Legislação e educação na América colonial portuguesa

Abstract

This article has as its object the origins of instruction in Portuguese America during the period of Mendonca Furtado, Governor of Grao-Para and Maranhao between 1751 and 1759. For this purpose, it will use as a methodology documentary research, having as primary sources the instructions to Governor Mendonca Furtado and the Directory of Indians of 1757 which, articulated, sparked a wide process of cultural and educational changes that would culminate, among other events, with the emergence of schools managed by the Portuguese State in the Brazilian territory to replace the Jesuit elementary schools, even before the teaching reform of the Marquis of Pombal in 1759..