Outside Government Science, ‘Not a Single Tiny Bone to Cheer Us Up!’ The Geological Survey of Portugal (1857–1908), The Involvement of Common Men, and the Reaction of Civil Society to Geological Research

Abstract

This paper focuses on the role played by the Geological Survey of Portugal in the emergence and consolidation of geology as a government science in the nineteenth century, within a general policy of control over territory. The period under consideration covers the directorates of its first leaders, Pereira da Costa (1809–1888) and the military engineers Carlos Ribeiro (1813–1882), and Nery Delgado (1835–1908). When the Geological Survey was created in 1857 as part of the Directorate of Geodesic, Chorographic, Hydrographical Works of the Kingdom (Direcção Geral dos Trabalhos Geodesicos, Chorographicos, Hydrographicos do Reino) established at the Ministry of Public Works, Trade and Industry (Ministério das Obras Públicas, Comércio e Indústria), Portugal lacked a geological culture and a tradition in geological research. The Portuguese Geological Survey was to be marked by the idiosyncrasies of the local culture and of the organization of the State. In this paper, the emergence of geology as a government science is analysed, by taking into consideration the structure, organization, and a general overview of contributions to the Survey. A particular emphasis will be given to its subordinate staff—the field assistants—not only because their contributions to the geological knowledge of the country have hitherto been largely ignored, but also because they materialized the only possible way for common people to become involved with geology in nineteenth‐century Portugal. Generally, with only a basic education, field assistants gradually acquired enough expertise to make decisions in the field, and a few of them even became what Nery Delgado termed ‘practical geologists’. The letters in which they reported their work in addition to vivid accounts of less glamorous aspects of fieldwork and its organization provide an image of the country and of its culture by portraying the reactions of civil society to the practice of geology.

Acknowledgements

The research underlying this paper was carried out in the context of the project Laying down the Foundation Stone: 19^th Century Geology in the Context of the Mining and Metals General Committee and the Geological Survey, approved by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia/Portugal, in the context of the Programa Operacional Ciência, Tecnologia e Inovação (POCTI) of the Quadro Comunitário de Apoio III (2000–2006), partly funded by FEDER.

I wish to express my deepest gratitude to David Oldroyd, Simon Knell, and Hugh Torrens for their bibliographical guidance and their comments and suggestions. I am also most grateful to Professor Miguel Magalhães Ramalho (IGM Vice‐President), for kindly having handed on to me Romão de Matos's tape‐recorded interview, and to Dr António Carvalhosa, for kindly sorting out the correspondence from Nery Delgado to Luís Couceiro, and for his advice. A word of gratitude goes to Dr J.M. Piçarra (IGM‐Beja), for clarifying some questions on graptolites, and most especially to Professor Helena Couto (Department of Geology of the Faculty of Sciences of Oporto), for invaluable information on palaeontological features of Valongo. I am also very grateful to the IGM librarians, Mrs Paula Serrano, Miss Fátima Moreira, and Miss Conceição Moura, for their kind assistance, and to Vanda Leitão, Luís Teixeira Pinto, and Teresa Salomé Mota, for sharing with me some relevant documents and the good and bad moments of working in an uncatalogued archive.

Notes

An earlier version of this paper titled ‘“God has forsaken this land!” The Anonymous and Forgotten Work of Collecting Rocks and Fossils’, was delivered at the meeting of the International Commission for the History of Geological Science, Portugal, Lisbon/Aveiro, 24 June–1 July 2001.

I have borrowed this expression from a Survey fieldworker, Miguel Pedroso, who in a letter he sent from Moledo (northern Portugal) to Calderon, a Survey clerk, dated 10 June 1880, reported himself as being in great dismay with his work in a cave, Casa da Moura, because the rocks were too hard and he could not find any specimens. The original in Portuguese reads: ‘… e sem ao menos aparecer um bocadinho de osso que nos anime’.

The Geological Survey of Britain was created in 1835; the French in 1822, and the Italian in 1877.

S. Knell, The Culture of English Geology, 1815–1851. A Science Revealed through its Collecting (Aldershot, 2000), pp. 6–7.

Knell (note 3), xi.

Knell (note 3), xi.

These schools were the University of Coimbra, one of the eldest in Europe, the Lisbon Polytechnic School and the Polytechnic Academy of Oporto, both created in 1837 by the Liberal educational reforms which took place in the nineteenth century, especially from 1850 to 1890.

Martim P. Ferreira, 200 Anos de Mineralogia e Arte de Mina. Desde a Faculdade de Filosofia (1772) até à Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia (1972) (Coimbra, 1998); Miguel T. Antunes, ‘Sobre a História do Ensino da Geologia em Portugal’, Comunicações dos Serviços Geológicos de Portugal, 75 (1989), 122–70.

In the eighteenth century among them the Italian Domenico Vandelli, who became professor at the University of Coimbra, the Frenchmen Guy T. Dolomieu and Faujas de Saint‐Fond, the Germans Heinrich Link and the Count of Hoffmansegg. In the nineteenth century, the Brazilian‐born José Bonifácio de Andrada e Silva and later the German Baron of Eschwege and the British Daniel Sharpe published on Portuguese geology. However, with the exception of Sharpe, who introduced palaeontology into Portugal, these authors approached stratigraphy from a lithological perspective.

We know little about Charles Bonnet. Apparently, he had come to Portugal to work in the coal mines of Bussaco and Mondego Cape, upon invitation of the Count of Farrobo.

The tasks the Academy required Bonnet to carry out encompassed a geological description of the country together with one on the materials useful to civil construction, of coal strata, metal mines and of thermal waters. The description was to include a geological map with cross‐sections. Bonnet also had to organize mineralogical and geological collections, collect and organize shells and insects, and rectify a geographic map authored by Marino Miguel Franzini. All these tasks assigned to Bonnet, who was occasionally assisted by Joaquim Júlio Pereira de Carvalho, a philosophy graduate from Coimbra University and José Maria da Ponte e Horta, a 2nd lieutenant of artillery, show that the Academy of Sciences of Lisbon was unaware of the complexities involved in each of the tasks.

Concerning other European Geological Surveys, see: Gordon L. Herries Davies, North from the Hook. 150 years of the Geological Survey of Ireland, Dublin, Geological Survey of Ireland, (Dublin, 1995); H.E. Wilson, Down to Earth. One Hundred and Fifty Years of the British Geological Survey (Edinburgh, 1985); John S. Flett, The First Hundred Years of the Geological Survey of Great Britain (London, 1937); Bach‐Hofmann et al., eds, Die Geologische Bundesanstalt in Wien (Vienna, 1999); M. Guntau, ‘The History of the Origins of the Prussian Geological Survey in Berlin (1873)’, History of Technology, 5 (1988), 51–58.

The Ministry of Public Works (MPW), indeed a super ministry, was created on 30 August 1852. Its first Minister was the gifted, influential, and emblematic leader of the Partido Regenerador (Regenerator Party) the former military engineer Fontes Pereira de Melo (1819–1887). The policies then implemented are known as Fontismo and are associated with the development of Portuguese capitalism. Concerning the nature of nineteenth‐century Portuguese capitalism, see Armando de Castro, A Revolução Industrial em Portugal no Século XIX (Lisbon, 1971) and Manuel Villaverde Cabral, O Desenvolvimento do Capitalismo em Portugal no Século XIX (Lisbon, 1981); Luís R. Torgal; João L. Roque, co‐ordinator, História de Portugal. O Liberalismo, vol. 5, edited by José Mattoso (Lisbon, 1998). On Fontes Pereira de Melo, see M. Filomena Mónica, Fontes Pereira de Melo (Lisbon, 1999).

Bruno Latour, Science in Action. How to Follow Scientists and Engineers through Society (Milton Keynes, 1987), 232.

See ‘Centres inside centres’, Latour (note 13), 235.

Latour (note 13), 230.

Maria P. Diogo, A Construção de uma Identidade Profissional. A Associação dos Engenheiros Civis Portuguezes, 1869–1937 (Lisbon, unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, New University of Lisbon, 1994), 309–14.

‘Parecer da Comissão Nomeada para examinar o Projecto sobre Minas do Vogal do Conselho de Obras Públicas, o Dr. Isidoro Emílio Baptista’, Boletim do Ministério das Obras Publicas, Commercio e Industria, 2 (1857), 148–67 (159). I thank Vanda Leitão for this information.

‘Preambulo do decreto de 8 de Agosto de 1857’, Diário do Governo, 207 (3 September 1857), 1168.

David Oldroyd, Thinking about the Earth: A History of Ideas in Geology (London, 1996), 108–30.

See Rui Branco, O Conhecimento do Território e a Construção do Estado. O Desenvolvimento da Cartografia Territorial em Portugal no Século XIX (Lisbon, unpublished MA dissertation, New University of Lisbon, 1999) and Maria F. Alegria; João Garcia, ‘Aspectos da Evolução da Cartografia Portuguesa’, in Os Mapas em Portugal, da Tradição aos Novos Rumos da Cartografia, edited by Maria H. Dias (Lisbon, 1995).

To my knowledge, no historical work on the French Geological Survey has been published.

Report addressed by Pereira da Costa to Filipe Folque, 16 November 1867. Historical Archive of the Portuguese Geographic Institute (Instituto Geográfico Português) (IGP), file ‘Relatórios’. IGP inherited the archives of the Geodesic Directorate.

Research schools have been defined by Gerald Geison as: ‘Small groups of mature scientists pursuing a reasonably coherent programme of research side‐by‐side with advanced students in the same institutional context engaging in direct, continuous social and intellectual interaction’. Gerald Geison, ‘Scientific Change, Emerging Specialties, and Research Schools’, History of Science, 19 (1981), 20–40 (at p. 23). Concerning the role of the British Geological Survey as a research school, see James Secord, ‘The Geological Survey of Great Britain as a Research School, 1839–1855’, History of Science, 24 (1986), 233–75.

The structure and personnel of the Geological Survey throughout its various reorganizations is described in tables 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, and 11; tables 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, and 12 summarize the research carried out by the Survey geologists and their field assistants.

‘General Map Illustrative of the Operations in Portugal, and the adjoining frontier of Spain compiled under the Direction of J. Wyld, Geographer to the Queen, engraved by S. Stockley, Compiled from Survey made during the War’. Its size is 126 cm by 86 cm, and there is no indication of the date of publication, but according to the list of the British Library, the map dates from 1845. I thank Hugh Torrens for this information.

Vanda Leitão, ‘The Travels of Geologist Carlos Ribeiro (1813–1882) in Europe in 1858’, Comunicações do Instituto Geológico e Mineiro, 88 (2001), 293–300.

This map was not found at the IGM Historical Archive or at the IGP's.

See The Dictionary of National Biography, from the Earliest Times to 1900, edited by L. Stephen; S. Lee (Oxford, 1937–1938), 19, pp. 1080–81. I thank Teresa Salomé Mota for sending me this information from England.

‘Relatório da Direcção Geral dos Trabalhos Geodésicos, Chorographicos, Hydrographycos e Geologicos do Reino, 1859–1860’, Direcção Geral das Obras Publicas, Comércio e Indústria, Repartição de Minas, 1^a Secção, Typescript, IGM Historical Archive, 32 (published in the Diário do Governo). However, it is not possible to know which map Delgado used.

There are various maps of Portuguese regions and plants published prior to the establishment of the Geodesic Directorate, usually by the military, which were probably used in Ribeiro's and Delgado's works at the Survey. They are intact, which suggests that copies in translucent tracing paper might have been used by these geologists in fieldwork.

The scale of both maps was not yet in accordance with the decimal metric system.

‘Minuta de Huma Carta do Reino de Portugal para a Defesa Geral do dito Reino’ (1840). See Orlando Ribeiro, ‘Evolução do Estado Actual da Cartografia Geológica de Portugal’, Finisterra, 1 (1966), 141.

‘Carta Topographica Militar do Terreno da Península de Setúbal’ (ca 1816).

Official letter from the Geodesic Directorate, 30 April 1859, addressed to the Minister of Public Works, Serpa Pimentel, No. 52, IGP Historical Archive, book Registo da Correspondência referida à Secção de Geologia desde Setembro de 1857 a Novembro de 1865.

The geographic surveying underlying the 1:100,000 chorographic map began in 1853 and was finished in 1892. Its publication was initiated in 1856 and ended in 1904. The slow pace of publication, which was due to financial constraints and changes in political orientation, would have had a negative effect on the cartographic production of the Geological Survey, had the Government refused the elaboration of the geographic map.

Official letter (note 34).

It was lithographed on 55 cm by 84 cm sheets. At this point, it is still impossible to tell exactly when lithography began in Portuguese cartography. In 1854, the Portuguese Government contacted J. Lewicky, a Polish émigré residing in France, who came to Portugal to set up a lithographic workshop at the Geodesic Directorate. This workshop together with that of the National Stationary Office (Imprensa Nacional), both inaugurated a tradition of lithography and chromolithography in Portuguese cartography. See M.F. Alegria; J. Garcia (note 20), 75; J.V. Ribeiro, A Imprensa Nacional de Lisboa, Subsídios para a sua História, 1768–1912 (Lisbon, 1912), 121.

The chorographic map constituted an atlas of 37 sheets (0.8 m by 0.5 m and covered 4000×10³ m²), the scale being 1:100,000. See Branco (note 20), 167.

José Cordeiro d'Araújo Feio (?–?) was a draughtsman of the MPW between 1854 and 1856. He worked in this capacity on the Hydrographical Commission of Figueira da Foz (1858) and was in charge of the making of the hydrographical map of Figueira da Foz's port. He worked for the Geological Survey until 1867 as a lithographer of geological maps 1:100,000. He also learned and applied photographic techniques with talent and skill. In 1877, he was 2nd class Technical Engineer of the MPW. See Archive of the Ministry of Public Works, Personal Files and Report 1862–1863, IGM Historical Archive.

At the British Geological Survey, 6 inches to the mile topographic maps published by the Ordnance Survey were used. These maps were cut up and taken into the field, and geological information was marked directly onto these pieces, approximately size A4. They were called ‘field‐slips’ and correspond roughly to the Portuguese minutas de campo. The information was put on the field by the geologists, but the Director General or District Officer would check this work at least annually. The fieldwork was carried out mainly in warmer months. In the winter months, information was transferred from the field‐slips to a composite map, for a region, and this version was called a ‘standard’, which corresponded to the Portuguese water‐coloured drafts before they were chromolithographed. J.S. Flett (note 11).

Norman E. Butcher, ‘The Advent of Colour‐Printing Geological in Britain’, Proceedings of the Royal Institution of Great Britain, 55 (1983), 149–61. On printing techniques and geological maps, see also Karen S. Cook, ‘From False Starts to Firm Beginnings: Early Colour Printing of Geological Maps’, Imago Mundi, 47 (1995), 155–72.

Corresponding to the regions of Benavente, Azambuja and Alcochete; Estremadura Province, between the mouths of rivers Tagus, Sado and the town of Alcácer do Sal.

See Relatório dos Trabalhos Executados no Instituto Geographico durante o Anno Económico de 1863–1866 (Lisbon, 1866), 18.

Region of Lagoa de Óbidos and Lourinhã.

Carlos Ribeiro, Description du terrain quaternaire des bassins du Tage et du Sado (Lisbon, 1866).

This geographic map does not indicate the date of publication.

In fact, even in the twentieth century, not all field assistants were directly involved in cartography. According to Dr António Carvalhosa, a retired Survey geologist, because they were almost uneducated, only very few (the ‘most intelligent’) were entrusted the task of marking boundaries on maps after they learned how to do it while assisting geologists in the field.

The name of the field assistant in question is not mentioned. See Report of 1862–1863 (note 114).

Carlos Ribeiro, Vues de la côte portugaise entre l'estuaire de la rivière de Maceira et Pedra do Frade à l'ouest de Cezimbra, posthumous publication edited by Georges Zbyszewski (Lisbon, 1949). The original atlas is held at the IGM Historical Archive.

So far, no information about Michaëlis has been found.

This lithography seems to have lasted only unti1 1868, because the next maps were printed at the lithography of the Geodesic Directorate.

In a letter to F.M. Tubino, Director of the Archaeological Museum of Madrid, Delgado confided that Pereira da Costa had sent clay moulds of archaeological items found by Ribeiro, Delgado and Vasconcelos Pereira Cabral to the French archaeologist Louis Lartet, and a memoir in which he distorted the interpretations of his colleagues. He asked Lartet to present these items and the memoir in the archaeological meeting to be held in Paris. Letter from Delgado to Tubino, Lisbon 2 March 1869. IGM Historical Archive, Box 1, Shelf 2, Bookcase 10.

C.A. Sepulveda, História do Exército Português (Lisbon, 1912), vol. 6, 145–229.

It is worth noting that both Beaumont and Dufrénoy, who, under the direction of Brochant de Villiers, were the main actors in the geological surveying of France, spent six months in Britain to learn Smith's methods.

Knell (note 3), 26.

Daniel Sharpe, ‘On the Geology of the Neighbourhood of Lisbon’, Transactions of the Geological Society of London 6 (1841), 107–33 and ‘On the Geology of the Neighbourhood of Porto, Including the Silurian Coal and Slates of Valongo’, Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, 5–6 (1849), 142–53.

The Geological Survey was now christened Secção dos Trabalhos Geológicos.

For the details of Ribeiro contacts with Choffat during the meeting, see Luís Teixeira Pinto, ‘Paul Choffat's First Stay with the Portuguese Geological Survey’, Comunicações do Instituto Geológio e Mineiro, 88 (2001), 301–308.

P. Choffat, Recueil de monographies stratigraphiques sur le système crétacique du Portugal. Première étude. Contrées de Cintra, Bellas et de Lisbonne (Lisbon, 1885).

P. Choffat, ‘De l'impossibilité de comprendre le Callovien dans le Jurassique supérieur’, Communicações da Commissão dos Trabalhos Geologicos, 1 (1883–1887), 69–87; and ‘Sur la place à assigner au Callovien’, Communicações da Commissão dos Trabalhos Geologicos, 1 (1883–1887), 159–63.

J.M. Oliveira Simões, ‘Os Serviços Geológicos em Portugal’, Comunicações dos Serviços Geológicos de Portugal, 14 (1923), 5–123 and F. Moitinho de Almeida, A. Barros e Carvalhosa, ‘Breve História dos Serviços Geológicos em Portugal’, Comunicações dos Serviços Geológicos de Portugal, 53 (1974), 241–265.

J.F. Nery Delgado, ‘Breves apontamentos sobre os terrenos paleozóicos do nosso paiz’, Revista de Obras Publicas e Minas, 1, 3–4 and 6 (1870), 15–27; 98–110; 168–75.

J.F. Nery Delgado, Terrenos Paleozoicos de Portugal. Sobre a existência do terreno Siluriano no Baixo Alemtejo (Lisbon, 1876). This has a French translation.

Based on Ribeiro and Delgado's map, the following were published: Geographic and Geological Map of Portugal, 1:500,000 in Gerardo A. Pery, Geografia e Estatística Geral de Portugal e Colónias (Lisbon, 1875); Sketch of a Geological Map of Portugal, on the scale 1:2,250,000 by Ribeiro and Delgado, Lisboa, Imprensa Nacional, 1879; Agronomic Map of Portugal (with the major geologic divisions), 1:2,250,000, by Barros Gomes, in his Cartas Elementares de Portugal (Lisbon, 1878); Geological Map of Spain and Portugal, 1:2,000,000, Madrid, 1879, by F. de Botella y de Hornos; Geologische Karte von Portugal, 1:1,500,000, by Müller‐Beck, in Eine Reise Dürch Portugal (Hamburg, 1883).

In an undated letter (surely from the 1880s), Ribeiro's friend Pinto Carvalho thanks him in the Proceedings of the meeting of the International Archaeological and Palaeoanthropological Congress. He says jokingly that for two years he had read only Büchner, Darwin, and Strauss. ‘The mollusc was the creator of the universe! Man inhabited the Tertiary and comes from the mollusc … you are destroying my belief in Adam's legend. … Upon such scientists fell the responsibility for the evolution of my ideas’. IGM Historical Archive, File 9, Box 1, Shelf 1, Bookcase 1.

Ana L. Pereira, Darwin em Portugal (1865–1914). Filosofia, História, Engenharia Social (Coimbra, 2002); C. Almaça, O Darwinismo na Universidade Portuguesa (1865–1890) (Lisbon, 1999).

Notably, the French Paleoanthropologist Gabriel de Mortillet called ‘the man of the Tertiary’ Homos simius riberoi, as a tribute to Ribeiro and included the topic in the courses he taught in Paris, according to an advert of his lecture courses at the Ecole d'Anthropologie, 1885–1886. IGM Historical Archive. On the relationship between geology, archaeology, and palaeoanthropology, see for Portugal João L. Cardoso, ‘As Investigações de Carlos Ribeiro e de Nery Delgado sobre o “Homem do Terciário”: Resultados e Consequências na época e para além dela’, Estudos Arqueológicos de Oeiras, 8 (1999–2000), 33–54. For France, see Claudine Cohen, L'homme des origines, savoir et fictions en préhistoire (Paris, 1999); Eric Buffeteaut, Histoire de la paléontologie (Paris, 1998); Goulven Laurent, Paléontologie et évolution en France, 1800–1860 (Paris, 1987). Also, in Britain, close links developed between geology and archaeology often within a theological as well as a scientific framework. See H.S. Torrens, ‘Geology and the Natural Sciences: Some Contributions to Archaeology in Britain 1780–1850’ in The Study of the Past in the Victorian Age (The Commemorative Volume for the 150th Anniversaries of the Royal Archaeological Institute and the British Archaeological Association), edited by V. Brand (Oxford, 1998), 21–59.

J.L. Cardoso (note 67).

Ibid.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro. Mealhada 3 November 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Corresponding to the regions of Rabaçal, Vila Nova de Ourém and Fátima.

Figueira da Foz is a town located on the west coast of central Portugal.

This involvement in politics goes back to the eighteenth century. See Ana Carneiro, Ana Simões and Maria P. Diogo, ‘Enlightenment Science in Portugal: the Estrangeirados and their communication networks’, Social Studies of Science, 30 (2000), 591–619. The same applies to the nineteenth century at the level of some leading engineers of the MPW, members of the Association of Civil Engineers and even of the Survey.

P. Krusch, ‘Sobre a Importância da Geologia na Prática’, Communicações da Comissão do Serviço Geológico, 12 (1917), 216–23. This was a translation of an article on the importance of practical geology published by Krusch, a senior officer of the Royal Geological Institute of Berlin, in the journal Der Geologie, 5 (1911).

P. Choffat, ‘Exemplo frisante da importância de dados geológicos na escolha dos traçados dos caminhos de ferro’, Communicações da Comissão dos Trabalhos Geológicos, 2 (1891) 161–70.

Letter from Nery Delgado to Lucas Mallada, Lisbon, 12 June 1876. IGM Historical Archive, Box 15, Shelf 2, Bookcase 10.

It is worth noting that by then, the DGS exchanged publications with 81 institutions, mainly foreign. Nery Delgado, ‘Preface’, Communicações da Commissão dos Trabalhos Geologicos, 1 (1883–1887), i–xii (at p. ix).

The report of 1875 said that the budget amounted to 4,263,400 reis. Direcção Geral dos Trabalhos Geodesicos, Topographicos, Hydrographicos e Geologicos do Reino, Relatório do Anno de 1875 (Lisbon, 1876).

The name of the Survey was now Comissão dos Trabalhos Geológicos. The restructuring of national surveys in all manner of ways has been a common occurrence in the history of geoscience.

H. Guerreiro Botto, ‘Engenheiros através do ‘Diário do Governo. Compilação’, Técnica (1936), 1–71 (at pp. 26 and 30); C. Aires Sepúlveda, História do Exercito Português (Lisbon, 1912), vol. 6, 155–229.

He wrote to Eduardo Benot (1822–1907), then Minister of Development of Spain, asking him for details about the organization of the Geographic Institute of Spain, for whose autonomy Benot had been responsible. Reply from Eduardo Benot to Delgado, Madrid, 8 August 1878, IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 1, Bookcase 10.

J. F. Nery Delgado, Estudo sobre os Bilobites e outros fosseis das quartzites da base do sistema silúrico de Portugal (Lisbon, 1886) and Estudo sobre os Bilobites e outros fosseis das quartzites da base do sistema silúrico de Portugal, Supplemento (Lisbon, 1887). Both monographs were translated into French.

A.‐G. Nathorst, Nouvelles Observations sur des traces d'animaux et autres phénomènes d'origine purement mécanique décrits comme ‘algues fossiles’ (Stockholm and Paris, 1886)

J. F. Nery Delgado, Fauna silúrica de Portugal. Descripção de uma nova forma de Trilobite, Lichas (Uralichas) Riberoi (Lisbon, 1892); Fauna silúrica de Portugal. Novas observações sobre Lichas (Uralichas) Riberoi (Lisbon, 1897) (both translated into French).

J. F. Nery Delgado, ‘Contributions à l'étude des terrains anciens du Portugal’, Communicações da Commissão dos Trabalhos Geológicos , 2 (1888–1891), 216–28.

P. Choffat, Description de la Faune Jurassique du Portugal. Mollusques Lamellibranches (Lisbon, 1885).

Maria D. Areias, ‘Expeditions in the African colonies during the 19th century: Geological Contributions from Portuguese Travellers’, Comunicações do Instituto Geológico e Mineiro , 88 (2001), 347–54.

Simões (note 61).

Direcção dos Trabalhos Geológicos

Portugal covers Sheets 29^a. V and 37 A. VI, which were coloured according to the drafts of the Portuguese Survey presented to the 1894 meeting of the International Geological Congress held in Zurich.

In the 1950s, the Geological Survey relaunched geological cartography in Portugal, and in 1951, the Geological Map of Portugal on the scale 1:50,000, based on the Military Map of Portugal on the scale 1:25,000, but released on a simplified version of the Chorographic Map of Portugal, was published by the Geographic and Cadastral Institute. From the 175 sheets, 118 have been published at the time of writing. This map was extended to Azores and Madeira. In 1952, a geological map of Portugal was published on the scale 1:1,000,000. In 1983, the Geological Map of Portugal on the scale 1:200,000 began to be published, and in 1992, a 5th edition of the Geological Map of Portugal on the scale 1:500,000 was published, based on the various 1:50,000 maps published in the meantime. See Almeida Rebelo, As Cartas Geológicas ao Serviço do Desenvolvimento (Lisbon, n.d.). The remapping was supported by Carlos Teixeira (1910–1982), Professor of Geology at the Faculty of Sciences of Lisbon, who collaborated with the Geological Survey between the 1950s and the 1960s and involved several of his students in periods of paid training at the Geological Survey.

P. Choffat, ‘Note sur le Crétacique de Torres Vedras’, Communicações da Commissão dos Trabalhos Geológicos, 2 (1891), 175–215.

P. Choffat, Description de la faune Jurassique du Portugal. Céphalopodes. 1ère série. Ammonites du Lusitanien de la contrée de Torres Vedras (Lisbon, 1893); Description de la faune Jurassique du Portugal. Mollusques Lamellibranches. Premier ordre. Siphonida (Lisbon, 1893).

P. Choffat, ‘Notice stratigraphique sur les gisements de végétaux fossiles dans le Mésozoïque du Portugal’ in Flore fossile du Portugal. Nouvelles contributions à la flore le Mésozoïque, edited by Marquis de Saporta (Lisbon, 1893), 272–82.

Direcção dos Serviços Geológicos.

Comissão do Serviço Geológico.

The latter technical schools had been created in 1853–1854, but they were to be converted to technical schools for higher education, with the Republican teaching reform of 1911.

J. F. Nery Delgado, ‘Considérations générales sur la classification du Système Silurique’, Communicações do Serviço Geológico, 4 (1901), 208–27.

J. F. Nery Delgado, Faune Cambrienne du Haut‐Alemtejo (Lisbon, 1904)

J. F. Nery Delgado, ‘Contribuições para o estudo dos Terrenos Paleozóicos–I. Precambrico e Archaico–II Cambrico’, Communicações do Serviço Geológico, 6 (1895), 56–122.

J. F. Nery Delgado, Système Silurique du Portugal–Etude de stratigraphie paléontologique (Lisbon, 1905)

P. Choffat, ‘Subdivisions du Sénonien du Portugal’, Comptes Rendus de l'Académie des Sciences de Paris, 130 (1900), 1078–80.

P. Choffat, ‘Le Crétacique supérieure au nord du Tage’ in Recueil de Monographies Stratigraphiques sur le Système Crétacique du Portugal (Lisbon, 1900).

P. Choffat, ‘Sue les séismes ressentis en Portugal en 1903’, Comptes Rendus de l'Académie des Sciences de Paris, 138 (1904), 313–15.

Adolpho Loureiro, ‘Carlos Ribeiro. Noticia Necrologica’, O Instituto, 30 (1882–1883), 193–205; Paul Choffat, ‘Notice nécrologique sur Carlos Ribeiro’, Bulletin de la Société Géologique de France, 11 (1883), 321–29; Ricardo Severo, ‘Carlos Ribeiro’, Revista de Sciencias Naturaes e Sociaes, 5 (1898), 153–77; Nery Delgado, ‘Elogio historico do General Carlos Ribeiro’, Revista de Obras Publicas e Minas, 36 (1905), 1–51; Pedro de Aguiar, ‘Dois homens ilustres: José Victorino Damásio e Carlos Ribeiro’, Boletim da Associação Industrial Portuense, 248–52 (1940), 5–37.

Paul Choffat, ‘Notice nécrologique sur J.F. Nery Delgado (1835–1908)’, Communicações da Commissão do Serviço Geologico de Portugal, 7 (1909), vi–xxi; Paul Choffat, ‘La géologie Portugaise et l'oeuvre de Nery Delgado’, Bulletin de la Société Portugaise des Sciences Naturelles, 3 (1909), 1–35; ‘O General de Divisão Joaquim Filippe Nery da Encarnação Delgado’, Revista Militar, 11 (1908), 741–43; Carlos Teixeira, ‘A Figura e Obra de Nery Delgado’, Boletim da Sociedade Portuguesa de Ciências Naturais, 12 (1968–1969), 45–54.

The single exception was Romão de Matos, whose personal file survives in the archive of the Ministry of Public Works. Archive of the Ministério das Obras Públicas (MOP), Lisbon, Ficheiros do Pessoal.

Portuguese currency of the time. A 1st class engineer of the MPW would earn 70,000 reis per month as a member of staff, plus 60,000 when on duty. That is, a 1st class collector earned approximately six times less than a 1st class engineer.

Law of 1 December 1892, No. 2, ‘Organização geral dos Serviços de obras publicas e minas e do pessoal technico respectivo’, Capitulo II, Disposições Geraes, p. 907.

During this early period, the monthly salary of the Head of the Survey, Carlos Ribeiro, was about 47,000 reis, plus a fieldwork supplement varying according the number of days he spent in the field. See payrolls: ‘Registro dos officios remettidos ao Ministerio das Obras Publicas desde Fevereiro 1865 a Novembro 1868’, Livro ‘Contas’, IGP Historical Archive. In fact, Livro ‘Contas’ provides payrolls only between 1859 and 1867.

Carlos Teixeira and Georges Zbyszewsky, ‘Romão de Matos (1880–1879)’, Comunicações dos Serviços Geológicos de Portugal, 68 (1982), 309. They also wrote on Manuel de Matos, Romão's brother, who joined the Survey in 1918. Like his brother, he also reached high standards. Carlos Teixeira and Georges Zbyszewsky, ‘Manuel de Matos (1894–1971)’, Comunicações dos Serviços Geológicos de Portugal, 68 (1982), 307–308.

Nery Delgado, ‘Les Services Géologiques du Portugal de 1857 à 1899’, Comunicações da Direcção dos Serviços Geológicos, 4 (1900–1901), vii–xlviii.

Simões (note 61).

‘Relatório da Direcção Geral dos Trabalhos Geodésicos, Chorographicos, Hydrographycos e Geologicos do Reino, 1859–1860’, Direcção Geral das Obras Publicas, Comércio e Indústria, Repartição de Minas, 1^a Secção, Typescript, IGM Historical Archive, 32 (published in the Diário do Governo); ‘Relatório da Direcção Geral dos Trabalhos Geodésicos, Chorographicos, Hydrographycos e Geologicos do Reino, no anno de 1860–1861’, 8^a Classe Geologia, Typescript, IGM Historical Archive, 45; ‘Relatório da Direcção Geral dos Trabalhos Geodésicos, Chorographicos, Hydrographycos e Geologicos do Reino, no anno de 1861–1862’, 8^a Classe Geologia, Typescript, IGM Historical Archive, 56; ‘Relatório da Direcção Geral dos Trabalhos Geodésicos, Chorographicos, Hydrographycos e Geologicos do Reino, no anno de 1862–1863’, 8^a Classe Trabalhos Geologicos, Typescript, IGM Historical Archive, 58; ‘Relatório da Direcção Geral dos Trabalhos Geodésicos, Chorographicos, Hydrographycos e Geologicos do Reino, correspondente ao anno economico de 1863–1864’, Typescript, IGM Historical Archive, 91; ‘Relatório da Comissão Geológica de Portugal correspondente ao anno economico de 1864–1865’, Typescript, IGM Historical Archive, 97; ‘Relatorio dos Trabalhos Executados no Instituto Geographico durante o anno economico de 1865–1866’, Typescript, IGM Historical Archive, 97. From 1866 until 1908 field assistants are not mentioned in the reports.

Choffat said ‘Parmi les collecteurs, je dois citer Manuel Roque pour la manière intelligente et consciencieuse avec laquelle il s'est acquitté de son travail’. P. Choffat, Etude stratigraphique et paléontologique des terrains jurassiques du Portugal. I. Le Lias et le Dogger au nord du Tage (Lisbon, 1880), iv.

However, Portugal saw some development during the 1870s and the 1880s. For instance, the index of industrial return was 29.5 in 1851, in 1875 about 50, and in 1888, 71.6. See Vítor P. Lains, A Economia Portuguesa no Século XIX (Lisbon, 1995), 208.

António Mendes was private No. 126, 2nd Company of the Battalion of Engineers. Official letter, 30 January 1858. See ‘Officios recebidos de diversas auctoridades’, IGP Historical Archive, Box 1. Later, António Mendes became a private of the 7th company of Reservists. Manuscript table describing the Survey personnel dating from 1892 and signed by Nery Delgado. IGM Historical Archive, Box 4, Briefcase 2, Shelf 1, Bookcase 1.

Manuel Martins Pereira was private No. 22 of the 5th Company of the Queen's Rifles Battalion (Batalhão de Caçadores da Raínha), ‘Officios recebidos de diversas auctoridades’, IGP Historical Archive, Box 1.

Manuscript table of personnel mentioned in note 117.

It is purely coincidental that the surname of this field assistant, Cunha, and the expedient he used to join the Survey is expressed in Portuguese by the same word.

Letter from Joaquim Duarte da Cunha to Father Ferreira, who forwarded it to Carlos Ribeiro. Casal da Comba 2 November 1866, IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

M. Polanyi, Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post Critical Philosophy (New York, 1964); and The Tacit Dimension (Garden City, 1966).

Typescript by Pedro Guedes, then eighty years old, dated 1 August 1957. IGM Historical Archive, Box 81, Briefcase 6, Shelf 2, Bookcase 7.

Sempre admirei estes homens que, vindo de um meio quase inculto, conseguiram à força de tenacidade e prática, palmilhar léguas de terrenos e de martelar montes de pedras em busca de fósseis, conhecimentos práticos nos trabalhos de campo de que muitos engenheiros geólogos se serviram. P. Guedes (note 123).

Letter from Nery Delgado to Luís Couceiro (Secretary to the Survey) from Espinho, where he was doing fieldwork, 10 June 1904. IGM Historical Archive, Box 3, Shelf 1, Bookcase 10.

Official letter from Nery Delgado to E. Navarro, then Minister of Public Works, informing him of his decision to suspend Scolla. Lisbon, 9 October 1887. IGM Historical Archive, Box 4, Briefcase 2, Shelf 1, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Nery Delgado to Luís Couceiro, Figueira da Foz 20 August 1906. IGM Historical Archive, Box 3. Shelf 1, Bookcase 10.

Letters from Augusto Mendes to Carlos Ribeiro, Mealhada 29 October and 24 December 1879; Letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira to Carlos Ribeiro, Figueira da Foz 31 January 1881. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1

Official letter from Nery Delgado to the Director General of the Ministry of Public Works, João Sarmento Osório, Lisbon, 24 May 1905. IGM Historical Archive, Briefcase 2, Shelf 1, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Nery Delgado to Luís Couceiro. Figueira da Foz 11 August 1906. IGM Historical Archive, Box 3, Shelf 1, Bookcase 10.

Letter from Francisco Ferreira Roquette, Head of the Geological Service, to the Director General of the Ministry of Public Works, Lisbon, 7 August 1912 and Letter from Alfredo Bensaude to the Director General of the Ministry of Public Works, Lisbon, 16 January 1912. Francisco Ferreira Roquette was an engineer who held the position of Mining Inspector General of the Geological Survey. He was also Professor at the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon and of the Technical Institute. In 1911, he was appointed President of the Geological Servey, a position he held until 1918. Alfredo Bensaude was a Doctor in Science, Chief Mining Engineer of the Geological Survey and Professor of the Technical Institute. He specialized in mineralogy and petrography. He was appointed to the Survey as adjunct in 1883 and remained in this institution until 1895.

Letter from Nery Delgado to Luís Couceiro, Figueira da Foz 19 September 1906. Box 3, Shelf 1, Bookcase 10. Valongo is a region in northern Portugal, near Oporto.

Letter from Nery Delgado to Luís Couceiro, Figueira da Foz 28 September 1906. Box 3, Shelf 1, Bookcase 10.

Letter from Nery Delgado to Luís Couceiro, Figueira da Foz 21 October 1906. Box 3, Shelf 1, Bookcase 10.

I wish to thank Professor Helena Couto, Department of Geology of the Faculty of Sciences of Oporto and Dr J.M. Piçarra, IGM‐Beja, for kindly helping in the attempt at sorting out this question.

Joaquim F. Nery Delgado, Système Silurique du Portugal. Etude de stratigraphie paléontologique (Lisbon, 1908).

Teixeira and Zbyszewsky (note 111).

Interview conducted and tape‐recorded by Professor Miguel de Magalhães Ramalho and Dr João Pacheco at Romão de Matos's house, in the late 1970s. I am much obliged to Professor Ramalho for giving me access to it. This section is largely based on this interview.

Teixeira and Zbyszewsky (note 111), 307.

Alfredo Augusto Freire de Andrade (1859–1929), military engineer, mining engineer, colonialist, and statesman.

Sintra is a town near Lisbon whose landscape attracted writers, painters, and the aristocracy, especially from the early nineteenth century. Lord Byron lived for a while in Sintra.

Teixeira and Zbyszewsky (note 111), 307.

One of his daughters worked as a laboratory assistant at the Survey's chemical laboratory.

In this paper, I have borrowed expressions from some of my favourite nineteenth‐ and early twentieth‐century writers: Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness (London, 1995) and ‘An Outpost of Progress’ in Tales of Unrest (London, 2000); Eça de Queiroz, Os Maias (Lisbon, n.d.); Thomas Mann, A Montanha Mágica (Portuguese translation) (Lisbon, n.d.).

See payrolls (note 110).

On two occasions, in 1859, their names appear on the payroll under the heading of a county (Distrito de Faro or Distrito de Coimbra). The names of towns and villages come after their names in brackets. See payrolls (note 110).

‘Commissão Geológica de Portugal. Regulamento que deve ser observado pelos collectores quando estejam em serviço fora de Lisboa’, Manuscript, IGM Historical Archive, File ‘Congresso Geológico Internacional’, Shelf 1, Bookcase 17. The date of this code of conduct is unknown. However, it was updated on 13 October 1883 and modified in 1815. See ‘Regulamento de Serviço para os Colectores da Comissão dos Trabalhos Geológicos, elaborado em 13 de Outubro de 1883 e modificado em 1815’, typescript dating from 1815. Papers recently transferred from the IGM Museum to the IGM Historical Archive.

This pass was personal and could not be lent to another person. If, for some reason, the pass was lost, field assistants had to inform the Survey, and another was re‐issued. If they failed to produce such documents and, for that reason, were imprisoned, they were charged the damages (note 147).

The first railway to be built was between Lisbon and Carregado and was inaugurated in 1856 with all due pomp and circumstance.

The relationship between geological fieldwork and railway construction in Portugal still requires further investigation. On this matter, in Britain see Michael Freeman, ‘Tracks to a New World: Railway Excavation and the Extension of Geological Knowledge in Mid‐Nineteenth‐Century Britain’, British Journal for the History of Science, 34 (2001), 51–65.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro, Mealhada 30 October 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira to Carlos Ribeiro/Nery Delgado?, Algador, 23 November, 1873. Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro, S. Pedro do Sul 16 March 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Carreira to Nery Delgado, Terena 26 January 1881. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Carreira to Nery Delgado, Granja 13 May 1881. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro, Elvas 28 August 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from António Monteiro to Carlos Ribeiro, Montalegre 7 May 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

The code also stated: ‘When a landowner or any other person asks questions about the work being carried out, the field assistant must always answer courteously. He should avoid shocking that person but he should fulfil that person's expectations’ (note 147).

Letters from Manuel Roque de Oliveira to Nery Delgado, Figueira da Foz, 20 January and 7 February 1881. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro, Régua 10 April 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from António Mendes to Carlos Ribeiro, Mealhada 15 September 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Joaquim Scolla presumably addressed to Berkeley Cotter, 9 April 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Miguel Pedroso to Calderon, the Survey accountant. Moledo 22 May 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Joaquim Scolla presumably addressed to Berkeley Cotter, Ramalhal 4 June 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

According to the code of conduct: ‘Before a field assistant carries out work within a private property he should ask permission from the landowner or from his representative. … In all situations conflict should be avoided and the field assistant must always be patient and courteous, even with least co‐operative landowners’ (note 147).

Letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira to Nery Delgado, Carregado 5 August 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro, Mealhada 30 October 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro, Mealhada 5 November 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Joaquim Scolla, presumably addressed to Berkeley Cotter, Mafra 5 July 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from António Mendes probably to Carlos Ribeiro, Alcobertas 14 February 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

In the nineteenth‐century Muge was called Mugem.

Letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira to Carlos Ribeiro, Mugem 21 May 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

See, for instance, the letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira probably to Berkely Cotter or Nery Delgado, Cabeço d'Arruda 11 June 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

In his report of the activities of the Geodesic Directorate of 1871, General Filipe Folque entreated the Government to take measures, notably ordering local governors to assign the police the effective surveillance of the ‘pyramids’ used in the triangulation of the Portugal, because they were being vandalized by shepherds and by ignorant peasants. Also, the officials carrying out the triangulation were being victims of verbal and physical aggression. He had addressed the Government on this issue in 1854, 1859, 1861, 1862, 1864, 1866, 1867, and 1868, but thus far, the measures taken had been useless. Filipe Folque, ‘Trabalhos Geodésicos, Topographicos, Hydrographicos e Geológicos do Reino, Executados Durante o Anno de 1871. Relatório da Direcção Geral’, Revista de Obras Públicas e Minas, 3 (1872), 99–102.

On the role of local political bosses in politics and elections, see Pedro T. de Almeida, Eleições e Caciquismo no Portugal Oitocentista (1868–1890) (Lisbon, 1991).

The code of conduct stated clearly that ‘When a field assistant is away he has to carry with him paper, tools and other objects required by his work in order to avoid visits to Lisbon and the interruption of the work’ (note 147).

See, for example, the letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira to Nery Delgado, Muge[m] 21 May 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro, Caldas das Taipas 31 May 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

In his novel Os Maias, published 1888, Eça de Queiroz opposed the conservative views on education of the Abbot of Santa Olávia and those of Afonso da Maia who advocated that ‘the most appropriate education for a child is not reciting Tityre, tu patulae recubans … Rather it should be learning facts, useful things, practical things. … ‘ Queiroz (note 144), 63.

See Ana Carneiro, ‘The Travels of Nery Delgado (1835–1908) in the Context of the Portuguese Geological Survey’, Comunicações do Instituto Geológico e Mineiro, 88 (2001), 277–92.

Regarding illness, the code of conduct established that: ‘At the onset of an acute or serious illness the field assistant should be admitted to the nearest hospital and should inform the Survey. Hospital costs are deducted from his salary. As to the remaining salary, the Survey will decide whether or not it will be paid to the field assistant at the outset, depending on the nature of the illness, that is, if proved that it was caught while on duty, and on his behaviour and the quality of his contributions to the Survey’ (note 147).

Letter from António Mendes, probably to Carlos Ribeiro, Mealhada, 11 October 1880.

Sousa Martins had discovered in Serra da Estrela the ‘magic mountain’, where those suffering from consumption and driven by despair would seek a cure. An early advocate of the use of the microscope in Portuguese medicine, he assumed the posture of a Good Samaritan. A statue of Sousa Martins was built in Lisbon at Campo dos Mártires da Pátria. To this day, his monument is decorated with flowers that anonymous people bring to thank his ‘miracles’. The irony is that this demonstration of popular faith in miracles rather than in medicine is displayed right in front of a faculty of medicine.

Fieldwork expenses covered means of transport, tools, personnel, food, and accommodation.

Letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira probably to Nery Delgado, 16 December 1870. He does not mention the place, but he was establishing the limits of the Wealden between Cunhados and Adeguerra.

Letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira probably to Nery Delgado, Montemor 21 April 1872. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira probably to Nery Delgado, Mealhada 14 May 1881. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Joaquim Scolla presumably to Carlos Ribeiro, Mafra 30 June 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Joaquim Scolla presumably to Carlos Ribeiro, Mafra 28 July 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from António Monteiro to Carlos Ribeiro, Montalegre 7 May 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from João Alves to Nery Delgado, Vimieira 26 January 1873. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro, Mealhada 26 November 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Carneiro (note 181), 288.

Roque de Oliveira, for example, wrote to Lisbon saying that His Excellency, M. Carlos Ribeiro who had joined him in the field had paid him from his own pocket and left money in advance to cover subsequent expenses. Letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira, Muge[m] 16 June 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from José Martins to Carlos Ribeiro, Mealhada 26 October 1879. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

Letter from Manuel Roque de Oliveira, Muge[m] 25 June 1880. IGM Historical Archive, Box 5, Shelf 2, Bookcase 1.

The code of conduct of field assistants stated that they had to write down a diary in which they reported daily work and the interruptions due to bad weather or illness (note 147).

Delgado explicitly referred to this question in his report of 1899 (published posthumously), saying that originally, the Survey possessed two kinds of experts, the engineers, and specialists on the natural sciences. He pointed to the example from other countries, where geological surveys employed mining engineers and had attached to them professors of geology and other naturalists. Nery Delgado, ‘Relatórios sobre a Reorganização dos Serviços Geológicos apresentados ao Ministro das Obras Publicas’, Communicações da Commissão do Serviço Geológico de Portugal, 7 (1907–1909), 171.

Paul Choffat, ‘Esquisse de la marche de l'étude géologique du Portugal’, Revista de Portugal, 4 (1892), 18.

The realization that the Liberal policies favouring technical teaching in detriment of fundamental science led to a deep reform, which emerged in 1911, following the victory of the Republicans, in 1910. At this point, the shortcomings of technical education, which had meanwhile become counterproductive in a country lacking private entrepreneurship, were recognized, and brought fundamental research into Portuguese universities—which Liberalism had tried to convert into schools of application following the French model—seen by some sectors as a move of paramount importance to the development of the country. See A. Celestino da Costa, A Universidade Portuguesa e o Problema da sua Reforma (Porto, 1918) and M.I. Amaral, As Escolas de Investigação de Marck Athias e de Kurt Jacobsohn e a Emergência da Bioquímica em Portugal (Lisbon, unpublished Ph.D. thesis, New University of Lisbon, 2002), 152–59.

The so‐called 1911 generation tried to bring fundamental research into Portuguese universities, and generally promote scientific research in the country. In particular, the physician Celestino da Costa invoked Ribeiro and Delgado as examples worth following in Portuguese science and regretted the fact that they had never been invited to teach in any Portuguese school for higher education. Celestino da Costa (note 202), 59.

At the British Geological Survey, at least a small number of assistants made it to the top. See J.S. Flett (note 11), Appendix II, Staff List, 241–62.

^aDuring this period, it has been assumed that all these field assistants were working for Carlos Ribeiro, because all letters were addressed to him and never to Pereira da Costa, also Director of the Survey. Nery Delgado was then beginning his career as a geologist, and he mainly helped Ribeiro and also Pereira Costa.

^bThe locations drawn from the payrolls are solely derived from the places of origin of the guides accompanying the field assistants. Between 1859 and 1861, the payrolls often give the places of origin of the guides. From 1861 onwards, guides disappear from the payrolls, which suggests that field assistants no longer needed them.

^cResearch topics are derived from the Survey Reports (note 114) and from the publications of the geologists working for the Survey.

^dThe dates given are those mentioned in Simões (note 61); those given in italics are drawn from the payrolls (note 110), and the others are based only on the existence of their letters.

^eHe began working for the Survey as a guide in December 1859.

^aFrom 1932 onwards, Romão de Matos was appointed Curator of the Museum of the Geological Survey, due to his exceptional qualities. See Teixeira and Zbyszewsky (note 111), 309. He also worked temporarily for schools of higher education such as the Instituto Superior de Agronomia, Instituto Superior Técnico, Faculdade de Ciências de Lisboa, and Estação Agronómica Nacional.

^b‘Lusitanian’, a stage of the Upper Cretaceous, between the Oxfordian and the Kimmeridgian, the name of which was coined by Choffat.