“Angola” como conceito : uma análise da obra História geral das guerras angolanas de Oliveira de Cadornega (século XVII)

Abstract

This PhD thesis analyse the writing of the manuscripts Historia Geral das Guerras Angolanas (HGGA) by the exiled Portuguese, new-Christian Antonio Oliveira de Cadornega. Thus, we assay Cadornega’s work between text and context, exploring his many and ambiguous “Angolas”, that are at the same time Portuguese, Bragantine, Flemish, exiled, enslaved and sobas. In the first part of the thesis we highlight the author’s experience as a writer since his departure from Lisbon until his arrival in Angola, his participation in the slave markets and the building of his networks with the local elites. The second part assesses the many different manuscripts of the HGGA in which the authorship was attributed to Cadornega and that form the current collection of some Institutions such as the National Library of France, the British Library, the Lisbon Science Academy, National Library of Portugal and the Public Library of Évora. In the last part we analyse the writing itself of Cadornega’s work: its ambiguities, keywords, concepts, repetitions, and style. The three parts of the thesis are composed by seventeen chapters and as a general perception considers that the Cadornega’s work was dedicated to the king Pedro II of Portugal given the author’s links with the dynastic house of Braganza, but mainly given the fact the Cadornega, being a new-Christian, was constantly in need to keep himself away from the Portuguese Inquisition in a time of political and administrative changes in the Portuguese African colonies. For him, staying in “Angola” was a matter of survival.