Francisco Adolfo de Varnhagen: Diplomat, Patriot, Historian Open Access

In 1844, when Francisco Adolfo de Varnhagen began work on his História Geral do Brasil, a comprehensive history of Brazil based on documentary sources did not exist.¹ As a field for investigation Brazilian history remained a sertão, a backland awaiting the diligent tread and inquisitive eye of a new explorer. True, there had already been entradas into the field. Sebastião Rocha Pitta, a Brazilian, had published in 1730 his História da América Portugueza, covering the period from 1500 to 1724. A pioneer work, it was marred by the omission of many important facts, by a lack of documentation, and by an approach which was “more imaginative than thoughtful.”²

The English poet-historian Robert Southey had made another significant attempt in his three-volume History of Brazil, published between 1810 and 1819. Southey’s work was excellent, but he had written without access to many of the basic sources and without ever having visited Brazil.³ The opening of the sertão of Brazilian history was to be the task of a Brazilian—a man familiar with the land and the people and motivated by a love of his homeland, yet cosmopolitan in experience, taste, and training. Educated in the methodology of European historical investigation and pledged to veracity, Francisco Adolfo de Varnhagen established himself as the father of modern Brazilian historical scholarship by his archival researches and even more by his História Geral do Brasil.

Varnhagen was born on February 17, 1816 in Sorocaba (São Paulo state). His father was Luis Guillerme Varnhagen, a German noble from Waldeck, who as a metallurgist in the service of Portugal had been sent to inspect the iron foundry at São João de Ipanema.⁴ He had settled there, and it was for this reason that Varnhagen was to be “natural de Sorocaba,” a fact which he often pointed to with considerable pride.

At the age of seven Varnhagen was taken by his family to Portugal, where he attended the Real Colégio da Luz (Royal Military Academy). He concentrated on mathematics, but he also studied the humanities and the Portuguese classics.⁵ In 1832 he continued toward a degree in engineering, with a pause, however, to participate in the civil wars on the side of Dom Pedro I. He emerged from that conflict with a commission as first lieutenant of artillery.⁶ After this interruption, Varnhagen returned to his studies, not only the physical sciences but political economy, paleography, and languages as well. His study of German, French, and English allowed him to read widely and with profit to his later development.⁷

As early as 1835 Varnhagen had become interested in history, and in 1839, at the age of twenty-three, he published his first historical work, Reflexões críticas…, a critical edition and examination of the now famous sixteenth-century document of Gabriel Soares de Sousa.⁸ This work was so well received that it earned Varnhagen admission to the Real Acadêmia de Ciências of Lisbon and the recently established Instituto Histórico of Rio de Janeiro.⁹ A second critical, annotated edition followed in 1839, the Diário de Navegação de Pero Lopes de Sousa. Both of these publications reflected Varnhagen’s interest in Brazil, and in 1841 he became a Brazilian citizen.¹⁰ Meanwhile, Varnhagen continued his archival research, and in 1841-1842 he published a number of biographical and bibliographical articles in Lisbon’s O Panorama on topics such as Antonil’s Cultura e opulência do Brasil and Salvador Corrêa de Sá.¹¹

Through these investigations and, after 1842 as attaché to the Brazilian legation at Lisbon, Varnhagen became familiar with the major Portuguese archives in his search for documents of Brazilian history. Hardly a document escaped his notice.¹² By 1844 he had already begun work on what was to be his greatest achievement, the História Geral do Brasil.

In 1846 Varnhagen was sent to Spain as secretary to the Brazilian legation in Madrid. Hispano-Brazilian relations at the time involved no major diplomatic questions, so that Varnhagen was free to work in the Spanish archives of Seville, Madrid, and Simancas searching for documents and maps dealing with Brazilian frontiers. These researches enriched the História Geral on which Varnhagen continued to labor. The young historian still found time to lift his pen on other matters, however, and his famous polemic with José Inácio Abreu e Lima, discussed below, dates from this period. In 1850 his Memorial Orgânico was published with the sole signature “amante do Brasil.” This essay contained in capsule many of Varnhagen’s views on Brazil’s past as well as suggestions for its future.¹³ It was also in 1850 that his major literary contribution appeared, a three-volume anthology, Florilégio de poesia brasileira.

Varnhagen returned to Brazil in 1851 to serve in the Foreign Office. On June 6 of that year he read part of what was to be the História Geral to the Instituto Histórico in Rio de Janeiro. In that same year the Instituto Histórico elected Varnhagen as first secretary.¹⁴ He proved to be an active member of that organization, publishing many articles in the pages of its Revista, reorganizing the library, museum, and archive, and taking an active part in institutional affairs.¹⁵ This membership was one of his most prized affiliations.

In 1854 the first volume of the História Geral do Brasil appeared, dedicated to Dom Pedro II and signed only by a “member of the Instituto Histórico of Brazil, and native of Sorocaba.” The second volume appeared three years later, completing a brief period which may be regarded as the great watershed of Brazilian historiography. The volumes awakened favorable reactions; for example, Alexander Von Humboldt wrote in 1855: “I will be glad to have it in its entirety and to see it reposing in our library.”¹⁶ Varnhagen was also invited to join the Instituto Histórico y Geográfico del Río de la Plata and the Academy of Sciences in Munich. As will be shown, however, there were also dissenting opinions, especially from Brazilian Indianophiles.¹⁷

Still in the service of the nation, Varnhagen was appointed resident minister in Paraguay in 1859. Because he disliked the regime of Carlos Antonio López, he soon left his post, but not without having first gathered valuable historical documents such as the Tupí grammar of Ruiz de Montoya.¹⁸ By 1860 he was already at work on História da Independência, which was not published, however, in his lifetime.¹⁹ He had also completed a work on Vespucci by 1858.²⁰ In 1861 he was appointed minister to Venezuela, New Granada, and Ecuador, and en route to this post he spent three weeks in Ceará, Pará, and Maranhão, an experience which gave him a better insight into the geographical realities and pulse of life in those northern regions. This experience resulted in an improvement and enrichment of certain sections of the second edition of the História Geral.²¹ Later Varnhagen continued his diplomatic career in Lima, but he was constantly writing on a host of topics as diverse as immigration, Vespucci, and agriculture.²²

In 1868 Varnhagen departed for Vienna, where he was to spend the last years of his life as a Brazilian diplomatic representative, while he continued to write on a number of subjects. In 1871 the second edition of the História Geral was published with many important changes and additions. In 1872 Dom Pedro II named Varnhagen Barão do Pôrto Seguro, and in 1874 he was raised to the rank of Visconde do Pôrto Seguro. The selection of the title Pôrto Seguro was significant since this was the site of Cabral’s first landfall, and it indicated the recognition of Varnhagen as Brazil’s foremost historian. He died in 1878 at the age of sixty-two.

The Brazilian historian, Max Fleiuss, has written that Varnhagen was a “perfect bibliophile whose constant idea was to live and die outside the confusion of the century in the somber silence of great monastic libraries … engulfed in the reading and interpretation of manuscripts….”²³ In a sense this was true, for Varnhagen was an ardent and thorough researcher in discovering new materials on Brazil. But this research was not merely the “painful and insane collection and selection of materials,” as one contemporary critic stated,²⁴ nor were his archival efforts an escape from the realities of the times. Varnhagen was motivated by a deep concern for the Brazilian present as well as the past, and he took up his pen on many occasions to offer suggestions for the improvement and progress of Brazil. For example, the Memorial Orgânico of 1850 dealt with the major contemporary problems of Brazil: the Indian, the Negro and slavery, immigration, communications, and provincialism. Varnhagen was no ivory-tower historian, and he was ready to point out the deficiencies of his nation. An example is this outburst on population:²⁵

This is not the historian spending his life in the “somber silence of great monastic libraries,” unaware of the world around him, but a Brazilian deeply concerned for the future of his nation. This concern he demonstrated in a number of small pamphlets and essays. For instance, O Tobaco da Bahia (Caracas, 1863) was written after a visit to Cuba and suggested methods to improve Brazilian production of cigar tobacco. Sementeira da Herva Mate (Vienna, 1877) contained recommendations for the growing of maté tea.²⁶ Another of these short essays was A Questão da Capital: Marítima ou no Interior? (Vienna, 1877) which discussed the possibility of establishing the capital in Goiás, thereby opening the interior. In this proposal Varnhagen anticipated later plans which eventually resulted in the creation of Brasilia. These works are concerned with progress, and Varnhagen’s preoccupation with progress is one key to understanding his historical judgments.

Another facet of his thought must be made explicit at this point, for it is closely related to his concern for the Brazilian future. This is his patriotism. In Varnhagen’s patriotic position there is the fervor of the convert. Always sensitive about his German father and his European upbringing, he would tolerate no implication that he was not a Brazilian. In fact, Varnhagen considered himself doubly Brazilian, since he had citizenship both by birthplace and by imperial decree in 1841, and he called Brazil his “fatherland by birth and adoption.”²⁷

This patriotism was not only a dominant theme in Varnhagen’s major historical works, but also a primary stimulus for his historical production. His História das lutas com os Holandeses no Brasil was written expressly to raise Brazilian morale during the war of the Triple Alliance against Paraguay. By describing the Dutch period, Varnhagen hoped to silence the complaints of his countrymen about the length and asperity of the war. He wished to show that “Brazil, then an insignificant colony, had fought for twenty-four years without respite and was finally successful against one of the most warlike nations in Europe at that time.”²⁸

Varnhagen combined his interest in history with his desire to serve the nation, and he agreed openly with Alexandre Herculano, the great Portuguese historian, that a lack of love for the antiquities of the nation was a certain indication of the ultimate ruin of its people.²⁹ When, in fact, he completed the second volume of the História Geral in 1857 he wrote to Dom Pedro II of the value of his work to the nation: “I fell on my knees, giving thanks to God … for having inspired in me an idea of such great service to the nation and to other nations and for giving me the health and life to do it….”³⁰ Moreover, Varnhagen was so convinced that the História Geral was a great benefit to the nation that he paid the costs of the second edition himself, so that the price could be kept within the reach of his countrymen.

It is clear that patriotism and a profound concern for Brazil underlay much of Varnhagen’s historical production. The assertion that Varnhagen was nothing more than a collector of facts and a bibliophile with an almost pathological fixation for documents and details must be moderated in terms of his final objectives. It cannot be denied that Varnhagen enjoyed archival research, but this was work which would yield information about Brazil. The diplomatic posts which he undertook gave him access to the world’s libraries and archives, and Varnhagen the historian always took precedence over Varnhagen the diplomat. Moreover, it was as a historian that Varnhagen best served Brazil. Some have thought that his method and historical training inculcated in him such a love of truth that it handicapped him as a diplomat. Eschewing duplicity or falsehood of any sort, Varnhagen especially disliked it on behalf of anyone else.³¹ His attention to detail, collection of facts, and numerous historical polemics, however, cannot be attributed to any fixation about archives but rather to his training and personality.

The studies in Portugal which propelled Varnhagen on a career of historical scholarship were undertaken at a time of considerable importance in the development of European historiography. In the early 1820s and 1830s the impact of the Romantic movement had influenced many intellectuals, and Portugal, although something of a European cultural backwater at this time, received an occasional ripple from this current of thought. Indeed, national pride and memory of past glories made Portugal receptive to Romantic ideas which emphasized the “long ago and the far away.” Already Alexandre Herculano was at work, tracing the basis of a liberal tradition in Roman-Visigothic laws and medieval privileges.

Varnhagen, although a political conservative, monarchist, and centralist throughout most of his adult life, was also influenced by this current of thought and, like his Portuguese contemporary, expressed these liberal sentiments in historical judgments such as his condemnation of the Inquisition.³² An ardent admirer of monarchy, Varnhagen nevertheless battled in Portugal against the absolutist forces of Don Miguel and later signed the História, Geral as “filho do povo” despite the noble title of his father. In 1863 Varnhagen advocated the cultivation of tobacco in Bahia in order to create “a true people, free and independent, instead of classes of rich and poor, plebeian and patrician, slaves and masters…”³³ But while he condemned Negro slavery and showed concern for the lower classes of Brazil, Varnhagen disliked democracy, and he came to view the republican governments of South America as repellent examples of popular rule. In fact, his polemics with the Brazilian Indianists may have been colored by his dislike of their republicanism as well as disagreement with their historical tenets. Like Herculano, Varnhagen saw in democracy the seeds of despotism and disunity. But the liberal Romantic ideas of his formative years in Lisbon lived on in his liberal social position within a conservative political framework.³⁴

But if Herculano and Varnhagen responded to certain concepts of the Romantic era, their historical training and method were shaped by other traditions: the diplomatics of the French and the methodology of the Germans.³⁵ Both men adopted the historical criticism of Jean Mabillon and the eighteenth-century French Benedictine historians, and the conviction of Leopold von Ranke that the historian must view the past without the prejudices of the present.³⁶ It was this critical approach and the insistence on the verification of sources which allowed Varnhagen to play a revolutionary role in Brazilian historiography, just as Herculano had revolutionized the writing of history in Portugal.³⁷ And it was his methodology and his concept of historical writing which compelled Varnhagen to become an exhaustive researcher.

Given his painstaking methods of critical scholarship, it is not difficult to understand the effect of these methods on his view of history. Facts became ascertainable entities existing in the past, merely awaiting discovery, and rewarding the discoverer with “truth.” By strict neutrality and devotion to veracity the historian could maintain a position outside the events and thereby attain that impartiality which would entitle him to make historical judgments. Varnhagen put his position thus:³⁸

For Varnhagen, therefore, impartiality and complete veracity were the most necessary elements of the historian’s craft. Throughout his historical works there are constant references to his amor à verdade, as well as to his analysis of documents with the proper impartiality “in the light of critical evaluations.”³⁹ Truth was to be served at all costs, even if the price was the destruction of some of the nation’s most hallowed historical myths. When others lamented the demise of these illusions, Varnhagen advised them to take pride in sounder heroes and beliefs.⁴⁰ Accuracy and objectivity were the principles of his method, and in the preface to his História da Independência he claimed to write “…with the love of the truth which guides me above all other human considerations; and thus should be written all history which hopes to pass on to posterity.”⁴¹

Like the nineteenth-century positivist historians Varnhagen became a master of detail, seeing in its collection the key to understanding. The result of this industrious compilation of detail was the monumental História Geral, which remains today, over a century after its original publication, the most complete repository of factual information on colonial Brazil. But Varnhagen’s emphasis on the accumulation of facts was so excessive that he could not organize them adequately to understand Brazilian history in the whole. Facts suppressed concepts, smothered synthesis, and hindered style, and he lacked the ability to stop and reflect on his material long enough to find a perspective or to establish a balance between the vital and the trivial.⁴²

Varnhagen was a naturally proud individual who found it difficult to accept criticism of any type. Committed to the “truth” and convinced of his own objectivity, he saw most criticism as an attack on his principles. Like the Chilean historian Francisco Encina, Varnhagen was convinced that he wrote not a history but the history,⁴³ and that to criticize him was to imply that he had used documents incorrectly or that he was simply mistaken. As a result of this attitude Varnhagen entered into a number of academic polemics with European and American scholars. Some of these debates were the honest disagreements of learned men that advanced scholarship. Others took a decidedly bitter and personal tone.⁴⁴ In these scholastic debates Varnhagen usually conducted himself in a courteous and gentlemanly manner, but he had set high standards for himself, and if the work of others failed to meet them he was not slow to criticize. When defamed or unjustly attacked, he could respond with vitriol.

A good case in point is the famous quarrel with “General” José Inácio Abreu e Lima, which has been called “one of the most violent polemics in Brazilian historiography.⁴⁵ In 1843 Varnhagen wrote a critique of the Compêndio da História do Brasil by Abreu e Lima, a volume based on little original research. The Primeiro Juízo which Varnhagen submitted to the Instituto Histórico showed Abreu e Lima’s “borrowings” from a French work which in turn had plagiarized Southey’s History of Brazil.⁴⁶ Abreu e Lima felt that he had been wronged, since he had made no claims of original research but rather had emphasized a new periodization. He also suspected that Varnhagen’s criticism had been incited by certain members of the Instituto Histórico who were Abreu e Lima’s political opponents. Resentfully he struck back with a Resposta, highly critical of the Instituto, in which he called Varnhagen a “pedant, imbecile, half-breed Brazilian, and miserable cheat (gatuno),” the “son of a German and of a woman who was not a Brazilian.”⁴⁷ Varnhagen, proud and self-assured, was extremely sensitive on the topic of his nationality, and his Réplica apologética de um escriptor caluniado e juízo final de um plagiario defamador que se intitula general vehemently rebuked Abreu e Lima. Not all of his polemics, however, were of this virulent nature, and his debates with Henry Harrisse and Armand-Pascal d’Avezac on the letters of Columbus and Vespucci were examples of the excellent use of critical methods in historical scholarship.

Whatever one may think of Varnhagen’s fact-laden history-writing, no one can deny his contributions to archival research. Our knowledge of colonial Brazil would be far from what it is today if we did not have the documents of Pero Lopes de Sousa, Padre Fernão Cardim, and Padre Antônio Vieira, to name but a few which he first presented to the public. The rediscovery of the História do Brasil of Frei Vicente do Salvador or the attribution of the Tratado descritivo do Brasil to Gabriel Soares de Sousa would by themselves entitle Varnhagen to a place of esteem in the annals of Brazilian historiography; yet these were merely two of his outstanding contributions.

Varnhagen’s critical editions of Columbus’ letter of 1493 and his discussions of the Vespucci letters were models of critical scholarship, and although his interpretation of the validity of some of the Vespucci documents has been proved to be false, he was mainly responsible for the reevaluation of Vespucci’s contributions. Contradicting Las Casas and others, Varnhagen showed Vespucci’s importance as the first man to realize that the New World was not part of Asia.⁴⁸ He wrote:

Indeed it was Varnhagen’s works on Vespucci which seem to have won him worldwide recognition, since most of these were written in French, while the História Geral remained in Portuguese.⁵⁰

But, important as his critical scholarship and presentation of documentary materials were to the understanding of Brazilian history, Varnhagen’s position as the father of Brazilian historiography is based primarily on the História Geral. This great work, first published in 1854-57 and then with many changes in a second edition of 1871, is a five-volume history of Brazil from its earliest beginnings to the close of the colonial era. The organization is by areas, each of which is discussed chronologically. Much of the history presented revolves around great men and events, but Varnhagen has made significant attempts to discuss socio-economic developments and cultural achievements.⁵¹

This approach owed much to the essay of Karl von Martius, “Como se deve escrever a história do Brasil,” which appeared in the pages of the Revista of the Instituto Histórico in 1843. Martius had advocated the study of the Brazilian past in terms of the major racial components and their fusion. Specifically, he suggested the study of Indian ethnology and language, of the development of Portuguese culture and actions in terms of Brazilian reality, and, finally, of the role of the Negro and his African backgrounds. While admitting the Portuguese nature of Brazil, he emphasized the importance of other racial and cultural elements.⁵² The historian, said Martius, must “appreciate man according to his true value as the most sublime work of the creator and separately from his color or previous development….”⁵³ José Honorio Rodrigues has pointed out that Varnhagen in the História Geral followed Martius’ suggestion in the collection of materials on the Indian and in a chapter on the laws and rights of the Portuguese colonists, but that because of “his lack of philosophical perception” he failed to integrate them in a significant manner.⁵⁴ The writing of Brazilian history as Martius had envisioned it was left to Gilberto Freyre and others of a later era. Nevertheless, in Varnhagen’s work the ideas of Martius were already bearing important if somewhat undeveloped fruit.⁵⁵

Probably the most controversial and unbalanced aspect of the História Geral is Varnhagen’s attitude toward the Indian. He reacted against the dominant Indianist school of Gonçalves Dias, José de Alencar, and others of the period after independence who had sought in a somewhat romantic view of the Indian as the “noble savage” a basis for brasilidade. Aside from their writings some had gone to the extreme of adopting Tupí family names.⁵⁶ Varnhagen rejected this “dangerous cabocla Brazilianism.”⁵⁷ In an essay appended to Volume II he summarized his argument:⁵⁸

This attitude appeared throughout the História Geral. Varnhagen consistently sided with the colonists against the Indians and their clerical defenders, and, although his devotion to the truth impelled him to cite abuses, he was firmly convinced that force was necessary in civilizing the Indian. In fact he even advocated temporary tutelage similar to the encomienda system. Varnhagen took every opportunity to emphasize the most “uncivilized” aspects of Indian culture, and he constantly referred to them as “barbarians” or bugres (savage brutes). He was especially critical of Las Casas and other “pseudophilanthropists” who in order to save the Indian caused the introduction of Negro slavery, which he abhorred.⁵⁹ Over the course of three hundred years of Brazilian history Varnhagen saw little progress in the customs of the Indian, for, he said, “…they continue in the forests killing and eating each other….”⁶⁰

Varnhagen’s attitude did not go unchallenged by the Indianists, especially the important Maranhense historian João Francisco Lisboa.⁶¹ Although Lisboa had praised the História Geral highly, he took quite a different position on the question of the Indian. Lisboa expressed his views in the journal Timón, of which he was the editor. Varnhagen, stung by the criticism, answered with Os Índios bravos e o Senhor Lisboa, Timón 3, but because of Lisboa’s death in 1863 withheld his reply from publication. Four years later, however, when Indians attacked a joint Peruvian-Brazilian boundary commission expedition, Varnhagen as minister in Lima was so incensed that he published the book, an action which led to further wrangling with the friends of the deceased Lisboa.

The controversy with Lisboa and the circumstances surrounding the publication of Os Índios bravos suggest some possible reasons for Varnhagen’s position on the Indian. Since he was committed to progress and the full “Europeanization” of Brazil, he was understandably impatient with any force that impeded this process. Varnhagen saw the Indian through the course of Brazilian history as a retarding factor, a cyst which had to be cut from the body of the nation. Varnhagen was ashamed that in the Brazil of 1867 Indians could still attack “civilized man.” It was a sign of Brazil’s backwardness and as such called for condemnation.⁶² False emphasis on the Indian, he felt, was leading the nation down a dead-end path.⁶³ Since the nation could never be Indianized, the Indian had to be civilized.

Indianists were not slow to accuse Varnhagen of Lusophilism and over-emphasis on the Portuguese, and it is certainly true that Varnhagen viewed the Portuguese as the nucleus of Brazilian history, as Martius had done and Gilberto Freyre was to do later. Devotion to the truth, however, compelled Varnhagen to be candid and, while recounting the “glorious deeds of the old Portuguese,”⁶⁴ he admitted that many cruelties had marred the spirit of the Portuguese people.⁶⁵ Although Varnhagen was critical of any act by the metropolis which hindered Brazilian development, he was, basically favorable to Portugal.⁶⁶ He viewed events such as the Guerra das Emboabas and the Guerra dos Mascates as civil conflicts without nationalistic overtones, and he even noted that “the good offices of the government of the metropolis have given as much to me personally as to all Brazilians in general.”⁶⁷

In Varnhagen’s view of Brazilian history, the Negro fared much better than the Indian. He recognized the Negro as a vital element of the population “to whose vigorous arm was owed the cultivation of sugar and later of coffee.”⁶⁸ He cited the plants, foods, and linguistic elements of Africa present in Brazil.⁶⁹ Negroes who were motivated by patriotism and devotion to Brazil received all possible praise, especially Henrique Dias, the leader of a band of “valiant Negroes” who in his struggles against the Dutch “shed his blood for the cause he embraced.”⁷⁰

Closely connected with the question of the Negro was that of slavery. Though Varnhagen did write of the benefits of civilization and Christianity bestowed on the Negro in Brazil, he opposed slavery. The Memorial Orgânico of 1850 contained an attack on the slave trade and slavery in general, and in the same year he published in Madrid O tráfico dos Africanos e a escravidão in which he condemned slavery and suggested means to end the slave trade. In this attitude Varnhagen anticipated some aspects of later abolitionist thought. Varnhagen hoped for a gradual process of “whitening” that would remove all stigma of servile origins from future generations of Brazilian Negroes, even though he felt that race relations in Brazil were conducted with more “softness than in any other country of America.”⁷¹

In assessing the role of the Jesuits Varnhagen was caught in a historical dilemma. Although the Jesuits had protected the Indians and opposed the colonists, they were also responsible in many ways for Brazilian development. Some critics, like João Capistrano de Abreu and Eduardo Prado, stated that Varnhagen was openly antiJesuit. Varnhagen, in turn, disclaimed any conscious antipathy toward the Jesuits in Brazil, and pointed out that he had contributed to their fame by his discovery and publication of important works of Nóbrega, Anchieta, Fernão Cardim, and João de Aspilcueta.⁷² In fact, in the Florilégio Varnhagen stated that, “it would be ungrateful to deny that Brazil owes its rapid civilization to the Company of Jesus….”⁷³

Nevertheless, Varnhagen’s views on the Indian and his emphasis on civil government often placed him historically on the opposite side from the Jesuits. Basically Varnhagen recognized the Jesuit contribution in three areas: conversion of the Indian, education of youth, and construction of buildings. While noting the benefits of conversion, Varnhagen cited, on the other hand, the harm of preventing the forceable reduction of the Indians and the fact that the success of the Jesuit fazendas operating on the sweat of the Indians had compelled the colonists to turn to Negro slavery. The educational services of the Company were good, he believed, but they overemphasized devotion to the Jesuit order. Construction was due for the most part, said Varnhagen, “to the labor of the Indian monopolized by the disciples of St. Ignatius.”⁷⁴ He blamed the failure of the Treaty of Madrid of 1750 at least in part on the Jesuits and in general approved Pombal’s expulsion of the order in 1759 and the abolition of the Company of Jesus in Brazil, because its lands were subsequently sold at a low rate to the colonists.⁷⁵

In judging the Jesuits, Varnhagen took his position once again in terms of their effects on the development of Brazil. As always patriotism was the criterion for historical judgment, but Varnhagen’s patriotism was an open attitude and not, as he said, “the other lamentable patriotism contained … in the absurd ostentation of a vile and rancorous hate of all that is foreign.”⁷⁶ This lack of xenophobic tendencies, his attempt to be fair in historical opinions, and his standards for evaluation are seen to best advantage in his treatment of the Dutch episode of 1624 to 1654.

Varnhagen thoroughly examined the Dutch period in the História Geral and, as has already been noted, also made it the subject of a separate work.⁷⁷ Throughout he maintained his objectivity toward the Dutch. “After 1621,” he wrote, “the war was quite legitimate, since the Dutch had been declared an enemy by a Portuguese royal order.” Varnhagen’s description of John Maurits of Nassau, the Dutch governor of Pernambuco, was almost laudatory, and he duly noted all of Nassau’s good works.⁷⁸ Yet, when Nassau was involved in duplicity Varnhagen condemned him sternly.⁷⁹

Underlying this attitude toward the Dutch, however, was the same standard of benefit to his country. Varnhagen openly asked the question: did the Dutch invasion result in some good for Brazil? His first impulse was to lament the horrors of the war. But realizing that “we are born weeping, and we spend a large part of our infancy suffering until we are educated and strengthened,” Varnhagen saw the contribution of the Dutch occupation to Brazilian maturity.⁸⁰ Their presence in Brazil enabled the Dutch to popularize and create a market for Brazilian products in northern Europe, especially for sugar. Moreover, more men came to Brazil in the various contingents of troops than were killed.⁸¹ In short, Brazil benefitted from contact with “a nation more active and industrious.”

No historian is free from a point of view no matter how strenuously he tries to remain objective. Varnhagen was a convinced monarchist, both because of the enlightened attitudes and scholarly mien of Dom Pedro II and because of his own belief that monarchy represented centralism. Varnhagen condemned “pernicious localism,” and he felt that without unity Brazil would never assume its place as a leading nation in the world.⁸² This approval of monarchy and centralism colored Varnhagen’s attitude toward the various eighteenth- and nineteenth-century revolts such as the Bahian conspiracy of João de Deus of 1798 and the 1817 Pernambuco revolution. Capistrano de Abreu claimed that if Varnhagen had been the magistrate at Tiradentes’ trial he would have meted out the same fate of execution. This is probably true, for Varnhagen viewed the conspiracy of Minas as an act of rebellion which, if successful, would be a cause of disunity. Independence for Minas would have produced not only civil war but a pretext for the intervention of foreign powers.⁸³

A passion for his nation and a belief that the future of Brazil lay in progress and civilization are the basic components of Varnhagen’s thought. In this he rates comparison with other nineteenthcentury Latin Americans like Domingo F. Sarmiento and Euclides da Cunha who also saw the necessity of progress over the retarded elements of the nation. A most interesting analogy, moreover, can be drawn between Varnhagen’s work and that of the twentieth-century Chilean historian Francisco Encina, who also judged events in terms of their benefit to the nation, depreciated the Indian, criticized the Jesuits, and stressed the role of the European; and in fact displayed the same self-assured arrogance that was characteristic of Varnhagen.⁸⁴

To the generations of historians that followed him Varnhagen left a heritage of critical methodology and passionate nationalism along with a corpus of documentation and factual information that is still today the fundamental work in the field. The interpretive works of João Capistrano de Abreu, the general history of Pedro Calmon, and the colonial volumes of the composite work under the direction of Sérgio Buarque de Holanda all reflect a dependence on the research and writings of Varnhagen.⁸⁴ The História Geral do Brasil would merit a place on the reference shelf for its appendices alone. These lists of the major officials of each captaincy with their dates of office are a research tool of inestimable value. Yet the História Geral has much more to offer as a factual account of Brazilian history still unequaled. It surveys not only famous men and battles and the drum-and-trumpet tradition but also the growth of society and the development of culture and economy. Moreover, its long discussions of various source materials make the História a bibliographical guide as well as a history. No matter what its faults may be, Varnhagen’s História Geral is still the great history of colonial Brazil.

Author notes