plant leaves and grapes, and frequently induced tissue necrosis, diminishing both the quantity and the quality of the wine. It had spread from London to several European states from France to Naples, and it had also been detected in Algeria, Syria, and Asia Minor. By 1853 it had affected a great part of the Portuguese territory, including the Madeira archipelago, and specialists such as Corvo and Grande feared the economic and social impact it could have on Portugal because the country’s agriculture was too dependent on wine production. ³¹ Determined to study the disease, evaluate its real impact, and try to minimize losses, Grande appointed a special commission at the Agrarian Institute, in which Corvo took part. ³² Corvo then traveled to the Madeira archipelago because the disease was particularly harsh there, and a specialist like him was needed to analyze the damaged vines and understand what caused such devastating consequences. After studying the islands’ climate, he concluded that its characteristically higher temperatures and humidity had intensified the damage, and they were so profound that he even argued for the replacement of vines by other plant species suitable to providing the inhabitants with a livelihood. ³³ In spite of Corvo’s efforts and of Grande’s action on the continental side of the kingdom, their worst fears were confirmed, as the pest devastated Portuguese wine production to such an extent that their former levels were only restored after thirty years. ³⁴

The second problem that Corvo studied concerned an old public health issue directly related to the plantation of rice fields. The way in which he was driven to study this problem, in 1859, signals an important change of perception in some members of the political elite regarding Portuguese men of science. The decision to take action against the mildew epidemic of 1853 had originated in the Royal Academy of Sciences of Lisbon, a specific institution with its own elected members and agenda. ³⁵ Corvo and Grande decided to act because they understood the substantial impact the pest was likely to have on Portuguese economy and society. By the end of the 1850s, however, it was the government that directly approached Corvo, as well as two other specialists, and recruited them to solve a public health problem that had become unavoidable. ³⁶ This commission was appointed by Fontes in 1859, who headed the most important ministry of the current government, a man whose Saint-Simonian inclinations were shared by Corvo and Grande, and to whom both had become more closely linked since the foundation of the Agrarian Institute. ³⁷ The fact that Fontes chose Corvo shows he was gaining more political prestige. During the early 1850s, Corvo had undoubtedly benefited from his closeness to Grande, who had already achieved a political prominence of his own. But such links would be insufficient to sustain a political career had he not used his knowledge in botany and agriculture to prove himself of value on important matters for the nation’s prosperity. The teaching positions he held in technoscientific schools and the fact he investigated scientific topics conferred on him sufficient authority to secure a political career. Moreover, Grande’s death in 1857 left an empty space that few other than Corvo could fill, given the scarcity of Portuguese specialists in agronomical topics, and that also favored his political rise. The study of the effects of rice fields in public health further contributed to this ascension.

For decades, the inhabitants of villages close to rice fields had been complaining, arguing the fields favored the spread of diseases characteristic of swampy areas, such as malaria. Several members of the two legislative chambers had already drawn attention to the problem in the past, but rice production continued to increase in subsequent years, thus indicating the expansion of the cultivated area. ³⁸ Landowners successfully protected their interests because rice provided them higher profits than other grains. ³⁹ Between 1858 and 1859, however, the complaints became so frequent that the government felt obliged to take action. ⁴⁰ Contrary to wine production, rice represented a small share of Portuguese agricultural revenues, accounting for less than 1 percent of the total, but the perceived nefarious consequences of its cultivation on public health gave the topic a high social relevance. ⁴¹ In order to decide if rice plantation should be heavily regulated or even abandoned, Corvo and two more specialists studied the pros and cons of rice fields. While a professor of rural engineering at the Agrarian Institute determined the extension of the fields and the watering techniques used, and the chemistry professor at the Lisbon Industrial Institute analyzed the water of the plantations, Corvo compared the public health data and calculated agricultural yield and revenues. The resulting report, published in 1860, made a clear case: rice plantations damaged public health and should be replaced by other cultures, such as corn, which would be more profitable in the long term. ⁴²

By the early 1860s, Corvo was therefore a known figure in Portuguese political circles. Through his scientific studies, he had proven his authority in agricultural matters relevant for the state’s prosperity, building his public image as a specialist and using it to rise politically. Although Fontes’s ascendency over the executive finished in the mid-1860s with the triumph of political rivals, when he returned to prominence in 1865 Corvo was elected to the parliament, and just one year later he was chosen to head the Ministry of Public Works, Trade and Industry in order to implement the reforms he had been arguing for the reorganization of the agricultural territory. ⁴³ This was his first governmental appointment of high relevance, and he used it, for example, to sign detailed laws to severely restrict rice plantation. However, the landowners’ interests prevailed in subsequent decades, and the executive did not last long, resigning at the beginning of 1868. ⁴⁴ Corvo continued to promote the modernization of agricultural practices in Portugal, namely by publishing books popularizing new and updated techniques and machines, but in the late 1860s geopolitical changes in Europe caused him to focus instead on foreign affairs. ⁴⁵

A new Portuguese colonial politics in a changing Europe

In 1868, a coup d’état overthrew Queen Isabel II of Spain (1830–1904) and rejected Bourbon rule, following a strong discontent with the inability of government institutions to solve the problems affecting the country. ⁴⁶ The members of the provisional government moved to unite Spain and Portugal, and the Portuguese King Luís I (1838–89) and his father Ferdinand II (1816–85) were asked to rule a unified Iberian state, but neither accepted. Their opposition was shared by large sectors of Portuguese public opinion, including Corvo, who feared for the likely loss of the country’s autonomy as a result. ⁴⁷ In fact, Corvo became strongly involved in preventing an Iberian unification and he was sent to Madrid as an Ambassador, between 1869 and 1870, to undermine the negotiations. ⁴⁸ Without favorable support from Portugal, the political project ultimately failed.

That such a question had arisen at the end of the 1860s is a direct result of the geopolitical transformations that had taken place in Europe in the preceding decades, with the unification of Italy and the annexation of various German-speaking territories by Prussia. ⁴⁹ Competition between great powers was becoming fiercer, and the annexation of neighboring territories had the obvious consequence of leaving smaller states in a more difficult position. When a war broke out between France and Prussia in 1870 in a nationalist thirst for power and influence over Europe, Corvo became even more apprehensive. Until Fontes’s Regeneration movement inaugurated a period of greater political stability, Corvo had lived in a country torn apart first by the hatred between Absolutists and Liberals, and, once the Liberals seized power, by the skirmishes between their factions. ⁵⁰ In particular, the conflicts and persecutions he had witnessed at a young age impressed him so much that he developed a dislike for war and his family’s Absolutist sympathies. He had been educated in schools with a strong military influence, but that was only due to his family ties to the army, and he never pursued a military career. ⁵¹ In 1870, Corvo thought that the expansionist policies of Prussia, led by the astute Bismarck, were setting a dangerous precedent in clear violation of the new European diplomacy pursued since the end of the Napoleonic Wars. The imminent rise of a powerful and vast German Empire constituted an important turning point in the European balance of power, which in Corvo’s opinion was threatening agreements that had transformed great armed conflicts into distant memories. By the late 1860s, Corvo had therefore realized that striving for the modernization of Portuguese agriculture was insufficient to guarantee a bright future for his nation. He needed to act at a broader political level because that was the only way of securing the place of Portugal on the international chessboard of European politics. Imbued with this sense of urgency, Corvo published in late 1870 the booklet Perigos (Dangers), in which he warned against the nationalistic appeals that were being used for the mobilization of foreign peoples: ⁵² “Given the current situation, will the project of maintaining the German part of the Austrian Empire separated from the German Empire still hold?” ⁵³ Was it unlikely that Russia’s appetite for power would not lead it to emulate Prussia in mobilizing existing nationalist sentiments from Slavic peoples in Eastern Europe for the benefit of the expansion of its own empire? Was not this geopolitical strategy openly aggressive and could it not ultimately lead to an armed conflict with Germany? “Although there is peace today, war will arrive tomorrow,” concluded Corvo, rather gloomily and wishing to leave a strong impression on the minds of fellow politicians. ⁵⁴

A new attitude in foreign politics therefore had to be taken by Portuguese politicians to secure the country’s independence. In Corvo’s opinion, the most immediate concern was to counterbalance the fact that Portugal was a small state. As he emphasized dramatically in the opening pages of his booklet, “amidst universal danger, the danger for the smaller nations is immense. Where only force dominates, the weak are sacrificed to the brutal greed of the strong.” ⁵⁵ Corvo argued that Portuguese foreign politics should follow a dual strategy. Firstly, it was necessary to establish alliances with European nations of similar political importance, like Belgium. Securing the autonomy of smaller states was a political and diplomatic imperative in Europe because they could act as geographical barriers to the unbridled expansionist intents of powerful empires. Having similar political weights, none of these smaller countries could dominate the others, and their independence would be consequently reaffirmed. Secondly, Portugal should sign economic treaties with great powers such as Britain, by taking advantage of the history of good diplomatic relations between both countries. A network of mutual agreements further replicated throughout Europe would dispel rivalries and maintain peace. ⁵⁶

In 1871, a new government formed by Fontes and other members of the center-right Regenerator Party (Partido Regenerador) appointed Corvo as Minister of Foreign Affairs, a vote of confidence on his plan for Portuguese foreign policy. In subsequent years, however, disagreements over Portuguese rule and associated commercial privileges in colonial areas of interest in the African continent awakened diplomatic conflicts with Britain, forcing Corvo to pay closer attention to the Portuguese colonial space. The conquest of overseas territories by Portugal had started in the early fifteenth century in North Africa, but it was not until its last decades that it spread along the southern part of the continent with the establishment of various trading posts. Reaching India at the end of the century, the Portuguese succeeded in the following decades in monopolizing the spice trade and accumulated great commercial gains. ⁵⁷ This period of maritime expansion, known as the Age of Discovery, was considered a golden, almost mythical era for Portugal, when an empire was forged under the guidance of ambitious political leaders. In spite of the loss of political and commercial importance in the following centuries, Portugal still maintained colonies in Africa, the largest being Angola and Mozambique, though the occupied parts of the territories were essentially restricted to narrow coastal areas. ⁵⁸

Diplomatic conflicts with Britain regarding African territories, however, did not start only after Corvo became Minister of Foreign Affairs. One of the most recent before his appointment concerned Bolama, an island of Guinea-Bissau, then a Portuguese colony, strategically placed on the western coast of Africa. British forces had occupied it, claiming that the Portuguese had failed to effectively colonize and occupy the island. After diplomatic conversations, both countries agreed to submitting the question to the arbitration of a third party, the United States of America. Based on the priority claims presented by Portugal, president Ulysses S. Grant (1822–85) favored Portuguese rule in 1870 and Britain had no other option but to accept the decision. ⁵⁹ But in 1871 the stakes went higher when the British government contested the authority of Portuguese sovereignty over Delagoa Bay, a region located on the coast of Mozambique well-suited to becoming one of the most important harbors in Eastern Africa. Again favoring diplomatic solutions, Corvo proposed another international arbitrage. After a period of discussion, the question was submitted to the president of France, Marshal Patrice de MacMahon (1808–93), who in 1875 supported Portugal’s priority, as president Grant had done before. ⁶⁰ Similar disputes continued in subsequent years. For example, India’s viceroy contested the commercial privileges retained by Portugal in Surat in 1872, a decision obviously backed up by the British government. ⁶¹ Tension was beginning to strain a long diplomacy of alliances and treaties between Britain and Portugal, thus threatening Corvo’s plans.

In spite of his cautious foreign policy, Corvo was prompted by internal challenges to take a more direct action regarding colonial policies. A segment of the Portuguese intellectual elite became apprehensive with what they saw as weak and defensive governmental responses to successive foreign advances. Such apprehensions heightened around mid-1875, as several European states gathered in Paris for the second International Geographical Congress, trying to define concrete lines of action for the colonization of African territories, and the reconnaissance of unexplored areas in the heart of the continent. The news brought by the Portuguese envoy to the congress inflamed the patriotic feelings of some who thought their home country was on the verge of losing overseas territories, in particular the lands around the Congo River, a region that was said to possess important resources. ⁶² In order to lobby the government for the adoption of expansionist policies in Africa, a group of personalities founded the Geographical Society of Lisbon in 1875. ⁶³ Geographical societies had already been founded in Britain, France, and Russia decades earlier, motivated by scientific interests and colonial aspirations. Obviously, the emphasis on geographical exploration was by no means incidental, for it was crucial to the economic exploitation and political control of territories of interest. Given the growing prestige of science, the need to expand scientific knowledge endowed colonialist intents with a respectable aura. ⁶⁴

Fearful of the influence the Geographical Society of Lisbon might have in undermining his careful political and economic negotiations with more powerful nations, Corvo also headed the Ministry of the Navy and Overseas Territories between September 1875 and March 1877 in order to create a rival consultative body on colonial matters, the Central and Permanent Geographical Commission (Comissão Central Permanente de Geografia). ⁶⁵ Contrary to the Geographical Society of Lisbon, which functioned as a private institution, every member of the Geographical Commission was appointed by the Navy Minister, who also headed it and always had the final word in any decision. ⁶⁶ This was a fundamental difference that separated the two institutions, even though in practice they shared goals, and also several members.

By 1876, when the Geographical Commission was founded, it was clear that colonial politics was going to dominate Portuguese foreign affairs in the coming years. Although in 1870 Corvo had not anticipated the importance it would acquire, he rapidly understood its significance for the maintenance of Portugal’s independence. Given the growing asymmetries between smaller and vaster European states, a colonial empire stood out as a symbol of a country’s influence in the world and could be used to confer prestige at an international level, thus compensating Portugal’s small scale, limited industrialization and low economic competitiveness. Of course, this was by no means the only motivation for securing territories in Africa. Corvo also wanted to make them profitable to the metropolis by creating a colonial labor market in which forced labor was inscribed in the law to ensure that Africans would fit into any plans of economic development in the colonies, a strategy whose legitimacy rested, so it was argued, in the need to civilize backward and idle ways of life. ⁶⁷ This last aim was particularly relevant, since it provided a logical justification for reinforcing colonial rule and eventually expanding it. By then it was evident that Portugal could not rely indefinitely on the argument of historical priority to claim authority over African territories of interest. As competition between European powers increased, it would not be long until authority was solely appreciated in terms of the effective occupation of the territories.

Making use of the Geographical Commission, Corvo succeeded in monopolizing the discussion around Portuguese colonial policies. His knowledge in scientific subjects made him aware of the ways in which science and technology could be mobilized to effectively colonize the hinterland of Angola and Mozambique, Portugal’s biggest African colonies, and he launched two campaigns to this end. The first consisted of approving substantial loans to send an expedition of metropolitan engineers to the colonies, whose mission was to build infrastructures that proved the nation was investing in its African territories. ⁶⁸ The second campaign dealt with the organization of a grand scientific expedition to gather geographical data on the much coveted and essentially unknown regions around the river Congo, or between the colonies of Angola and Mozambique, mirroring what explorers such as Verney Lovett Cameron (1844–94) had been doing in Africa. ⁶⁹ Such information would be of paramount importance to claiming authority over these yet unclaimed territories and to identifying their economic potential. However, it was not easy to reach a consensus in the Geographical Commission, since some of the members thought that a small expedition with very precise political and commercial objectives would be more useful and realistic. ⁷⁰ The discussions delayed a decision, and a political crisis that forced the government to resign in March 1877 threatened to undermine the project, but the new Navy Minister kept it, with some changes. Although the exploration of the river Congo was still contemplated, its main aims were now explicitly commercial and political, and the scientific studies to be carried out would concentrate only on the geography of other rivers running through Angola’s hinterland. ⁷¹ After some debate, the army captain Alexandre de Serpa Pinto (1846–1900) and the navy officers Hermenegildo de Brito Capelo (1841–1917) and Roberto Ivens (1850–98) were appointed to lead the expedition and sailed to Africa in July 1877. ⁷²

Both campaigns initiated by Corvo had limited success. The scientific expedition to Africa had a severe setback shortly after the three explorers reached Angola. Henry Morton Stanley (1841–1904) had just finished an expedition across the continent during which he had studied the river Congo, forcing the Portuguese explorers to abandon the most scientifically relevant part of their expedition. ⁷³ Worse still, carriers were hard to find and tensions began to build between Pinto, Capelo, and Ivens. Pinto was ambitious and proposed replacing the exploration of the river Congo with a journey from Angola to the coast of Mozambique, but Capelo and Ivens held that they should stick to the initial plan. Tension grew as Capelo and Ivens did not trust Pinto’s decisions, which seriously risked jeopardizing the expedition, and they eventually decided to separate from Pinto, leaving him free to pursue the difficult task of crossing the continent. ⁷⁴ He failed, as expected, and were it not for the assistance provided by the French missionary François Coillard (1834–1904) and his wife, Pinto would not have survived. ⁷⁵

Although Capelo and Ivens collected relevant geographical, meteorological, geological, zoological, and botanical data, they traveled across a relatively small area of Angola and made no scientifically significant discoveries. It would be hard to impress an international audience with so little. The mission of the Portuguese engineers in Africa also achieved little, and the attacks it suffered in the legislative chambers for being wasteful led to the reduction of the funds allocated to it, until they were altogether eliminated in 1879. ⁷⁶

Corvo also took more specific and somewhat less costly initiatives that functioned essentially as propaganda on behalf of Portugal’s image as a colonizing nation, aimed at impressing European powers. Publicizing a respectable image of the country was all the more relevant as the prestigious explorer Cameron accused the government of complicity with the enslavement of Africans in its colonies, or at least of the inability to punish it. ⁷⁷ The importance of publishing and promoting works about the colonies had been explicitly stated in the regulations of the Geographical Commission, ⁷⁸ and one of its first significant decisions was the publication of a book on Angolan birds, in 1877. ⁷⁹ Its author was Bocage, a zoologist, member of the Geographical Commission, and a colleague of Corvo at the Lisbon Polytechnic School. Bocage’s contribution to the promotion of an imperialist image of his country was by no means accidental, for his work had been increasingly dependent on the colonial links between Portugal and Africa. It was the existence of such links that allowed him to play important political roles in the 1880s.

Barbosa du Bocage: from zoological studies to politics

Bocage (Figure 2) was born in 1823. He studied medicine in the University of Coimbra between 1839 and 1846, and he worked as a physician for a brief period in Lisbon. As Bocage had no great interest in this profession, in 1848 he applied to a more promising position as substitute professor of zoology at the Lisbon Polytechnic School. He was chosen, and only three years elapsed before his promotion to a full professorship at the young age of 28 years, following the death of his former colleague. ⁸⁰ In this capacity, the ambitious Bocage tried by all means to start a career as a naturalist, but this was no easy task. In mid-nineteenth-century Portugal, academic research was generally seen as a superfluous activity that diverted the professor’s attention from his main function of teaching. Such a notion was strong in schools like the Lisbon Polytechnic, which had been founded to spread technoscientific knowledge with direct relevance to practical questions. ⁸¹ For this reason, there were few, if any, Portuguese zoologists carrying out research in this field consistently, and Bocage was forced to build a career almost from scratch.

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Figure 2.

Portrait of Barbosa du Bocage at an older age. In Baltasar Osório, J. V. Barboza du Bocage (Lisboa: Imprensa Libanio da Silva, 1915).

Since zoological research could not be easily pursued at the Lisbon Polytechnic, Bocage devised a plan to legitimize it. Aware that the Royal Academy of Sciences of Lisbon had a museum of natural history that lacked sufficient space, funds, personnel, and a competent director, he sought to transfer it to the Lisbon Polytechnic, where he could redefine its mission to serve his interests. ⁸² Some members of the Academy opposed this plan, but continued pressure during the 1850s ultimately decided for it in 1858. ⁸³ Bocage sought to follow the best museum practices, and to this end in 1859 he visited important museums of natural history throughout Europe, such as the Muséum d’Histoire Naturelle in Paris, the British Museum (Natural History), and similar institutions in Madrid, Bordeaux, Leiden, Strasbourg, Brussels, and Frankfurt. He also made contacts with zoologists, explorers, natural history dealers, and owners of private collections. ⁸⁴ Bocage understood that the relatively small number of naturalists in Europe, and the great distances between them, brought the necessity of fostering bonds across nations. To build a career in zoology meant to become a part of this international network of specialists, and traveling was a means of introducing oneself to it. ⁸⁵ Additionally, he also acquired collections for the new Lisbon museum, benefiting mostly from donations from the Paris Muséum.

After returning to Lisbon, Bocage started to reorganize the collections that were in the Academy of Sciences with the help of books he had ordered, and prepared a complete reform of the institution to overcome its severe deficiencies. He proposed to the government the expansion of the museum’s budget to account for paid naturalists to study collections of different groups of animals, a competent staff to prepare specimens for display, and the exploration of the largely unknown Portuguese fauna. These requirements were generally accepted, and the new National Museum of Lisbon was created in 1862 with Bocage as the director of its Zoological Section. ⁸⁶ Relocated to the newer and bigger building of the Lisbon Polytechnic by the end of 1863, it had plenty of space to expand and become a prestigious institution. ⁸⁷ Bocage had the Paris Muséum as an ideal in mind, but he knew it would be impossible to achieve it, since the government did not have scientific research as one of its funding priorities. In fact, it had established a paid position for only one naturalist, something clearly insufficient to allow for the classification of even the main zoological types. ⁸⁸ Nevertheless, Bocage could now justify his scientific researches with the necessity of taking care of a national institution. Distrusting speculative theories, especially the claims of the naturalists influenced by the German Naturphilosophie, he confined himself to describing and classifying animal specimens, following Cuvier’s methodology and views on the fundamental distinction between the four animal types. ⁸⁹

A final condition had to be met so that Bocage could pursue a career in zoology: he needed plenty of zoological specimens to study. Bocage’s responsibilities as zoology teacher and in the administration of the National Museum, aside from the work he performed as a naturalist, kept him busy and left little time to do zoological explorations in Portugal. He therefore focused on finding people who liked to contribute in their spare time to collecting animals and sending them to the museum, and found several during a three-month period of travel he undertook in 1862. In order to make sure they followed the necessary requirements, he wrote a book with instructions and distributed it. ⁹⁰ This strategy was so successful that Bocage discovered new species and published his findings in prestigious journals of the international zoological community. ⁹¹ By 1865, he had already established a network of collaborators throughout Portugal and he was receiving specimens from various regions, but contributions were also arriving from other parts of the world. Bocage took advantage of the Portuguese colonial network to get access to exotic specimens by writing a formal request to the then Minister of the Navy and Overseas Territories, who transmitted it to the governors of the Portuguese colonies. This was Bocage’s first contact with the Portuguese colonial sphere, and his interest in zoology had been the means. ⁹²

Among the shipments that had flowed from Africa, India, China, and even Timor to the National Museum, one of the largest consignments had been sent from Angola by Francisco António Pinheiro Baião (1833–83), an army officer with a personal interest in natural history. Trusting in Baião’s abilities and gathering support from the Navy Minister, Bocage asked him to undertake extensive zoological explorations in Angola on behalf of the Portuguese crown. Baião, however, declined the invitation and suggested instead José de Anchieta (c.1832–97), his friend and former fellow student at the Lisbon Polytechnic School, who was then also in Angola. ⁹³ Anchieta had taken scientific courses in several Portuguese and foreign institutions, but he never completed any degree and was more excited by the prospects of traveling to distant places to explore their unknown zoological riches. It was most probably for this reason that he had traveled to Angola, collecting and shipping specimens to the National Museum at his own expense. ⁹⁴ In 1866, Bocage was sufficiently impressed by Anchieta’s contributions that he proposed an official contract binding him to explore Angolan fauna on behalf of the Portuguese crown for at least four years. Anchieta agreed to work as a professional naturalist, a situation that perfectly suited his interest in living an adventurous life and his eccentric personality; Anchieta was a man for whom daily routine and social conventions had little importance. After receiving some training at the National Museum, he traveled again to Angola, now on an official mission. ⁹⁵ This partnership proved to be successful, with Anchieta traveling extensively throughout various regions during decades and shipping hundreds of animals to Lisbon, especially reptiles and birds, ultimately becoming the most important of Bocage’s collaborators. It was thus solely due to his scientific interests that Bocage became linked to Portuguese colonialism, and this fact was essential to building a career as a naturalist and to achieving international acclaim as a specialist in African fauna. His career would have been very different were it not for Anchieta’s unrelenting dedication.

Bocage favored the maintenance of the Portuguese colonies because he obtained most of his zoological specimens through colonial networks, but he also had patriotic sentiments and he wanted his nation to thrive under Liberal rulers. Bocage and his family had supported the Liberals for decades, and they fled Portugal fearing retaliations from the Absolutist ruler Prince Miguel, who seized power in 1828, only to return in 1834 after the end of the Portuguese Liberal Wars. Bocage had even joined the academic battalion that fought against a conservative Portuguese government in the civil war between 1846 and 1847, when he was about to graduate in medicine. ⁹⁶ He and Corvo belonged to the same generation of patriots who wanted to modernize their country through technoscientific knowledge and who saw imperialism as an effective means of renewing its national identity. It was thus in a mix of personal interest and patriotic sense of duty that Bocage joined the movement for the foundation of the Geographical Society of Lisbon, and supported Corvo’s action in the Geographical Commission, to which he was elected, arguing for a grand scientific expedition to Africa. ⁹⁷

At the same time, Bocage’s work also benefited from his participation in the discussions around Portuguese colonialism. By taking advantage of the fact that Corvo, his friend and colleague from the Lisbon Polytechnic School, had headed the Navy Ministry since 1875, Bocage succeeded in having the publication of a book on Angolan birds supported by the government. The first volume was released in 1877, and when the final version appeared in 1881 it comprised almost 600 pages and ten lavishly colored plates, which had been commissioned to the famous bird illustrator Johannes Gerardus Keulemans (1842–1912). ⁹⁸ In 1877, Bocage had already classified thousands of specimens, including a number of new species, and was an internationally respected naturalist, ⁹⁹ but the book was far from being a mere tribute to his scientific capacities. The government had never spent so much on a scientific publication, and even a modest increase in the budget of the National Museum of Lisbon was frequently resisted, despite Bocage’s recurrent requests. ¹⁰⁰ The book was published to give the impression that Portugal consistently studied its African territories, using science to shed light on the ‘dark continent’ and contributing to the ‘civilizing mission’ pursued by the main European powers, thus having a rightful claim to them, one which went beyond any historical priority. It was written in French, in order to be easily read by an educated audience anywhere in Europe, and it was not only offered to science academies and museums of natural history, but also to geographical societies in London, Paris, and Brussels, among others, with a clear propagandistic intent. ¹⁰¹ Additionally, Bocage and other naturalists of the National Museum of Lisbon also studied the limited number of zoological specimens collected during Pinto’s, Capelo’s, and Ivens’s scientific expedition, the main aim of which was to study the geography of the African hinterland. The findings were published in the relatively recent Portuguese periodical Jornal de Sciencias Mathematicas, Physicas e Naturaes (Journal of Mathematical, Physical and Natural Sciences), which was customarily sent to institutions such as the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University, the British Museum (Natural History), or the Paris Muséum. The travels of the Portuguese explorers were thus publicized in the zoological community, since the most relevant discoveries were always written in French. ¹⁰² Francisco Manuel de Melo Breyner (1837–1903), the Count of Ficalho, the substitute professor of botany at the Lisbon Polytechnic School, and a colleague of Bocage and Corvo, also published botanical studies on plants collected by Pinto in a prestigious periodical to publicize the African expedition. ¹⁰³ This research was meant to give a favorable image of Portugal, but in reality it had a relatively small political impact. Portuguese politicians had to turn to other strategies if they wanted their colonial claims to be taken seriously in the international arena.

Bocage thus became actively involved in Portuguese colonial politics from the late 1870s onward, taking part in the discussions on how to best defend Portuguese interests in Africa. Although he still devoted much of his time to zoology, he started to take on more political responsibilities as he was elected president of the Geographical Society in 1877, and a member of parliament two years later. During this period, Corvo again headed the Ministry of Foreign Affairs when the Regenerator Party returned to power in 1878, but he became unpopular due to the negotiation of a treaty in which several economic and diplomatic advantages were conceded to Britain, a perceived antipatriotic deal for public opinion. After the fall of the government in 1879, Corvo never returned to a prominent political position. ¹⁰⁴ Nevertheless, this did not entail the failure of Corvo’s colonial plans. In 1883, when the Regenerator Party had already formed another government, Bocage provided a kind of continuity to Corvo’s vision as he relied on his predecessor’s political advice while he headed the same ministries Corvo had headed. ¹⁰⁵

Bocage was drawn to the Regenerator Party because of his personal and professional proximity to Corvo, mirroring what had happened before to Corvo thanks to Grande. He followed closely the discussion of Portuguese colonial policies and contributed to it while he served as president of the Geographical Society of Lisbon between 1877 and 1883. However, the reason that Bocage was an unusually important political asset was the fact that he had been receiving first-hand information on the functioning of the Portuguese colonies since 1866 through correspondence with Anchieta, his best scientific collaborator. In the letters, in addition to observations on the climate, geography, and natural history of the regions he explored, Anchieta frequently included remarks on the colonial administration, the agency of colonial authorities, the characteristics of the peoples he encountered, or the moves of foreign explorers. ¹⁰⁶ Although Bocage never set a foot in Africa, few Portuguese would be more aware of their country’s colonial reality, especially on the Angolan coast and its hinterland. It was because Bocage could see Africa’s opportunities and limitations through Anchieta’s eyes that he achieved political prominence, being ultimately chosen to head the Ministry of the Navy and Overseas Territories in 1883 and initiate an extensive reorganization of the entire Portuguese colonial system. ¹⁰⁷ During his mandate, Bocage reorganized the Portuguese navy and pushed forward reforms in the colonial army, taxes, and maritime transportation. ¹⁰⁸ Corvo had also been compiling information on the colonies dispersed through books, governmental dispositions, and colonial administrators’ reports, which he certainly shared with Bocage to help him in his task. ¹⁰⁹

Before the end of 1883, important events led Bocage to be transferred to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a decision he deplored but eventually accepted for patriotic reasons. ¹¹⁰ The European powers had started to give concrete expression to their imperialist intentions over Africa, which rapidly developed into a scramble that grew with increasingly nationalist rivalries. The technological improvements of the past decades, such as the development of faster means of communication and more powerful weapons, gave Europeans an unprecedented advantage over Africans. One of the first open conflicts had begun with a dispute between Britain and France over Egypt in 1880, but more conflicts resulting from competing interests ensued in other regions. ¹¹¹ By 1883, the European powers were now preparing to reclaim a part of the much coveted lands surrounding the Congo River. In the midst of such a struggle for power Portugal was in a delicate position, since it was conducting risky diplomatic negotiations with Britain in the hope that its authority would be recognized over at least some of the Congo regions, and any foreign advances blocked. France had already established scientific outposts along the Congo margins and Belgium had created the Association International Africaine, an organization created under the pretext of promoting scientific missions in the ‘heart of Africa’, but in reality used by the Belgian King Leopold II (1835–1909) to legitimize an imperialist takeover of that area.

Although Portugal did sign a treaty with Britain in February 1883, which recognized Portuguese colonial authority in the Congo region, ¹¹² this was only the first step of a necessarily tortuous formal negotiation with other nations if full recognition was to be achieved in the international arena. In this context, Bocage was a good candidate to conduct the important diplomatic negotiations that ensued, not only because of his knowledge of the Portuguese colonial reality, but also on the grounds of his scientific prestige. In 1883, Bocage had a long career with international relevance as a zoologist, being one of the leading experts on African birds and reptiles, and corresponded with several naturalists from foreign institutions. ¹¹³ Bocage’s respectability as a man of science made him look like a trustworthy mediator between the local Portuguese context and the global European space. To be sure, that alone would not be sufficient for the international acceptance of Portuguese colonial claims, but it could nevertheless be used as an asset in diplomatic conversations.

The partition of the lands around the Congo River entailed, as expected, many obstacles. Before the British–Portuguese treaty was ratified in the parliaments of each country, the French government criticized its validity. ¹¹⁴ Eager to block any colonial advance of either Britain or its allied nations, Bismarck’s Prussia followed. ¹¹⁵ In order to prevent the escalation of the dispute, Bocage and other diplomats agreed to discuss these matters at an international conference. On Bismarck’s insistence, the meeting was held in Berlin in late 1884, with the main aim of deciding which countries deserved to rule over the lands around the Congo River, but ultimately bringing together more nations with colonial interests. The Portuguese government sent an official delegation composed of men well versed in African geography and who knew its potentialities, thus being prone to defend Portuguese colonial claims. Bocage was absent from the delegation, probably for health issues, but he sent instead his son, Carlos Roma du Bocage (1853–1918), a military engineer who was carefully instructed on colonial matters by him and reported back every important detail. ¹¹⁶ Despite all efforts, the members of the Portuguese delegation could hardly make themselves heard and influence the plans of more powerful European nations. Through the Association International Africaine and backed by Bismarck, Leopold II succeeded in having recognized the independence of an extensive territory in the ‘heart of Africa’, which he reclaimed for Belgium. Portugal was left with a comparably much smaller region on the south bank of the Congo River and the enclave of Cabinda. It was a sound defeat. Even worse, the conference had asserted the necessity of effective colonization of a territory in order to ensure a country’s authority over it. Although formally restricted only to coastal areas, it was a matter of time before this deliberation would be extended to the African hinterland. Long gone were the times where priority and historical right would suffice for the assertion of colonial claims. The Scramble for Africa now had new rules, and Portugal would either play by them or risk losing even more.

In the months that followed the international conference in Berlin, Bocage’s attention was directed at the last African territory that might be secured for the Portuguese crown: the region that linked the two colonies of Angola and Mozambique. The British also had an interest in it, since it formed the missing geographical bridge in the strategic route from Cape to Cairo, and this required the negotiations to be again done very carefully by Portugal. Bocage succeeded in striking a deal with France on the recognition of Portuguese authority over this region after some concessions, and his successor in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did the same with Germany in late 1886. ¹¹⁷ British protests to such resolutions were already manifest by 1887, but the Portuguese government continued its colonial policy, sending military forces to occupy and demarcate specific regions between Angola and Mozambique. The tension built between the two nations in the following years, and in January 1890 the British diplomats sent an ultimatum to the Portuguese government demanding immediate retreat from the African hinterland. Fearing the menace of a war that could never be won, the Portuguese government conceded. The decision sparked an anti-Britain wave of protests in Portugal, which entailed an acute political crisis. ¹¹⁸ A special executive had to be put together to solve the diplomatic crisis and Bocage was forced, once again, to head the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and conduct the negotiations, which were only completed in 1891. ¹¹⁹

Renewing Portugal’s national identity through imperialism

In August 1891, as the political and diplomatic crisis caused by the British ultimatum had been followed by the financial crisis of 1891–2, the famous Portuguese writer Eça de Queirós stated rather dramatically, “I believe that Portugal is over. … It is almost certain that the disappearance of the kingdom of Portugal will be the great fin de siècle tragedy.” ¹²⁰ The crises had shaken the country’s national identity, and the loss of African territories long associated with Portugal’s sphere of influence since the Age of Discovery was no smaller part of the nationalist angst of the time. Colonies were seen as important elements for securing the country’s independence in a Europe where the gulf between stronger and weaker states was getting bigger, because they stood as a symbol of power and influence in the world. Every powerful European nation had or craved influence over African territories to extract economic benefits from its resources and to block the expansion of its rivals. As long as Portugal maintained its own, so it was thought, it could at least be respected by stronger nations in spite of its small political relevance. This necessity provides an explanation for the relatively sudden attention of Portuguese foreign affairs to Africa from the mid-1870s onwards. In the preceding decades colonialism roused little political interest, since the priority was to modernize metropolitan infrastructure and to develop its economy so that the country would become prosperous. ¹²¹ This was the plan of Fontes’s Regeneration, which aimed at transforming Portugal’s national identity according to the Saint-Simonian gospel of progress. Once great powers such as Britain started to challenge Portuguese rule over African territories, Fontes’s Regeneration was no longer sufficient to renew the country’s identity, and imperialism became a powerful ideology with which to strengthen the identity of a small country in a changing Europe.

Two of the most important defenders of Portuguese sovereignty in Africa, Corvo and Bocage, both had a scientific background and devoted a significant part of their time to scientific studies. Their proximity to political agents facilitated their introduction in Portuguese political circles, but it was ultimately due to their expertise in scientific matters that they were offered political offices of relevance. Corvo’s studies of agricultural problems of economic and social relevance, as well as his work in the teaching of agricultural sciences and botany, built his image of a specialist, giving him the prestige he needed to be appointed to a political office in which he could plan the reform of the country’s agricultural territory. This appointment was not related to the organization of the Portuguese colonial sphere, but as major geopolitical changes in Europe took place Corvo turned his attention to colonial politics, since he considered the maintenance of the Portuguese colonies to be more important for the future of the country. Bocage, on the other hand, approached politics because his scientific work became closely interwoven with Portuguese colonialism. The correspondence he exchanged with his collaborator Anchieta provided him with valuable information to plan colonial policies. Through his participation in the discussions of the Geographical Society of Lisbon and of the Geographical Commission, Bocage was recognized as an authority in colonial politics, and this recognition led to his appointment to political offices of direct relevance to Portuguese colonialism. It is therefore clear that Corvo and Bocage would not have been chosen to head such ministries if they had not devoted their time to their specific botanical and agricultural, or zoological studies. This specificity explains why they were the only Portuguese personalities with such scientific backgrounds to reach ministries in which Portuguese colonialist strategies were planned. ¹²²

Corvo’s scientific education allowed him to better appreciate the potential of science for political goals such as planning Portuguese colonial policies. Influenced by the same Saint-Simonian inclinations as Grande and Fontes, Corvo sent a team of engineers to Africa to transform its territory. He thought that the application of technoscientific knowledge in the building of the infrastructures characteristic of the modern nation-states was the best way to show to more powerful European countries that Portugal took care of its colonies, and therefore had the right to rule them. It was also his understanding of the political usefulness of science that led him to organize a scientific expedition to Africa and to sponsor the publication of Bocage’s research on African birds. It is unlikely that these initiatives would be put forward by someone who did not have Corvo’s scientific background. Contrary to Corvo, Bocage reached important political offices at a moment in which competition between European powers was fierce and practical measures had to be rapidly taken. There was no time to implement projects that would only yield concrete results in the long term. For this reason, Bocage had to resort mainly to diplomatic negotiations to secure Portuguese colonialist claims. The prestige he derived from his scientific studies certainly gave him an advantage in such negotiations, but it would never be enough to overcome the intense pressure of the European powers during the partition of Africa.

Unlike more powerful nations, Portugal was in a difficult economic and financial situation, relying mostly on loans and foreign investment to boost its economy. The country could hardly sustain public works and great scientific expeditions to Africa, the establishment of scientific and commercial outposts, or the agricultural development of a significant part of the colonial territory. For these reasons, the political efforts of Corvo and Bocage did not have the results they wanted. ¹²³ However, their action should not be underestimated. Despite the significant losses in terms of colonial territories claimed, Portugal still managed to maintain quite large areas such as Angola and Mozambique, which were still too vast to be easily controlled from the metropolitan center. These colonialist gains would undoubtedly have been smaller were it not for Bocage’s and Corvo’s decisive diplomacy in the international arena.