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The Second Reign: At Last, a Nation in the Tropics
The idea of crowning Dom Pedro II in 1843, before he came of age (eighteen years old, according to the constitution), was by now an open secret. After all, the elites had been urging his ascension to the throne since 1835. But the process gathered momentum from 1840 when the liberal deputies opposed to Araújo Lima’s regency – the majority Club – confronted the Senate, demanding that young Pedro II assume the throne. Strange to think that after all the rebellions during the regency period, all the revolts in favour of a republic and the general atmosphere of radicalization, the solution – incredible as it may seem – was to strengthen the monarchy and reaffirm the centralization of power in Rio de Janeiro.
Meanwhile the young prince was kept in the palace, unaware of the government’s plans and with little understanding of the urgency of the political situation. In a report dated March 1840, Pedro Araújo Lima related one of his conversations with the young monarch. According to the regent, when Dom Pedro was consulted about the possibility of announcing his majority, he answered: ‘Actually I haven’t thought about it.’1 The official version of the conversation was rather different: when consulted the young monarch allegedly replied ‘Let it be at once!’, revealing an emotional maturity that is hard to credit. Thus began the process of constructing an image for the emperor that was to last until his death: a monarch who was always calm, who chose his words with caution and was decisive on political issues, supposedly above politics, and who had come to redeem the nation. According to reports of the time, with the possible exception of his build – he had long, slender legs – and his strident voice, he represented the incarnation of a European king. Physically he resembled the Habsburgs – pronounced chin, very blue eyes, white skin and straight blonde hair – in contrast to the subjects of his kingdom, the majority of whom were black, mulatto or mestizo.
Newspapers and pamphlets distributed in Rio unceasingly praised the prodigious qualities of the young Pedro: his education, intelligence, culture, the classical and modern languages he spoke, and his skill at riding and fencing. Thus Brazil’s second monarch – the longest-reigning and most popular – took the throne in the midst of a theatrical promotion of his precocious maturity. His adult clothes, his fame as a multilingual philosopher and his equanimity all contributed to his projected image as a great monarch: the mirror opposite of his father. Everything was thus ready for the ritualistic consecration and coronation of Dom Pedro II.
A SPECTACLE WORTHY OF GREAT KINGS
The day fixed for the festivities was 16 July 1841 and Rio de Janeiro woke up once again ready to celebrate. Dressed de rigueur, the entire court waited for the ritual to begin. A pamphlet specially printed for the occasion – Arrangements for the Coronation of His Majesty the Emperor – gave the details of the ceremony with which the state intended to display all the grandiosity of the empire and mark the beginning of a new era. The booklet of ten pages, distributed all around the town, gave a description of the three parts of the ceremony – the procession, the coronation and the reception, including the rules of etiquette for the banquet. The ritual began at midday, involving hundreds of people, each of whom joined the procession at a given moment with a specific role, each one having his moment of glory. Officers from the cavalry, carriages and archers filed by, to the occasional roar of cannon salutes. It was all flawlessly planned to be both seductive and intimidating.
The calendar of events was carefully laid out: the order of proceedings for the coronation, the day for receiving tributes, the night for the city to be illuminated, the visit to the São Pedro de Alcântara theatre and, finally, the grand ball. The public coffers were ransacked to pay for it all. The whole town became a massive depository for wood, cloth, glass, paint and tools, while the streets teemed with carpenters, painters, firework-makers, fashion designers, artists and their apprentices. Manuel de Araújo Porto-Alegre, an architect and painter, was commissioned to design a special building – the famous Veranda – from where Dom Pedro II would wave to the people after his coronation. Following tradition, the monument was to be an expression of the excellence of the regime, of the authority of the governor, and of the mutual trust between the prince and his subjects.
Marc Ferrez, one of the artists who had come from France during the reign of Dom João VI, was commissioned to make the sculptures for the occasion. Chandeliers, candleholders, orbs, lamps, inscriptions, engravings, wallpaper, gold-plated ornaments, gold and silver goblets, embroidery, lace, velvet, damask and silks, and tapestries. These are some of the items included in the document describing the Veranda.2 The building was so large it occupied the entire space between the Royal Palace and the Imperial Chapel. It was decorated with allegories representing the hopes and expectations for the new reign. The area at the centre of the building where Dom Pedro II was to take his seat after the coronation was called the ‘temple’, lending the event the aura of a religious ritual with a divine presence. Inscribed over the two pavilions on either side were the words ‘Amazonas’ and ‘Prata’3 in tribute to the two rivers marking the northern and southern frontiers of the country, each represented by a colossal statue. Two lions – symbolizing Strength and Power – stood at the foot of the staircase that led from the Prata Pavilion down to the Imperial Chapel. On the upper floor all the images were taken from Antiquity: chariots, a triumphal carriage, statues of Justice and Wisdom, and an inscription that read ‘God protect the Emperor of Brazil’. The throne room was inside the temple. In the middle of the ceiling, in plasterwork, the Emperor Dom Pedro I – with a halo of stars symbolizing his immortality – was depicted handing the crowns of Portugal4 and Brazil to his two children.5
There was much more. In the allegory representing Brazil, the country’s coat of arms was depicted in gold, and at the feet of Portugal lay the laurels of her past glory. The provinces of the empire were represented by stars against a blue background, where the signs of the zodiac through which the sun was passing on the date of the prince’s birth and of his accession to the throne – Sagittarius and Cancer – were also depicted. Large medallions representing Charlemagne, Francis I, Napoleon and Peter the Great, all of whom had founded empires, stood as symbols for the destiny of Brazil’s new emperor. Beside them the coats of arms of Portugal and Austria were displayed side by side, the cradles of the Brazilian imperial dynasty. Above the throne there were portraits of Pedro I and João VI and on the wall there was an apocalyptic depiction of what was at stake: on the one side the emperor, governing within his constitutional rights, and on the other the calamities and crimes that had torn the country apart during the ‘anarchical state of the country during the minority’. Here the figures are seen fleeing in terror back to hell, from where they had emerged, making way for the wisdom and virtue of the new regime.
The ideological meaning was clear. The regencies represented devilishness and anarchy, whereas revitalized imperial rule promised stability and prosperity. The regencies were characterized by vanity; the empire by wisdom, science and civic virtue. The republican experiments during the regencies represented acts of barbarity that were now being buried along with the past. History was being manipulated to display coherence and continuity between the past and the future. The galleries and pavilions were decorated with carefully chosen tributes to illustrious national figures and events – including Dom Pedro I’s declaration that he would stay and the declaration of independence. Only the moments when the monarchy had achieved approval and popular support were portrayed. The image of the emperor reverberated simultaneously around the city and in the imagination of its people.
Meanwhile, the poor boy could hardly conceal how overwhelmed he was by the voluminous robes, the heavy crown, the long sceptre and the cloak trailing behind him along the ground. There was a veritable battle over these images. The first that appeared in Brazil and abroad showed the boy ill at ease with ceremonial vestments that were far too big for him. But in the official pictures he
appeared as a Bourbon or Habsburg king. Ever since the disappearance of Dom Sebastião during his crusade in Morocco and the birth of the myth that he would return, the Bragança monarchs had not been actually crowned, but only acclaimed. But in Brazil the emperor was acclaimed, crowned and consecrated, in an effort to offset the political fragility of the moment by restoring the ancient tradition.
New elements were also introduced into the ritual. Pedro de Alcântara was invested as ‘Dom Pedro II, by the grace of God and unanimous acclamation of the peoples, Constitutional Emperor and Perpetual Defender of Brazil’. This was a combination of the old and the new: the consecration was maintained, but at the same time the new emperor, like his contemporaries, was a constitutional monarch. He represented both continuity and a new beginning. This was reflected in the insignia: the sword, the sceptre, the cloak and the crown. The cloak of the founder of the new empire, was made of green velvet with an embroidered band, decorated with gold stars, dragons and orbs, and lined with yellow silk. It signified a tribute to the new world and its poncho shape was a reference to the traditional clothes of the region. The sword, which had belonged to Dom Pedro I, displayed the Portuguese coat of arms on the blade. Beside it, on a salver, was a copy of the imperial constitution, wrapped in a green velvet cover and sealed with a ribbon of the imperial order of the cross. The imperial orb, a symbol central to the consecration ritual, was a silver armillary sphere with nineteen gold stars arranged around the cross of the order of Christ. The ring, worn on the fourth finger of the right hand, encrusted with diamonds, depicted two dragons tied together at the tail. The monarch’s silk gloves displayed the imperial arms. The solid gold sceptre, which was 1.76 metres long, displayed the symbol of the Braganças – a wyvern, a kind of serpent with wings and diamond eyes. Immediately after the coronation Marc Ferrez made a plaster cast of the emperor’s right hand, which was given the name of the ‘hand of Justice’ and distributed to grandees of the court. The crown measured sixteen inches across, too large for the emperor’s head. The base was decorated with diamonds and pearls, some of which had been taken from Dom Pedro I’s crown, possibly due to lack of time and funds.6 The new elements symbolizing Brazil included the Southern Cross and other constellations of the southern hemisphere. The plume of toucan feathers and the russet-coloured shoulder pads (made from feathers of the galo-da-serra)7 were an idealized reference to the indigenous peoples.
The ritual was planned to enchant the public. The cortège alone was made up of more than fifty people. There were soldiers and honour guards, a band, a herald, ushers, court officials, the emperor’s confessor, and various carriages transporting aristocrats and members of the imperial family.8 Members of the court had gathered at the Imperial Chapel for the ceremony of kissing the monarch’s hand.9 It was said that since French hairdressers were in short supply many ladies had to have their hair styled the day before, and spent the night already dressed for the occasion and propped up with pillows. Everything was done so that the event resembled a European coronation.
The most notable difference was the new emperor’s dark-skinned subjects and the rustic surroundings, which the official painters had tried to disguise. The bells pealed, the canons discharged, and the crowds saluted the monarch. With the heavy crown on his head, the train of his cloak dragging along the ground, and his mantle of feathers giving him the exotic look of a boy emperor during the Festival of the Holy Spirit, Dom Pedro II walked up the steps to the throne and looked down at the crowds. He was so small that he looked like an allegorical figure. But it was the logic of the spectacle that mattered. The monarch’s age, the haste with which the ceremony had been organized, the artificial character of much of the spectacle – all these were forgotten. It seemed that all the political disturbances of the regencies had been banished by ritual consecration.
CONSTRUCTING A NATION AND SCULPTING ITS EMPEROR
The period between 1841 and 1864 was an important phase for the consolidation of the monarchy in Brazil. The rebellions in Bahia, Pará and Maranhão had been suppressed with the help of the Baron of Caxias, who by then had become something of a local hero. The Majority Cabinet declared amnesty for all rebels who handed themselves over to the authorities and the end of the rebellions was celebrated by conservatives and liberals alike.
Dom Pedro II’s civic education was handled with the utmost importance: he was aided by his steward Paulo Barbosa, who undertook to train him in the exercise of power.10 In a note dated 1842 the young emperor asked him: ‘What is the royal herald’s name? What is the name of the master of ceremonies? How many gentlemen of the bedchamber are there and what are their names? I don’t know exactly how much is spent on maintaining the stables …’11 Although the monarch had not yet become a political figure, the politicians around him were already acting in his name. His picture began to appear in government departments, in national and foreign newspapers, and his likeness on neckerchiefs and coins.
According to royal tradition, as he approached eighteen it was important to arrange a marriage for him so that it would be clear to one and all that he was an adult and had truly come of age. This was no easy task. Brazil was a distant, exotic empire, its reputation still clouded by the notoriety of Pedro’s father. What was more, Pedro II was shy, and blushed at the very idea of marriage. Pedro Araújo Lima wrote to Paulo Barbosa, commenting on the young monarch’s reaction to the idea of matrimony:
I asked him whether he would authorize me to initiate negotiations which I could not contemplate beginning without his consent, as it was a business that intimately involved his person and would influence his domestic happiness. He was kind enough to say that I should do what I thought best […] Afterwards I explained that it would be fitting for the marriage to take place as soon as possible, so that he would be equipped to begin to exercise power.
The account reveals the interests of several parties and the various strategies of the wedding. It was not actually a question of Pedro II’s ‘domestic happiness’; instead, it was a question of public demands: after all, marriage would sanction his majority. With the emperor’s formal approval the negotiations got under way, aimed at organizing three marriages simultaneously: that of Dom Pedro II and those of his two sisters who had remained in Brazil, Dona Januária and Dona Francisca. Obviously the most strategically significant of the three was the emperor’s. A bride was found, and on 23 July 1843, along with the marriage contract, a small portrait of Teresa Maria Cristina, Princess of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, arrived. Teresa was descended from the Bourbons through three of her grandparents, and from the Habsburgs through the fourth. Her branch of the family was not, however, wealthy, and her dowry was small. Furthermore she was almost four years older than her future husband and was descended from a less important family line than he was. She was, nevertheless, a niece of Maria Amélia, Queen of the French and sister of Ferdinand II, King of Naples. She was also said to be a good singer. Abandoning his usual shyness, the young Pedro said that he liked the portrait – which, it must be said, emphasized the appealing qualities of the future empress while concealing her defects. The marriage took place by proxy, in Naples, and immediately after the ceremony Teresa Cristina set out on the long journey to Brazil. The expenses were by no means negligible. The government spent 3:555$00012 réis on the emperor’s portrait, the wedding gift for the future empress, and gold bars, as proof of the wealth of the empire.
Eighty days later the princess arrived in Rio de Janeiro: on 3 September 1843 the frigate Constituição docked in Guanabara Bay. Everything was prepared for the ceremony. His majesty, in his admiral’s uniform, boarded the royal launch, which was decorated with the winged dragon of the Braganças and rowed by twenty-four oarsmen with armbands displaying the colours of the Two Sicilies. After saluting the crew he made his way to the empress’s rooms. There he was met by the Count of Áquila, his future brother-in-law, who was to marry his sister Dona Januária. At eleven o’clock the imperial couple disembarked and rode in the royal carria
ge to the Imperial Chapel, where a Te Deum was sung, followed by the ritual of kissing the emperor’s hand. The carefully planned festivities that followed included public spectacles, a gala dinner in the palace, and balls in the parishes where the slaves ‘were authorized to display their dances in tribute to Her Imperial Majesty, mother of the Brazilian people’.
Despite the festivities, the young Dom Pedro had experienced an unpleasant surprise. None of the information he had received about the princess’s virtues had revealed the fact that Teresa Cristina was short, overweight and slightly lame. It was said that the young bridegroom managed to conceal his disappointment but afterwards wept in the arms of the Countess of Belmonte, his nurse, and on the shoulder of Paulo Barbosa, who said to him: ‘Remember the dignity of your position. Do your duty my child!’ His sisters were more fortunate. The two travelled to the courts of Europe where Dona Francisca, ‘the beautiful Chica’, married the Prince of Joinville, son of Louis-Philippe of France, in 1843. Dona Januária married the Count of Áquila, Teresa Cristina’s brother, the same year. Marriages of state were a political business, and, somehow or other, the imperial marriage was consummated. The couple’s first son, Dom Afonso, was born in 1845. He died when he was one year old, on 11 June 1847. In 1846, Teresa Cristina gave birth to her first daughter, Isabel, and the following year to her second, Leopoldina. The couple’s fourth child, Dom Pedro Afonso, also died when he was one year old, on 10 January 1850, at the Fazenda de Santa Cruz. This, it was commented at the time, seemed to be the fate of the male heirs of the Bragança dynasty: they never prospered.
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