A Postal Office “as Quick and Economical as Possible”: The Implementation of Postal Networks in Portuguese America (1796–1807)

In 1798, Portugal implemented the first regular postal lines in its American domains, forming a network organized around two poles, Belém and Rio de Janeiro. The objective was to create the fastest possible connections, to serve the administration and commerce in a movement of territorialization and temporal ordering of space in an economically self-sustainable and profitable way. To this end, local governments adapted royal determinations to their realities, in a process analyzed in this article based on sources from various institutions, such as the Historical Overseas Archive, the National Archive of Rio de Janeiro, the National Library of Rio de Janeiro and Public Archives of the State of São Paulo. Among the conclusions, the following can be observed: a) the low capillarity of the network, focused mainly on serving the captaincy headquarters; b) the difficulty of making profitable the land routes and, mainly, the river routes; c) the lack of connection between the captaincies of the North and those of the Southeast and South, although Goiás and Mato Grosso are connected to both blocks; d) the predominance of Rio de Janeiro in connections with the Center-West, even though Pará aspired to dominate the circuit.