Timeline / 1870 to 1880 / / ALL THEMES

Date Country Theme

1870 Portugal Reforms And Social Changes

Publication of Joao de Deus’s Cartilha Maternal, a beginner’s reading book that was to be in use for a long time. João de Deus was a follower of Maria Montessori’s pedagogical theories and founded in Portugal the “Escola Nova” movement.

1872 - 1874 Portugal Fine And Applied Arts

O Desterrado (The Outcast), a sculpture by António Soares dos Reis (1847–89) is an idealised self-portrait. It conveys the collective feelings of his contemporary intellectuals and the feelings of loneliness and longing common to those who had left their homeland. The sculptor’s romantic sensibility enabled him to shape feelings and psychological tensions in the marble.

1873 Portugal Reforms And Social Changes

A primary school building to be built in wood attracts the attention of visitors to the Portuguese stand at the “Weltausstellung” (world exposition) in Vienna.

1875 - 1876 Portugal Economy And Trade

In 1875 the French government convenes the Diplomatic Conference of the Metre that proclaims the Metre Convention. Portugal receives the tenth copies of the metric and kilogram standards.

1875 Portugal Travelling

Aware that Portuguese empirical knowledge of Central was being overtaken by other countries, the “Sociedade de Geografia de Lisboa” is founded to "promote and assist the study and progress of geography and related sciences in Portugal". To raise awareness of the colonial Portuguese possessions in Africa and Asia was also a goal.

1876 Portugal Political Context

Partido Histórico and Partido Reformista merge into the Partido Progressista in September. Power alternation with the Partido Regenerador framed rotativism. They were able to carry out some urgent reforms but in the end the system soon degenerated into political conformism.

1876 Portugal International Exhibitions

“Centennial International Exhibition” Philadelphia, USA. Support for visitors and accommodation of the Portuguese Commissariat were the main purposes of a stylish and exotic Portugal Pavilion.

1877 Portugal Cities And Urban Spaces

Ponte Dona Maria Pia, a bridge over the Douro River, completes the Lisbon– railway line. Designed by Gustave Eiffel and Théophile Seyrig, the bridge keeps Date Country Theme the beauty of the Douro unchanged. It was built where the banks are closer. It was named after the Queen.

1877 Portugal Music, Literature, Dance And Fashion

Birth of Teixeira de Pascoaes (d. 1952). This poet was the main representative of the aesthetic and doctrinal movement called “saudosismo”, a form of existentialism, and a leader of the movement Renascença Portuguesa. In 1910 he launched in Porto the magazine A Águia, the main resource of the “saudosismo” movement .

1877 Portugal Travelling

Hermenegildo Capelo, and Serpa Pinto appointed to organise an expedition to southern Africa. After a briefing by Silva Porto in Bié, they chose separate itineraries. Capelo and Ivens focus on the Kwanza and Kuangu rivers and on the Yaka people. Serpa Pinto picks the River and eventually reaches the Transvaal.

1878 Portugal Cities And Urban Spaces

28 September: The first electric lighting on the terrace of the Citadel of Cascais to celebrate the 15th birthday of future King Carlos I (ruling from 1889). A ball commemorates the electric lighting premiere. The daily press celebrate the occasion, saying that the electric light turned the entrance and the royal residence balconies into “a clear and luminous day’’.

1878 Portugal Cities And Urban Spaces

Opening of Lisbon Botanical Garden. During the 19th century Portugal aspires to reach the level of economic and social “progress” of other European countries in, for example, education and teaching. Natural History Museum and the Lisbon Botanical Garden were important institutions for scientific research and the exchange and circulation of ideas and natural knowledge.

1878 Portugal International Exhibitions

At the Paris “Exposition Universelle”, the Portuguese Pavilion sets up a sophisticated, emblematic scenario, portraying the monasteries of Batalha and Jerónimos, two of the magnificent symbols of the 15th and 16th Portuguese Discoveries.

1879 Portugal Reforms And Social Changes

11 October: The labour association Voz do Operário is founded in Lisbon by Custódio Gomes and Custódio Braz Pacheco, two factory workers in the tobacco industry, to defend the rights of the workers more disrespected and threatened than ever by the tobacco industry crisis of 1879.

1880 Portugal Rediscovering The Past

Celebration of the third centenary of the death of Luís de Camões. His poetry is considered the epitome of Portuguese literature both for The Lusiads, the epic national poem in which Vasco da Gama tells the history of Portugal to the Samorim (king) of Calcutta upon his arrival in India in 1498, and for his love sonnets. Date Country Theme

1880 Portugal Rediscovering The Past

The 11th International Congress of Anthropology and Prehistoric Archaeology is held in Lisbon. This important conference gives international recognition to the dynamism that Portuguese archaeology has demonstrated since 1850.

1880 Portugal Rediscovering The Past

The remains of the poet Luís de Camões and the explorer Vasco da Gama are moved to the Jerónimos Monastery. Vasco da Gama and Luís de Camões (north and south side respectively), the two main representatives of the 16th-century The Lusiads epic poem, are honored and rest beside members of the Avis dynasty buried in Jerónimos.

1880 Portugal Cities And Urban Spaces

3 October: Barbadinhos steam pumping station is inaugurated. The water from the Alviela Canal starts to be pumped thus increasing the water supply to Lisbon.

1880 Portugal Music, Literature, Dance And Fashion

Publication of the novella O Mandarim (The Mandarin) by Eça de Queirós (Queiroz) (1845–1900).