José Pinto de Azeredo. Essays on Some Maladies of Angola
(1799). Edited by Timothy Walker. Dartmouth: Tagus
Press at UMass Dartmouth, 2016. ISBN: 978-1-933227-69-6
Gisele C. Conceição1
Fabiano Bracht2
The Portuguese Atlantic Empire is the framework within which the book Essays on
Some Diseases of Angola (1799) is inserted. It refers to a time when the attention of the
Portuguese crown was increasingly focused on the Atlantic colonies in Africa and Brazil.
Throughout the eighteenth century, there was a considerable increase in the slave trade,
partly due to the discovery of the immense gold reserves of Minas Gerais (Boxer, 2011;
Bethencourt and Curto, 2010). A policy of incentives was implemented to stimulate the
production of knowledge about the natural potentialities of the colonies, mainly in relation
to their medical elements (Walker, 2018; Conceição, 2018; Domingues, 2001). Within this
context, after the expulsion of the Dutch invaders (1648) and until the end of the next
century, Angola, whose main port was Luanda, became one of the Empire’s most
important strategic points (Bethencourt, 1997: 250-269).
As far as the colonies are concerned, the historiography of science has produced a
large number of works about the formation of medical knowledge in these regions, largely
since the beginning of the second half of the eighteenth century, with most emphasis being
placed on the last quarter of the century. The main focus of such research has been the
natural potentialities of the most important strategic territories of that period (i.e. Brazil
and Africa).
From the beginning of the reign of Dom João V (1706-1750) onwards, there was a
much wider circulation of agents, books, ideas, and correspondence in a variety of
environments, not only in Portugal but also in the countries of northern Europe and in the
colonies (Furtado, 2012). The different parts of the Portuguese Empire were connected by
sea (Alencastro, 2010: 115-144) between them circulated not only commercial goods and
slaves, but also texts and knowledge. Both logistically and geographically, the Portuguese
1
PhD in History at the University of Porto. Post-Doctoral Researcher at the University of São Paulo/USP,
FAPESP—São Paulo Research Foundation, and Researcher at CITCEM—Transdisciplinary Research Centre
“Culture, Space and Memory,” University of Porto. E-mail: giselecconceicao@gmail.com
2 PhD in History at the University of Porto. Post-Doctoral Researcher at the University of São Paulo/USP,
FAPESP—São Paulo Research Foundation. E-mail: bracht.fabiano@gmail.com
Conceição & Bracht
Essays on Some Maladies of Angola
Empire can be considered either as a maritime system that created a social network linking
many ports and small villages (Schwartz, 2010: 21-51) or as a network of maritime
connections that supported the interests of the Crown’s expansionist policies, whether
mercantile, religious, or military (Thomaz, 2009: 13-57). From the sixteenth century
onwards, this network promoted the circulation of information about the different natural
potentialities of the colonies, especially those that were useful to medicine (Sanches and
Abdalla, 2014: 183-187).
Angola was an important center within the Portuguese maritime complex, since its
port served one of the main regions for the export of African slaves, mainly to Brazil
(Alencastro, 2010: 115-144; Madeira-Santos, 2010). The ships not only transported slaves but
also a series of goods. Many aspects of the connection between these two regions of the
Empire (Brazil and Angola) have been extensively studied under the umbrella of Atlantic
History, with emphasis being placed mainly on the slave trade and the circulation of
consumer goods (Ferreira, 2012; Alencastro, 2010; Reis, Silva Jr., 2016; Richardson, Silva,
2014; Boxer, 2011). However, the transatlantic connection was not only linked to human
trafficking and the trading of commercial products between the various points of the Atlantic
Empire. Quite significantly, it also helped to spread diseases originating from various points
in the Empire. To a certain extent, such diseases had to be recognized by physicians and
required specific treatments, often involving the use of botanical components of local origin
(Walker, 2009; Cook and Walker, 2013: 337-351; Abreu, 2012: 163-183).
This is the context within which this book, edited by Timothy D. Walker, together
with Adelino Cardoso, António Braz de Oliveira, and Manuel Silvério Marques, is
presented to us. It is definitely a fundamental tool for studying the life and work of those
historical agents who produced treatises on medicine in early modern colonial Africa,
including the Luso-Brazilian physician José Pinto de Azeredo (1764–1810). This book’s
most important contributions are related to the history of the production of medical and
pharmaceutical knowledge within the Portuguese colonial spaces and the circulation of
agents and knowledge between the two sides of the Atlantic Ocean, connecting Africa,
Brazil, and Portugal. In addition to providing an English translation of Azeredo’s treatise
on medicine (1799), the book is composed of three analytical essays, each addressing
different aspects of the author’s work and life. With this careful and accurate translation,
Walker and his collaborators have made an important contribution by bringing one of the
most important medical texts of the late eighteenth century to a wider audience.
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José Pinto de Azeredo was born in Brazil and studied in Europe. His academic
career took him to many important educational centers, such as France, England, Scotland,
and the Netherlands. In 1789, he was named Chief Physician in Angola, having moved to
Luanda in 1790. Once in Africa, Azeredo worked mainly at the military hospital. Like many
other scholars of the Old Regime, Azeredo wrote on a variety of different subjects and by
offering his writings to important nobles, clergymen, politicians, or armchair savants, he
expected to have his work recognized through a corresponding improvement in his own
social position. Despite not having been recognized during his lifetime at the level of his
own expectations, his writings are definitely important if we consider the late eighteenthcentury intellectual panorama, which, in itself, testifies to the importance of this published
translation.
The three essays that make up this book—namely “Medical inquiry in the
Enlightenment-Era Portuguese Imperial World: Azeredo’s Scientific Publications in
Context,” by Timothy D. Walker; “Describing and Explaining: The Systematic Horizon of
the Essays by José Pinto de Azeredo,” by Adelino Cardoso; and “Shadows in the
Enlightenment of Imperial Tropics: José Pinto de Azeredo’s Enfermidades de Angola,” by
António Braz de Oliveira and Manuel Silvério Marques—provide us with a coherent
analytical series of studies on Azeredo’s life and work as well as the historical contexts in
which he operated in Africa, Brazil, and Europe.
In the first essay, Timothy Walker looks at the importance of the historical contexts
surrounding both Azeredo and his work. According to Walker, “Azeredo’s work in Brazil
and Angola is so compelling because he represents, and is a producer of, a watershed
moment in Portuguese medical history” (Walker, 2016: 3). In his essay, Walker examines
the most important characteristics of Azeredo’s writings by studying not only those
produced in Angola but also those produced in Brazil, mainly in Rio de Janeiro. Walker
establishes an interesting connection between Azeredo’s work and the political, economic,
and scientific issues that dictated the Portuguese imperial strategy in that period, especially
those relating to the production of scientific knowledge about the medicinal potentialities
of plants from different parts of the Empire.
In the second essay, Adelino Cardoso leads the reader into a detailed analysis of
Azeredo’s methods and theoretical references. In his essay, Cardoso seeks to demonstrate
how close Azeredo’s work was to the ideals of the Enlightenment by offering a more
rational approach to the Angolan diseases and their cures and causes, while, at the same
time, searching for local knowledge and therapies based on local drugs. In his analysis,
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Cardoso states that Azeredo was able to detach himself from the mystical and religious
patterns that characterized medicinal practices in Angola by adopting a more scientific
understanding in which “… the art in the Science of medicine calls attention to organic,
psychosocial, and anthropological factors that imply a conception of medicine as natural
and social Science” (Cardoso, 2016: 28).
The last essay is composed of two different but complementary parts. In the first
one, by António Braz de Oliveira, the reader is given details of José Pinto de Azeredo’s
both personal and professional pathways. By describing the time that he spent studying at
the major European centers, Oliveira seeks to demonstrate the important role that the
physician played during that period, mainly by analyzing how his personal networks may
have influenced his writings and medical practice. Finally, in the second part, written by
Manuel Silvério Marques, there is a precise discussion about theories and theorists who
may, in some way, have influenced Azeredo’s scientific and political choices. Marques also
presents his readers with details about some of Azeredo’s choices linked to both his
observation methods and his experimentation. Marques ends his essay by pointing out that
Azeredo’s work is definitely an important source for a better understanding of the
processes of constructing medical knowledge in Angola, as well as for gaining a wider
knowledge of the formation of modern medical thinking.
Therefore, Essays on Some Maladies of Angola is not only a compendium in which the
authors report on diseases and their possible methods of cure. Most of all, Azeredo’s
treatise establishes a series of theses on the most common diseases in Africa: Fevers of
Angola; Intermittent Fevers; Dysenteries of Angola; and Tetanus in Angola. José Pinto de
Azeredo provides his readers with a historical narrative about Angolan diseases and their
causes and possible treatments.
Essays is a complete narrative treatise, compiled by a physician who not only
demonstrated the specific knowledge of his own field of work but also established a
connection with the scientific thinking of his time. These are the key concepts in the
analysis of Timothy D. Walker, Adelino Cardoso, António Braz de Oliveira, and Manuel
Silvério Marques. According to them, Azeredo’s work is a crucial historical source for
sociologists, philosophers, and historians of science if their aim is to provide a better
understanding of the processes involved in the construction of medical knowledge both in
Angola and in the Portuguese Atlantic Empire during the eighteenth century.
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