Maria da Fonte
In 1846 Portugal was, much like Spain and the United Kingdom are still today, a constitutional monarchy.
The Queen, D. Maria II, was loved by the people, but the Minister of the Kingdom, Costa Cabral was hated by all but a few powerful men.
Much to his discredit, Costa Cabral was an unfair ruler and his policies had long been cause of unrest among the poor people.
When the glass is full it takes but a little drop to spill it, and so when Costa Cabral decreed it was forbidden to bury people inside churches the people started to rise.
In fact this was a good measure, brought about for sanitation reasons, but the religious fervor allied to a long list of bad measures by the minister on previous times made the people ignore all logics.
When a woman died in the northern part of Portugal a group of women took her body to a Monastery for the burial, in spite of the minister’s orders.
The governor of the district sent for the army and a judge gave orders to exhume the body of the deceased woman.
The population led by a woman known as Maria da Fonte stormed the exhumation.
The judge then ordered the army to arrest a few women to strike fear into the hearts of the rebels.
Tough luck, Maria da Fonte led the crowd to the jail, they raided the jail, freeing the prisoners and burning all the processes of that court.
The Maria da Fonte revolution, as it is commonly known nowadays, gave rise to the liberal revolutions, like the coupe d’etat of October 6 of 1846 or the revolution of June 30 of 1847.
The unrest wouldn’t really stop until 1910, when the monarchy was overthrown. The truth being it didn’t stop in 1910 either…
Back to Maria da Fonte, little is in fact known by most of us about this woman who managed to lead her countrymen against their rulers. She was born in Póvoa do Lanhoso, she is usually portrayed with a spade on one hand and a pistol on the other and although she is claimed as the revolution leader this is pretty much all most of us know about that woman.
Tags:Portugal
The Queen, D. Maria II, was loved by the people, but the Minister of the Kingdom, Costa Cabral was hated by all but a few powerful men.
Much to his discredit, Costa Cabral was an unfair ruler and his policies had long been cause of unrest among the poor people.
When the glass is full it takes but a little drop to spill it, and so when Costa Cabral decreed it was forbidden to bury people inside churches the people started to rise.
In fact this was a good measure, brought about for sanitation reasons, but the religious fervor allied to a long list of bad measures by the minister on previous times made the people ignore all logics.
When a woman died in the northern part of Portugal a group of women took her body to a Monastery for the burial, in spite of the minister’s orders.
The governor of the district sent for the army and a judge gave orders to exhume the body of the deceased woman.
The population led by a woman known as Maria da Fonte stormed the exhumation.
The judge then ordered the army to arrest a few women to strike fear into the hearts of the rebels.
Tough luck, Maria da Fonte led the crowd to the jail, they raided the jail, freeing the prisoners and burning all the processes of that court.
The Maria da Fonte revolution, as it is commonly known nowadays, gave rise to the liberal revolutions, like the coupe d’etat of October 6 of 1846 or the revolution of June 30 of 1847.
The unrest wouldn’t really stop until 1910, when the monarchy was overthrown. The truth being it didn’t stop in 1910 either…
Back to Maria da Fonte, little is in fact known by most of us about this woman who managed to lead her countrymen against their rulers. She was born in Póvoa do Lanhoso, she is usually portrayed with a spade on one hand and a pistol on the other and although she is claimed as the revolution leader this is pretty much all most of us know about that woman.
Tags:Portugal
posted by DCveR at 9:21 PM
4 Comments:
IF...if he'd been a good ruler who had declared no burials in churches, would people still have rebelled?
penny: She was probably just a poor peasant with a loud voice.
GG: Knowing religious fanatism and the way people hold on to superstitions probably the result would have been the same.
tacit: Too much work in the lab makes my mind wonder to different subjects while I'm off work.
tall glass: There are a few advantages in talking about dead people, they don't sue you for slander for starters... ;)
isis: Spanish history???? LOL
I like to say really bad things about our dead dictator and he can't do anything hehehe
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