MARRIAGE, QUALITY, EQUALITY AND CIRCULATION OF CONCEPTS IN THE PORTUGUESE AND SPANISH EMPIRES (1770-1820)

Abstract

This article focuses on reformist Portuguese and Spanish laws on marriage. At the same time, we analyze processes mediated by those laws open in Portugal and in Portuguese and Spanish Americas. In such processes, men and women belonging to different social groups were prevented from getting married due to the stigma of “mulatto” and “New Christian”, which, within the scope of the Portuguese empire, they mobilized the Pombaline laws of equivalence published between 1755 and 1773. The results of this analysis suggest that there was an intense circulation of the concepts of “quality”, “equality” and “marriage inequality” among the different social groups examined and that there were diametrically opposed interests on the part of the Portuguese monarchies and Spanish in proposing those state interventions in the private sphere of marriages.

Keywords:
marriage; quality; equality; Portuguese empire; Spanish empire