O Arquivo da Casa de Belmonte, séculos XV-XIX: Identidade, gestão e poder

This thesis studies the Archive of the House of Belmonte. The oldest core of this archive was produced and preserved by the lineage of the Figueiredo family, becoming attached to their path since late fifteenth century. The main purposes are the understanding of the documental production and the dynamisms that led to the documental production of the lineage of the Figueiredo family, between the end of the 15th century and the first half of the 19th and to the creation, production and preservation of the Archive. By identifying the contexts in the origin of this archive, the intention is to seize the way(s) and motivation(s) for the use of the documentation, to identify the intertextualities in it, and to understand the relation between the lineage and its documents. This is done in an interdisciplinary plan in which History and Archival Science are combined. The work is divided in three main parts: the first part presents the theoretical support that guides this study, mainly in terms of the current paradigms of the Archival Science, the Nobility History in Portugal, and the current knowledge about Family Archives in its specificities. The second part focuses on the clarification of the custodial history of the archive and the explanation of how the analytical corpus was shaped, through the existence of two inventories preserved in the Archive of the House of Belmonte and the consultation of the Royal Archive’s fonds (Chancelarias Régias; Corpo Cronológico; Registo Geral de Mercês). The third part explains the archival representation and is focused in the analysis of the roduction and uses of documents. The further analysis of the two inventories preserved in the Archive of the House of Belmonte enabled the understanding of the various information recovery tools. The work is finalized with a reflection about the effect of the archive in the consolidation of the family/House and an epilogue that intents to reflect about the appreciation, dissemination, and availability of Family Archives.