Established in 1479 by D. João II and inaugurated by D. Manuel I in 1501, the Todos os Santos Hospital was the biggest and most important Portuguese Hospital of the early modern period. It is around its history, memory and archival heritage that this doctorate dissertation is built.
The research, globally framed between the foundation of the Hospital at Rossio and its change to the Santo Antão College, in 1775, already as São José Hospital, focuses on three crucial phases of the institution’s life: its establishment; transfer to the Lisbon Misericórdia administration (1564) and subsequent period and, finally, the Marquês de Pombal intervention after the 1755 earthquake.
How has the Todos os Santos Hospital survived over more than three centuries? What was its asset base and how have it developed? Which strategies were implemented to keep it running? What was its relation with the Crown during the period under analysis? In which way did it interact with all other agents involved? How was created the documentary memory of the institution? How did the Hospital’s archives support its activities? How was built its their archival heritage? These are some of the questions that we have tried to answer using a wide range of sources, mostly from the Hospital’s archives.
This book proposes to show, among other results, that the Hospital has always favoured body care. It reveals its structural asset fragility despite its income, privileges and royal exemptions, and it pay special attention to the donations attached to pious bequests.
