An Analysis of the Royal Preserves in Portugal: Issues of Privilege, Power, Management and Conflict

This book looks at the functioning and symbolic meanings of the royal preserves, parks, and forests in a transitional period in Portuguese political regimes: at the end of the Ancien Regime and in the aftermath of the first liberal revolution in Portugal (1821), from 1777 to 1824.The aim is to understand how life developed in royal preserves before and after the Liberal Revolution in Portugal. The majority of academic work produced before 1998 focused on hunting and royal preserves in England, Spain or France. If the classic Whigs and Hunters, by E. P. Thompson, proclaimed the prerogatives of aristocracy for the British aristocratic mastering of property rights, status and ethos, other contributions of the preserves regime, in the mastering of social order and in the attempt to balance or master powers, can be added, for other regions in Europe. In this case, the focus is on Portugal.