Tesouro de meninas and Tesouro de meninos: Reading of civility in Portuguese America

Abstract

This paper aims to give visibility to the books Tesouro de meninas and Tesouro de meninos, which began to circulate in Portuguese America in the Johannine period. Tesouro de meninas is the Portuguese version of the French original Magasin d’enfants, written by Pauline de Montmorin, known as Madame Leprince Beaumont, who published this work of a pedagogical nature in 1757. It was translated by the Portuguese priest Joaquim Ignácio de Frias in 1774. Tesouro de meninos, in turn, was written by Pierre Blanchard and translated from French by the Portuguese Matheus José da Costa. Although there is no record of the fi rst edition, it is assumed to be from the 18th century. These fi ction narratives arrived in Brazil through wish lists sent from Rio de Janeiro to Portugal’s Royal Censorship. The titles Tesouro de meninas and Tesouro de meninos point to a genre that has been little studied until now, viz. civility books. These works introduced literate people in Portuguese America to sociability codes as sociability networks expanded in the Johannine period.

Keywords: reading books, civility, Portuguese America.