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Lucia Maria Bastos Pereira das Neves The forgotten in the independence process: a history to be made

Almanack, Guarulhos, n. 25, ef00220, 2020 http://doi.org/10.1590/2236-463325ef00220

as mysterious; and it has evidently been identified in the qualified periods marked, without missing a point, by premeditated facts”^[1]. Prophecies, no doubt, but not the by prognostications of modern language, in Koselleck’s perspective: “a concrete history matures amidst expected experiences and expectations”^[2]. In the case of Antônio Barbosa, it was not this vision that guided his horizon of expectation.

Women: participating members of civil society?

Finally, it can still be highlighted in a forgotten group - women in the process of independence. In a society deeply hierarchical as in the Old Regime, it is possible to imagine the almost invisible role of these ladies. However, their presence can be detected, in addition to their effective action in fights for separation of the new empire, by letters in newspapers, by private correspondence and even by the writing of political pamphlets. In the last case, for example, in Bahia, there can be found regrets of a woman from that place due to the crisis faced in her homeland due to the constitutional despotism of the Auxiliary Troop of Portugal, commanded by General Madeira de Melo. He said it was a 13-year-old girl, in her anonymity and closed in her room, writing verses “washed in tears”^[3]. Another, Maria Clemência de Silveira Sampaio, was considered the first poet of Rio Grande do Sul^[4].

The participation of women as members of political society, however, was also reflected in petitions, requests and letters that claimed their civil rights. In 1823, before this climate of antagonism between Portuguese and Brazilians, there was a representation written by women addressed to Emperor Pedro I. These women - Brazilian - asked for their Portuguese husbands, threatened with expulsion from Bra-

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1. Ibidem, p. 57.
2. KOSELLECK, Reinhart. Futuro passado: contribuição ... Op. Cit., p. 309.
3. LAMENTOS de huma bahiana na triste crise, em que vio sua patria oppressa pelo despotismo constitucional da tropa Auxiliadora de Portugal. Rio de Janeiro: Imprensa Nacional, 1822, p. 3-4.
4. MOREIRA, Maria Eunice (org.). Uma voz ao sul: os versos de Maria Clemência da Silveira Sampaio. Florianópolis: Ed. das Mulheres, 2003.