Influence of the Jesuits in Education in Portugal

Abstract

In the same year that the Society of Jesus was confirmed by Pope Paul III, in 1540, the first Jesuits arrive to Portugal, namely, two of its founders: the Portuguese Simão Rodrigues and the Navarrese Francisco Xavier. While Francisco Xavier leaves to evangelize the East, in 1541, Simon Rodriguez stays in Portugal in order to lay the foundations of the Province of Portugal, built as the first province of the Order in 1546, and to start the implementation of the Jesuit education in Portugal. The first house that the Jesuits owned in Portugal, and in the world, was the monastery of Santo Antão in Lisbon, founded on January 5, 1542. Their first school, for the exclusive use of its members, was the College of Jesus in Coimbra, founded on July 2 of that same year. From this moment until they were expelled in 1759 they progressively increased their supremacy in the Portuguese educational system. This domain led to a dependence of our teaching in this Company which, after their expulsion in 1759, led to a series of difficulties and to a slow recovery of the Portuguese education system.
In this paper we describe the factors that led to this domain of Jesuit education in Portugal, with particular emphasis on the teaching of mathematics. We will present the common aspects between the Jesuit school in Portugal and the rest of the network of Jesuit education, which was expanding globally, but we also stress what distinguished Portugal. We will describe the impulses and obstacles to the teaching of this science in Portugal, which led to advances and retreats in the Portuguese scientific knowledge.